Yummy! One sleeve in New York Times' Sam Sifton's accordion folder marked “2010 Delicious” - 15 best meals in NYC 2010

From The New York Times:

CRITIC’S NOTEBOOK: Dishes That Earned Their Stars

The 15 best things The New York Times’ restaurant critic ate in New York City in 2010.

Read on for all the juicy details:
http://nyti.ms/hZ3QRX

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The future is fidgetal - Frustration with technology is driving our new scatology

The future is fidgetal

28 December 10 00:54 GMT

"Technology, and the hype that surrounds it, is changing the way we speak. But we don't have to turn into drones, all spouting the latest i-word. Chris Bowlby says it's time for the techno-bullied to fight back with their own subversive speak.

With the online Oxford English Dictionary recently re-launched and on the look-out for new language, maybe it's time for a counter-revolution.

Can we create a new vocabulary that expresses not marketing mania, but the downside, the frustration, the terrible things we sometimes suspect modern technology is doing to us?

When your cursor makes you a curser, do the necessary words come to mind?

Let's start to talk about the crazily fidgetal, the MisApps, mobile drones and Skypeochondria that afflict us all.

Go to BBC to read the original article.

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Dawn of the age of the robot - a different sort immigration

Dawn of the age of the robot

"Advancement in robotics will dominate next decade, says head of the Institute for the Future."

The future is robotic. Photograph: Blutgruppe/zefa/Corbis

Dominic Rushe in New York

The Guardian, Thu 30 Dec 2010 07.00 GMT

"The robots are coming. The second decade of the 21st century will see the rise of a mechanised army that will revolutionise private and public life just as radically as the internet and social media have shaken up the past 10 years. Or so says Marina Gorbis, futurologist and head of Californian thinktank The Institute for the Future."

Read the rest of this article:

http://m.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/dec/30/futurologist-predicts-age-of-robots?cat=business&type=article

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Exploring Google Body with Google Chrome

Exploring Google Body  from Google Labs with the Google Chrome browser.

 

 

Thanks, Arthur!

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3 million UK children in households without either computers or internet

A disturbing new report from the e-Learning Foundation, an education charity, has revealed that approximately 3 million UK children live in households without either computers (1 million) or internet access (2 million).

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2010/12/28/3-million-uk-children-still-without-computers-or-broadband-isp-internet-access.html

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In Pursuit of the Perfect Brainstorm

From The New York Times:

Corporate America wants help coming up with fresh ideas. Can a new breed of consultant teach companies how to think?

http://nyti.ms/erRtXR

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Quiet revolution - the power of silence

Six ways to make a point by saying nothing

Go to BBC to read the original article.

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Captain Beefheart dead - Don Van Vliet had MS - end of music era

http://www.google.com/gwt/x?u=http://bit.ly/i2g9RM

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In France, Civil Unions Gain Favor Over Marriage

From The New York Times:

In France, Civil Unions Gain Favor Over Marriage

Civil unions confer most of the benefits and protections of marriage, and French couples increasingly prefer them. Major benefit - you can end them simply with a registered letter. http://nyti.ms/gl7zzk

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The rights and wrongs of digital books

The rising popularity of e-books highlights many modern dilemmas, says Bill Thompson

Go to BBC to read the original article.

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Metaphors, sign language & networks of meaning #communication

http://www.machineslikeus.com/news/sign-languages-help-us-understand-nature-metaphors 

A recent study of the use of metaphors in spoken language and various sign languages shows that certain types of metaphors are difficult to convey in sign language.

The study, "Iconicity and metaphor: Constraints on metaphorical extension of iconic forms," to be published in the December 2010 issue of the scholarly journal Language, is authored by Irit Meir of the University of Haifa. A preprint version is available here.

Dr. Meir's research sheds new light on the interrelations between two notions that play an important role in language and communication, iconicity and metaphor. This study shows that the iconicity of a form may constrain the possible metaphorical extensions that the form might take. Put another way, certain metaphorical expressions in spoken language cannot be "translated directly" into sign language if their form is iconic.

Sign languages are natural languages, with rich and complex grammatical structures and lexicons. Sign languages have rich use 

of metaphors. But quite often, when trying to translate metaphors from a spoken language to a sign language, we find that it is impossible to use the same words. For example, it is impossible to use the sign FLY (in Israeli Sign Language and American Sign Language) in the expression "time flies" or "the day just flew by." The metaphorical uses of a word such as FLY are impossible because of the form of this sign, in particular, its iconicity. The sign for FLY is produced by moving the arms as if flapping one's wings. But in the expression "time flies," we do not mean that time is flapping its wings. Rather, the metaphor is built on an implication of the action of flying, namely that it is a very fast way of motion. So there is a clash between what the form of the sign encodes (wing flapping) and the aspect of meaning on which the metaphor is built (fast movement).

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Google unveils Chrome OS notebook

Google shows off a notebook running its much anticipated Chrome operating system but says that it will not go on sale until 2011.

Go to BBC to read the original article.

sent from Colby's iPhone

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