Interesting Stuff...
I found Academic Earth via TechCrunch the other day, and I'm pretty impressed so far. The website achieves lectures from various universities on various topics; it's the library version of Youtube or Vimeo. I started working through the Harvard Computer Science series as a tester since I already have a base of knowledge in that area, and watching the lectures is just going to refresh me and increase me knowledge.
I'm kind of on a "I'm going to make sure I'm really solid in my major" kick, that and I'm worried the data structures course I'm taking might be high in calories but low on nutrition, so I'm also investigating MIT's OpenCourseware. MIT is part of the OpenCourseware Consortium, which is a group of Universities who develop curriculum in specific subjects then post the courses on the Internet. Between Academic Earth and OpenCourseware, I can cross-train with different universities and see how they are different. :)
Aside from that, just a couple interesting articles I found.
BigThink.com is similar to Academic Earth, but it's more like a magazine with videos. I found it linked in the TechCrunch Academic Earth article, and the article titled "Where Have All The Revolutionaries Gone?" caught my eye. It's an interesting article about the decline of protests, and it has a video of Naomi Wolf talking a little about the subject.
The Wall Street Journal has an piece titled "When Doctors Opt Out". The article, written by a practicing doctor, talks about the current state of doctor and health insurance company relationship. The point is to show how universal health care may fail just because doctors may opt not to treat patients covered under the government health care. It's an interesting idea, but one that is tainted coming from the Rupert Murdoch owned Wall Street Journal.
This one is from Fox News, and while Fox is questionable due to Rupert as well, it's interesting the article was run. "McCain Strategist Warns GOP Risks Becoming 'Religious Party'" is summed up in the title. Steve Schmidt, McCain's top adviser during his campaign, says the Republican Party needs to loosen up socially or risk becoming that weird, super religious kid everyone in school tries to avoid. Not the annoying, empty headed, perky one, but the one that is obviously using religion to keep sociopathic tendencies under control. It's hardly some great incite as the Republican Party has been doing everything in it's power to alienate social liberals for a few years now. I like how he calls for people to reach out to Hispanics voters. You know the same block of people who the Republican candidates demonized in the election, and who the Republican voters have been racist (or xenophobic, bigoted, prejudiced, supremacist, whichever euphemism is preferred) pricks toward in many a state.
I'm kind of on a "I'm going to make sure I'm really solid in my major" kick, that and I'm worried the data structures course I'm taking might be high in calories but low on nutrition, so I'm also investigating MIT's OpenCourseware. MIT is part of the OpenCourseware Consortium, which is a group of Universities who develop curriculum in specific subjects then post the courses on the Internet. Between Academic Earth and OpenCourseware, I can cross-train with different universities and see how they are different. :)
Aside from that, just a couple interesting articles I found.
BigThink.com is similar to Academic Earth, but it's more like a magazine with videos. I found it linked in the TechCrunch Academic Earth article, and the article titled "Where Have All The Revolutionaries Gone?" caught my eye. It's an interesting article about the decline of protests, and it has a video of Naomi Wolf talking a little about the subject.
The Wall Street Journal has an piece titled "When Doctors Opt Out". The article, written by a practicing doctor, talks about the current state of doctor and health insurance company relationship. The point is to show how universal health care may fail just because doctors may opt not to treat patients covered under the government health care. It's an interesting idea, but one that is tainted coming from the Rupert Murdoch owned Wall Street Journal.
This one is from Fox News, and while Fox is questionable due to Rupert as well, it's interesting the article was run. "McCain Strategist Warns GOP Risks Becoming 'Religious Party'" is summed up in the title. Steve Schmidt, McCain's top adviser during his campaign, says the Republican Party needs to loosen up socially or risk becoming that weird, super religious kid everyone in school tries to avoid. Not the annoying, empty headed, perky one, but the one that is obviously using religion to keep sociopathic tendencies under control. It's hardly some great incite as the Republican Party has been doing everything in it's power to alienate social liberals for a few years now. I like how he calls for people to reach out to Hispanics voters. You know the same block of people who the Republican candidates demonized in the election, and who the Republican voters have been racist (or xenophobic, bigoted, prejudiced, supremacist, whichever euphemism is preferred) pricks toward in many a state.