RE: Wikipedia assignment [CMMNA100]

From today’s TechCrunch:

Microsoft To Shutter Encarta, Read All About It On Wikipedia

by Jason Kincaid on March 30, 2009

***

Note especially this:

For a full history of Encarta, be sure to check out its comprehensive Wikipedia entry, which has already been updated to reflect Encarta’s shutdown. Encarta’s entry on itself doesn’t mention anything about its demise, and actually seems to have less information than the Wikipedia article.

***

Also, I was little surprised that almost everyone mentioned accuracy as an important criterion to use in evaluating Wikipedia.  But no one thought to check the accuracy of alternative sources of information — as did this article.

New ‘Mass Comments’ post.

http://blogs.loyno.edu/mass-comm/2009/03/12/whats-a-newspaper/

Qik sucks up to THE MEDIA.

And quickly becomes boring.

http://qik.com/blog/306/reporting-snow-depth-on-necn-live-using-qik-and-mogulus

Don’t accommodate.  Eliminate.

The blog thing again.

Check it.

http://blogs.loyno.edu/mass-comm/2009/03/06/im-going-to-do-you-a-favor-today/

The SMC now has a blog thing going.

Check it.

http://blogs.loyno.edu/mass-comm/

Update on the CMMNX237 blog assignment.

A gentle reminder:  You have four online-related assignments for the course.  1. Blog  2. Wiki  3. Webpage  4. MMO.

If you’ve forgotten anything about these assignments, check the syllabus, ask questions, etc.

The online content you create (play with) for the blog/wiki/webpage assignments should reflect something about your reading and understanding of the four required texts for the course.

For instance, you are going to demonstrate your reading and understanding of two of the four texts (Caillois and Huizinga) through the wiki assignment — which you will find detailed on the class Blackboard page.

In order to successfully complete the blog assignment (ie., the blog you created with wordpress during the first week of class) do this:  Beginning this week, post on your blog weekly responses to the readings in The Ambiguity of Play (Sutton-Smith), most of which we have already discussed in class.  These chapter readings, you will remember, are also partially summarized in the powerpoint presentations available at the CMMNX237 drop.io site.

So, over the next four weeks (running up to Mardi Gras and the exam on The Amibguity of Play which immediately follows Mardi Gras) you will owe me four (at a minimum) posts covering 1) animal play and chapters 1, 2, and 12; 2) child play and chapters 3, 7, and 9; 3) adult self play and chapters 6, 8, and 10; and 4) adult social play and chapters 4, 5, and 11.  If you want to split these posts into more than four posts, so be it.  No problem.

Each time you post to your blog, link that post to our CMMNX237 twitter page, so that everybody (but mostly I) can easily find it and read it.

Remember, in developing and working on these four online assignments, the idea is not necessarily to master the online form, but to play with it.  It is not a mastery thing.  It is an experiential thing.

Novelties welcome.

***

Oh, and I haven’t talked much about the webpage assignment yet.  I know.  First we have to talk about ftp’ing a little more.   Once that happens, then I will tell you more about the webpage I want you to create:  A timeline of your gaming/internet/media play life.  Coming up soon.

Some CoH newbie advice.

If you want to get started early on City of Heroes, here are some tips.

Currently, good pvp characters include ice/super strength tanks, and anything with the force field power (available for controllers and defenders), which allows use of personal force field (PFF).  If you are inside PFF in Bloody Bay (the first zone pvp area, available to enter at level 15), then you are pretty much invulnerable.  Other defense-based characters are also effective later on, but not so much at level 15.

If you like to play solo, play a scrapper.  I suggest either Martial Arts/Regen or Dark Melee/Regen (my favorite) — which are not currently the best at the upper levels but are very good at low levels of play.  Ask me which powers to select at each level, if you wish.  I will give a specific sequence to follow.

To make money, go to Wentworth’s and buy second-tier salvage (yellow) that you can sell to NPCs for 1000 for less than that.  Once you have 20-30K influence, begin buying level 45 recipes — defense, resistance, fear, hold, any of those — for about 12-14K.  You can then sell those recipes at a profit to NPCs, and this will take you all the way up to 1M influence fairly easily.  Or, you can contact me in-game at @Gotcha and I will simply give you 1M influence — that would prolly be lots quicker, actually.

Don’t buy any enhancements (other than accuracy maybe), until you get to level 8 at least.  It’s stupid.  Use the ones that drop, but don’t waste money on the trainer enhancements.  No point.

Go through the tutorial when you first create your character.  Most experienced players don’t, but you should.  Choose Atlas Park as your starting point.  Try to catch a sewer team in order to get to level six.  As soon as you get to level six, go to King’s Row and do the newspaper missions until you get the protect the bank mission, which, if completed successfully, gives you a jet-pack allowing you to (slowly) fly.  Once  you get to level 8 or so, go to Steel Canyon and do the newspaper missions until you get the jump-pack, which allows you to (more quickly) jump.

Once you get to level 10, do the Steel Canyon missions available at the university.  By that time, we should be able to get together and group play up to level 15, at which point we will go to Bloody Bay and die some.

Inauguration day.

Inauguration day is not a news day.

The news day was when Obama was elected.

Tuesday is a ceremony day.

I do not like it when ceremony becomes news.

News has more than enough ceremony in and of itself.

However, when news becomes ceremony — as will definitely be the case on inauguration day — then news becomes easier to study as form rather than content.  And, since, even when news does have a little content (as when Obama was elected), the form of news is probably more important and influential than its content, inauguration day will be a good news study day.

Here’s some stuff for news study day.

1.  As you probably know, Obama is into the social networking thing.  Of course, maybe that’s just his campaign manager’s idea or something.  But he does at least speak the words “network neutrality” now and again.  So that’s good.

2.  On the open internet, here’s what you what you might find.

The National Post

The CNN semi-live feed (think it’s going to have bandwidth problems?)

and the CNN facebook thingy

The LA Times, summarizing the ceremony

The NY Times, plugging the mobile tv companies

and NPR, with what counter culture would look like if counter culture were basically a wine-tasting

and, finally, with NPR’s help, what counter culture would look like if counter culture were paid for by the same people who were selling the wine that was being tasted at the wine-tasting.

Put pogo.com on your list.

Mail, search, shopping, and casual games.

Build it free and they will come.

http://www.hitwise.com/datacenter/rankings.php

Now which is better…

…I wonder.

1.  The digital dropbox on Blackboard.

Or this:  http://drop.io/CMMNX237#.

2.  Emailing everyone through Blackboard.

Or this:  http://twitter.com/CMMNX237.