Ink

A friend sent me a link to this.

Ink is a self-described PAW, or "persistant alternate world." It's designed to teach writing and foster a community. Similar to MUD or MOOS, Ink says they are different because "Whereas other games invite players to swing swords and slay dragons, Ink challenges players to communicate, cooperate, compete, and achieve through writing."

It looks very interesting, and I will likely visit them when they 'open' on July 1.

Not to be left out...

Microsoft has also entered the wiki waters. You can see their wiki here.

Looks like they want their user base to add to/help out with their documentation?

e-bay getting wikis.

Ebay is getting into blogs and wikis.

Not sure why they would want to, but there you have it.

The Farm

I went out to the farm again, yesterday. It was a lot of fun. The last time I went we were fixing an old mower (everything out there is circa 1917), and this week they had already cut the alfalfa. They had this ancient machine that was led by two draft horses. It scooped up the hay and then plopped it down onto a wagon. I, along with two other men, would then take the hay and stack it up on the wagon. It was quite difficult to keep your balance, all the while you are in close quarters with two other men who are swinging sharp pitch forks.

Once we had the wagon full, we used a single draft horse and a pulley system to haul loads of the hay up into the barn. It was a very interesting setup. I know Dr. Sidwell (the Center's director) was taking pictures of the process, and I'll try to track some of them down.

And then of course I also gave some pony rides, chopped some wood (I've got the blood blisters to prove it), and tried to keep the boys busy.

The last thing I did before I left our van, was take off my watch (I've got to be 'in character', and a digital watch doesn't work with overalls) and leave it in the car. All afternoon I didn't know what time it was. And that was just fine with me.

Consider the Following

I've heard of some strange pets, and once met a man who kept a pot-bellied pig as an indoor pet (he called him bacon, so the family wouldn't forget why they had him in the first place). But I had never heard of this.

I came across this article while doing a bit of research for my second book... And as usual, the event in chapter 10 actually happened... In fact, I'm trying to get with my friend so that I can see if I've missed any details.

You can't vandalize this wiki...

I've been working on a literature review of wikis in education, and so I've been kind of watching new developments in the news. I found this article interesting.

One of the problems (although it's a minor problem in an active wiki community) is vandalism. Somebody comes in and deletes text, adds inaccurate text, or swaps pictures. Easily undone, but it can still can be an annoyance.

But now the idea is that every change must be ratified by users. Depending on how they set it up, it could be nice. I don't think a minor edit should have to have as many ratifications as say, changing out all of the images, but it's still an interesting idea. Although you would need an active community to make this happen, and if you have an active community to begin with, vandalism is not really a problem.

Still, interesting idea.

I've finally arrived...

I work with a wonderful group of folks, both at COSL, and at FACT. They are a lot of fun. My co-workers here at FACT nominated me to be employee of the week. I got three balloons (my kids will love them), and a king size Hershey's bar (my wife will love that).

My grant runs out at the end of the year, but I hope that I will be working with all of these people for a long time.