“
This “huge reach, limited profitability” problem is characteristic of the digital economy as a whole. As the George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen wrote in his 2011 e-book, “The Great Stagnation,” the Internet is a wonder when it comes to generating “cheap fun.” But because “so many of its products are free,” and because so much of a typical Web company’s work is “performed more or less automatically by the software and the servers,” the online world is rather less impressive when it comes to generating job growth.
The Facebook Illusion - NYTimes.com
“
he secretive, long-running, organized, well-financed campaign to centralize, standardize, and privatize American education is on track. To follow the campaign, follow the money. Standardized or not, there are at least two dozen reasons why faith in the core curriculum is misplaced. Here are three: (1) Humankind’s hope for the future lies, as it always has, in the richness of human variability. We differ in experience, situation, aspirations, attitudes, abilities, interests, motivations, emotions, life chances, prospects, potential, and luck. To survive and prosper, these differences need to be exploited to the maximum. The core curriculum minimizes them. (2) Knowledge is exploding at an ever-accelerating rate. Whole new fields of study unimagined even a few years ago are emerging. The explosion isn’t just going to continue, it’s going to accelerate. Thinking we know enough to lock ANY curriculum in place — much less one that’s more than a hundred years old — is either naïve or malicious. (3) The future is unknowable. Period. Even if it were possible to standardize and program kids, we don’t know — NOBODY knows — what they’ll need to know next week, much less for the rest of their lives. They may need technical skills no one now has, or the ability to survive on edible weeds and a quart of water a day. Neither the Common Core nor the tests that manufacturers are able to write can take adequate account of an unknown future.
A radical idea to transform what kids learn in school - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

Educating The Next Steve Jobs

An antidote to what ails education. “In conventional schools, students learn so that they can get good grades. My most important research finding is that young innovators are intrinsically motivated. The culture of learning in programs that excel at educating for innovation emphasize what I call the three P’s— play, passion and purpose. The play is discovery-based learning that leads young people to find and pursue a passion, which evolves, over time, into a deeper sense of purpose.”

“
Kids learn. Period. School or not. It’s natural. They do it using an extremely efficient system for organizing knowledge to construct understanding. If they’re helped to move from constructing understanding, to understanding how they construct understanding, they move to new levels of learning and creativity.
A ‘simple fix’ for school curriculum (and it’s not Common Core) - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

Washington Post

Unbelievable. Time traveling to the early 20th century. Margaret Sanger turning in her grave. This will not stand.

“
WHAT I might have said to my son’s friend is that it is incontrovertible that sometimes things get done better when you’re doing something else. If you’re writing and you get stuck, and you then make tea, while waiting for the kettle to boil the chances are good ideas will occur to you. Seeing that a sentence has to have a particular shape can’t be forced; you have to wait for your own judgment to inform you, and it usually does, in time. Some interruptions are worth having if they create a space for something to work in the fertile unconscious. Indeed, some distractions are more than useful; they might be more like realizations and can be as informative and multilayered as dreams. They might be where the excitement is.
The Art of Distraction - NYTimes.com

Pinterest: Everything You Wanted to Know About 2012's Hottest Startup [INFOGRAPHIC]

Pinterest: Everything You Wanted to Know About 20122s Hottest Startup [INFOGRAPHIC]
Pinterest has emerged as the runaway social media hit of early 2012. You probably knew that already. But did you know the company just has 12 people? Or that 97% of Pinterest’s Facebook fans are women? Lemon.ly, a visual marketing firm, took a deep dive into the data to catalog Pinterest’s st…

Snow Job: Ski Resorts Call On - WSJ.com

Sometimes the old ways are just more effective —

A week after Vail’s snow dance, Park City Mountain Resort in Utah invited about 30 Northern Utes to a plaza near its base for a mountain blessing at high noon. Park City had reached out to them around Christmas. “We felt like it was time for Mother Nature to kick in,” said Park City marketing director Krista Parry, as she watched five inches of snow drop outside her window Wednesday.

Last Sunday, descendants of multiple Native American tribes presented their own snow dance at a state park near Lake Tahoe’s skiing areas. Forecasts for Northern California now predict enough snow to salvage the season’s dismal opening.

Thousands of Women Mass in Major March in Cairo - NYTimes.com

“Biggest women’s demonstration in modern Egyptian history” to protest treatment of women by military police. Huzzah!

Gadgets: These shades put a screen right before your eyes - Wire - Lifestyle - bellinghamherald.com

For $499. Plug in and turn on.