I love technology. This is why I am banning the use of laptops in my big lecture course, Media & Society, this coming fall.

Wait, that didn’t sound right. But it’s true. I love technology so much that I know that I would be distracted in a course should I have the choice between paying attention to the course or looking around online. I’m just a year out of grad school, and even in some of my amazing graduate courses the temptation was strong.

Now, self-discipline is the best policy, and generally I will let a student suffer the grade consequences if they want to screw around during class. So while a recent article about professors observing bad grades among students and using that to justify laptop bans did resonate, it wasn’t the bulk of why I decided to do it. Read more

Well, we aren’t into full interactivity mode with the White House web site, but America at least got out of the early 1990s with a new feature the Obama adminstration added to WhiteHouse.gov.

Obama promised in the 2008 campaign to allow for public comment on legislation sent to his desk. This weekend we got a look at how it’ll happen, as the White House provided a link for citizens to share public comment on the economic recovery bill.

Granted, it’s one way communication. People can type in their thoughts and send it on to whoever’s reading everything (assuming they are; I harbor no illusions that it might not be going into a server landfill somewhere), but there is no talk of getting a reply back or even the ability to see what others are saying. Read more