I just realized that reading blogs about stuff I don't understand -- looking over the shoulders of practitioners as they talk shop -- is a path to legitimate peripheral participation, and maybe that's one reason …
Yesterday some pals and I played "Snake Oil", the game where you make up fake things to sell each other. I failed to sell a senior citizen a "Truth Photo" which shows you your loved …
I'm trying to think of public speeches where the orator clearly does not believe what s/he is saying, and subverts literal or ostensible statements with tone, cadence, asides, body language, etc. I'm specifically interested in …
From yesterday: Frances Hocutt, my intern for this summer, finished her New York City visit and went home to Seattle. But not until we had schemed about writing documentation and improving client libraries for the …
Larger, older open source projects have more people, more getting-started resources for new contributors, more name recognition, and sometimes more money to spend. (Examples: the Linux kernel, MediaWiki (the software behind Wikipedia, part of Wikimedia), …
I am more interested in actual vests than in stock options that vest. I presume I am but one of many dapper-aspirational women who eschew dominant startup culture in this way. (Also, Christie Koehler is …
In a few hours, I'm giving the opening keynote address at Wiki Conference USA. Here are some links and citations for sources I'll be referring to. Engineering learning styles and educational psychology research by Mel …
A few months ago I got to read an advance copy of My Real Children, the new book by Jo Walton. It goes on sale today in North America, and if your reading tastes mirror …
Fleeing As A Service: hook up a FitBit to Uber so that, if the user becomes stressed enough that her physiology reflects it, a cab shows up to "nope" her out of there Match.com/Idealist/Duotrope's Digest/RightSignature/SlideShare …
This week, alumni like me get to spend time at Hacker School. Since I work on MediaWiki-related documentation and I've never programmed in PHP before, I decided to start understanding just enough PHP to be …
