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 MediaWiki web API to enable feminist analytics. With existing tools, folks made RENDER and some data visualization projects; what could they do if it were easier?

• Over its run, cookie-cutter sitcom Family Matters gradually became a speculative fiction soap opera starring a black scientist, and I think this is amazing and ought to be more widely recognized. Also, the series finale has the same plot as Gravity. In conversation with Leonard, I thus proposed several reboots of or sequels to Family Matters. Example: "Mad About You meets The X-Files and everyone's black." Leonard considered many of them derivative but promising.

• Leonard cut my hair. I now sport a buzzcut.

• Lyndsey and I talked about the reflex to diminish one's own past or current work. I dated myself by saying "Honey, I Shrunk The Accomplishment". We also noted that it's now easier than it's ever been to constantly compare your own work to that of the best people in your field. Lyndsey: "'Oh look, this person made 36% more commits than you did last month.' The problem isn't Quantified Self, it's Quantified Other People's Selves."

• Skud pointed me to "How We Organize the AMC Zine Vol. 1" which is an amazing conference organizing guide from the makers of Allied Media Conference.

  Its contents offer theoretical vision, practical tips, and best practices that we hope will make the AMC organizing process as smooth and effective as possible, and will hopefully inspire other similar gatherings.

  I suspect this, the OpenHatch Event Handbook, Hack Day Manifesto, and Community Event Planning (from the Stumptown Syndicate) overlap a bit, but are all valuable!