Day: September 13, 2004

Bascom Deaver wins Distinguished Professor award

I saw this in my alumni magazine: Bascom Deaver, my first year physics instructor, major advisor, and the Associate Chairman for Undergraduate Studies of the University of Virginia Physics Department, has won the Alumni Association’s Distinguished Professor Award for teaching. Any man who could help to convince me, or let me convince myself, that I didn’t want to continue in academics after finishing my undergrad degree in physics, certainly deserves some kind of award for managing bullheaded undergrads. Thanks, Mr. Deaver, for the help eleven years ago, and congratulations on a well deserved award.

ArlingtonList

Almost forgot: Adam pointed me to ArlingtonList, a community mailing list for residents of Arlington, MA. The site has instructions on joining the list, member bios, password-protected archives, and a wiki (which has since been turned off as it was underused and getting defaced). The site also features a reprint of a 2002 Boston Globe article about the list. It’s interesting. I may have to rethink some assumptions about the role of geography in building online communities.

And the Globe this morning had an article about CraigsList and Boston. I didn’t realize that this was the first place CraigsList went after its original San Francisco location.

Overprotective SonicWall

Hmm. Apparently Panera’s content filter blocks Chris Baldwin’s Bruno comic strip as being in the forbidden category “cult/occult.” Um, huh? Blocking Bruno and not, say, Sluggy Freelance for that category seems a bit odd.

Also odd: the comic strip Questionable Content and Scary Go Round (“adult/mature content”) are blocked and Least I Could Do and Diesel Sweeties are not. Errant Story is blocked as “pornography” (better cool it with the naked elf stuff!). And Achewood is passed through scot-free.

Their filter is SonicWALL. I haven’t heard of them before but it’s the same old story. Do I need to point out the obvious? Content filters are brain dead. They don’t work. They end up blocking legitimate sites and harming their reputations. And there’s no appeal.

Neighborhood connection

I finally connected with Adam Medros (of JennyAndAdam.com) this morning. He is, it turns out, in our neighborhood, just over the top of the hill. We caught up about work and the neighborhood and traded home improvement notes. It’s good to know someone so close by.

Now I’m taking advantage of the free wi-fi in Panera to get a little work done before I go back to the dogs. It’s kind of nice to have a little breathing room in a place where there are other people around.