An interesting set of statistics about access to the Web as well as many other metrics relating to use, availability and freedom on the Web, ranking nearly every country on various different scales. Canada makes a mediocre showing at 15th overall, with a disappointing nearly-80% having access, and falling well short of perfect on most other metrics too. The recent CBC report that ranks Canada 53rd in the world on upload speeds is also sobering. Like all such statistics, these need to be looked at critically and considered in context, but it is none-the-less a good starting point for discussion. See http://www.webfoundation.org/projects/the-web-index/ for more on the project, and how the figures are calculated.

Address of the bookmark: http://thewebindex.org/data/all/scores/

This study looks at multitasking behaviour measured by the amount and frequency of attention paid to a computer screen and TV. It is interesting, if flawed, at least partly because of the differences it claims to show between multitasking behaviour in older and younger people. The researchers claim to show that there is not much age-related difference in overall time spent looking at things when multitasking, but that younger people’s gaze tends to flit much more frequently – the differences between age groups on this measure are actually quite huge. The researchers don’t make any notable claims about whether this is a good or a bad thing, but it is a result that helps to explain other findings that older people are better at multitasking, inasmuch as they retain more of what they have been paying attention to and are typically less easily distracted (I think I may be an outlier here!). However, the big flaw that I see in this study is that it used staff and students at a university as subjects. University staff are trained to concentrate in quite peculiar ways because that is what scholarly study is all about, and have typically spent a great many years acquiring that habit, so they are not at all representative of older people in general. It would at least be useful to compare this demographic with other older people who do not habitually concentrate very hard and very persistently on one thing for a living.

Address of the bookmark: http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/full/10.1089/cyber.2010.0350

Thanks to my friend Richard for pointing me to this great site for total geeks. Electronic toys galore, at knockdown prices, direct from China. Important proviso – almost all look pretty awful, but the site is honest about their failings and ridiculously rich in information about them, so it is easy to decide not to buy things. But who needs Apple, Samsung, or Sony when you can get a no-name budget dual SIM Android phone for $70? Or any number of watch-phones, projectors, remote controlled doodahs and accessories to fit any need? Well, me. But I like browsing this site.

Address of the bookmark: http://www.chinavasion.com/

Balanced critique by Barbera J. King for NPR of a study that reveals strong correlation between brain processes for technology use (flint knapping) and those for language. The study itself uses fTCD to show brain activity while engaged in language and tool-use tasks, with remarkably consistent patterns for both.

The authors suggest that  ‘tool-making and language share a basis in more general human capacities for complex, goal-directed action’. The critique linked here provides grounds for being wary of drawing firm conclusions of this nature because there are other confounding factors (we already use language so it is possible that we are using it to conceptualize how we go about using tools) and the fTCD approach is a bit coarse. However, the study’s results accord well with the widely held view that language is a technology. Whether tool use or language use evolved first is still up for debate, though I strongly suspect that they evolved in tandem. Language is a technology that makes other technologies possible and vice versa: all technologies are mutually constitutive assemblies, evolving as a result of being combined and recombined.

Address of the bookmark: http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2013/09/05/219236801/when-did-human-speech-evolve?ft=1&f=

Sad news of the death, at 88, of one of the greatest thinkers and inventors of the past century. Although the headlines all proclaim him as the inventor of the mouse, that was only one of his many achievements that were more profoundly influential. Among the many other things that he invented or played a significant role in inventing were the first working hypertext (and hence the Web), the word processor, the Internet (his lab was the second node on its forerunner, the ARPANET), email, video conferencing, windowing systems like the Mac and Windows, and much else besides. A modest and inspiring genius whose vision of augmenting, not replacing, human intellect reverberates loudly to this day.

Address of the bookmark: http://gigaom.com/2013/07/03/doug-engelbart-american-inventor-computing-legend-passes-away/