online job searches

It's an ugly fact, but it can't be ducked. The economy, especially in this part of the country, is hurting. That's been felt by a disturbing number of people, who may or may not have been in the job market recently. If it's been a while, you may not know about some of the online tools available to help job-seekers.
First off, here's a list of online job-posting sites, via the blog Lifehacker. Those online ads, while often great, are kind of a mixed bag, though. Just like traditional job searches, it pays to check multiple venues.
The Akron Beacon Journal runs a portion of its classifieds through online posting service Monster: here's that list.
And, finally, here's a link to the employment classifieds over at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Teacher cracks down on Linux users

Here's a fun one, via the tech blog HardOCP. A teacher noticed her student using Linux on a laptop. Her reaction? Putting an immediate stop to it and confiscating all the discs the student had. Seems she didn't believe any software could be free (though in the reprinted letter she does admit to trying Linux in college - one wonders what she thinks Linux is, exactly). Anyway, she wrote her letter to a Linux forum threatening legal action.
There is a serious element here, though. Namely, it underscores the challenge Open Source software faces. In many cases it -- not just Linux, but also OpenOffice, Gimp, and all those others so many of us have grown to love -- is just as good, or even better, than its commercial equivalent. But we live in an ownership society, and in the minds of many something that has no cost cannot have any value.
Someday we'll live in a world where teens don't have to experiment with Linux behind the barn and where college experiences with software aren't abandoned by adults. Until then, many people are likely to miss out on some great stuff as they skip over some excellent tech products.

Google archive of Life Magazine pics

Here's something the Internet is perfectly suited for. Google, as part of its ongoing efforts to digitize everything, has gotten hold of Life Magazine's photo archives. Here's the story, via HotHardware.com.
For the younger readers, Life Magazine was a powerful part of American journalism, known for its photography. Many of its photographs serve as the most memorable images of the 20th century.
Interestingly, while the project is up and running and the pictures are easily accessible, there doesn't seem to be any copyright information included. Presumably the parent companies and photographers have not relinquished their copyrights. But given other recent stories about Google landing in hot legal water for its liberal take on intellectual property, I would have expected to see a disclaimer.

Recover lost form data!

Here's a great tip from the ever-interesting blog Lifehacker. Someone's gone and made a Firefox extension that can recover lost form data. If you're anything like me, you've spent hours crafting lists of threats and insults to submit to your local newspaper/blog/sports team/daycare forum. It's incredibly easy to get distracted and switch pages, or get a glitch on hitting the submit button. Rather than toss up your hands in frustration and give up ever trying to remember all your wit and witticisms, now all you have to do is press go on the Lazarus Firefox extension.

Linguistics of nerdery

Ever wonder where those Internet shorthand terms come from? No? Well, apparently some people do. Here's a story from PC World magazine about Net shorthand. Interestingly, some of the terms, such as ROFL (rolling on the floor laughing) and its many derivatives predate the explosion of the World Wide Web. ROFL dates back to at least 1989 on Usenet forums. Some other terms, like FWIW (for what it's worth) actually have their origins in office culture rather than the Web.

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Google and copyright

Remember the brouhaha a couple years back about Internet search giant Google trying to put copyrighted books online for free? If you're wondering what happened to that, it's been tied up in court. Finally, it looks like the tangled mess is due to be sorted out, sort of. A potential settlement is being floated to the various litigants in the class action lawsuit, with May as a deadline for approval. Here's the story, via Library Journal.
The thing is, the classes in this suit are pretty nebulous. There's just no way to represent all authors and publishers. Yet the ramifications of this litigation could be felt by all of us in the information industry. Already the various classes involved are showing signs of dissent. It'll be interesting to see how this all shakes out.

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TMI?

Here's what looks to be an interesting study from Forester, via the blog Lifehacker. While the study costs money, Lifehacker reports that it found RSS use (blogs and such) has slowly risen to around 11 percent. That means most folks are still going to individual Web sites or getting information in other ways.
Now, RSS is still relatively new and things like that take time to catch on. But the troubling part (for RSS proponents) is that of the large portion of people not using it, an overwhelming majority -- something like four-fifths -- aren't even interested in learning about it.
Have we finally reached a point where the tired expression "TMI" ceases to refer to gross or unsavory information but instead means, quite literally "too much information"? As a self-described RSS junkie, I can definitely see where most people would quite happily swear off the vast amounts of information that cross my computer screen each day.

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