Education/Learning Applications of ListServs, Blogs, Wikis, Social Networking, and Twitter
Getting More Than We Give

Bob Jensen

Accountancy News Sites ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/accountingnews.htm

ListServs

Blogs

Social Networking for Education:  The Beautiful and the Ugly
(including Google's Wave and Orcut for Social Networking)

Video:  The Worst Thing You Can Do in Life is Set Goals
Stephen Fry: What I Wish I Had Known When I Was 18 --- Click Here  http://www.openculture.com/2010/05/stephen_fry_what_i_wish_i_had_known_when_i_was_18.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+OpenCulture+%28Open+Culture%29

Delicious Social Bookmarking

Twitter (and other Microblogs competitors)

Deceptions, Hoaxes, and Fakery

David Pogue's Advice

Giving Stuff Away Free on the Internet

Note the excellent tutorial course at http://newmediaocw.wordpress.com/

Course Materials

• Syllabus
  • Week 01: Blogs
  • Week 02: RSS
  • Week 03: Wikis
  • Week 04: Bookmark Sharing
  • Week 05: Photo Sharing
  • Week 06: Folksonomies and Tagging
  • Week 07: GIS/Maps/Satellite Tools
  • Week 08: Podcasts
  • Week 09: Creating Audio Podcasts
  • Week 10: Creating Video Podcasts
  • Week 11: Creating Screencasts
  • Week 12: Video Sharing
  • Week 13: Hacks and Mashups
  • Week 14: Final Project
• About the Professor
• Download This Course
• Welcome to the Course!

Video:  Learn the new (RSS) way to view the news you are most interested in from your favorite news sites ---  www.commoncraft.com  has a “RSS in Plain English” video
This great link was forwarded by Mary Jo Sanz [MSANZ@BENTLEY.EDU]
Also see Nanoscale --- http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journals/NR/

Feed Demon 3.0 --- http://www.newsgator.com/ 

So you want to stay up to date with news from the Boston Globe and the New Orleans Times-Picayune and 75 other news outlets as well? Feed Demon 3.0 can make it happen. This recently released edition of the popular RSS news aggregator syncs effectively with Google Reader, and it makes it easy to update your subscriptions and share items with others. Visitors should also note the application's compatibility with Twitter feed reading and tagging features. This version is compatible with computers running Windows 95 and newer.

No Other Encyclopedia Comes Close to Wikipedia
"Understanding collaboration in Wikipedia,"  Royce M. Kimmons, First Monday, December 5, 2011 ---
http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/3613

Abstract
Previous attempts at studying collaboration within Wikipedia have focused on simple metrics like rigor (i.e. the number of revisions in an article’s revision history) and diversity (i.e. the number of authors that have voluntarily contributed to a given article) or have made generalizations about collaboration within Wikipedia based upon the content validity of a few select articles. By analyzing the contents of randomly selected Wikipedia articles (n = 1,271) and their revisions (n = 85,563) more closely, this study attempts to understand what collaboration within Wikipedia actually looks like under the surface. Findings suggest that typical Wikipedia articles are not rigorous, in a collaborative sense, and do not reflect much diversity in the construction of content and macro-structural writing, leading to the conclusion that most articles in Wikipedia are not reflective of the collaborative efforts of any community but, rather, represent the work of relatively few contributors.

Wikipedia stands as an undeniable success in online participation and collaboration. By looking more closely at metrics associated with each extant Wikipedia article (N=3,427,236) along with all revisions (N=225,226,370), this study attempts to understand what collaboration within Wikipedia actually looks like under the surface. Findings suggest that typical Wikipedia articles are not rigorous, in a collaborative sense, and do not reflect much diversity in the construction of content and macro–structural writing. Most articles in Wikipedia are not reflective of the collaborative efforts of the community but represent the work of relatively few contributors.

Bob Jensen's search helpers ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm

With all the good, though, there are some negative aspects to online presences.  It’s important to recognize that whatever we write online is for public consumption, that we are not simply chatting with friends and family when we post.
Billie Hara

The kind of vocalizations that caused the above-named individuals to be fired are common in high stress professions, as they can defuse anger or frustration.  Speaking these words can be a way to commiserate with colleagues, or they can become “in jokes” among friends.  These exchanges can be OK when we are face-to-face with others, as we have body language and voice inflections to help us understand the meaning and context behind the statements.  Online is a different situation, however.
Billie Hara

"Think Before You Tweet (or Blog or Update a Status)," by Billie Hara, Chronicle of Higher Education, February 24, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/think-before-you-tweet-or-blog-or-update-a-status/30949?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Earlier this week, Miriam Posner, Stewart Varner, and Brian Croxall wrote “Creating Your Web Presence: A Primer for Academics.”  They had some terrific recommendations about how to establish an online presence and how to keep that presence active and positive.  Good stuff!

Here at ProfHacker, we’ve written before about the networking wonders and creative collaborations that can happen via online forums.  We meet people from different disciplines in various parts of the world, and we connect because we share interests and goals.  With all the good, though, there are some negative aspects to online presences.  It’s important to recognize that whatever we write online is for public consumption, that we are not simply chatting with friends and family when we post.

Today I want to veer off their post just a bit and write about something that might detract from a positive and professional online presence, a presence that we so meticulously create and maintain, comments made online that publicly disparage students and colleagues.  These comments can be intentional—meant to demean or criticize—or they can be random comments made in jest.

Take, for example, the case of Dr. Gloria Gadsden, an associate professor at East Stroudsburg University.  About a year ago, Dr. Gadsden wrote on Facebook that she had a good day at school, and “didn’t want to kill even one student,” adding “Friday was a different story.”  She wrote this comment—surely in jest—in a space that she believed to be private.  However, it wasn’t.  A third party read her comment and notified university authorities.  Dr. Gadsden was suspended, and ultimately reinstated, after the incident, but the hit to her professional reputation is clear.

A few more cautionary tales:

• In the U.K., thirteen Virgin Atlantic Airlines crewmembers were fired after they made fun of passengers and jokes about airline safety on Facebook.
• In June of 2010, a Pittsburgh Pirates’ mascot was fired after posting a negative comment about the contract extension of two team managers.  Andrew Kurtz, 24, was fired within hours of posting the comment, “Coonelly extended the contracts of Russell and Huntington through the 2011 season. That means a 19-straight losing streak. Way to go Pirates,” to his Facebook page.
• At a Dallas radio station, The Ticket, producer Mike Bacsik was suspended after making some unfortunate Twitter comments after a night drinking with friends.  The station noted that Bacsik “had been ‘a good employee’ . . . and [his] final public communication while a Ticket employee reflected poorly on the station.”
• Lastly, do you know what it means to be “dooced”?  If you’ve been blogging for any length of time, you’ve heard the word.  It’s now slang for “fired.”  Heather Armstrong, of the blog Dooce.com, was fired from a job she held after she wrote satiric accounts about her bosses and colleagues on her blog.

The kind of vocalizations that caused the above-named individuals to be fired are common in high stress professions, as they can defuse anger or frustration.  Speaking these words can be a way to commiserate with colleagues, or they can become “in jokes” among friends.  These exchanges can be OK when we are face-to-face with others, as we have body language and voice inflections to help us understand the meaning and context behind the statements.  Online is a different situation, however.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
If this is what you are going to teach in your CPE session at the AAA annual meetings in Denver then I want no part of that session. That is an absurd statement that might fly in a teen's blog, but rumor mongering should be screamed down by any and all members of the Academy David.

Blogging is now part and parcel to freedom of speech. But with freedom comes responsibility, especially in the Academy.

It's a violation of the code of ethics of professional journalism to create rumors that are not verified (usually by at least two independent sources). I contend that members of our Academy have, at a minimum, a responsibility to adhere to the code of ethics of journalism. In fact I would hope the we even have a higher standard in the Academy to name our sources before spreading rumors, especially rumors about people that can affect their professional futures as well as guide student opinions.

The higher standard in the Academy is that professors, unlike journalists, should be bound to cite their sources or to provide normative logic that adheres to the standards of logic in philosophy and mathematics. That entails defending assumptions upon which deductions are based.

I also disagree that time pressures of the author are justifiable reasons for not investigating facts before shooting off at the hip. Tom had ample opportunity to investigate facts that he simply did not do before letting off a salvo and naming names.

Jensen Comment
I think open lines of communication are essential for standard setters, and I applaud both the FASB and the IASB for issuing exposure drafts before and both inviting comments and publishing comments before finalizing standards. Having said this, the standard setters are not responsible for either the quality of the comments coming in or the strategies (such as cookie cutter comments) of people from around the world who send in comments.


The standard setters are responsible for studying all comments submitted and then deciding themselves what comments add value to the deliberations. For example, if standard setters have overlooked some significant costs of adhering to parts of a standard then the comment letters helped to correct this oversight.


Blogging is now part and parcel to freedom of speech. But with freedom comes responsibility, especially in the Academy.

"Social Media Lure Academics Frustrated by Journals," by Jennifer Howard, Chronicle of Higher Education, February 22, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Social-Media-Lure-Academics/126426/

Social media have become serious academic tools for many scholars, who use them for collaborative writing, conferencing, sharing images, and other research-related activities. So says a study just posted online called "Social Media and Research Workflow." Among its findings: Social scientists are now more likely to use social-media tools in their research than are their counterparts in the biological sciences. And researchers prefer popular applications like Twitter to those made for academic users.

The survey, conducted late last year, is the work of Ciber, as the Centre for Information Behaviour and the Evaluation of Research is known. Ciber is an interdisciplinary research center based in University College London's department of information studies. It takes on research projects for various clients. This one was paid for by the Emerald Publishing Group Ltd. The idea for the survey came from the Charleston Observatory, the research arm of the annual Charleston Conference of librarians, publishers, and vendors.

An online questionnaire went to researchers and editors as well as publishers, administrators, and librarians on cross-disciplinary e-mail lists maintained by five participating publishers—Cambridge University Press; Emerald; Kluwer; Taylor & Francis; and Wiley. Responses came from 2,414 researchers in 215 countries and "every discipline under the sun," according to David Nicholas, one of the lead researchers on the study. He directs the department of information studies at University College London.

Continued in article

October 12, 2010 message from Paul Clikeman

Bob,

I would be very grateful if you would look at my new website http://auditeducation.info . The site contains articles, cases, classroom exercises, videos and academic research related to financial statement auditing. I’d appreciate suggestions for improving the site and publicizing it.

Paul M. Clikeman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Accounting
Robins School of Business
University of Richmond
Richmond, VA 23173

 

October 12, 2010 reply from Bob Jensen

Hi Paul,

I welcome this exciting new site containing resources for auditing and the history of auditing. It selectively links to some of the best articles on an array of auditing topics, including auditing history.
http://auditeducation.info 

I linked your site in various Web documents including
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Fraud001.htm#Professionalism
However, until I get my new computer set up at Trinity University, I may not be able to update these files on the Web server.

I will also announce your site on the AAA Commons.

Hopefully other accounting bloggers will also announce your site.

Good Work

Bob Jensen

Free Open Sharing Tutorials, Videos, and Course Materials

Bob Jensen's threads on open sharing lectures, videos, and course materials from prestigious universities ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's threads on free tutorials and videos in various academic disciplines ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#EducationResearch

Other free online videos and textbooks in various disciplines (including accounting, economics, finance, and statistics) ---  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ElectronicLiterature.htm#Textbooks

ListServs

Accountancy Discussion ListServs:

AECM (Educators) http://listserv.aaahq.org/cgi-bin/wa.exe?HOME AECM is an email Listserv list which provides a forum for discussions of all hardware and software which can be useful in any way for accounting education at the college/university level. Hardware includes all platforms and peripherals. Software includes spreadsheets, practice sets, multimedia authoring and presentation packages, data base programs, tax packages, World Wide Web applications, etc. Over the years the AECM has become the worldwide forum for accounting educators on all issues of accountancy and accounting education, including debates on accounting standards, managerial accounting, careers, doctoral programs, and critical debates on academic (accountics) research, publication, replication, and validity testing.

CPAS-L (Practitioners) http://pacioli.loyola.edu/cpas-l/  (Closed Down) CPAS-L provides a forum for discussions of all aspects of the practice of accounting. It provides an unmoderated environment where issues, questions, comments, ideas, etc. related to accounting can be freely discussed. Members are welcome to take an active role by posting to CPAS-L or an inactive role by just monitoring the list. You qualify for a free subscription if you are either a CPA or a professional accountant in public accounting, private industry, government or education. Others will be denied access.

Yahoo (Practitioners)  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xyztalk This forum is for CPAs to discuss the activities of the AICPA. This can be anything  from the CPA2BIZ portal to the XYZ initiative or anything else that relates to the AICPA.

AccountantsWorld  http://accountantsworld.com/forums/default.asp?scope=1  This site hosts various discussion groups on such topics as accounting software, consulting, financial planning, fixed assets, payroll, human resources, profit on the Internet, and taxation.

Business Valuation Group BusValGroup-subscribe@topica.com  This discussion group is headed by Randy Schostag [RSchostag@BUSVALGROUP.COM]

FEI's Financial Reporting Blog Smart Stops on the Web, Journal of Accountancy, March 2008 --- http://www.aicpa.org/pubs/jofa/mar2008/smart_stops.htm FINANCIAL REPORTING PORTAL www.financialexecutives.org/blog Find news highlights from the SEC, FASB and the International Accounting Standards Board on this financial reporting blog from Financial Executives International. The site, updated daily, compiles regulatory news, rulings and statements, comment letters on standards, and hot topics from the Web’s largest business and accounting publications and organizations. Look for continuing coverage of SOX requirements, fair value reporting and the Alternative Minimum Tax, plus emerging issues such as the subprime mortgage crisis, international convergence, and rules for tax return preparers.

The CAlCPA Tax Listserv September 4, 2008 message from Scott Bonacker [lister@bonackers.com] Scott has been a long-time contributor to the AECM listserv (he's a techie as well as a practicing CPA) I found another listserve that is exceptional - CalCPA maintains http://groups.yahoo.com/taxtalk/  and they let almost anyone join it. Jim Counts, CPA is moderator. There are several highly capable people that make frequent answers to tax questions posted there, and the answers are often in depth. Scott Scott forwarded the following message from Jim Counts Yes you may mention info on your listserve about TaxTalk. As part of what you say please say [... any CPA or attorney or a member of the Calif Society of CPAs may join. It is possible to join without having a free Yahoo account but then they will not have access to the files and other items posted. Once signed in on their Yahoo account go to http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/TaxTalk/ and I believe in top right corner is Join Group. Click on it and answer the few questions and in the comment box say you are a CPA or attorney, whichever you are and I will get the request to join. Be aware that we run on the average 30 or move emails per day. I encourage people to set up a folder for just the emails from this listserve and then via a rule or filter send them to that folder instead of having them be in your inbox. Thus you can read them when you want and it will not fill up the inbox when you are looking for client emails etc. We currently have about 830 CPAs and attorneys nationwide but mainly in California.... ] Please encourage your members to join our listserve. If any questions let me know. Jim Counts CPA.CITP CTFA Hemet, CA Moderator TaxTalk

I must thank Professor Albrecht for the honor.
"Prof Albrecht’s Most Influential," by David Albrecht, The Summa, August 28, 2011 ---
http://profalbrecht.wordpress.com/2011/08/28/profalbrechts-most-influential/

"The Sociology of Academic Networks," by Lincoln Mullen, Chronicle of Higher Education, July 13, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/the-sociology-of-academic-networks/34691?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

I’m a historian who is spending a month in the company of sociologists, studying religious congregations and social change. In crossing these disciplinary boundaries, I’ve been fortunate to read a great deal of sociological works that I would otherwise not encounter. Among these is Randall Collins’s theoretical work, Interaction Ritual Chains (2004).

Collins’s describes his work as a “radical microsociology,” meaning that he theorizes about the rituals by which people interact with others, from large groups, to person-to-person relationships, to the imaginary conversations that a person engages in his or her mind. I’m ambivalent about parts of the theory, but I’m intrigued by his central claims: “occasions that combine a high degree of mutual focus of attention … together with a high degree of emotional entrainment … result in feelings of membership that are attached to cognitive symbols; and result also in the emotional energy of individual participants, giving them feelings of confidence, enthusiasm, and desire for action in what they consider a morally proper path” (42). In other words, when people interact their shared attention trains each other to be in a group with a shared purpose.

Though that theory is dense, I find it powerful for explaining many things, not least of which is the way parts of the academy work. If part of the mission of ProfHacker is to make plain the hidden (even unconscious) rules of the academy, then Collins’s explanations of the sociology of academic networks and of academic writing can be helpful.

I’ll take up Collins’s ideas of academic writing in a later post, but first let’s look at his ideas about academic networks.

Collins says that thinking is a social process. (Hint: sociologists think that everything is social.) He observes that important thinkers tend to be the students of important thinkers and to have important thinkers as students themselves. He also notes that the best scholars have personal contacts with the other best thinkers, whether allies or enemies. These groups are “not merely the clubbing together of the already famous, but groups of would-be thinkers who have not yet done the work that will make them famous.” This is not to say that only “important” scholars move on the work of scholarship, but that the social structure focuses on such eminent individuals, who “work extremely long hours, seemingly obsessed with their work.” Perhaps most important, Collins insists on the importance of direct interaction between scholars, especially face-to-face interaction. He writes, “What one picks up from an eminent teacher … is a demonstration of how to operate in the intellectual field of oppositions. Star intellectuals are role models … but in a fashion that cannot be picked up at a distance, and only by seeing them in action.”

Collins’s sociology goes a long way towards explaining the unpleasant side of the academy, such as the emphasis on academic celebrities and the plight of scholars who are never embedded in the academic social network. But it also offers ways of thinking about the academy that can help you hack your own career:

• Get a mentor. This is hardly a unique observation, but it bears repeating. Good mentors don’t just teach you what you need to know to be a scholar, they teach you how to be a scholar.
• Participate in small groups—meeting face to face—to refine your work. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century debating clubs might be out of style, but writing groups aren’t. Small, frequent gatherings can provide the kinds of social thinking that produces great scholarship. If possible, reach outside your own institution when forming your group. And participating in an intensive, collaborative group, such as the month-long seminar that I’m engaged in now, will help you generate ideas that a month of reading and writing alone never could.
• Making a place for yourself at academic conferences. As universities become increasingly budget-conscious, there is more and more skepticism that face-to-face conferences are worth the money. But it is at conferences where you can discern the social shape of your discipline.
• Reach out to scholars whose work you admire. On the whole, senior scholars have been overwhelmingly generous whenever I’ve contacted them or introduced myself to them. (Forget the few exceptions.)
• Be the collegial colleague yourself. This point might not be as susceptible to empirical proof as the others. But if scholarship is essentially social, then you owe it to your fellow scholars to behave with courtesy and generosity, which will help your work as it helps others.

Jensen Comment
The AECM listserve is my main Academic network.
My threads on listservs, social networks, blogs, Twitter, and Facebook (See the Table of Contents above)

Academic networks do not replace refereed journals for communication of research. Rather they enhance refereed journals in many ways, especially in expanding those journals like The Accounting Review that for all practical purposes do not publish replications or even commentaries on research articles they publish.

Academic networks are also important sources of research ideas where a networked message can inspire professors and even students to undertake research projects as well has deepen their scholarship.

I'm active on two accounting ListServs called the AECM and CPA-L, both of which were formed many years ago by Barry Rice. I was asked recently by someone close to Barry to comment on these ListServs. Below is my response including why the medium is much more than the message in the case of a ListServ:

Hi XXXXX,

I did not know Barry Rice when he started up the AECM and CPA-L Listservs. I got to know him better by email and met him quite a few years later. Barry is a world class accounting teacher with administrative skills as well. I now consider him a great friend.

ListServs are much like forums except that a forum usually has an assigned leader or group of leaders with their own agendas. ListServs are totally voluntary and spontaneous communities. Forums often have invited memberships, whereas most ListServs can be freely joined by any person on the world’s Internet. When a message is sent to a forum, the sender generally knows where it is going. When a message is sent to a ListServ, the sender has some idea of a few people who will receive it but no idea about all the people in the world who are lurking for messages. 

Off the top of my head, I would say that a ListServ aids in the following:

• Communication of news intended to be of common interest to members (e.g., accounting education news). Internet links are probably the most common and useful items shared in those communications.
   
• Questions and answers where one member raises a question and others try to answer either in private or for all members.
   
• Debates that follow unpredictable paths and are generally interesting until they get too tedious. Theories are often built and and/or destroyed on ListServs.
   
• ListServs make us humble. Just when we think we know a lot about something, all we have to do is comment about it on the AECM. Suddenly we discover that there’s a whole lot we did not know. We learn from a ListServ because of the scholars who are willing to share what they know and feel.
   
• ListServs capture moods and opinions of members more spontaneously and deeply than formal surveys.
   
• Sharing of research and scholarship. For example, members may have work-in-progress that they put at a Website and then use the ListServ to inform members of where to find this work-in-progress. Members then contribute comments in private or in public about these works.
   
• Archiving of communications and Web links. This library function makes ListServs more valuable than telephone and most other forms of communication that do not have easily-accessible archives.
   
• Entertainment (sometimes communications are off-topic and entertaining with humor and links to outside topics).
   
• Building of friendships with people in all parts of the world that are not likely to ever meet face-to-face.
   
• Building of reputations where some participants reveal knowledge, talent, skills, and effort beyond what would otherwise be known about these rare diamonds in the rough.
   
• Motivating some members about career choices/changes. On the AECM students get an inside peek at professors who comment about the beautiful and the ugly aspects of being in academe.

A ListServ does not generally do all of the things listed above, although the AECM initiated by Barry comes about as close as possible to doing all those things mentioned above. The CPA-L list that Barry also formed is primarily a Q&A List that does none of the other things listed above. Practitioners on the CPA-L generally raise a question (often a tax question) and others provide answers. There’s almost nothing in the way of daily news, debates, sharing of research/scholarship, entertainment, building of friendships, or building of reputations.

The AECM somehow evolved into a multi-purpose ListServ that accomplishes all of the things mentioned above. Its international success was primarily timing and leadership and luck. Barry offered up this service when there was very little else for accounting educators on the Internet. There were at least three other early competitors, and I honestly cannot say why the AECM emerged as the main ListServ for accounting educators around the world. I do think that time is too valuable for people to join in on very many active ListServs. Hence it’s not likely that all competitors early on would’ve flourished. Why the AECM emerged as the main general-purpose higher education ListServ for accounting educators is indeed a mystery. The American Accounting Association for a time offered another alternative, but I think bad timing and bad luck destroyed its efforts. The AAA was too late on the scene. There was also the stigma, not a fact, that the AAA’s effort was only for members of the AAA.

I have to say that Barry’s leadership in communicating on the AECM was probably not the crucial factor at the germination stage. After a very short time Barry became more of a lurker. It was about a dozen accounting educators who emerged out of nowhere to make the AECM germinate. Then more leaders and lurkers evolved like wild flowers in a worldwide field.

Keep in mind that Barry did not begin the AECM as a general-purpose accounting educator ListServ. In the beginning it was primarily intended for messaging about computers and multimedia technologies that could be used in new ways by teachers of accountancy. In fact the acronym “AECM” stands for “Accounting Education using Computers and Multimedia.” Today the AECM ListServ is much more than its title. Why this happened is complicated to answer, but the title is unfortunate today whenever someone is looking for the main accounting education ListServ and naively thinks that the AECM is restricted to messaging about computers and multimedia.

A better name for the AECM as it evolved is the Internet’s “Accounting Education Communications Medium.” And the “medium is the message.” I am forever grateful to Barry for letting the original AECM evolve into what it is today. He could’ve jumped on every message that was not deemed “on topic” in the context of “computers and multimedia.” Instead he let the AECM messaging follow their own serendipitous meanderings. And he forgave us for some of the dumb things we messaged.

In this regard we were lucky. AECM participants had the good sense to avoid some turn-off topics like politics, advertising, religion, and too much humor. But the messaging did follow many serendipitous paths that were not tied to computers and multimedia, including topics of accounting theory, fraud, student cheating, professorial cheating, plagiarism, pedagogy in general, research methodologies, and learning theories. These evolved into topics that AECM subscribers wanted to learn more and more about.

ListServs are fragile things that in general do not work well. Leaders either emerge out of nowhere and keep a ListServ going or it dies from lack of participation. Participants must find rewards or ListServs simply fade away. Most participants in a ListServ are “lurkers” who often “listen in” but rarely if ever contribute to the membership. This puts the burden on “actives” to evolve as leaders. These actives can either be terrific and draw new ListServ members wanting to listen to what the actives have to say or ListServs can become very tedious and/or boring and causing members to resign from the ListServ.

ListServs have interesting behavioral dynamics that emerged with newer technology. This is an interesting topic to study and needs to be studied in much greater depth. The medium is much more than the content of the messages.

ListServs provide wonderful and unique opportunities to make a difference. For example, an accounting educator and world leader who I supremely respect is Dennis Beresford. Denny is a popular Accounting Hall of Fame speaker at academic, business, and accounting profession conferences. But a speech is a speech and is limited to a given audience and a given point in time. Denny’s published a lot of papers, but a paper is a paper that is a bleep at a fixed point in time.

Remember that “the medium is the message” as discovered by Marshall Mcluhan many years ago. AECM messages are bleeps that resurface in new and different ways repeatedly over time on the AECM. Denny has probably had more impact on changing accounting education via the AECM than in all his speeches and all his publications combined. His messaging to the AECM is continuous over time and reacts to concerns of accounting educators around the world. His AECM audience is unlimited in terms of size and scheduled times.

And we learn a lot about Denny just by learning when he messages. Keep in mind that I’m talking about one of the busiest accountants in the world. He teaches at the University of Georgia full time and is an extremely popular consultant and on the boards of directors of several worldwide corporations. He’s even head of the Audit Committee and a Board member for Fannie Mae after this trillion-dollar company hit the rocks. And yet he seemingly keeps his eye on AECM communications 24/7. What impresses me most is when I send messages out to the AECM at 7:00 a.m. on Sunday mornings I have them answered within minutes by Denny Beresford. Hence I learned a whole lot more about the man beyond the content of his excellent messages. I also learned that he’s respectfully a very humble man.

Denny does not want more money or more trophies. What Denny wants is to make a lasting difference for the betterment of the accounting profession and accounting education. And he’s proved this countless times to all of us on the AECM. Those many other accounting leaders and educators who failed to grab this AECM brass ring missed out and continue to miss out of the opportunity to make a continuous and lasting difference.

I’m also a 24/7 AECM active like Denny. And I’m certain that Denny, like me, will say that he tries to make a difference. But the AECM is so rewarding that in the end he, like me, got more than he received. That is why we’re on the AECM.

We get more than we give no matter how much we give. That’s because so many scholars big and small contribute to our learning and loving. The Internet forever changed research and scholarship and learning. ListServs are a lasting part of this process.

Bob Jensen

April 5, 2007 reply from Dennis Beresford [dberesfo@TERRY.UGA.EDU]

Bob,

Thanks for your kind comments below.  And thanks to Barry for getting this whole thing started.  AECM is a wonderful learning opportunity for me and I'm just glad that you and many others are willing to share so much knowledge.

Denny

With all the good, though, there are some negative aspects to online presences.  It’s important to recognize that whatever we write online is for public consumption, that we are not simply chatting with friends and family when we post.
Billie Hara

The kind of vocalizations that caused the above-named individuals to be fired are common in high stress professions, as they can defuse anger or frustration.  Speaking these words can be a way to commiserate with colleagues, or they can become “in jokes” among friends.  These exchanges can be OK when we are face-to-face with others, as we have body language and voice inflections to help us understand the meaning and context behind the statements.  Online is a different situation, however.
Billie Hara

"Think Before You Tweet (or Blog or Update a Status)," by Billie Hara, Chronicle of Higher Education, February 24, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/think-before-you-tweet-or-blog-or-update-a-status/30949?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Earlier this week, Miriam Posner, Stewart Varner, and Brian Croxall wrote “Creating Your Web Presence: A Primer for Academics.”  They had some terrific recommendations about how to establish an online presence and how to keep that presence active and positive.  Good stuff!

Here at ProfHacker, we’ve written before about the networking wonders and creative collaborations that can happen via online forums.  We meet people from different disciplines in various parts of the world, and we connect because we share interests and goals.  With all the good, though, there are some negative aspects to online presences.  It’s important to recognize that whatever we write online is for public consumption, that we are not simply chatting with friends and family when we post.

Today I want to veer off their post just a bit and write about something that might detract from a positive and professional online presence, a presence that we so meticulously create and maintain, comments made online that publicly disparage students and colleagues.  These comments can be intentional—meant to demean or criticize—or they can be random comments made in jest.

Take, for example, the case of Dr. Gloria Gadsden, an associate professor at East Stroudsburg University.  About a year ago, Dr. Gadsden wrote on Facebook that she had a good day at school, and “didn’t want to kill even one student,” adding “Friday was a different story.”  She wrote this comment—surely in jest—in a space that she believed to be private.  However, it wasn’t.  A third party read her comment and notified university authorities.  Dr. Gadsden was suspended, and ultimately reinstated, after the incident, but the hit to her professional reputation is clear.

A few more cautionary tales:

• In the U.K., thirteen Virgin Atlantic Airlines crewmembers were fired after they made fun of passengers and jokes about airline safety on Facebook.
• In June of 2010, a Pittsburgh Pirates’ mascot was fired after posting a negative comment about the contract extension of two team managers.  Andrew Kurtz, 24, was fired within hours of posting the comment, “Coonelly extended the contracts of Russell and Huntington through the 2011 season. That means a 19-straight losing streak. Way to go Pirates,” to his Facebook page.
• At a Dallas radio station, The Ticket, producer Mike Bacsik was suspended after making some unfortunate Twitter comments after a night drinking with friends.  The station noted that Bacsik “had been ‘a good employee’ . . . and [his] final public communication while a Ticket employee reflected poorly on the station.”
• Lastly, do you know what it means to be “dooced”?  If you’ve been blogging for any length of time, you’ve heard the word.  It’s now slang for “fired.”  Heather Armstrong, of the blog Dooce.com, was fired from a job she held after she wrote satiric accounts about her bosses and colleagues on her blog.

The kind of vocalizations that caused the above-named individuals to be fired are common in high stress professions, as they can defuse anger or frustration.  Speaking these words can be a way to commiserate with colleagues, or they can become “in jokes” among friends.  These exchanges can be OK when we are face-to-face with others, as we have body language and voice inflections to help us understand the meaning and context behind the statements.  Online is a different situation, however.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
If this is what you are going to teach in your CPE session at the AAA annual meetings in Denver then I want no part of that session. That is an absurd statement that might fly in a teen's blog, but rumor mongering should be screamed down by any and all members of the Academy David.

Blogging is now part and parcel to freedom of speech. But with freedom comes responsibility, especially in the Academy.

It's a violation of the code of ethics of professional journalism to create rumors that are not verified (usually by at least two independent sources). I contend that members of our Academy have, at a minimum, a responsibility to adhere to the code of ethics of journalism. In fact I would hope the we even have a higher standard in the Academy to name our sources before spreading rumors, especially rumors about people that can affect their professional futures as well as guide student opinions.

The higher standard in the Academy is that professors, unlike journalists, should be bound to cite their sources or to provide normative logic that adheres to the standards of logic in philosophy and mathematics. That entails defending assumptions upon which deductions are based.

I also disagree that time pressures of the author are justifiable reasons for not investigating facts before shooting off at the hip. Tom had ample opportunity to investigate facts that he simply did not do before letting off a salvo and naming names.

Jensen Comment
I think open lines of communication are essential for standard setters, and I applaud both the FASB and the IASB for issuing exposure drafts before and both inviting comments and publishing comments before finalizing standards. Having said this, the standard setters are not responsible for either the quality of the comments coming in or the strategies (such as cookie cutter comments) of people from around the world who send in comments.


The standard setters are responsible for studying all comments submitted and then deciding themselves what comments add value to the deliberations. For example, if standard setters have overlooked some significant costs of adhering to parts of a standard then the comment letters helped to correct this oversight.


Blogging is now part and parcel to freedom of speech. But with freedom comes responsibility, especially in the Academy.

"Immersed In Too Much Information, We Can Sometimes Miss The Big Picture," by Dave Pell, NPR, August 11, 2010 ---
http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2010/08/11/129127690/too-much-information-can-sometimes-mean-we-miss-the-big-picture

Even in the era of Facebook, this was not a face I expected to see.

A few weeks ago, I might have argued that it’s almost impossible to shock members of Generation TMI. I would have been wrong. I was shocked by a recent Time cover that featured a photo of Aisha, an 18 year-old Afghan woman who had her nose and ears cut off by the Taliban.

My first reaction was to look away from the photo. My second was frustration toward the Time editors who decided to run the image. But after some reflection, I realized that in order to understand and form an opinion about the Taliban and the broader issues in Afghanistan, it was an image I needed to see. As a fellow human being — especially one living in an environment where my iPhone coverage is considered a critical issue — isn’t taking a long, hard look at this photo the very least I owe Aisha?

[Time Cover Picture of an Afghan woman with her nose chopped off]

Time Managing Editor Richard Stengel explained his decision to run the cover shot:

Bad things do happen to people, and it is part of our job to confront and explain them. In the end, I felt that the image is a window into the reality of what is happening — and what can happen — in a war that affects and involves all of us. I would rather confront readers with the Taliban’s treatment of women than ignore it.

While thinking about this issue and its relationship to social media, I reached out to the cadre of folks who often advise and assist me before I press the publish button.

None of them had seen the image.

This is in part a statement on the significance (or lack thereof) of magazine covers in today’s media.

I could imagine folks missing even an image this arresting in the past. But who would've thought we could collectively avert our eyes in an age when random videos can get millions of views and we all know about a Jet Blue flight attendant's creative slide to retirement within a few hours of it happening.

But that these folks — all of them heavily plugged-in —  missed this portrait of Aisha is also a statement on how we can collectively repress data that we don’t want to think about. Even though we are immersed in shared words and images, it’s still pretty easy to miss the big picture.

In his New Yorker piece, Letting Go, Atul Gawande laments the fact that doctors and patients have extremely poor communication when it comes to the difficult topic of end-of-life care.

Two-thirds of the terminal-cancer patients in the Coping with Cancer study reported having had no discussion with their doctors about their goals for end-of-life care, despite being, on average, just four months from death.

Although we find ourselves as travelers in the age of over sharing, it turns out we remain quite adept at avoiding the really tough topics.

Google’s Eric Schmidt recently stated that every two days we create as much information as we did from the beginning of civilization through 2003. Perhaps the sheer bulk of data makes it easier to suppress that information which we find overly unpleasant. Who’s got time for a victim in Afghanistan or end-of-life issues with all these Tweets coming in?

Between reality TV, 24-hour news, and the constant hammering of the stream, I am less likely to tackle seriously uncomfortable topics. I can bury myself in a mountain of incoming information. And if my stream is any indication, I’m not alone. For me, repression used to be a one man show. Now I am part of a broader movement — mass avoidance through social media.

Eric Schmidt followed up his comment about the piles of information being created with this: “I spend most of my time assuming the world is not ready for the technology revolution that will be happening to them soon.”

But in reality, we’re a lot more ready for the technology revolution than we are for Aisha.

Jensen Comment
With 500 million people using just one social network (Facebook) plus the millions of others on other social networks and addicted (like me) to blogs, there is most certainly information overload. In fact, one of the services I provide to accounting educators is to distill a vast amount of news to find accounting tidbits that I think will be on interest to accounting educators. But with so many social networks I cannot begin to cover the waterfront and don't even try on Facebook. I also only cover a microscopic part of Twitter where I have only a few selected sources that mostly are like me --- distilling the ocean of information for accounting tidbits.

What I discovered in the AAA Annual Meetings in San Francisco is that there are top-name accounting educators and researchers who are lurkers on the AECM. At least a dozen of them revealed to me for the first time that they've been lurking for years. We can't seem to motivate them to share their expertise with us on the AECM or the AAA Commons. I suspect that one of the main reasons is that they fear having to take too much time engaging in threads that they either commence or join on the AECM or AAA Commons. They are extremely paranoid about their time commitments.

Perhaps this is part of the overall information overload syndrome. It takes some time to lurk over tidbit nuggets, but it takes an even greater amount of time to engage in conversations about those nuggets.

When you think about it, information overload is probably a job saver for educators. Our students would be totally lost amongst the trees of the forests if educators were not handing out Google-type satellite maps of hidden mazes in each forest. The problem for us is that the forests are becoming so immense in size and so overlapping between disciplines that map construction is becoming more and more difficult.

Roles of ListServs, Blogs, and Social Networks ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on data visualization (no chopped off noses) are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/352wpvisual/000datavisualization.htm

May 22, 2010 message from Ramesh and Nadee Fernando [mferna073@ROGERS.COM]

Dear Prof. Jensen and list members,

As accounting is very research focused it would be great if all accountants had access to other researchers in accounting. ResearchGate has lot's of various groups from economics to  physics.

I created the Management Accountants group so that there could be access to discussion and research in management accounting. 

http://www.researchgate.net/group/Management_accountants

There is also a financial accounting group on research net

http://www.researchgate.net/group/Financial_Accounting/

Finally there is an Accounting  Information systems group

http://www.researchgate.net/group/Accounting_Information_Systems/

May I suggest to this list's members, if you are interested in research in accounting to please join ResearchGate and become a member of these groups. I might add I owe it to Economist  for finding ResearchGate which mentioned ResearchGate in their  special report on Social Networks.

Regards,
Ramesh
CMA (Canada) Candidate
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

I did not do anything but forward Doug’s request to the AECM. Hence I’m not personally bragging.

But I do want to brag about the efficiency and effectiveness of the AECM listserv. After receiving yet another private response from an AECMer, Doug wrote the following message. What he really means is “thank you AECM.”

My threads on the history of the AECM are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm#ListServs

Professor Jensen,

Another response from a colleague.

Your assistance in this matter has been invaluable and the responses most helpful.

I appreciate your assistance more than I can express in words.

Douglas McWard, CPA | Director, Financial Reporting and Compliance
Corporate - Clayton, MO | Office (314) 573-9383 | Fax (314) 573-9455 | doug.mcward@graybar.com
www.graybar.com - Works to Your Advantage

 

An Academic Study of the History of the AECM

"Knowledge Sharing among Accounting Academics in an Electronic Network of Practice," by  Eileen Z. Taylor and Uday S. Murthy, Accounting Horizons 23 (2), 151 (2009);
Electronic edition subscribers can download an copy from
http://aaapubs.aip.org/dbt/dbt.jsp?KEY=ACHXXX&Volume=LASTVOL&Issue=LASTISS
Others might be able to access the article from at their college libraries.

SYNOPSIS:
Using a multi-method approach, we explore accounting academics' knowledge-sharing practices in an Electronic Network of Practice (ENOP)—the Accounting Education using Computers and Multimedia (AECM) email list. Established in 1996, the AECM email list serves the global accounting academic community. A review of postings to AECM for the period January–June 2006 indicates that members use this network to post questions, replies, and opinions covering a variety of topics, but focusing on financial accounting practice and education. Sixty-nine AECM members constituting 9.2 percent of the AECM membership base responded to a survey that measured their self-perceptions about altruism, reciprocation, reputation, commitment, and participation in AECM. The results suggest that altruism is a significant predictor of posting frequency, but neither reputation nor commitment significantly relate to posting frequency. These findings imply that designers and administrators of the recently launched AAA Commons platform should seek ways of capitalizing on the altruistic tendencies of accounting academics. The study's limitations include low statistical power and potential inconsistencies in coding the large number of postings. ©2009 American Accounting Association

Jensen Comment
The article above affords an opportunity to comment on the AAA Commons about Barry Rice and the AECM. I have initiated the posting below at http://commons.aaahq.org/posts/b7f123c2be 

If you are an AAA member it is an opportunity to add comments to the above posting. You might mention your own reaction to the Taylor and Murthy research paper on the AECM. Do you agree or disagree with the major findings of Taylor and Murthy?

It is also an opportunity to thank Barry Rice for what he enabled you to learn from the AECM over the years since 1996. It is also fabulous that the AECM archived all this messaging.

The AAA Commons access page is at https://commons.aaahq.org/signin 
It can only be accessed by American Accounting Association members and invited guests (some students).

"What Do Accounting Professors Talk About?," by David Albrecht, The Summa, February 1, 2010 ---
http://profalbrecht.wordpress.com/2010/02/01/what-do-accounting-professors-talk-about/

… when permitted to leave their offices for unsupervised free time?

Most questioners ask only rhetorically.

In response to my statement, “What is I do? I’m an accounting professor,” I wish I had a nickel for every time I heard __________ (fill in the blank with a much less than flattering comment about either accounting, accountants, or accounting classes in college).

In response to my statement, “I’m on an e-mail listserv with 1,000 other accounting professors,” I wish I had a nickel for every time I heard __________ (fill in blank with a much less than flattering comment about how little there is to talk about, and what we talk about must be exceedingly boring).

So, what did the accounting professors really talk about today?

1. “In my opinion the Number 1 disgrace in higher education is grade inflation.”  And student evaluations of teaching are identified as the causal factor.
2. Rankled by Rankings: The problems with the ranking of best accounting programs, best accounting departments, best college, best universities in country, best universities in world.
3. Stephen Colbert uses an iPad at the 2010 Grammy.
4. Designing Corporate Governance Systems
5. Canadian Signs of IFRS Transitions to Come in the United States
6. The enduring impact of transient emotions on decision making – being predictably irrational. I don’t think anyone believes in EMH (efficient markets hypothesis) anymore, except economists, economists advising President Obama, and corporate PR people.
7. Could it be that some audit firms take on fewer clients when risks of negligence lawsuits increase?
8. The major problem in accountics research using statistical inference is the underlying assumption of stationary-state is the real world where probabilities on constantly in transition.
9. Oh, … and how Dave Albrecht uses retesting to implement mastery learning concepts in his classes. [Hey, I didn’t even bring it up.]

I love the experience.  The discussions are fodder for the educated mind.  It comes  at a cost,though.  Reading all these e-mails takes a significant portion of the three hours I daily devote to e-mail processing.  It can take an hour (or more) to craft a reply.  My reply to item #9 will take many hours and be the next blog post (or 2 or 3) to The Summa

A prominent librarian utters dire warnings about new media

"Mass Culture 2.0," by Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed, June 20, 2007 --- http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2007/06/20/mclemee

This month, Encyclopedia Britannica’s blog is serializing a commentary on the cultural effects of Web 2.0. The author, Michael Gorman, is dean of library services at California State University at Fresno and a former president of the American Library Association.

About two years ago, Gorman published a memorable essay in Library Journal. In it, he referred to “the Blog People,” expressing doubt that they were “in the habit of sustained reading of complex texts.” The immediate occasion for this remark was the public reception of one of Gorman’s own complex texts, about which uncomplimentary things had been said by bloggers (some of them, in fact, being his colleagues in the library world). “It is entirely possible,” he continued, “that their intellectual needs are met by an accumulation of random facts and paragraphs.”

There were other zingers of the same general sort. And so it has not escaped notice, much of it sardonic, that his most recent effort to win friends and influence people is taking place at a blog. His Britannica series consists of three chapters, each in two parts. Something of the flavor of the whole work may be gleaned from the phrases heading up its various segments. So far, “The Sleep of Reason” and “The Siren Song of the Internet” have been published, and may be consulted here. The final portion, “Jabberwiki,” will run next week

. . .

The tone of Gorman’s remedial lecture implies that educators now devote the better part of their day to teaching students to shove pencils up their nose while Googling for pornography. I do not believe this to be the case. (It would be bad, of course, if it were.)

But the idea that new forms of media require training in new kinds of literacy hardly counts as an evasion of the obligation to cultivate critical intelligence. Today the work of acquiring knowledge on a given subject often includes the burden of evaluating digital material. Gorman may pine for the good old days — back when literacy and critical intelligence were capacities to be exercised only upon artifacts made of paper and ink. So be it. But let’s not pretend that such nostalgia is anything but escapism at best.

What really bothers the neo-Luddite quasi-Mandarin is not the rise of digitality, as such. The problem actually comes from “the diminished sacredness of authority,” as Edward Shils once put it, “the reduction in the awe it evokes and in the charisma attributed to it.”

But it’s not that all cultural authority or critical intelligence, as such, are vanishing. Rather, new kinds are taking shape. The resulting situation is difficult and sometimes unpleasant. But it is not exactly new. Such wrenching moments have come repeatedly over the past 500 years, and muddling through the turmoil does not seem to be getting any easier.

Continued in article

Accountancy Discussion ListServs:

AECM (Educators)  http://pacioli.loyola.edu/aecm/  AECM is an email Listserv list which provides a forum for discussions of all hardware and software which can be useful in any way for accounting education at the college/university level. Hardware includes all platforms and peripherals. Software includes spreadsheets, practice sets, multimedia authoring and presentation packages, data base programs, tax packages, World Wide Web applications, etc

CPAS-L (Practitioners) http://pacioli.loyola.edu/cpas-l/  CPAS-L provides a forum for discussions of all aspects of the practice of accounting. It provides an unmoderated environment where issues, questions, comments, ideas, etc. related to accounting can be freely discussed. Members are welcome to take an active role by posting to CPAS-L or an inactive role by just monitoring the list. You qualify for a free subscription if you are either a CPA or a professional accountant in public accounting, private industry, government or education. Others will be denied access.

Yahoo (Practitioners)  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xyztalk This forum is for CPAs to discuss the activities of the AICPA. This can be anything  from the CPA2BIZ portal to the XYZ initiative or anything else that relates to the AICPA.

AccountantsWorld  http://accountantsworld.com/forums/default.asp?scope=1  This site hosts various discussion groups on such topics as accounting software, consulting, financial planning, fixed assets, payroll, human resources, profit on the Internet, and taxation.

Business Valuation Group BusValGroup-subscribe@topica.com  This discussion group is headed by Randy Schostag [RSchostag@BUSVALGROUP.COM]

Blogs/Listservs Versus Scholarly Journals:  Bob Jensen's secrets about blogs and listservs

Recently I encountered criticism that blogs and listservs providing public information that allegedly is not refereed and misleading relative to scholarly journals. First I would like to point out that this is not an either/or choice between blogs/listservs versus journals. Fortunately in this age of technology we can learn from both outlets.

The term "blog" evolved out the term "Weblog" that is defined more formally at http://www.trinity.edu/~rjensen/245glosf.htm#Weblog
A blog is like a scrapbook of knowledge on a subject that is maintained by an individual or an entire organization. For example, Jim Mahar maintains an excellent finance professor blog at http://www.financeprofessor.com/ .
The University of Illinois Library maintains a great blog at http://www.library.uiuc.edu/blog/scholcomm/

Listservs are defined at http://www.trinity.edu/~rjensen/245glosf.htm#Listserv
My advocacy of listservs for scholars can be found at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm

Some Advantages of Scholarly Journals
Journals have some comparative advantages over blogs/listservs in that journal articles published are carefully crafted and generally subjected to blind reviews by referees that, because they are anonymous, can be quite critical and demanding. Journals articles are generally time tested in that they're not fired off without time to reflect and consider many ramifications before publication.

Some Disadvantages of Scholarly Journals
Probably the biggest myth is that referees are independent reviewers. In my opinion, journal refereeing is often a biased process where all sides of arguments are not given fair tests. Much of the bias centers on allowable research methodologies. For example, leading accounting research journals just do not allow humanities and legal studies research methodologies. Virtually all published articles have to have mathematical analysis and/or rigorous statistical inference testing. One example here is The Accounting Review (TAR), Virtually no Accounting Information Systems  (AIS) papers were published in TAR between 1986 and 2005. The reason is that AIS research methods generally do not entail mathematical modeling. Virtually all TAR referees have required mathematical models for over two decades. Jean Heck and I examined all articles published by TAR 1986-2005 and found less than one percent of the TAR articles that did not have mathematical equations and/or multivariate statistical analyses. Our examination excluded a few articles labeled as book/literature reviews, editorials, and memorials. Thus “…over 99 percent of TAR’s articles contained complex mathematical equations and multivariate statistical analyses…” See  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/395wpTAR/Web/TAR395wp.htm

Another problem is that journal editors have only a discrete set of available referees. Expertise needed is a continuum rather than a discrete scale. There is a strong likelihood that for a given submission to a journal, there are no available (known) referees that are as expert on this topic and methodology as perhaps 100 or more experts in the world who are unknown to the journal editor and/or unwilling to take the time and trouble to conduct formal reviews for the journal. Paranoia thereby enters the journal refereeing process. When assigned referees are uncomfortable with their own expertise they are often inclined to be more fault finding and not recommend publication.

Another problem with journal refereeing is that the referees are anonymous and therefore are not held accountable for their decisions. If a referee is superficial or wrong, nobody knows except maybe the unhappy author who receives the rejection notice.

Another problem in some journals, like TAR, is that they do not publish commentaries such that the public in general has no outlet for writing critical, supportive, or expansive comments on a published article. TAR also will not publish replications --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen//theory/00overview/theory01.htm#Replication

Still another problem in some journals is the long delay between when the research was conducted and when the paper is finally published. In accounting this delay can be years. Fortunately some authors provide free working papers or post the papers on something like SSRN where readers can purchase non-refereed working papers for a fee.

Advantages of Blogs and Listservs
The advantages of blogs and listservs is that they can and often do overcome the major disadvantages of the flawed refereeing process and timing delays of scholarly journals. Listservs open to the general public are best in the sense that bias is overcome by allowing anybody to comment on a topic or paper. Blogs are good if the person running the blog will publish comments that are both favorable and unfavorable with respect to the original blog item.

The biggest myth about blogs and listservs is that they published non-refereed items. In fact when an article or tidbit is published on a blog or listserv, the entire world has an opportunity to referee the item. Blogs are deemed the most successful when their items are not ignored by the public.

Disadvantages of Blogs and Listservs
Probably the biggest disadvantage is that there are so many blogs and listservs that it is very time consuming to ride heard on all the ones that touch on topics of interest to you. Secondly, some blogs and listservs post so much material that readers are apt to get information overload from just one blog or listserv.

Another problem is that most readers of a given blog or listserv are "lurkers" who for various reasons are unwilling to submit their own commentaries like the fewer number of "actives" who submit comments, news items, etc. Hence, the world may be open to all persons whereas only a small subset of people are actually willing to share their expertise.

Bob Jensen's Secrets
Since I actively publish what might be termed blogs and actively contribute to some listservs, I will now reveal my secrets for doing so. This is a message that I recently sent out to a listserv called TigerTalk at Trinity University.

Hi XXXXX,

Apology accepted. Now I will let you in on my secrets about blogs.

I find it strange that you’re critical of Tidbits from time to time and, at the same time, brag in public about never reading them. I place more stock in avid readers who weigh them on balance. Of course that’s a biased sample since “avid readers” by definition find them to worthy of the time and effort it takes to read and respond to them. I remind folks once again that my Tidbits are rarely posted to TigerTalk since I retired. Readers must seek them out at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm  or stumble upon them while using search engines.

I might add that I receive many, many replies to Tidbits that I also post in Tidbits when I obtain permission. I might’ve requested to do so in your case had you found errors in the physics of David’s technical explanation. In fact probably more Tidbits are accompanied by replies (critical, supportive, and/or expansive) from readers than the smaller number of Tidbits that elicit no readership response. In fact, one of the real advantages of blogs, listservs, and forums in general is that the whole world can be referees rather than just a few referees that are assigned in scholarly journals. At the time lapse between publishing and critiquing is nearly instantaneous.

Secret One
I’ve always viewed my Tidbits, New Bookmarks, and Fraud Updates "blogs" as my own personal scrapbook archives that I’m willing to share with the world. My first secret about these “blogs” is that they’re invaluable to me when answering the many inquiries I get from students, faculty, and the public in general. When my memory fails, my searching process almost never fails if I’ve posted tidbits about the topic in the past.

Secret Two
Now I will let you in on my second secret about why I really publish my "blogs." My second reason is to learn more about each of the topics. It’s the replies that make the effort really worthwhile. Instead of having to search and struggle to learn more about a tidbit, the world sends value-added information back to me either in public or private communications. For me it’s a great learning experience, especially for technical topics in accountancy, economics, and finance.

Secret Three
My third secret that I will share with you is that I sometimes post a tidbit for purposes of stirring up controversy. My love of academe comes from my love of watching debates by scholars on opposing sides. I often take a side I don’t especially believe just to stir up the pot. And I’m not in general fond of political correctness. PC is dysfunctional to our academic principles and purposes. I miss those “pink pistol” debates between Glen and Harry.

It may sound strange but I’m rather glad that you criticized me on TigerTalk. I’ve long regretted that TigerTalk virtually degenerated to classified advertising and directory requests. When Larry Gindler commenced TigerTalk it was intended to be a listserv where faculty and students actively debated scholarly issues. Sadly there is no longer campus-wide listserv for scholarly debate. There are some specialty listservs, but it’s sad that there’s no longer a listserv for debate that spreads across the entire campus.

David XXXXX who wrote the tidbit that you challenged assumed you were a student Gordon. I subsequently revealed to him that you are a professor. He says he would like to write a more technical rejoinder to your criticisms of his tidbit, but I hope he just lets this one lie.

Having said all this, the May 23 edition of Tidbits (subject to some tweaking) is up and running at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/tidbits/2007/tidbits070523.htm
I don’t know if I should be happy or sad that you will not be reading any of these tidbits Gordon.

Bob Jensen
May 22, 2007

May 22, 2007 reply from Paul Williams [Paul_Williams@NCSU.EDU]

There is a substantial amount of misleading information in refereed scholarly journals, particularly ours, as well.

Paul

May 23, 2007 reply from Dan Stone, Univ. of Kentucky [dstone@UKY.EDU]

Good insights gentlemen on blogs vs. scholarly journals. A few more thoughts:

1. academic institutions are conservative and increasing in their conservatism. At this point, posting to or creating blogs brings intrinsic, communitarian rewards to the "poster" or "creator". But my Dean (and most others, I suspect) cares only about my publications in a remarkably small number of scholarly journals.

2. given the mission creep (or should this be "mission crap") of most institutions the end-point of academic scholarship seems to be that only publications in a single U.S. journal will have extrinsic (i.e., careerist) value.

3. reforming the creepy, crappy academic scholarship domain requires bold iconoclasts like Bob and Paul who are willing to note that the Emporers are frequently severely underclothed.

Dan Stone
Univ. of Kentucky

"The Role of Blogs In Studying the Discourse and Social Practices of Mathematics Teachers"
by Katerina Makri and Chronis Kynigos, University of Athens
Journal of Educational Technology & Society, vol. 19, no. 1, 2007 ---  http://www.ifets.info/issues.php?show=current.

Added October 10, 2007

Bob Jensen

Blogs

A blog that is well done will take almost all your time.

The benefits lie firstly in how much you learn by doing a blog, especially what you learn from other blogs you visit often. You also learn from replies of other people to your blog. For example, today I naively stated that Fusion 3 is great for running the Windows OS on a Mac but that it probably would not run the new Windows 7. In less than an hour my good friend Glenn Kroeger (geology professor at Trinity University and super geek) set me straight that Fusion 3 works great on a high powered Mac.

Secondly, giving something back to a world, a profession, and many friends you meet along the way is a tremendous intrinsic reward. I discuss this under the term listserv at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm#ListServs

The problem with blogs is that there are now millions of great blogs in the world and hundreds in the field of accountancy. It's impossible to keep up with all of them.

"6 Tips For Building a High Quality Blog Following," by Shane Snow, Marshable, January 3, 2012 ---
http://ht.ly/8gu3L
Thank you Robert Harris for the heads up.

Jensen Comment
Keys to success for a Website are somewhat different than keys to success for a blogging site. For a Website the key to success is content --- lots of it even if the content is narrowly focused. The reason is that the most hits usually come for users of Web crawlers like Google, Yahoo, and Bing. For blog posts, huge-content files can become wearisome.

Sometimes accounting articles (rare)
Arts and Letters Daily --- http://www.aldaily.com/

An excellent similar site that is more focused on behavioral economics and finance (but rarely accounting) is Miguel Barbosa's Simoleon Sense blog ---
http://www.simoleonsense.com/
If Miguel has political leanings he hides them pretty well when giving balance coverage about the bon bons and turds of economics and finance.

CFO Magazine Bibliography (by James Martin) --- http://maaw.info/CFO.htm
CFO site see http://www.cfo.com/magazine/

Bob Jensen's threads on behavioral accounting, economics, and finance are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Theory01.htm#Behavioral

Musings on Markets (Aswath Damodaran at NYU) --- http://aswathdamodaran.blogspot.com/

Update on Lanny Arvan:  From SCALE Experiments to Blogs

Years ago economics professor Lanny Arvan directed the famous in a controlled SCALE experiments comparing resident full-time students at the University of Illinois taking onsite versus online courses from the same instructors using common grade assessment procedures. Thirty courses across multiple disciplines were examined across five years of experimentation ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/255wp.htm#Illinois
In spite of some technology glitches in those olden days, many students tended to prefer taking the courses online. Typically, many more students moved from B grades to A grades in online courses. However, there tended to not be much difference for D and F students, indicating that lack of motivation and aptitude cuts across online and onsite pedagogies in mostly the same way.

In one of my technology workshops Dan Stone (then from the University of Illinois) gave us an overview that I still serve up his PowerPoint and audio files ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/000cpe/00start.htm

"Teaching With Blogs, by Lanny Arvan, Inside Higher Ed, July 27, 2010 ---
http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/07/27/arvan

“It is my impression that no one really likes the new. We are afraid of it. It is not only as Dostoevsky put it that 'taking a new step, uttering a new word is what people fear most.' Even in slight things the experience of the new is rarely without some stirring of foreboding.”
--Eric Hoffer, Between The Devil And The Dragon

I tried the new in fall 2009, teaching with student blogs, (look in sidebar and scroll down) out in the open where anyone who wanted to could see what the students were producing. The blogging wasn’t new for me. I’d been doing that for almost five years. Having students blog was a different matter. I had no experience in getting them to overcome their anxieties, relaxing in writing online, learning to trust one another that way. Normally I believe what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. If I could blog comfortably and get something from that, so could they. On reflection, however, I was very gentle with myself when I started to blog. As an experiment to prove to myself whether I could do it, for three full weeks I made at least one post a day, 500 to 600 words, a couple of times 1,100 to 1,200 words. I didn’t tell a soul I was doing this. There was no pressure on me to keep it up. It was out in the open, yet nobody seemed to be watching. After those three weeks I felt ready. In the teaching, however, at best I could ask the students to blog once a week. I gave the students weekly prompts on the readings or to follow up on class discussion. (See the class calendar for fall 2009. The prompts are in the Friday afternoon entries.) If I let them blog quietly to get comfortable as I had done, the entire semester would expire before they were ready to go public. There seemed no alternative but to have them plunge in.

The uncertainty about how best to assist the students once they had taken the plunge created an important symmetry between the students and me; we both were to learn about how to do this well, often by first doing it less well. Though it was an inadvertent consequence, of all my teaching over the past 30 years I believe this course came closest to emulating the Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education by Chickering and Gamson. I learned to comment on the student posts, not with some pre-thought-through response based on what I anticipated they’d write, but rather to react to where they appeared to be in their own thinking. (This post provides a typical example. The student introduced time management as a theme. My comment aimed to make her think more about time management.) As natural as that is to do in ordinary conversation, I had never done it before when evaluating student work. Indeed, I didn’t think of these comments as evaluation at all. I thought of them as response. In the normal course of my non-teaching work I respond to colleagues all the time and they respond to me. This form of online interaction in the class made it more like the rest of my interactions at work.

Most of the students were quite awkward in their initial blogging. Good students all, the class was a seminar on "Designing for Effective Change" for the Honors Program, but lacking experience in this sort of approach to instruction, the students wrote to their conception of what I wanted to hear from them. I can’t imagine a more constipated mindset for producing interesting prose. For this class there was a need for them to unlearn much of their approach which had been finely tuned and was quite successful in their other classes. They needed to take more responsibility for their choices. While I gave them a prompt each week on which to write, I also gave them the freedom to choose their own topic so long as they could create a tie to the course themes. Upon reading much of the early writing, I admonished many of them to "please themselves" in the writing. I informed them that they could not possibly please other readers if they didn’t first please themselves. It was a message they were not used to hearing. So it took a while for them to believe it was true. In several instances they tried it out only after being frustrating with the results from their usual approach. This, as Ken Bain teaches us, is how students learn on a fundamental level.

I'm crustier now than I was as a younger faculty member. Nonetheless, I find it difficult to deal with the emotion that underlies giving feedback to students when that feedback is less than entirely complimentary to them. Yet given their awkward early attempts at writing posts that’s exactly what honest response demanded. It’s here where having the postings and the comments out in the open so all can see is so important, before the class has become a community, before the students have made up their minds about what they think about this blogging stuff. Though both the writing and the response are highly subjective, of necessity, it is equally important for the process to be fair. How can a student who receives critical comments judge those comments to be fitting and appropriate, rather than an example of the insensitive instructor picking on the hapless student? Perhaps a very mature student can discern this even-handedly from the comments themselves and a self-critique of the original post. I believe most students benefit by reading the posts of their classmates, making their own judgments about those writings and then seeing the instructor’s comments, finally making a subsequent determination as to whether those comments seem appropriate and helpful for the student in reconsidering the writing.

A positive feedback loop can be created by this process. The commenting, more than any other activity the instructor engages in, demonstrates the instructor’s commitment to the course and to the students. In turn the students, learning to appreciate the value of the comments, start to push themselves in the writing. Their learning is encouraged this way. Further, since the blogging is not a competition between the students and their classmates, those who like getting comments begin to comment on the posts of other students. The elements of the community that the class can become are found in this activity.

Since on a daily basis I use blogs and blog readers in my regular work, one of the original reasons for me taking this approach rather than use the campus learning management system was simply that I thought it would be more convenient for me. Also, given my job as a learning technology administrator, I went into the course with some thought that I might showcase the work afterward. Openness is clearly better for that. However in retrospect neither of these is primary. The main reason to be open is to set a good tone for the class. We want ideas to emerge and not remain concealed.

Yet there remains one troubling element: student privacy. Is open blogging this way consistent with FERPA? As best as I’ve been able to determine, it is as long as students “opt in.” (I did give students the alternatives of writing in the class LMS site or writing in the class wiki site. No student opted for those.) My experience suggests, however, that is not quite sufficient. If most students opt in, peer pressure may drive others to opt in as well. More importantly, however, students choose to opt in when they are largely ignorant of the consequences. Might they feel regret after they better understand what the blogging is all about?

Continued in article

Off the Kuff (Trinity alum) --- http://offthekuff.com/wp/?p=eephmmmebxdfo&paged=470

Disemboweler Jon Stewart Eviscerates Blogosphere (VIDEO)
The Blogs Must Be Crazy ---
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/05/disemboweler-jon-stewart_n_450715.html

This is an example of how commentaries in blogs often set the record straight.

"When banks voluntarily do principal reductions," by Felix Salmon, Reuters, July 11, 2011 ---
http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/07/11/when-banks-voluntarily-do-principal-reductions/

So, unusually, Felix Salmon is wrong:
"Accounting is destiny," Interfluidity.com --- http://www.interfluidity.com/v2/2039.html

So, unusually, Felix Salmon is wrong:

In order for banks to offer principal reductions, two criteria need to have been met: (a) they came into the mortgages via acquisition, rather than writing them themselves; and (b) they bought the mortgages at a discount… Economically speaking…what the banks are doing here does not make sense. Either writing down option-ARM loans makes sense, from a P&L perspective, or it doesn’t. If it does, then the banks should do so on all their toxic loans, not just the ones they bought at a discount. And if it doesn’t, then they shouldn’t be doing so at all.

It makes perfect sense for banks to reduce principal on loans valued at less than par on their books, and to refuse to do so for other loans.

Let’s suppose we have a loan whose direct value will increase if we offer to reduce the principal owed. That’s not a rare situation. As Salmon writes, “a sensibly modified mortgage is likely to be much more profitable for a bank than forcing a homeowner into a short sale or foreclosure and trying to sell off the home in the current market.” Under these circumstances, one effect of a principal reduction is to increase the expected present value of the cash flows associated with the loan. Ka-ching!

However, there are two offsetting effects. The most widely discussed is moral hazard. Banks worry that borrowers for whom a principal reduction would impair rather than enhance the economic value of the loan will find ways of getting reductions too, by strategic mimicry or due to changing norms and public pressure. That helps to explain why (Salmon again), “principal reductions were being done on many mortgages which were actually current and in good standing, rather than on mortgages which were careening towards foreclosure.” Keeping principal modifications something that is offered only to “our best customers” keeps the practice voluntary. It preserves banks’ freedom to discriminate between profit-making and loss-making modifications.

The second offsetting effect of an otherwise desirable principal reduction is a matter of accounting. If a bank has a loan on its books valued at par, and it offers a principal reduction, it must write down the value of the loan. It takes a hit against its capital position, and experiences an event of nonperformance that even the most sympathetic regulators will have no choice but to tabulate. If a bank has purchased a loan at a discount, however, the loan is on the books at historical cost. The bank can offer a principal reduction down to the discounted value without experiencing any loss of book equity.

Of course this is a matter of mere accounting. Whether or not a bank takes a capital hit has no bearing on whether a principal reduction will increase the realizable cash-flow value of the loan.

But accounting is destiny. The economic value of a bank franchise, both to shareholders and managers, is intimately wound up with its accounting position. A bank whose books are healthy may distribute cash to shareholders and managers, while a bank whose capital position has deteriorated will find itself constrained. A well-capitalized bank is free to take on lucrative, speculative new business, while a troubled bank must remain boringly and unprofitably vanilla. The option to distribute and the option to speculate have extraordinary economic value to bank shareholders and managers.

You cannot understand banking at all unless you understand that banks must be valued as portfolios of options. You can value some businesses by estimating the present value of cash flows from firm assets, and then subtracting liabilities. But banks are more complicated than that. The value of a bank is a function not only of expected cash flows, but of the shape of the probability distribution of those cash flows, and of the diverse arrangements that determine how different cash flow realizations will be split among a bank’s many stakeholders. A hit to a bank’s capital position narrows the distribution of future cash flows (by attracting regulatory scrutiny) and diminishes the degree to which cash flows can be appropriated by shareholders and managers rather than other parties. To say that a bank should only be concerned with maximizing the long-horizon value of its loan book is like arguing that the holder of a call option ought not object if her contract is rewritten at a higher strike price, because, after all, changing the strike price doesn’t reduce the economic value of the underlying. A bank’s accounting situation and regulatory environment define the terms of the options that are the main source of value for big-bank shareholders. Accounting changes imply real transfers of wealth.

Now the value of a bank to shareholders and managers is very different from the social value of a bank. If we aggregate the interests of all of a banks’ claimants — shareholders, managers, bondholders, depositors, counterparties, guarantors — there is far less optionality. From a “social perspective”, what we want banks to do is to lend into enterprises whose interest payments reflect real value generation and then maximize the expected value of those cash flows, irrespective of who gets what among bank claimants. If we were serious about that, we would force banks to write down their loan portfolios aggressively, so that going forward shareholders and managers have nothing to lose by offering principal modifications when doing so would maximize the cash flow value of their loans. But if we did force banks to write their loan portfolios down aggressively, the shareholders and managers with nothing to lose would be different people than the current shareholders and managers of large banks, via some resolution process or restructuring. Which is much of why we didn’t do that, when we had the chance, and why bank mismanagement of past loans continues to exert a drag on the real economy as we try and fail to go forward. This very minute, there are homeowners who are nervously hoarding cash, who are leaving factories idle and neighbors unemployed, in order to maximize the option value of the bank franchise to incumbent shareholders, managers, and uninsured creditors.

Also read the excellent comments!

Bob Jensen's threads on the need for more commentaries on accounting research articles ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TheoryTAR.htm

"Reader Poll: Tech Tool You're Most Excited to Take into the Classroom," by Julie Meloni, Chronicle of Higher Education, August 10, 2010 ---
http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Reader-Poll-Tech-Tool-Youre/26127/

I'm not sure I've ever said this out loud, but ReadWriteWeb is my absolute favorite blog in all the blogosphere, and has been since they began covering all things technology-related in 2003 or so—it's the emphasis on critical thinking and analysis rather than knee-jerk "first!" responses to news and events that makes me respect them so.

Recently, my most favorite RWW author (Audrey Watters) asked educators for input via Twitter: what's the tech tool you're most excited to take into the classroom with you this fall?. Audrey is collecting responses for use in an upcoming RWW story, so between now and August 15th feel free to help her out.

However, I'm interested in your answers as well. No, I don't aim to write a similar story as Audrey, but I do wonder about the different answers based on the different audiences. Audrey's readership comes from the already highly-technologically-inclined, often found on Twitter. The ProfHacker audience in the CHE is not necessarily so. In fact, I think it is safe to say that the majority of the ProfHacker readership is not on Twitter and is more technology-curious than technology-embedded (or invested).

So, I'd like to hear from you as well. In the comments, please let us know what's the tech tool you're most excited to take into the classroom with you this fall? (anything hardware or software "counts," and I'll even accept analog technologies as valid answers)

Hopefully, given your responses and Audrey's own article from (predominantly) her own audience, there will be some interesting food for thought on the state of technology in higher ed.

Jensen Comment
“Taking into the classroom” is a rather ambiguous phrase that should probably read “taking into the course.” In the latter case, something Camtasia is still on my list of important priorities for things to add to virtually any course whether onsite or online ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/video/acct5342/

Accounting Is a Sewer
If you think we're sometimes critical of the accounting profession and the accounting academy on the AECM, you ain't heard nuthin' until you've heard from the likes of Adrienne  --- http://www.jrdeputyaccountant.com/p/about.html
"Accounting Is a Sewer" --- Click Here
http://www.jrdeputyaccountant.com/2010/12/accounting-is-sewer.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/OVWr+(Jr+Deputy+Accountant)  

You can follow Adrienne's posts at
http://www.jrdeputyaccountant.com

Mark Schaefer (Marketing) --- http://www.businessesgrow.com/

From the Scout Report on October 1, 2010

EduBlogs --- http://edublogs.org/ 

Started in 2005, Edublogs has grown to include almost 60,000 blogs started by people all over the world. The Edublogs site can be used by anyone to create blogs with education content, and most school filters will allow their software to run correctly. The site includes a video introduction on how to get started, and teachers will appreciate that Edublogs includes discussion tools, video embedding, and social media options. Visitors can customize their blog by using over 100 different themes to give each one the personal touch. EduBlogs is compatible with all operating systems, and their site also includes a FAQ section and training guides.

"Cooley Law School Sues Bloggers and Lawyers," Inside Higher Ed, July 15, 2011 ---
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/07/15/qt#265103

The Thomas M. Cooley Law School, a freestanding institution in Michigan, on Thursday sued four anonymous individuals who have posted critical comments online and lawyers who have started an investigation into Cooley's job placement rates. The suits charge defamation, interference with business interests and other violations of the law. "With ethics and professionalism at the core of our law school's values, we cannot – and will not – sit back and let anyone circulate defamatory statements about Cooley or the choices our students and alumni made to seek their law degree here," said Brent Danielson, chair of Cooley's board, in an announcement of the suits.

One of the anonymous bloggers being sued runs a site called Thomas M. Cooley Law School Scam "to bring truth and awareness to the students getting suckered in by this despicable excuse for a law school." The blog questions Cooley's academic quality and charges that very few of its graduates find jobs. (Cooley says 76 percent of graduates find jobs, and that the figure was higher before the economic downturn.)

The law firm being sued is Kurzon Strauss, in New York, which ran a notice on the J.D. Underground website stating (according to the complaint) that it was "conducting a broad, wide-ranging investigation of a number of law schools for blatantly manipulating their post-graduate employment data and salary information" to take advantage of "the blithe ignorance of naive, clueless 22-year olds who have absolutely no idea what a terrible investment obtaining a J.D. is." The notice specifically requests information about Thomas Cooley and, according to the law school, suggested that it was "perhaps one of the worst offenders" in manipulating the data. Currently the J.D. Underground website features a posting with some similar language (but not nearly as strong) to that cited in the complaint, and another posting from the law firm retracting some of its earlier statements, suggesting that "certain allegations ... may have been couched as fact."

Continued in article

Jr Deputy Accountant and Going Concern Chosen as Top 50 Fantastic Accounting Blogs ---
http://www.jrdeputyaccountant.com/2011/01/jr-deputy-accountant-and-going-concern.html
Tom Selling also made the list with his Accounting Onion blog.

50 Fantastic Accounting Blogs --- http://www.onlineaccountingdegree.org/best-accounting-blogs

Jensen Comment
I applaud the sites that made the Top 50. However, I question the bias of the OnlineAccountingDegree.com site itself. It's sponsored by For-Profit universities that do not have AACSB accreditation when, in my viewpoint, students should first seek out online accounting degree programs in AACSB-accredited universities. In the case of those state-supported AACSB universities, the cost per credit hour may be much lower and the quality more reliable than accounting programs linked in For-Profit of the online accounting courses at  http://www.onlineaccountingdegree.org/
For example, the accounting programs listed in a search of "accounting programs" does not even list the online accounting degree programs available from AACSB accredited universities.

It should also be noted that Texas will not even allow candidates to sit for the CPA examination unless they've had at least five accounting courses onsite such that graduates of fully online programs cannot even sit for the CPA examination.

My advice to prospective online accounting students is to first look for accounting degree programs in AACSB universities such as flagship state university programs such as those the University of Connecticut, Wisconsin, Maryland, Massachusetts, etc.

My favorite example of what I consider For-Profit university frauds are the For-Profit online accounting doctoral programs listed at http://www.onlineaccountingdegree.org/
If you want to embarrass and online accounting doctoral program, ask who will be advising the dissertations and look carefully to see if the curriculum is at all comparable to an accounting doctoral program at an AACSB accredited university ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Crossborder.htm#CommercialPrograms
The fact of the matter is that graduates of these non-AACSB online accounting doctoral programs do not face the same academic job market alternatives that are available only to AACSB university accounting graduates.

In my judgment there is no respectable online accounting doctoral program in North America and probably will not be one until an accounting program in an AACSB-accredited university commences to offer an online accounting doctoral program. There are respectable online doctoral programs in other disciplines such as education, but there are none in accounting.

I have respect for the "50 Fantastiuc Accounting Blogs" but I've no respect for the company that chose these winners, OnlineAccountingDegree.com at
 http://www.onlineaccountingdegree.org/ 

January 8, 2010 message from David Albrecht [albrecht@PROFALBRECHT.COM]

A really, really good blog is CPA Trendlines ( http://cpatrendlines.com). I find it so useful, it is one of four from whom I'm grateful to receive tweets (retheauditors, feiblog, compliance week are the others). BTW, thanks to a hint from Francine, I was made aware of TweetDeck and it is much easier to track tweets.

Anyway, Rick Telberg has published some really useful stats from BLS.
http://cpatrendlines.com/2010/01/08/accounting-loses-2600-jobs-in-december/comment-page-1/#comment-546857 

He summarizes in the article that accounting is down 44,000 jobs from the start of this recession. Ouch! There are numerous stories of how many are needing to make what they perceive as permanent adjustments to their lifestyle. Ouch!

Dave Albrecht

Other Accounting Blogs
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/AccountingNews.htm

Tech Blogs
Tech Crunch --- http://www.techcrunch.com/
PC World's choices for the Top 100 blogs on June 25, 2007 --- http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,133119/article.html 

Interesting Blog on Twitter --- http://glinner.posterous.com/the-conversation-23

Top 50 Economics Blogs --- http://bankling.com/2009/top-50-economics-blogs/#more-604

Google Blog Directory --- http://www.google.com/press/blogs/directory.html

Bob Jensen's Sort-of Blogs --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/JensenBlogs.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called New Bookmarks --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called Tidbits --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
Current and past editions of my newsletter called Fraud Updates --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm

Immigration Law News --- http://www.canadausvisas.com/

Jerry Trites called my attention to the new "Babbage" blog from my favorite magazine The Economist (I read it cover-to-cover every week.)  ---
http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage?fsrc=nlw|pub|03_30_2010|publishers_newsletter

From Trites E-Business Blog on April 1, 2010 (no fooling) --- http://www.zorba.ca/blog.html

Babbage - A New Blog

The Economist Magazine has launched a new blog called Babbage.

Named after Charles Babbage, the father of the computer, our new blog aims to understand the world through the technology that now impacts our lives and reveals so much about us. Recent posts investigate the role of geeks (they are now officially cool, running companies and making millions), mourn the demise of the analog car, and ask just who Apple's iPad is for. Answer: no one knows, not even Apple.

The blog is at this URL. It's worth bookmarking, as the Economist is always on point.

Feminist Philosophers Blog --- http://feministphilosophers.wordpress.com/2010/04/10/ways-women-are-excluded/

From the Scout Report on October 9, 2009

In rules issued this week, the Federal Trade Commission declares that bloggers must disclose the receipt of free products and existing financial interests F.T.C. to Rule Blogs Must Disclose Gifts or Pay for Reviews [Free registration may be required] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/business/media/06adco.html?hp

Bloggers face disclosure rules --- http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-bloggers6-2009oct06,0,4733519.story

 FTC Tells Amateur Bloggers to Disclose Freebies or Be Fined
http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/10/ftc-bloggers/

 FTC Publishes Final Guides Governing Endorsements, Testimonials http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

 Concurring Opinions: FTC and Blogger Disclosure Rules
http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2009/10/ftc-and-blogger-disclosure-rules.html

 Google Blog Directory --- http://www.google.com/press/blogs/directory.html

Why are advertisers paying more money for space on blogs and social networks?
Americans have been devoting 17 percent of all their Internet time to social networks like Facebook and blogging Web sites like Blogger. The percentage for last month is up from 6 percent a year earlier. The report comes from Nielsen Co. and follows its decision to team up with Facebook on a marketing program that helps advertisers measure how well their ads work on the online hangout.Nielsen estimates that ad spending on leading social-network and blogging sites more than doubled year-over-year, to about $108 million for the month. This happened even as several industries decreased their overall ad spending.
MIT's Technology Review, September 25, 2009 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/wire/23532/?nlid=2383

A growing number of professors are becoming bloggers

Media studies as a discipline has been quick to embrace the potentials of new-media platforms as channels for sharing our research and scholarship. A growing number of junior and senior faculty members in our field are becoming bloggers. At the same time, media scholars are pooling their efforts to contribute to larger projects, such as the biweekly webzine Flow, which runs pieces on many aspects of contemporary television and digital culture, and In Media Res, which each day offers a short video clip and commentary by a leading media scholar. These same strategies can be and are being adopted across a range of academic disciplines, as scholars make a greater commitment to circulate their findings more broadly and to respond to contemporary issues in a thoughtful and timely manner.
Henry Jenkins, "Public Intellectuals in the New-Media Landscape," Chronicle of Higher Education, April 4, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/weekly/v54/i30/30b01801.htm

David Albrecht Goes Green

"Questions From A Future Blogger," by David Albrecht, The Summa, January 14, 2010 ---
http://profalbrecht.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/questions-from-a-future-blogger/

Accounting and/or financial blogs are a big deal. As the world evolves and becomes faster paced, long-lived jobs will disappear. We accountants will adapt by piecing together a career from many project-length opportunities. I believe it will be a matter of professional life or death for accountants to get on top of evolving current events and stay there. For there to be life, we all need to make life-long learning a lifestyle.

The ability to think will separate thrivers from survivors and hangers-on. We accountants will need to think critically (buzzword for analyze and understand what is going on), creatively (inventing solutions) and practically (applying cutting edge skills to implement solutions).

How will we get learn to think these ways and grow our thinking? Independent blogs commentaries like The Summa, and re: The Auditors, and TaxGirl. Blogs provide input to fuel critical thinking, seeds for creating thinking, and energy for practical thinking.

So, I want to encourage accounting/financial blogging. Then along came this e-mail. from a Summa reader, asking about my blogging process. Although I don’t reveal his identity, I’m already aware of his writing and his unifying message. He has a lot to contribute, and I think he should blog. So, I wrote this blog piece. His comments/questions are in emphasized green, answers in normal font.

Continued in article

"Blog Comments and Peer Review Go Head to Head to See Which Makes a Book Better," by Jeffrey Young, Chronicle of Higher Education, January 22, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/free/2008/01/1322n.htm?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

What if scholarly books were peer reviewed by anonymous blog comments rather than by traditional, selected peer reviewers?

That's the question being posed by an unusual experiment that begins today. It involves a scholar studying video games, a popular academic blog with the playful name Grand Text Auto, a nonprofit group designing blog tools for scholars, and MIT Press.

The idea took shape when Noah Wardrip-Fruin, an assistant professor of communication at the University of California at San Diego, was talking with his editor at the press about peer reviewers for the book he was finishing, The book, with the not-so-playful title Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies, examines the importance of using both software design and traditional media-studies methods in the study of video games.

One group of reviewers jumped to his mind: "I immediately thought, you know it's the people on Grand Text Auto." The blog, which takes its moniker from the controversial video game Grand Theft Auto, is run by Mr. Wardrip-Fruin and five colleagues. It offers an academic take on interactive fiction and video games.

Inviting More Critics

The blog is read by many of the same scholars he sees at academic conferences, and also attracts readers from the video-game industry and teenagers who are hard-core video-game players. At its peak, the blog has had more than 200,000 visitors per month, he says.

"This is the community whose response I want, not just the small circle of academics," Mr. Wardrip-Fruin says.

So he called up the folks at the Institute for the Future of the Book, who developed CommentPress, a tool for adding digital margin notes to blogs (The Chronicle, September 28, 2007). Would they help out? He wondered if he could post sections of his book on Grand Text Auto and allow readers, using CommentPress, to add critiques right in the margins.

The idea was to tap the wisdom of his crowd. Visitors to the blog might not read the whole manuscript, as traditional reviewers do, but they might weigh in on a section in which they have some expertise.

The institute, an unusual academic center run by the University of Southern California but based in Brooklyn, N.Y., was game. So was Mr. Wardrip-Fruin's editor at MIT Press, Doug Sery, but with one important caveat. He insisted on running the manuscript through the traditional peer-review process as well. "We are a peer-review press—we're always going to want to have an honest peer review," says Mr. Sery, senior editor for new media and game studies. "The reputation of MIT Press, or any good academic press, is based on a peer-review model."

So the experiment will provide a side-by-side comparison of reviewing—old school versus new blog. Mr. Wardrip-Fruin calls the new method "blog-based peer review."

Each day he will post a new chunk of his draft to the blog, and readers will be invited to comment. That should open the floodgates of input, possibly generating thousands of responses by the time all 300-plus pages of the book are posted. "My plan is to respond to everything that seems substantial," says the author.

The institute is modifying its CommentPress software for the project, with the help of a $10,000 grant from San Diego's Academic Senate, to create a version that bloggers can more easily add to their existing academic blogs.

A Cautious Look Forward

Mr. Wardrip-Fruin's friends have warned him that sorting through all those comments will take over his life, or at least take far more time than he expects. "It's been said to me enough times by people who are not just naysayers that it is in the back of my mind," he acknowledges. Still, the book's review process "will pale in comparison to the work of writing it."

He expects the blog-based review to be more helpful than the traditional peer review because of the variety of voices contributing. "I am dead certain it will make the book better," he says.

Mr. Sery isn't so sure. "I don't know how this general peer review is going to help," the editor says, except maybe to catch small errors that have slipped through the cracks. Traditional peer review involves carefully chosen experts in the same subject area, who can point to big-picture issues as well as nitpick details. He bets that the blog reviews might merely spark flame wars or other unhelpful arguments about minor points. "I'm curious to see what kind of comments we get back," he says.

That probably "depends on what you're writing about," says Clifford A. Lynch, executive director of the Coalition for Networked Information, a group that supports the use of technology in scholarly communication. "If, God help you, you're writing about current religious or political issues, you're going to get a lot of people with agendas who aren't interested in having a rational discussion. Some of them are just psychos."

Even without flame wars, Mr. Sery equates the blog review with the kind of informal sharing of drafts that many academics do with close friends. It's useful, but it's still not formal peer review, he argues. Carefully choosing reviewers "really allows for the expression of their ideas on the book," he says. Scholars can say with authority, for instance, that a book just isn't worth publishing.

Ben Vershbow, editorial director at the Institute for the Future of the Book, concedes that comments on blogs are unlikely to fully replace peer review. But he says academic blogging can play a role in the publishing process.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
This is one of those experiments that is impossible to extrapolate. Blog comments are totally voluntary and impulsive such that blog comments are going to be highly variable with respect to topics, errors in the original document, and extent of the readership in the blog. Few blog activists are going to give time and attention to reviews that are not going to be widely read.

Peer reviews are likely to be less impulsive since the reviewer generally agrees ahead of time to conduct a review. But they are more variable than blog comments. The reason is that peer reviewers spend less time reviewing manuscripts that are outliers (i.e., those that are so good that there are few recommendations for change or those that are so bad that there's little hope for a future positive recommendation to publish). More time may be spend on manuscripts that need a lot of repair but have high hopes.

The main problem with peer reviews is that there are so few reviewers. Much depends upon which two or three reviewers are assigned to review the manuscript. Three reviewers' garbage may be another three reviewers' treasure. Another problem is that peer reviews are seldom published in the name of the anonymous reviewers. Blog commentators generally do so in their own names and get some reputation enhancement among their blog peers, especially if their are praiseworthy replies on the blog to the blog review. Anonymous reviewers get little incremental reputation enhancement for their unpublished reviews.

Still another problem with peer reviews is that editors and their hand picked reviewers may be a biased subset of a scholarly community. Others in the community may be shut out, which is now a raging problem in academic accountancy --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Theory01.htm#DoctoralPrograms

Bob Jensen's threads on open sharing are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/updateee.htm#OKI

Bob Jensen's threads on oligopoly abuse of scholarly publishing are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudReporting.htm#ScholarlyJournals

On blogs and Web sites, by e-mail and video, the Iraq war is fought on the Internet
U.S. soldiers return from battle to their rooms or tents, boot up their laptops and log on to let their friends and family know they've made it through another day. If their base is large enough, the Internet service provider offers broadband, and they can make a video call home, watch news reports on the war or post their own versions of life in Iraq to their blogs. ''I blog for the same reasons soldiers wrote letters and diaries during previous wars: to communicate with family and friends, (and) to maintain an honest record of our daily existence,'' wrote 1st Lt. Matt Gallagher, in response to an e-mail about his blog http://kaboomwarjournal.blogspot.com . ''Blogging is simply a 21st century tool for a new generation of soldiers to utilize.''
MIT's Technology Review, March 18, 2008 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/Wire/20427/?nlid=945

In April 2007 the blog search engine Technorati reported that it was tracking 70 million blogs, with 120,000 new ones arriving every day --- http://technorati.com/weblog/2007/04/328.html
Technorati --- http://technorati.com/

Search for Blogs (Weblogs) ---  http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm#Blogs

Tech Crunch --- http://www.techcrunch.com/

PC World's choices for the Top 100 blogs on June 25, 2007 --- http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,133119/article.html 

Interesting Blog on Twitter --- http://glinner.posterous.com/the-conversation-23

Top 50 Economics Blogs --- http://bankling.com/2009/top-50-economics-blogs/#more-604

Google Blog Directory --- http://www.google.com/press/blogs/directory.html

Ace of Spades (irreverent but finds interesting modules) --- http://ace.mu.nu/

Professors Fama and French operate a very informative Q&A Blog in economics and financial markets at
 http://www.dimensional.com/mt/mt-search.cgi?blog_id=1&tag=Research&limit=20

It's Been Ten Years Since the Blog Was Born Out of Something Called a Weblog --- http://www.trinity.edu/~rjensen/245glosf.htm#Weblog
Google has a blog search tool --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm#Blogs

I fit into the category of an original NWAL blogger category meaning that I'm a Nerd Without A Life blogger. Now of course there are millions of bloggers who also have a life. I'm still stuck in the NWAL category.

New Blogs (at least new to me near the end of 2007)

Rate Your Students (be prepared for four letter words and worse) --- http://rateyourstudents.blogspot.com/
Perhaps this to counter RateMyProfessor --- http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/index.jsp
There is also a Professors Strike Back (largely video) site at http://www.mtvu.com/professors_strike_back/ 

From the Scout Report on November 21, 2008

Fast Blog Finder 2.50 --- http://www.fastblogfinder.com/ 

As its name indicates, the Fast Blog Finder helps users look for weblog posts that have a particularly high ranking in Google for a given phrase. It can be useful for research purposes, and visitors can also make use of it if they wish to attract more traffic to their own websites. This version is compatible with all operating systems.

Most Popular American Bar Association (ABA) Blogs

• Corporette
• The Legal Satyricon
• The Becker-Posner Blog
• iPhone J.D.
• Ernie the Attorney
• What the Judge Ate for Breakfast
• Underneath Their Robes
• The Inspired Solo
• The Brockovich Report
• Banking Law Prof Blog

Bob Jensen's threads on free online law and legal studies tutorials and videos ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob2.htm#Social

Other blogs --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Searchh.htm#Blogs
Google's blog search tool is at http://blogsearch.google.com/
(For example, search "Student Examination" at the above Google site)
(Accountants may want to search for "Accounting" at the above Google site)
(More serious accountants may want to search "FAS 133" or "IAS 39" at the above Google site.)

Bob Jensen's blogs and various threads on many topics --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm

To celebrate this tenth "blogiversary" on July 14, 2007, The Wall Street Journal on Pages P4-P5 ran a special column by Tunku Varadarajan that highlighted some of the leading blogs ---
http://blogs.wsj.com/onlinetoday/2007/07/14/pursuits-extras-for-saturday-july-14-2/

The WSJ blogiversary highlights the impact of some of selected blogs.

Christopher Cox, Chairman of the SEC, recommends searching for blogs at Google and Blogdigger ---  http://www.blogdigger.com/index.html
He points out that Sun Microsystems CEO Jack Schwartz in his own blog challenged the SEC to consider blogs as a means of corporate sharing of public information.
Jensen Comment
But more recently CEO John Mackey of Whole Foods got in trouble with the SEC for his anonymous blog.
See "Mr. Mackey's Offense," The Wall Street Journal, July 16, 2007; Page A12 --- Click Here

Christopher Cox, a strong advocate of XBRL,  gives a high recommendation to the following XBRL blog:
For fast financial reporting, a recommended blog is Hitachi America, Ltd XBRL Business Blog --- http://www.hitachixbrl.com/

One of the great bloggers is one of the all-time great CEOs is Jack Bogle who founded what is probably the most ethical mutual fund businesses in the world called Vanguard. He maintains his own blog (without a ghost blogger) called The Bogle eBlog --- http://johncbogle.com/wordpress/

Nobel laureate (economics) Gary Becker runs a blog with Richard Posner called the Becker-Posner Blog --- http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/

Actress and humanitarian Mia Farrow maintains blogs on her visits to troubles pars of the world.
See  http://www.miafarrow.org/
One of her favorite blogs (not one that she runs) is BoingBoing.net --- http://www.boingboing.net/
She is also a heavy user of satellite phones --- http://www.gpsmagazine.com/

James Toranto discusses the powerful impact that blogs have had on politics and government.
He recommends the following political blogs:
KausFiles.com from the liberal/progressive UK media outlet called Slate --- http://www.slate.com/id/2170453/
InstaPundet.com from a liberatarian law professor --- http://www.instapundet.com/
JustOneMinute.typepad.com --- http://www.justoneminute.typepad.com/

Jane Hamsher founded a political blog at http://www.firedoglake.com/
She recommends the following leftest-leaning blogs:
CrooksAndLiars.com --- http://www.crooksandliars.com/
TBogg.blogspot.com --- http://www.tbogg.blogspot.com/
DigbysBlog.blogspot.com --- http://www.digbysblog.blogspot.com/

General Kevin Bergner is a spokesman for the Multi-National Force in Iraq and generally gives straight talk a world of distorted and biased media --- http://www.mnf-iraq.com/
Some of his favorite blogs are as follows:
Small Wars Journal --- http://smallwarsjournal.com/index.php
Blackfive --- http://www.blackfive.net/
The Mudville Gazette --- http://www.mudvillegazette.com/

Newt Gingrich recommends the following conservative-politics blogs:
RedState,com --- http://www.redstate.com/
Corner.NationalReview.com --- http://corner.nationalreview.com/
Powerline Blog --- http://www.powerlineblog.com/

Dick Costolo is a Group Product Manager at Google. He likes the following blogs:
The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs by an imposter --- http://www.fakesteve.blogspot.com/
New Media and the Future of Online Publishing --- http://publishing2.com/
Photo Blogs --- http://www.photoblogs.org/

Tom Wolfe (popular novelist) grew "weary of narcisstic shrieks and baseless information."

Xiao Qiang, the founder of Chna Digital Times, recomments the following blogs:
ZonaEuropa for global news with a focus on China --- http://www.zonaeuropa.com/weblog.htm
Howard Rheingold's tech commentaries on the social revolution at http://www.smartmobs.com/
DoNews from Keso (in Chinese) --- http://blog.donews.com/keso
(Search engines like Google will translate pages into English)

Jim Buckmaster, CEO of Craigslist recommends the following blogs:
One of the first tech blogs --- http://slashdot.org/
Metafilter (a wiki community blog that anybody can edit) --- http://www.metafilter.com/
Tech Dirt --- http://www.techdirt.com/

Elizabeth Spiers is the founding editor of the news/gossip blogs called Gawks/Jossip and the financial blog Dealbreaker.. She recommends the following blogs:
The liberatarian Reason Magazine blog --- http://www.reason.com/blog/
MaudNewton blog on literature and culture (and occasional political rants) --- http://maudnewton.com/blog/index.php
Design Observer --- http://www.designobserver.com/

How did they fail to overlook the following NWAL blogs?
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/threads.htm
New Bookmarks --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/bookurl.htm
Tidbits --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/TidbitsDirectory.htm
Fraud Updates --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/FraudUpdates.htm

Bob Jensen's favorite free blogs (other than major newspaper, magazine, and  accountancy blogs that I track):
Aljazeera --- http://english.aljazeera.net
Commentary --- http://www.commentarymagazine.com/
New Republic --- http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/browse
Inside Higher Ed --- http://www.insidehighered.com/ 
The Finance Professor --- http://financeprofessorblog.blogspot.com/
Financial Rounds --- http://financialrounds.blogspot.com/
Consumer Reports Web Watch --- http://www.consumerwebwatch.org/
Issues in Scholarly Communication --- http://www.library.uiuc.edu/blog/scholcomm/
Knowledge@Wharton --- http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/
Multi-National Force --- http://www.mnf-iraq.com/
NPR --- http://www.npr.org/
PC World --- http://www.pcworld.com/columns/
PhysOrg --- http://physorg.com/ (Good coverage of happenings in science and medicine)
WebMD --- http://www.webmd.com/
Wired News --- http://www.wired.com/  (not as good as it used to be)
WorldNetDaily --- http://www.worldnetdaily.com/  (watch for bias and the mixing of adds with news)
Y-Net News --- http://www.ynetnews.com/home/0,7340,L-3083,00.html

I will probably be adding the following blogs on a less regular basis:
The Bogle eBlog --- http://johncbogle.com/wordpress/
Becker-Posner Blog --- http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/
CrooksAndLiars.com --- http://www.crooksandliars.com/
Small Wars Journal --- http://smallwarsjournal.com/index.php
Blackfive --- http://www.blackfive.net/
The Mudville Gazette --- http://www.mudvillegazette.com/
The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs by an imposter --- http://www.fakesteve.blogspot.com/
New Media and the Future of Online Publishing --- http://publishing2.com/
Photo Blogs --- http://www.photoblogs.org/
Tech Dirt --- http://www.techdirt.com/

For Newspapers and Magazines I highly recommend Drudge Links --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/DrudgeLinks.htm
In particular I track Reason Magazine, The Nation, The New Yorker, Sydney Morning Herald, Sky, Slate, BBC, Jewish World Review, and The Economist

For financial news I like The Wall Street Journal and the Business sub-section of The New York Times

For Book Reviews I like --- http://www.booksindepth.com/period.html
Also see the blog of the national book critics circle board of directors ---
http://bookcriticscircle.blogspot.com/

Much more of my news and commentaries comes from online newsletters such as MIT's Technology Review, AccountingWeb, SmartPros, Opinion Journal, The Irascible Professor, T.H.E. Journal, and more too numerous to mention.

And I also get a great deal of information from various listservs and private messages that people just send to me, many of whom I've never met.

A Blog for Students of Investment Strategies --- http://bonasimm.blogspot.com/

Top 50 Economics Blogs --- http://bankling.com/2009/top-50-economics-blogs/#more-604

Google Blog Directory --- http://www.google.com/press/blogs/directory.html

Ace of Spades (irreverent but finds interesting modules) --- http://ace.mu.nu/

Association of Government Accountants Blog
Inside Government Accounting --- http://aga.typepad.com/
There's quite a lot here on fraud and forensic accounting

Deloitte's International Accounting Blog --- http://www.iasplus.com/index.htm
Thanks to Paul Pacter this is probably the best site in the world for international accounting news

A Very Successful Blog
Stuff White People Like --- http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com/

"Stuff White People Like," by Evan R. Goldstein, Chronicle of Higher Education's The Chronicle Review, April 18, 2008 --- http://chronicle.com/weekly/v54/i32/32b00401.htm?utm_source=at&utm_medium=en

What do the Sunday New York Times, Barack Obama, knowing what's best for poor people, having gay friends, and arts degrees have in common? According to Christian Lander, they are all "stuff white people like." A mere three months ago, the 29-year-old Internet copywriter started a blog by that name with a post satirizing white people's affinity for coffee, noting that they are fond of sayings like, "You do NOT want to see me before I get my morning coffee" and are happy to pay a premium for fair-trade coffee because "the extra $2 means they are making a difference."

That item struck a nerve. Stuff White People Like averages around 300,000 hits a day, and its numbered catalog of the cultural, political, and social predilections of highly educated, middle-class, liberal, white people is nearing 100 items. At the end of March, Random House announced that it had signed Lander, who is himself white, to a book deal widely reported to be worth around $300,000.

The blog's emergence as a cultural phenomenon has triggered a wide-ranging discussion about race, humor, and whether Stuff White People Like is a trenchant critique of white cultural mores — or a backhanded celebration of white cultural superiority.

Gary Dauphin, writer and blogger: Stuff White People Like … smells like a classic racial con job. It goes without saying that the specific entries (Oscar parties?) don't really apply to anyone. That makes Lander's overall pose — and the uncritical response to it — the real action. You'd think from the approving hubbub that SWPL had discovered (white) America or something, but white comedians, academics, and artists have been thinking and cracking wise about "white" culture since before Lander was in, well, the short pants he's posted about. Usually even jokey talk about whiteness has a whiff of danger to it, but SWPL is likely the safest, most-affable racial satire ever, a loving high-five between friends passing as critique. (The Root)

Dean Rader, associate professor of English, University of San Francisco: One more reason SWPL has resonated is due to its very smart awareness of what I call "Overculture," which is the subject of my next book. Stuff White People Like is fantastic at mapping the icons of Overculture — those popular texts that indicate a ubiquity in American consumer and popular culture. For example, Starbucks plays music heard on The Wire, which gets written about in Slate, which has an agreement with NPR, which reviews books available in Borders, which sells coffee and expensive sandwiches. Overculture is a new kind of cultural map that circumscribes everything that has hit a tipping point, everything educated people should either consume or be aware of. (The Weekly Rader)

Gregory Rodriguez, senior fellow, New America Foundation: As unusual as Lander's site is, it is also part of a sociological trend among whites who live in increasingly non-Anglo cities and regions: their transformation into a minority group. Whites used to think of themselves as standard-issue American — they had the luxury of not having to grapple with the significance of their own racial background; they were "us" and everyone else was "ethnic." Not anymore. (Los Angeles Times)

Adam Sternbergh, editor at large, New York: Even as an admitted yoga-practicing, public-radio-listening, Wrigley Field-visiting, Wes Anderson-movie-watching, Arrested Development-championing white dude — i.e., someone squarely in the targets of Stuff White People Like — I don't feel even mildly chastened about yoga, NPR, Wes Anderson, or Arrested Development after reading this blog. In fact, all the site's entries, while superficially chiding, can actually be divided into three very comforting categories:

1) Entries that don't reflect your lifestyle choices … and therefore make you feel superior.

2) Entries that do reflect your lifestyle choices … and therefore make you feel like you're in on the joke.

3) Entries that nod to commonly held comic stereotypes … and therefore, because you recognize them, make you feel superior. (The New Republic Online)

David Mills, screenwriter: The No. 1 biggest thing white people like is pretending to poke fun at themselves. … Here are a few things that white people don't like:

1. Black bosses.

2. Mexicans.

3. Being told they're wrong.

4. Panhandlers.

5. Black people on magazine covers.

6. Islam. (Undercover Black Man)

Megan McArdle, associate editor, The Atlantic: All right, let me add myself to the list of white people who don't like Stuff White People Like. Leave aside the arrogance of declaring "white people" to be equal to a rather small group of self-satisfied, overeducated, affluent poverty vultures. And I actively applaud its purpose — my demographic is a rich vein of humor. One that should be strip mined.

Unfortunately, SWPL just isn't very funny. How can you take a target as rich and inviting as people who deliberately buy ugly shoes and produce … a dull thud? (Asymmetrical Information, The Atlantic Online)

Alex Jung, blogger: Its cleverness is getting stale because it hasn't exhibited ways to think differently; one can predict the rest of the posts — white people also like to dress their pets … and watch Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing and think about how "real" it is. [Lander] recognizes the dumb things white people do, such as believing they know what's best for poor people, but just as he will still spend 10 bucks on a sandwich, white people will still think buying a Gap T-shirt will end poverty in Africa. It's a critique followed by a shrug. (Race Wire, Colorlines)

I would love to learn about your favorite blogs!

From The Washington Post on July 23, 2007

What was the name of a technique invented in the early 1970s that often used reverse-chronological blog-like ordering?

A. talk.text
B. .plan file
C. net.log
D. .me folder
 

Anita Campbell's Small Business Blog on the AccountingWeb --- http://www.accountingweb.com/blogs/anita_campbell_blog.html

Bob Jensen's small business helpers are at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Bookbob1.htm#SmallBusiness

From the Financial Rounds Blog on April 21, 2008 --- http://financialrounds.blogspot.com/

The latest new finance blog note is titled Empirical Finance Research, which is intended to (in the authors' own words):

• Highlight research from the academic finance archives that may be useful to investors.
• Serve as a venue for the contributors to share our thoughts and insights with others who enjoy empirical finance research.
• Act as an outlet for authors or readers who would like to showcase their latest research.

It's authored by three guys (two of which are currently pursuing Ph.D.s in finance), and focuses on applications of current academic finance research. Good job, gentlemen, and keep up the good work. The world needs more blogs by finance PhDs.

The Empirical Finance Research blog is at http://empiricalfinanceresearch.blogspot.com/

"Favorite Education Blogs of 2008," by Jay Mathews, The Washington Post, April 7, 2008 --- Click Here

Early last year, as an experiment, I published a list of what I and commentator Walt Gardner considered our favorite education blogs. Neither Gardner nor I had much experience with this most modern form of expression. We are WAY older than the Web surfing generation. But the list proved popular with readers, and I promised in that column to make this an annual event.

Bernstein: The name is obviously a takeoff on the foregoing. The author of this one occasionally posts elsewhere as well. This site often provides some incisive and clear explanations of the key aspects of educational policy.

Mathews: I agree, but have a bias here, too. This is an Education Week blog, and I am on the board of trustees of the nonprofit that publishes Ed Week.

My promise was actually more specific: "Next year, through bribery or trickery, I hope to persuade Ken Bernstein, teacher and blogger par excellence, to select his favorite blogs and then let me dump on his choices, or something like that." As I learned long ago, begging works even better than bribery or trickery, and Bernstein succumbed. Below are his choices, with some comments from me, and a few of my favorites.

They are in no particular order of quality or interest. Choosing blogs is a personal matter. Tastes differ widely and often are not in sync with personal views on how schools should be improved. I agree with all of Bernstein's choices, even though we disagree on many of the big issues.

Bernstein is a splendid classroom teacher and a fine writer, with a gift for making astute connections between ill-considered policies and what actually happens to kids in school. He is a social studies teacher at Eleanor Roosevelt High School in Prince George's County and has been certified by the prestigious National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. He is also a book reviewer and peer reviewer for professional publications and ran panels on education at YearlyKos conventions. He blogs on education, among other topics, at too many sites to list. He describes his choices here as a few blogs he thinks "are worthwhile to visit."

 

· Bridging Differences. blogs.edweek.org/edweek/Bridging-Differences/

Bernstein: Deborah Meier and Diane Ravitch in the past have had their differences on educational issues. They both serve at the Steinhardt School of Education at New York University, and this shared blog is as valuable as anything on the Web for the insights the two offer, and for the quality of their dialog.

Mathews: I have a personal bias about this blog. I know Meier and Ravitch well, consider them the best writers among education pundits today and frequently bounce ideas off them.

 

· Eduwonk. www.eduwonk.com/

Bernstein: I often disagree with Andrew J. Rotherham, but his has been an influential voice on education policy for some years, and even now, along with all else he does, he serves on the Virginia Board of Education.

Mathews: I often agree with Rotherham, and my editors sometimes complain that I quote him too much. But the guy is only 37 and is going to be an important influence on public school policy for the rest of my life and long after.

 

· Edwize. www.edwize.org/

Bernstein: The site is maintained by the United Federation of Teachers, the New York affiliate of American Federation of Teachers. They have a number of authors, many active in New York schools, but they occasionally have posts from others. Full disclosure: I have been invited to cross-post things I have written elsewhere.

Mathews: A nice mix of both comment on policy and inside-the-classroom stuff from teachers.

 

· Education Policy Blog. educationpolicyblog.blogspot.com/

Bernstein: The site describes itself as "a multiblog about the ways that educational foundations can inform educational policy and practice! The blog will be written by a group of people who are interested in the state of education today, and who bring to this interest a set of perspectives and tools developed in the disciplines known as the 'foundations' of education: philosophy, history, curriculum theory, sociology, economics and psychology." Most of the participants are university professors. I am a participant from time to time in this blog.

 

     Eduwonkette. blogs.edweek.org/edweek/eduwonkette/ 

Continued in article

Social Networking for Education:  The Beautiful and the Ugly

Google's May 28-29, 2009 I/O Conference --- http://code.google.com/events/io/

Google Terminated Google Wave in 2010
Google Wave --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Wave

Google Wave is a self-described "personal communication and collaboration tool" announced by Google at the Google I/O conference on May 27, 2009.^[1][2] It is a web-based service, computing platform, and communications protocol designed to merge e-mail, instant messaging, wikis, and social networking.^[3] It has a strong collaborative and real-time^[4] focus supported by extensions that can provide, for example, spelling/grammar checking, automated translation among 40 languages,^[2] and numerous other extensions.^[4] Initially released only to developers, a "preview release" of Google Wave was extended to 100,000 users in September 2009, each allowed to invite twenty to thirty additional users. On the 29th of November 2009, Google accepted most requests submitted soon after the extended release of the technical preview in September 2009; these users have around 25 invitations to give.

Social Networking Sites and Our Lives --- http://pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Technology-and-social-networks.aspx

"52 Cool Facts About Social Media," http://dannybrown.me/2010/07/03/cool-facts-about-social-media/
Thank you David Albrecht for the heads up!

Google Plus --- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Plus

"Google+ Comes Up Short," by Joshua Ganz, Harvard Business Review Blog, July 7, 2011 --- Click Here
http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/07/google_comes_up_short.html?referral=00563&cm_mmc=email-_-newsletter-_-daily_alert-_-alert_date&utm_source=newsletter_daily_alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=alert_date

What problem does Google+ solve for consumers? The answer appears to be: nothing. And, therefore, it solves nothing for Google either.

As with many of these social launches — an exception being the ill-fated Google Buzz — the launch of Google+ was limited. Like Gmail and Google Wave, Google relied on invites to scale initial users and work out issues before a wider launch. I, somehow, managed to score access to Google+ from Day One of its recent launch, and I'm here to report on it. (I should note that opinions vary.)

What I found upon signing up was a routine to search my Google contacts and allocate people to Circles. The idea is that should any of them sign up to Google+ I could neatly organize my friends according to whatever category I thought best fit them. I could also find anyone currently on Google+ and choose to follow them. Ironically, I chose to follow Mark Zuckerberg the CEO of Facebook, but I also followed Google's founders. The latter seem to participate regularly and lots of people comment on their activities. The former, unsurprisingly, not so much (although Zuckerberg seems to be the most followed person on the network).

I then spent a little time filling in my profile (you can view it here). You can even follow my Google Buzz feed from there, a legacy of automatic reposting of my tweets and shared Google Reader links.

Having done lots of set-up, I waited to see what happened. The answer to that was: not much. For Google+ to work, it has to be populated. Specifically, it has to be populated with people the user is interested in. As it is early days, that crucial feature isn't there.

This (lack of) network effect could do Google+ in if it can't get a virtuous cycle going. So the question is whether Google+ has the potential to attract a large enough network.

The reasoning why Google itself might desperately want this to work out is clear. Facebook and Twitter are grabbing attention and Google is in the business of getting attention and on-selling it to advertisers. Add to that the fact that the type of attention that comes from users providing content and demonstrating their interest by commenting and subscribing to things, and Google+ (were it to work) could yield important information that helps advertisers target consumers better.

Continued in article

"3 Steps Google Plus Must Take to Win Against Facebook," by Zubin Wadia, ReadWriteWeb, June 29, 2011 ---
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/3_steps_google_must_take_to_win_against_facebook.php

Congratulations to the Google Plus team for shipping a superb beta under conditions which could be considered equal parts turmoil and FUD.

I absolutely love it. If it had 750 million users on it right now it would be a superior experience to Facebook.

For starters, it looks more cohesive. This isn't surprising because it is a blank slate product that did not have to deal with the technical debt Facebook has accumulated since 2004. Beyond the interface however, Google Plus will be more engaging emotionally for people because it allows them to be more authentic with one another.

Why? Because Google Plus establishes intuitive clarity for my social graph.

"Social Networking Threats to Security," by Jerry Trites, IS Assurance Blog, August 25, 2011 ---
http://uwcisa-assurance.blogspot.com/

This article links to
"Social networking security threats by the numbers," IT World of Canada, August 15, 2011 --- Click Here
http://www.itworldcanada.com/news/social-networking-security-threats-by-the-numbers/143741?sub=1520550&utm_source=1520550&utm_medium=top5&utm_campaign=TD+

Bob Jensen's threads on computer and networking security ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ecommerce/000start.htm#SpecialSection

"Thanks to Google Plus, Picasa Gets Unlimited Storage for Photos & Videos, Also Better Tagging," by Sarah Perez, ReadWriteWeb, July 1, 2011 ---
Click Here
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/thanks_to_google_plus_picasa_gets_unlimited_storage_for_photos_and_videos.php

With the launch of Google Plus, there may be some confusion as to how the photos uploaded to the social network (Google+) integrate with Google's online photo-sharing service (Picasa), especially in terms of storage limits. The answer provides some great news for Google Plus users - nearly everything you upload to Google Plus won't count towards your storage limits on Picasa, with the only exception being videos longer than 15 minutes.

And there's another nifty feature involving photo-tagging, too - your Google+ friends can now tag your Picasa photos.

Thus far I past my photographs on two Web servers at Trinity University:

Server One
Bob Jensen's Pictures and Stories
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/Pictures.htm

Server Two
More of Bob Jensen's Personal History in Pictures ---
http://www.cs.trinity.edu/~rjensen/PictureHistory/

"Beware Social Media's Dark Side, Scholars Warn Companies:  Technology festival features academic gadflies," by Jeffrey Young, Chronicle of Higher Education, March 20, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Beware-Social-Medias/126813/?sid=wc&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en

Bob Jensen's threads on the dark side of education technology in general ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/theworry.htm

The Marriage of SMSS and CMS:  Will you take this partner for better or for worse, in sickness and in health?

"The State and Future of the Social Media Management System Space," ReadWriteWeb, March 18, 2011 ---
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/the_state_and_future_of_the_social_media_management_system_space.php

This post originally appeared on guest author Jeremiah Owyang's blog. Social Media Management Systems, like CMS systems for websites, help companies manage, maintain, and measure thousands of social media accounts. Although the nascent SMMS space is only one year old, 58% of corporations have adopted at least one of these 28 vendors. Altimeter is conducting a formal research report on the SMMS topic (see research agenda for 2011), However, I wanted to give a year-end state, after coining this category 12 months ago and listing out vendors.

SMMS systems are the next growth market for the social business category. While saturation is at 58% of corporate buyers, the average deal size is a meager $22,000 but will expect to grow to six figure annual deals in coming quarters to meet market demand. This growing space has low barriers to entry, which result in a flood of clones, but expect only a handful to remain after a shakeout to serve enterprise-class buyers.

Continued in article

Jensen Comment
It will be interesting to see how the marriage of SMSS with CMS software plays out. CMS stands for Course Management Systems which includes everything from 1990s versions of Authorware and ToolBook to present revised versions of Authorware and ToolBook that have been virtually eclipsed by CMS systems such as Blackboard and Moodle. A summary of the history of CMS software can be found at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/290wp/290wp.htm

SMMS will inevitably become part and parcel to CMS since social media is becoming such a vital part of learning and education and student communications. But CMS itself will remain important for examination management, course record keeping, password-controlled serving up of course materials available to enrolled students but not available to the public in general, chat rooms, instant messaging, etc.

Bob Jensen's threads on education technology are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

"Social Media Lure Academics Frustrated by Journals," by Jennifer Howard, Chronicle of Higher Education, February 22, 2011 ---
http://chronicle.com/article/Social-Media-Lure-Academics/126426/

Social media have become serious academic tools for many scholars, who use them for collaborative writing, conferencing, sharing images, and other research-related activities. So says a study just posted online called "Social Media and Research Workflow." Among its findings: Social scientists are now more likely to use social-media tools in their research than are their counterparts in the biological sciences. And researchers prefer popular applications like Twitter to those made for academic users.

The survey, conducted late last year, is the work of Ciber, as the Centre for Information Behaviour and the Evaluation of Research is known. Ciber is an interdisciplinary research center based in University College London's department of information studies. It takes on research projects for various clients. This one was paid for by the Emerald Publishing Group Ltd. The idea for the survey came from the Charleston Observatory, the research arm of the annual Charleston Conference of librarians, publishers, and vendors.

An online questionnaire went to researchers and editors as well as publishers, administrators, and librarians on cross-disciplinary e-mail lists maintained by five participating publishers—Cambridge University Press; Emerald; Kluwer; Taylor & Francis; and Wiley. Responses came from 2,414 researchers in 215 countries and "every discipline under the sun," according to David Nicholas, one of the lead researchers on the study. He directs the department of information studies at University College London.

Continued in article

Bob Jensen's threads on social networking are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm

Some things you did not know about the latest technology
Did You Know video --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ILQrUrEWe8

While nasty little kids are driving their "fat, ugly, and molesting" teachers to give up the ghost because of networked and often false insults, their older brothers, sisters, parents, and misfits (many of whom are foreign enemies) are bent on overthrowing government regimes. No regime is immune from the instabilities caused by technologies that have great benefits to societies along with emerging costs that we'd not anticipated.

Anarchists have never had it so good!

Is this something George Orwell failed to anticipate or is it something that will ultimately bring on the evils of Big Brother?

Twittering an evil dictator sounds like a great thing until we discover that a nation may forever be thrown into instability and hunger by these little "tweets." Twittering may bring wealth and prosperity to Egypt in this decade, but don't count on it doing so for all the world in the 21st Century.

"Stability's End:  Technologies with goofy names like Twitter and Facebook are replacing political stability with a state of permanent instability," by Daniel Henninger, The Wall Street Journal, February 3, 2011 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704358704576118754214049490.html?mod=djemEditorialPage_t 

'Stability" has been the goal of civilized foreign policy since the dawn of the Cold War and arguably since the Congress of Vienna, which posited a framework for international relations in 1815. Stability, whose virtues are many, has had a worthy run. It's done.

Stability is done as we have known it, at least until political leadership evolves a better understanding than they have shown during the events in Egypt of the permanently unstable world they've tumbled into. The man who pitched the curators of national stability into their current shocked state—evident this week in the streets of Cairo and before that in the capital of Tunisia and before that in the U.S.'s November elections—is William Shockley.

Shockley, a physicist, co- invented the transistor. The transistor replaced the vacuum tube as the central component of all electronic devices. The transistor enabled Twitter, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, an ocean of apps and the unending storm of information that blows all of us, including politicians, here and there like leaves. Why would anyone think it possible in such a world for a Hosni Mubarak to maintain stability with the methods he's used since 1981?

The point here is not to argue again that information and communication technology (ICT) has caused another colorful "revolution." Nor is it to overstate the power of these technologies to enable democratic reform.

My point is merely to describe what is going on in front of our faces: This new, exponentially expanding world of information technologies is now creating permanent instability inside formerly stable political arrangements.

This stuff disrupts everything it touches. It overturned the entire music industry, and now it is doing the same to established political systems.

Here is how it works. In 2007, Egypt sentenced a blogger named Kareem Amer to four years in prison for insulting the president. Ten years ago, Mr. Amer would have simply disappeared, like all the others. So what if his family and 15 friends grumbled? Stability.

Not now. Instead, Mr. Amer became an icon of regime repression. What changed? Instead of 15 friends whispering over coffee in a café, 15,000 can talk to each other all day and every day via Internet cafés about who's getting tortured. According to the Open Net Initiative's helpful country profiles, some one million Egyptian households have broadband access, often sharing lines.

Think what this means at the crudest level: Huge swaths of any wired population exist in a state of engagement. Instability. Before, stifled populations were mostly sullen. Now, all the time, they're in mental motion.

Even if the Mubarak thugs somehow disperse the people in the street, they'll return some day because there is no effective way to cap their ability to share grievances on a massive scale. Egypt earlier pulled the plug on its entire Internet. So what? No nation will turn it off forever.

The Egyptian government itself has been responsible for expanding ICT, even making cheap computers available. Tunisia's autocrats wired their own nation, with some 1.7 million Internet users in a population of 10.2 million.

Continued in article

February 4, 2011 reply from David Fordham

Bob, what's old is apparently new again.

Either that, or author Henninger is completely ignorant of history.  I agree with Henninger in general.  But it's not new.  The same exact argument he makes about transistorized technology can be leveled against Gutenberg (and just as deservedly) hundreds of years ago.  Anyone who's been to Europe is aware of the instability which devastated that highly-civilized society after the invention of the printing press made it possible for radical new ideas to get into the hands of a wide (and generally unthinking, relatively uneducated, unenlightened, and catastrophically impatient) audience.  Instead of peaceful discussion, conferencing, give-and-take, diplomacy, and other less destructive avenues of change, which admittedly take time and are not as immediately effective, the widespread dispersal of "any man's" ideas -- happening without regard to the origin, merits, or value of those ideas-- resulted in the very instability Henninger is describing.

Riots, mob violence, millions of deaths, wanton destruction of wealth (ruination of the fruit of human labor) on an unprecedented scale, complete destruction of priceless antiquities, disappearance of what we today call "civil rights", nations appearing, nations disappearing, leaders rising and falling, polarization of the population... all of this and more can trace its origins to the widespread dissemination of ideas which upset the status quo -- new concepts being put to an unprepared populace.

Much has also been written about the impact of the printing press on the American independence movement, which the English still call "the uprising" or "the revolt".

I'm sure Shockley would be honored to have the results of his work compared with Gutenberg.  (Alas, Shockley is often demonized because "he called it as he saw it" after extensive research in genetics and human behavior.)    This is why I'm not a big fan of complete democracy in the presence of irresponsible "journalism", whether on paper or on a cell phone screen.  As Scar says in the movie the Lion King,.... (click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfSea_Q4WXg  ... 15 seconds.)

So I disagree with the use of the word "new" when Henninger says his point is to "describe what is going on... the "new" exponentially-expanding world of information technologies is creating permanent instability ..."   No.  The exponentially expanding world of information technologies dates from the invention of writing, and political instability is not "created by" technology. (tip of the hat and wink to David Coy.)  It is created by people who utilize the technology in a particular way, usually a very ignorant, short-sighted, and often self-serving way, without realizing the long-term effect their action has on the human institutions.  Today's journalists, commentators, "pundits", and yes, even some of us old graybeard denizens of the academy (like yours truly) often spout off ideas which, simply due to the reach of the technology, like Gutenberg's, will cause others to reach conclusions, judgments, opinions, attitudes, etc. which the originator hadn't stopped to think about, and if the originator had, probably would not have promulgated in the first place.

The author of an old book called Ecclesiastes says there is a time (and place) for everything. This implies that there is an inappropriate time and place.  I believe it.

Read some articles about the iconoclasts, the resulting counter-reformation, the inquisitions, and other results of Gutenberg's invention to see what we're in for if our journalists (and social networkers) aren't careful.   Perhaps one might begin to appreciate some of my acidity, rancor, and contempt for so much of today's "news". I've been there and although I haven't "done that", I have seen its effects, and it isn't pretty.

Bottom line:  I agree entirely and completely with Henninger's take on instability, and the widespread dispersal of communication leading to instability.  But this is not new.

David Fordham
JMU

Video:  Scar's surrounded by idiots --- https://mail.google.com/a/trinity.edu/#inbox/12decc30470f9b36

June 5,  2009 message from Carolyn Kotlas [kotlas@email.unc.edu]

ARE LOWER GRADES LINKED TO FACEBOOK USE?

When doctoral student Aryn Karpinski's unpublished study connecting students' heavy Facebook use and lower grades was presented at the annual meeting of the American Education Research Association in April it created a "media sensation" both in the press and among academic blogs. Not everyone found her conclusions convincing.

Three researchers attempted to replicate Karpinski's findings using three datasets: (1) a large sample of undergraduate students from the University of Illinois at Chicago, (2) a nationally representative cross sectional sample of American 14– to 22–year–olds, and (3) a longitudinal panel of American youth aged 14–23. They report (in "Facebook and Academic Performance: Reconciling a Media Sensation with Data," by Josh Pasek, Eian More, and Eszter Hargittai, FIRST MONDAY, vol. 14, no. 5, May 4, 2009) that "[i]n none of the samples do we find a robust negative relationship between Facebook use and grades. Indeed, if anything, Facebook use is more common among individuals with higher grades."

The article is available at
http://www.uic.edu/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/2498/2181

First Monday [ISSN 1396-0466] is an online, peer-reviewed journal whose aim is to publish original articles about the Internet and the global information infrastructure. It is published in cooperation with the University Library, University of Illinois at Chicago. For more information, contact: First Monday, c/o Edward Valauskas, Chief Editor, PO Box 87636, Chicago IL 60680-0636 USA;
email: ejv@uic.edu;
Web: http://firstmonday.org/

See also:
"Study Finds Link between Facebook Use, Lower Grades in College"
http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2009/05/facebook.html

Poster of Karpinski's study
http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/facebook2009.jpg

Bob Jensen's threads on the pros and cons of education technology, including distance education, can be found at http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on Education/Learning Applications of ListServs, Blogs, Wikis, Social Networking, and Twitter in education are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm

For nearly two decades I've updated a Web document called "The Dark Side" in which I post things that worry me about advances in education and communication technology --- http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/theworry.htm

Business Week now has a very long cover story that fits right into "The Dark Side." I don't consider myself a prude or a religious nut. But this trend in networking most certainly discourages me about how technology sometimes eats away at morality and good name of technology. This is yet another dark side tidbit on the evils of technology that goes along with ID theft, malware spreading, Internet frauds, porn, plagiarism, malicious hacking, and the like. I was a bit surprised to find this article in Business Week rather than Newsweek or Time Magazine.
.
The infidelity economy may be "alive, well, and profitable." But so is porn!

Those of you teaching about advances in social networking should also cover the emerging dark sides of social networking.

"Cheating, Incorporated:  At Ashley Madison's website for "dating," the infidelity economy is alive, well, and profitable," by Sheelah Kolhatkar , Business Week, February 10, 2011 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_08/b4216060281516.htm?link_position=link2

Do you want to have an affair?

After hearing an ad on Howard Stern's radio show or seeing a schlocky commercial on late-night TV, you might find yourself on AshleyMadison.com—the premier "dating" website for aspiring adulterers. Type in the URL, and as the page loads a gauzy violet backdrop appears with a fuzzy image of a half-dressed couple going at it beyond a hotel doorway. "Join FREE & change your life today. Guaranteed!"

Setting up a profile costs nothing and takes about 12 seconds. First you check off your availability status: "attached male seeking females," "attached female seeking males," or, even though the concept of the site is that all users are in relationships and therefore equally invested in secrecy, "single female seeking males." Next you're asked for location, date of birth, height and weight, and whether you're looking for something "short term," "long term," "Cyber affair/Erotic Chat," "Whatever Excites Me," and so on. If you're like me, you choose a handle based on the cupcake you most recently ate—"redvelvet2"—and then shave a few years and pounds off your numbers.

Once you provide an e-mail address that your spouse would presumably never have access to, you're thrust into Ashley Madison's low-tech pink and purple interface. And then, if you're a woman, the onslaught begins.

Continued in article

February 12, 2011 reply from Francine McKenna

Bob,

 

Maybe you forgot it was that terrible Ashley Madison.com site, the one that advertises on CNBC and wanted to advertise on the Superbowl that lured the poor Ernst & Young partner into a debauched life of inside trading and illicit love triangles.

 

Bad, bad internets...

 

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2009/07/insider_trading_as_common_as_f.html

In the fall of 2004, a fortysomething investment banker named Donna Murdoch logged into Ashley Madison, the discreet dating website married people visit "when divorce is not an option," and introduced herself to James Gansman, a partner at Ernst & Young in New York. The two struck up a relationship, meeting occasionally in hotels in Philly, New York, and California, and talking on the phone about their lives: James told Donna about how he was kicking ass at work, Donna told James about how she was struggling with her subprime mortgage.

Eventually the two settled into a comfortable day-to-day routine in their respective offices in New York and Philadelphia, staring at the same Yahoo Finance screen.

Sweet. Bill and Melinda Gates used to do kind of the same thing when they were long-distance dating. They'd see the same movies in different places and then talk about them on the phone. We just though we'd mention that, because that's the kind of information we have trapped inside our brains, and we hope that by releasing it we can make room for other things. Anyway, Donna and James's relationship did not go the way of Bill and Melinda's.

Eventually, their conversations about business grew more specific.

Mr. Gansman led Ms. Murdoch in a guessing game about which deals he was working on, she said. "The game was that I wouldn't be looking and he would give me hints: The market cap of two billion or market cap of 400 billion, and here's what they do, and he'd read it to me, and ultimately make sure I guessed," Ms. Murdoch testified. Before long, the guessing game fell away. Mr. Gansman told her more directly about upcoming deals of Ernst clients, she said.

She made $400, 000 off the deal, and the SEC noticed. He made nothing, and now he's going to jail. The end.

Insider Affair: An SEC Trial of the Heart [WSJ via Business Insider]

Francine McKenna

Managing Editor

My site: http://retheauditors.com

At Forbes: http://blogs.forbes.com/francinemckenna

@ReTheAuditors on Twitter

312-730-4884

 

February 12, 2011 reply from Jagdish Gangolly

Bob, Steve,

The forensic practices at the Big 4 are WAY ahead of the accounting academia in using the technology to cover the dark side of social networking in e-discovery. We in the accounting academia have been too busy regressing to take note.

I know of at least two who used it extensively in fraud examination as far back as 2008. They demonstrated its use to me while I was designing our fraud examination course.

One commercial product that is popular is attenex. See http://www.jurinnov.com/attenex.asp 

Jagdish

Bob Jensen's threads on social networking are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListservRoles.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on The Dark Side ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/theworry.htm

Bob Jensen's threads on Education Technology ---
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/000aaa/0000start.htm

"Why Most Facebook Marketing Doesn't Work," ReadWrite Blog, February 17, 2011 ---
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/why_most_facebook_marketing_doesnt_work.php

For almost four years, since the Facebook Platform was launched, I have been involved in delivering Facebook apps for top brands such as CBS, NBC, Lifetime, Universal Music, Visa and more. Here's what we have learned doesn't work, and more importantly, what does work.

First, deep campaigns don't work. Digital agencies love deep, expensive campaigns on Facebook, with tons of pages, interaction, and art. It fits in with how agencies build microsites and websites, and justifies the $100,000-plus price tag that they like to charge. Examples include lightweight games, prediction contests, treasure hunts where you include friends, and such. Unfortunately for agencies and the brands that drop a lot of cash, Facebook users decidedly don't like deep campaigns.

hey do not like to spend 20 or 30 minutes on a single brand's page, unless they are consuming innovative, funny, or exclusive content. So a travel site looking for a long time spent on a page should not put up a treasure hunt on a world map where you invite your friends and can together find great prizes after exploring cities. Sounds good in a pitch meeting, but it results in abysmally numbers of active users.

Facebook users are very sophisticated, and there is no way a single campaign is going to compete on game mechanics with CityVille. If you want to build CityVille, it might work. But, even Netflix pulled their Facebook app. You're better off putting up a bunch of funny videos from around the world and leave it at that.

Lots of Apps on One Tab Don't Work

It is easy to think of a Facebook tab like a Web page, and throw a bunch of features on it - such as a poll, gifting, and some videos - all on one tab. However, most users do not show up on a Facebook tab like they do on a Web page. They are usually coming in by clicking on a page's newsfeed posting ("What kind of traveller are you? Take the quiz!"), a friend's newsfeed posting ("I'm a cranky traveller! What kind of traveller are you? Take the quiz?"), or a Facebook ad ("Find out what kind of traveller you are!").

Now, if after clicking on one of these links a user is dropped into a Facebook Page tab with eight different things on it, they are not going to see a quiz immediately and move on. There should only be one engagement feature per tab.

Sweepstakes Don't Work

After an initial onslaught of Facebook sweepstakes promotions, marketers are learning that sweepstakes have very low conversion rates and almost no viral uptake. We're also learning that they attract unengaged users who are there for the prize rather than a relationship with the brand.

Continued in article

Bob Jensen's threads on social networking are at
http://www.trinity.edu/rjensen/ListServRoles.htm

So Says Dilbert
"How to Tax the Rich:  Try giving them perks and privileges (an extra vote?) in return, says 'Dilbert' creator Scott Adams," The Wall Street Journal, January 29, 2011 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703293204576106164123424314.html 

The president was too polite to mention it during his State of the Union speech on Tuesday, but here's a quick summary of the problem: The U.S. is broke. The hole is too big to plug with cost cutting or economic growth alone. Rich people have money. No one else does. Rich people have enough clout to block higher taxes on themselves, and they will.

Likely outcome: Your next home will be the box that your laser printer came in. I hope that you kept it.

Whenever I feel as if I'm on a path toward certain doom, which happens every time I pay attention to the news, I like to imagine that some lonely genius will come up with a clever solution to save the world. Imagination is a wonderful thing. I don't have much control over the big realities, such as the economy, but I'm an expert at programming my own delusions. I make no apology for that. A well-crafted delusion can be a delicious guilty pleasure. And best of all, it's totally free. As a public service, today I will teach you how to wrap yourself in a warm blanket of imagined solutions for the government's fiscal dilemma.

To begin, assume that as the fiscal meltdown becomes more perilous, everyone will become more flexible and perhaps a bit more open-minded. That seems reasonable enough. A good crisis has a way of changing people. Now imagine that the world needs just one great idea to put things back on the right track. Great ideas have often changed history. It's not hard to imagine it can happen again.

Try to imagine that the idea that saves the country is an entirely new one. It's too much of a stretch to imagine that a stale idea would suddenly become acceptable. In fact, that's the dividing line between imagination and insanity. Only crazy people imagine that bad ideas can suddenly become good if you keep trying them. So let's assume that our imagined solution is a brand new idea. That feels less crazy and more optimistic. Another advantage is that no one has an entrenched view about an idea that has never been heard.

For those of you with healthy egos—and that would be every reader of The Wall Street Journal—you can make this fantasy extra delicious by imagining that you are the person who comes up with the idea that saves the world. I'll show you how to imagine that. I think you'll be surprised at how easy it is.

I spent some time working in the television industry, and I learned a technique that writers use. It's called "the bad version." When you feel that a plot solution exists, but you can't yet imagine it, you describe instead a bad version that has no purpose other than stimulating the other writers to imagine a better version.

Continued in article

MAAW Social Networks Bibliography ---  http://maaw.info/SocialNetworksBib.htm

Cutting-Edge Social Media Approaches to Business Education: Teaching with LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Second Life, and Blogs, by Charles Wankel ---
http://management-education.net/rmed9/

Mark Schaefer (Marketing) --- http://www.businessesgrow.com/

"Facebook Checks In to the World of Locations," by Walter S. Mossberg, The Wall Street Journal,August 19, 2010 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703649004575437533304450888.html?mod=WSJ_Tech_LEFTTopNews

The 800-pound gorilla of social networks, Facebook, is jumping into the location game.

On Wednesday, it announced a new, optional service for its 500 million members called Places, which allows you to check in to various places you go, and share that information with your Facebook friends, complete with maps and comments and the Facebook thumbs-up "like" feature.

I've been testing the new service, and found it easy to use and reliable, with mostly logical privacy controls, an issue on which Facebook has been bruised in the past.

Companies began to build location-based social networks shortly after smartphones began to include social-networking apps and the ability to pinpoint your location.

These services let you and your network "friends" know if you were in the same area, so you could get together. They also let merchants entice you with coupons or ads.

Walt Mossberg and Geoff Fowler discuss Facebook's new location feature called 'Places,' including details about how it works and Walt's assessment about how it performs. All you had to do was use your smartphone to "check in" an establishment.

These location-based networks, notably Foursquare, have grown fast. Especially in a recession, many users appreciate offers to save money. There also is money to be made by the merchants.

But these networks are controversial. Though most have privacy controls, they are accused of eroding privacy by allowing others to know exactly where you are at any time. They also raise issues about giving such information to merchants.

Fourquare also has turned off some potential users with a big overlay of game-like features, like earning points and badges for visiting places, and even the ability to become the "mayor" of, say, a bar you frequent.

On the Facebook app, you initially can check in to Places only if you have Apple's iPhone, though you can use a site at touch.facebook.com via your browser on other phones and laptops that can track your location and support HTML 5 technology.

In the past week or so, my colleague Katherine Boehret and I have used Facebook Places to check in with iPhones around our home base of Washington, D.C., at stores, bars, restaurants and even our office. I also was able to check in, or "tag," other Facebook members with me, like my visiting son and daughter-in-law. All of these tests went well, but I was surprised by one odd thing: I could check myself into nearby places even if I wasn't there.

At each location, Places lets you see your friends and other Facebook members (even if they're not your friends), who are nearby, a feature called "People Here Now."

Minors are excluded from seeing anyone except their friends. We couldn't test this "Here Now" feature because, in the pre-release stage, there weren't enough people with the new service to be nearby.

These check-ins were posted on our Facebook pages (though, for this test, they could only be seen by the handful of others with pre-release access to the service), and people could comment.

One reason Facebook has launched Places, surely, is to compete with location-based services like Foursquare and Gowalla. Those services already can link up with Facebook and tap its huge member base, a potential threat to the larger social network.

Facebook says it is adding Places merely to enrich the social experience it already provides. The company says its users already post status messages that say things like: "at Starbucks in Harvard Square with Susan and Jeff." Now, they can tap a new Places icon in the Facebook app on their iPhones and do this more easily, complete with a map. "We're just building a new way for people to share that information in an engaging way," says one Facebook official.

Facebook says it isn't monetizing the service, at least not at first, but may consider ways for companies to make use of the data "down the line."

Users won't receive ads or offers, at least initially. But if a merchant already has a Facebook page, some will be able to display your check-ins from the start, though visible only to your friends. Facebook says it has no plans to add game-like features to Places, though third-party developers might.

In addition to testing Places around town, I paid close attention to its privacy features, to judge how much control Facebook is offering users over who gets to see where they are. My conclusion is that the controls are decent, but could be a bit better. You can control how public your Places information is on Facebook's privacy settings screen, in the Sharing section. The default for Places is "Friends Only," unless you expressed a preference to share things with everyone. That's a good thing, in my view. You can change this to broaden it to, say, friends of friends, or even everyone. Or, you can limit it, so that, for instance, only certain people can see your location, or certain people can't.

Facebook also allows you to bar others from checking you in, and lets you hide yourself from others' "Here Now" listings, though you can't customize this latter setting by, say, allowing only some people to know you're nearby.

In my tests, these settings worked fine. But I wished a couple of other settings were available. For example, you can't keep check-in notices off your Facebook page, unless you broadly block other kinds of status updates. And you can't block merchants from including your check-ins at their establishments on their Facebook pages. Also, while Places omits some annoying aspects of its competitors, like the game features, it's more stripped down and leaves out some attractive features others include. Foursquare has a feature that lets you leave suggestions about a location. And Gowalla has a "trips" feature that lets users string together places they've been into recommended tours.

Overall, I found Places a good enhancement to Facebook and one that will likely make the booming social network even more attractive to some.

"Frontiers of Collaboration: The Evolution of Social Networking," Knowledge@Wharton, July 7, 2010 ---  
http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2536              

Social networking tools such as Twitter and the emerging Google Wave web application are taking individuals and organizations to the frontiers of real-time communication and collaboration. The technology has the potential to make it easier to discover and share information, interact with others, and decide what to buy or do. But the key word is "potential": Social networking's evolution is still in its early stages. What makes the current crop of services more promising than those that came before? What are the obstacles to further progress?

An expert panel debated these questions at the annual Supernova technology strategy conference, produced in partnership with Wharton and held last winter in San Francisco. The 2010 Supernova forum will be held this month in Philadelphia.

The panel at the San Francisco event was chaired by David Weinberger, a fellow at Harvard Law School's Berkman Center for Internet and Society and co-author of The Cluetrain Manifesto. Appearing on the panel were: Anna-Christina Douglas, product marketing manager at Google; Laura Fitton, principal of Pistachio Consulting and co-author of Twitter for Dummies; Paul Lippe, founder and CEO of Legal OnRamp; Jason Shellen, founder and CEO of Thing Labs, and Deborah Schultz, a partner with the Altimeter Group. In addition, Google engineers were in the room demonstrating Google Wave by allowing the audience to post to the social networking service during the session; their comments appeared in real time on projection screens near the panelists.

Weinberger began the session by asking panelists what made the introduction of social networking tools different from previous technological endeavors to improve communication and collaboration. One significant issue discussed was how social networking compared with knowledge management (KM). KM systems first appeared on the scene about 20 years ago and once represented the frontier, embodying companies' most innovative ideas for integrating internal access to disparate information in order to improve communication, collaboration and business processes.

KM systems were implemented through technologies such as web portals, e-mail networks, content management systems and business intelligence infrastructure. Web portals, which were probably the most successful type of KM system, allow users to access a range of information -- including reports, diagrams, catalogs and maintenance records -- through one interface, rather than many. The portals also include external information supplied by business partners, government agencies and news sources. The technology automatically pulls information from the sources on demand so that users do not have to search for it manually.

Organizations employ KM systems to increase the value of their "intellectual capital." However, the technology that supports KM systems has traditionally been difficult to develop and deploy. And the systems have not been universally successful at fostering real time collaboration between employees.

According to Shellen -- who was part of the development teams for Google's blogging program and Reader aggregator service -- before social networking tools enabled quick and casual communication, many bloggers in corporate organizations had "some KM tool where you captured the knowledge in the tool's silo and assigned all sorts of tags, folders and so on to it. You would then pass the blog to your manager for him or her to [learn from] what you were writing." Shellen now heads Thing Labs, a San Francisco-based company that builds web-based software for sharing content. Social networking is easing some of the frustration users in many organizations have encountered with traditional KM systems. Through use of Twitter and other tools, more of the intellectual capital that KM systems once guarded is flowing freely, in real time, inside and outside organizations. If an employee needs to find expertise or share information, he or she doesn't have to work within the rigid confines of a KM system, or even the confines of his or her organization. Instead, the employee can use social media to collaborate with others and to find answers more quickly and put relevant advice into practice.

While there are virtues to being able to communicate faster and more easily with social networking tools, panelists agreed that many organizations are struggling to adjust to the spontaneity and loss of control over information that comes with these tools. Concerned that organizations will eventually clamp down, Weinberger asked, "Will all the fun be stripped out of it? Will people become afraid to Tweet about things that are not strictly business-related?" Fitton, whose consulting firm focuses on helping companies to use micro-blogging in a business environment, suggested that companies may find the "messy and random serendipity" of Twitter and other social networks to be more efficient than lumbering KM systems and processes. "It brings an infusion of humanity to business," she noted, who adding that, in her experiences at Pistachio Consulting, she has observed social networking having an impact on organizations by leveling management hierarchies, accelerating team-building across geographical locations, and improving mentoring. She stated that, in some cases, research to find human expertise that used to take many hours can happen much faster when queries are "flung out into the commons" to catch the attention of people who can provide answers more quickly.

Breadth vs. Depth

One of the advantages social networking tools have over KM systems, experts say, is that they simplify the process of obtaining information that would be useful to a business or employee. Tools such as Twitter provide a sort of "KM in the cloud," allowing users to collaborate with each other and send messages to locate expertise without a company having to build and maintain a complex and expensive system to provide these capabilities internally. Social networking tools provide access to a broad population and employ simple, standardized, techniques to link users to information. But while social networking offers "an enormous amount of horizontal power," Lippe said, "most of the hard collaboration problems are [solved] in vertical domains." His firm, Legal OnRamp, is a collaboration platform for lawyers that allows information to be collected and shared virtually. Membership is by invitation only.

Lippe noted that, in the legal field, "there's already a structure of knowledge, and most knowledge repositories and structures of the collaborative web have existed for multiple generations. So, the question is, how do you tap into them?" One core structure is attorney-client privilege, which Lippe said "has long preceded the information confidentiality and security regime that we all have now. It creates the structure of what you can and cannot share." In the legal universe, he added, the messy serendipity of "horizontal" social networking cannot solve the hardest problems. "Lawyers have some questions they will answer for free, and others that they will figure out a way to get paid to answer."

But the legal field's communication sensitivities are "a very specific case," Shellen pointed out. He noted that companies have built private social networks that feature protected blogs and search engines, and that these tools have proven effective in achieving new forms of collaboration while keeping information secure. Organizations are now incorporating use of Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and other social media into their daily routines, although they are in need of systems that can integrate and update the information being posted across all of the platforms. Shellen's Thing Labs produces a reader called "Brizzly" that can be used to provide that service.

Lippe agreed that, despite the concerns he noted, large legal firms have an opportunity to use social networking to reestablish an intimacy with clients that they may have lost as the businesses grew larger and adjusted to structural changes in the industry. Lippe wrote recently on his Legal OnRamp blog that social networking tools can be used to save attorneys from "e-mail and attachment overload" and to "share existing knowledge or collaborate on new work [including] high volume work like commercial contracts and high complexity work like major case litigation."

Office culture plays a significant role in what platform is used to share information, according to Schultz, a partner with the San Mateo, Calif.-based Altimeter Group, a technology strategy consulting firm. She noted that media companies, for example, may be a better fit for the horizontal nature of social networking. Schultz has been active in social media and networking for many years and has advised organizations ranging from startups to Fortune 50 companies, including Citibank and Procter & Gamble. At P&G, she built the P&G Social Media Lab, a program that enables the company to study the new dynamics of customer relationships in the age of social networking, and to use social media to break the mold of standard marketing measures and approaches that were geared toward older types of media. By encouraging brand managers to pay close attention to what customers were saying on community sites and other social networking places, Schultz said the Lab has helped P&G redefine how it engages, communicates with and uses marketing to influence consumers. "I see the tools making the roles we have more porous," she stated. "As the consumer-driven nature of social networking moves into organizations, the collaboration potential of their use becomes more interesting."

The use of tools like Twitter and Google Wave "definitely make a cultural statement," said Douglas. The Google product marketing manager described how Google Wave has the capabilities for real-time, rolling conversation and collaboration among users that can include messages, links and attachments. Douglas noted that each conversation or "wave" can be modified with different editing and replying privileges so that enterprises can "exercise controls for how people want to lock down content." The Google engineers demonstrated the application on the big screen behind the panelists; they showed how users can comment with links embedded in their messages and also load attachments.

Google Wave could be used effectively for private communication inside the firewall, as well as for working with a diverse community outside an organization, panelists said. Previous KM systems did not easily integrate communication with content management, making it difficult to use existing tools to access and manage information during real time conversations. Google Wave and other social networking tools offer the potential of a much tighter integration between communication and content, meaning conversations can include richer information sharing and easier references to content available across the organization.

To Shellen, the most interesting aspect to how social networking and collaboration tools are used is users' ability to join ongoing conversations. He said his firm is currently building a "data set on top of that engagement, where we ask people to explain trending topics on Twitter." The combination of immediate updates plus access to more in-depth information can enhance knowledge. "Tools like Twitter make me much smarter about you," Schultz noted. "And the 'you' could be an entity or an individual." She said that with the right kind of filtering, people can collaborate and make more effective use of the information available on social networks. "Companies can collaborate in real time with customers on products and even pricing."

But does the 140-character limit for posts to Twitter enable engagement, or is it "a sign of triviality?" asked Weinberger. "Constraints breed invention," replied Shellen. Douglas added that communities using Twitter, Google Wave and other tools are creating their own etiquette. Panelists agreed that both the creation of etiquette for particular conversations and the sheer ability to engage in several discussions at once would be difficult using blogs and older forms of web content sharing programs.

An Open and Vibrant World

Weinberger asked the panelists whether progress toward the real-time collaboration frontier is being driven by new technology or human needs. Speaking to the human needs, Fitton observed that social networking tools such as Twitter "help us overcome human isolation in a way that is not brand new but is happening on a different scale." She said that the collaboration possible on the site is a question of "not just; 'What are you doing?' but, 'What do we have in common?'" Fulfilling that need is what fascinates her about the phenomenon. Shellen added: "There's accountability behind it; we now have modes of identity tied to short bursts of communication that are very much 'you.'"

Continued in article

"Trying Out a Revamped Myspace," by Katherine Boehret, The Wall Street Journal, December 22, 2010 ---
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703581204576033703049174660.html

Thanks to the popularity of Facebook, it's easy to assume that all social networks are designed primarily to connect friends with one another. But many of these networks—think Twitter, Yelp and LinkedIn—aren't focused on that. Instead, they provide information from strangers, business contacts and group postings on a variety of topics. Myspace is now also shifting in this direction after Facebook decisively overtook it as the most popular social network.

Last month, the company rolled out a revamped version of Myspace, which is owned by News Corp., publisher of the Wall Street Journal. I've been testing it to see what has changed and if it's worth using. Its interface is cleaner than the old version of Myspace and I found it easy to navigate. It's also inviting for non-members or people who've long-since given up on Myspace. But I can't definitely say I like it enough to add it to my large list of social networks.

Step one of this site's rehab was a new focus. Myspace (myspace.com) was redesigned to serve as a source of information about entertainment. People who use it can follow five categories—TV, music, movies, celebrities and comedy—that include more than 100,000 topics. News about these topics comes from sites all over the Web and is arranged on users' home pages to show loads of information at a glance. A Discovery tab at the top of the page shows content related to trends on Myspace makes suggestions based on a user's preferences and taste. A spokesman said the Myspace topics can be expanded, but for now, if you're fonder of, say, books, theater or hard news, Myspace won't be a good fit.

. . .

This week, a Myspace mobile app was launched in Apple's App Store, and an Android app is due out next year.

Myspace successfully reinvented itself in a way that could very well get people using it again, but Facebook's more personalized social network may be more valuable than a rich library of entertainment content.

Google terminated Google Wave in 2010
Google Wave --- http://code.google.com/apis/wave/
Google Wave is a product that helps users communicate and collaborate on the web. A "wave" is equal parts conversation and document, where users can almost instantly communicate and work together with richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more. Google Wave is also a platform with a rich set of open APIs that allow developers to embed waves in other web services and to build extensions that work inside waves.
Developer Preview --- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQ

Frank Sinatra's Tribute to MySpace --- http://americancomedynetwork.com/animation.html?bit_id=25239

"The Future of Social Networking," Business Week, July 2, 2009 ---
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/special_reports/20070618thefutureo.htm?link_position=link24

Eastman’s Online Genealogy Newsletter – Google Wave
http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/05/googles-wave.html

 West Walkabout – Brought Back Google Wave
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/

Why are advertisers paying more money for space on blogs and social networks?
Americans have been devoting 17 percent of all their Internet time to social networks like Facebook and blogging Web sites like Blogger. The percentage for last month is up from 6 percent a year earlier. The report comes from Nielsen Co. and follows its decision to team up with Facebook on a marketing program that helps advertisers measure how well their ads work on the online hangout.Nielsen estimates that ad spending on leading social-network and blogging sites more than doubled year-over-year, to about $108 million for the month. This happened even as several industries decreased their overall ad spending.
MIT's Technology Review, September 25, 2009 --- http://www.technologyreview.com/wire/23532/?nlid=2383

Facebook is more like having pen pals. How many pen pals can we tolerate if our former students and total strangers keep asking us to be pen pals? To keep my sanity I've not accepted any invitations to become pen pals with over 200 people (many strangers) who invite me to  MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn (North America); Nexopia (Canada); Bebo, Hi5, StudiVZ (Germany); Decayenne, Tagged, XING, Badoo and Skyrock (Europe); Orkut and Hi5 ( South America and Central America); and Friendster, Mixi, Multiply, Orkut, Wretch, Xiaonei and Cyworld (Asia and the Pacific Islands). I’ve even been asked to join social networks in languages that I do not understand.

 I don’t Twitter because I prefer to run at the mouth rather than Tweet.