Another Movie Thread - Because We Love Them So

[kandrathe]

First, either I suck at writing sarcasm or you suck at reading it.

I've been accused of sometimes being too literal... So, it might be me.

Second, it's not the money, it's the principle. SHE PAID A $170 FINE. She did not buy the books (or, at least, if she did then the report failed to say so and implied the opposite).

Clearly, getting medieval on people like her is the only way to get through to them. Go back and read her comments. SHE DOESN'T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT ANYTHING BUT HERSELF. "Bad doggie" is not going to cut it -- unlike the real thing, she doesn't give a damn about pleasing you or anyone else.

BTW, I present her as exhibit A in my case for why libertarianism (also anarchy and communism) is a crock. She's a sight more representative of the typical person than is the informed, concerned, and responsible citizen the libertarians would like us to believe inhabit this nation.

I agree with the principle you espouse, and I am also bugged by her lack of principles. In some respects I can see the value of making an example, medieval or not, of the occasional miscreant, if for nothing more than for LavCat to tape up within view of the "Late Returns" counter. The librarian in ominous goth dress can casually glance over at the article with a knowing smile in silent testimony of what may happen to careless scoff laws.

In an interesting followup story; ABC News report on overdue library books

Regarding your mis-perception of a libertarian utopia... Heh. It's really not about selfish narcissistic over indulgence, and anarchy. First, the library as owner, is free to engage in any contract they deem necessary (including an advanced deposit) for the rental of their property. Clearly, she violated the terms of their contract, and so the library was fully within their common law rights to address the grievance through the courts. Failing to appear at court usually results in a bench warrant, and so she was arrested for failure to comply with the summons of the court. Were I the judge, I would have awarded the library full damages to restore them to whole (allowing her to return the stolen materials as partial remuneration), and added to the libraries fines the estimated costs to the municipality for the necessity of using the police and judicial process. Give her two weeks to comply, or then be charged with misdemeanor failure to appear, and possibly contempt of court charges.

Libertarians do believe in a fully functioning judicial system to protect our rights, and ensure our liberties.

The only thing holding them back is the TB's of disk space they need.

TB? As in sub $100 per TB hard dives? That's holding them back? Are they scanning to image or going all the way with OCR? Because an image takes a whole lot more space than does a text document (and especially a zipped text document; The Three Musketeers is about 1/2 MB zipped) -- 1 TB is about 2000 books.

Mostly PDF images, and it gets more complicated when you want to archive many to 100's of TB's of images, and then make them some what accessible.

Hence, why Netflix on demand works better for me. Most newer movies now go to electronic distribution, and it's only the older, and less popular titles that I need to rent on DVD.

I don't know that it is that simple. Titles have been on the streaming list, then came off of it, and then sometimes have come back on it.

Well, yeah, there is probably a finite space they have, and some licensing issues with the owners.

I haven't jumped into an e-book machine yet, although I'm keenly interested in the hardware wars between iPad vs Kindle vs Nook etc.

A pox on all their houses. E-readers, smart phones, media players, blah blah blah. The technology is there for hardware independent content. Let me buy the reader I like best and buy the content from whomever has what I want at the best price. I refuse to get into any of their effing gilded cages.

Being that I can't afford to get whatever I like... I'll probably settle for the one that has the most content available, and that is most readable.

At the college where I work, I've done research on the whole electronic "text book" phenomenon, and I've given recommendations for our current official academic position... Which is; we see it as a valuable part of the integration of a comprehensive technology assisted curriculum where the course materials, the curriculum, learning, and assessment are all integrated online, and available to the mobile environment. We have a cadre of e-learning specialists available to help professors adapt their courses toward a blended learning strategy which transforms a traditional course to enhance the face to face, group online, and individual online pedagogy. We've opted for a more protracted, experimental approach to ease our faculty toward this change and by being very selective on which courses we choose we can demonstrate just how innovative and successful this approach can be. For example, more online learning for Studio Arts would not improve pedagogy, while more peer interaction in studying history may improve the teaching/learning experience. I think most importantly, it forces the instructors to seriously challenge their traditional rubrics in measuring student outcomes. A thirty page essay on the Napoleonic Wars may not be the only method for measuring if a student understands history, although it may be a good measure on how well a student writes a thirty page essay. I'm also on the assessment steering committee, so I'm involved in measuring the success of these experiments as well.

That is a great example of just what is wrong with our educational system. I have absolutely no idea what you said -- about 30 seconds in, I fell asleep, overcome by the stupor of turgid prose. I suspect that deeply embroiled in all that complex text and grammar is a simple, good, idea screaming to get out.

Let's see... More simply said; we see e-books as only a part of a broader strategy to make parts of a course experience (teaching and learning) more interactive (where it makes sense), and accessible to wherever you happen to be at the moment.