Dark Skies, Dark Internet

Looking around the internet today, I’m amazed to see how many people and websites are in their own way protesting SOPA and PIPA. What is most fascinating to me is the reaction people have as the sites they count on day to day blink out. Should SOPA or PIPA actually get passed, we run the risk of having...

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CosmoQuest

Posted by pamela on Jan 16, 2012

For the past several years, my cohost and friend Fraser Cain has been talking about wanting to change how we do astronomy – change access, change the embargo system, change even peer-review. He’s not the only one: All across the internets we’ve seen open science projects of various types crop up and slowly take root. This summer, I finally let Fraser infect me with the idea of creating a wall free environment for learning and...

AAS219: Austin, TX

Posted by pamela on Jan 9, 2012

I’m currently at the 219th meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Austin, TX. I’m here for just two days, and due to meetings, my coverage may be somewhat limited, but I’m going to do what I can to cover press conferences. The last couple meetings I’ve been at, I’ve found myself tweeting and not blogging. Now, with Google+ a new option exists and I’m going to try an experiment. In the mo+ment,...

T’was the Week After Chr...

Posted by pamela on Dec 28, 2011

Twas the week after Christmas, when all through the halls Not a student was stirring – they’d gone out to the malls The professors were all doing their research with care In hopes that peer review would be gentle and fair. The servers were whirring all snug on the cloud While theorists muttered their equations out loud With data in columns, I figured and plotted Checking every t’s crossed and every I dotted When from the fax room...

The Twenty-Four Hour Work Day ...

Posted by pamela on Dec 11, 2011

I’m currently sort of on vacation. I say “sort of” because modern day technology and society combine to really makes it impossible for many of us to be totally off work, totally away for a couple of days, and totally removed from instantaneous communications. Everyday of this trip, either my husband, or I, or both have received an “urgent”, “high priority” or “need response immediately” email...

STEM Education for Tomorrow

Posted by pamela on Dec 7, 2011

Over the past several weeks I’ve had more than one person ask me, “What is your view on the future of STEM (1) Education?” Sometimes they have gone on to ask further about how I feel about the future of science in general. This much repeated question has been triggered by many things. On one hand, I work in a Center for STEM Research, Outreach and Education, and we’re working to define our vision. On the other hand, the...

Of Comic Books and Christmas S...

Posted by pamela on Nov 18, 2011

Next week, all across America, we will go through a ritual holiday weekend. There is Thanksgiving Thursday; Back Friday, Bloated Saturday, and self-hating (still bloated) Sunday. For many, this is the weekend of eating way the [expletive] too much, watching football, putting up a Christmas Tree and starting Christmas shopping. For me, it means I’m not going anywhere near a shopping mall at anytime between next Wednesday and after New...