Notebook of Sand

Contents

Contact: jnm@rubberpaw.com

Curriculum Vitae

• Recent Publications
• Recent Projects
• Conferences & Speaking
"Comparing Spatial Hypertext Collections"
  ACM Hypertext '09
"Archiving and Sharing Your Tinderbox"
  Tinderbox Weekend London '09
"The Electronic Nature of Future Literatures"
  Literary Studies Now, Apr '09
"The World University Project"
  St. John's Col. Cambridge, Feb '09
"Ethical Explanations,"
  The New Knowledge Forge, Jun '08
Lecture, Cambridge University
  Tragedy in E-Lit, Nov '07
Hypertext '07: Tragedy in E-Lit
Host for Tinderbox Cambridge '07
Keynote: Dickinson State Uni Conf
Upper Midwest NCHC'07: Speaker
eNarrative 6: Creative Nonfiction
HT'05: "Philadelphia Fullerine"
  Nelson award winning paper
NCHC '05:
 Nurturing Independent Scholarship
Riddick Practicum:
  Building Meeting Good Will
NCHC '04:
  Philadelphia Fullerine
  Lecture on American Studies
WWW@10: Nonfiction on the Web
NCHC '03: Parliamentary Procedure
ELL '03 -- Gawain Superstar
• (a)Musing (ad)Dictions:

Ideas. Tools. Art. Build --not buy. What works, what doesn't. Enjoy new media and software aesthetics at Tekka.

Theodore Gray (The Magic Black Box)

Faith, Life, Art, Academics. Sermons from my family away from home: Eden Chapel!

My other home: The Cambridge Union Society (in 2007, I designed our [Fresher's Guide])

The Economist daily news analysis

Global Higher Ed blog

• Hypertext/Writing

Writing the Living Web

Chief Scientist of Eastgate Systems, hypertext expert Mark Bernstein. (Electronic) Literature, cooking, art, etc.

Fabulous game reviews at playthisthing.

• Stats

Chapter I: Born. Lived. Died.

There is a Chapter II.

Locale: Lancaster County Pa, USA

Lineage: Guatemala

Religion: My faith is the primary focus of my life, influencing each part of me. I have been forgiven, cleansed, and empowered by Jesus Christ. Without him, I am a very thoughtful, competent idiot. With him, I am all I need to be, all I could ever hope for. I oppose institutional religious stagnation, but getting together with others is a good idea. God is real. Jesus Christ is his Son, and the Bible is true. Faith is not human effort. It's human choice. I try to be the most listening, understanding, and generous person I can.

Interests: Anything I can learn. Training and experience in new media, computer science, anglophone literature, education, parliamentary debate, democratic procedure, sculpture, and trumpet performance. Next: applied & computational linguistics, probably.

Education: Private school K-3. Home educated 4-12. Graduated Summa Cum Laude from Elizabethtown College in Jan 2006. As the 2006 Davies-Jackson Scholar, I studied English at St. John's College, Cambridge University from 2006 - 2008.

Memberships: Eden Baptist, Cambridge Union Society, ACM, AIP, GPA.

Alum of the Elizabethtown College Honors Program, sponsored by the Hershey Company.

Recent Posts
2004: Earlier | March | April | May | June | July | Aug | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec
2005: Jan | Feb | March | April | May | June | July | Aug | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec
2006: Jan | Feb | March | April | May | June | July | Aug | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec
2007: Spring | Summer - Summer 2008 | Spring & Summer 2009 | Now
Remembering Holst, WITF, Strawser
Monday, 16 Nov 2009 :-: ["Permalink"]

On this torrentially-rainy day, surrounded by boxes (I have moved in, but not arranged my things), and working on the opening of UniLives.com video uploads, I turned on a recording of The Planets, by Gustav Holst. This symphony is a popular crowd-pleaser at concerts for its recognizably-different movements, prominent use of a wide range of instruments, and strong melodies.

Today, listening to the symphony brought back memories of my first commute. When I was in eleventh grade, I began a regular drive to Lancaster Bible College for night classes. Over two and a half years, I studied composition, public speaking, psychology, and field ecology. Through its Sunrise/Sunset program, the college offered free courses to secondary students with promise, and to the elderly. Those courses were critically-important to my intellectual development, and I only now see the radical generosity of that program. (They still do it, and it's now called Jumpstart)

The drive was 30 minutes each way, and I would listen to WITF on the radio, most usually Dick Strawser, introduce me to so much amazing and wonderful music from the Western tradition. His informative introductions educated me about composers and opened the door on new worlds of human society.

Driving back one night, he played the Planets. I can remember the speakers inside my parents van battling mightily against the roaring storm outside, to the brass exuberance of Jupiter, the bringer of Jollity (Allegro giouoso).

Now living in Cambridge, where it's easy to attend concerts with famous ensembles and composers, and I have had opportunities to perform as well, those doors have been opened to me. I wish I had more time to participate.

In 2008, many of the familiar names and voices of WITF, including Dick Strawser, left or were let go. But Dick is still writing his wonderful music blog, and apparently continuing with his love of historial musical fiction with NaNoWriMo this year. He is Dr_Dick on twitter.


E-Lit Camp and More
Friday, 30 Oct 2009 :-: ["Permalink"]
E-Lit Camp 2009 Card

Plans have finally come together for E-Lit Camp Boston, Dec 11-13. More information on Mark Bernstein's site.

E-Lit Camp is an informal weekend gathering for writers, artists, and programmers currently involved or interested in electronic literature. Work on your projects, give a presentation, collaborate, and learn from others.

If you're a writer, artist, journalist, coder, or some combination of the above, E-Lit camp is for you. Have a project? Bring it. Don't have one? Bring your skills and creativity. Fiction is fab; documentary is cool. Bring your camera, laptop, projector, ideas, and anything else you need to be creative. Bring electronic works, Interactive Fictions, and videogames that you like, so we can try them out!

** * **

In other news, my non-work life over the last few weeks has been a very technical one: Railscamp UK (thanks MrJaba!), and writing Wordpress plugins. Good news: I move into an apartment today after 9 weeks of sleeping on floors and couches. Hurrah!


University Lives Collection Launch
Monday, 12 Oct 2009 :-: ["Permalink"]

Last Thursday, we launched the University Lives Collection in conjunction with the announcement of the World University Rankings by the Times Higher Education.

Now it's time to finish the full site in preparation for our launch on November 16.