General
http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2005/Apr/hour2_042905.html
On April 29, 2005, NPR's Science Friday, hosted by Ira Flatlow, featured "fun with numbers." The guest interviews addressed topics such as how math is turning up in shows like "The Simpsons," "Futurama," and "Numbers" and ways these references might be able to reduce math anxiety and motivate students. They also discuss "the clash of cultures between mathematicians and TV writers behind-the-scenes" as well as "the natural instinct people--and animals--may have for math." The radio program is available to download from the NPR Audio Archive. They also provide links to related articles and other online resources. [VF]
http://news.com.com/Cities+brace+for+broadband+war/2009-1034_3-5680305.html
In this article, staff writers for CNET, an online technology news source, discuss the "broadband war." The article focuses on a battle in Lafayette, La., over plans by BellSouth and cable provider Cox Communications to lay out their fiber-optic broadband network. The article provides a link to another article describing the "legal skirmish" from a year ago and goes on to discuss the issues surrounding the debate, which the authors say is essentially about "whether the government or private industries should take the leading role in building out what's considered this generation's critical infrastructure challenge." [VF]
HamRad is a resource for Ham Radio enthusiasts. The website organizes the links to various online resources by topic area: Organizations, Events, Manufacturers, Dealers, Personal Ham Sites, Misc. Ham Sites, HamRad Trader, and Buy-Sell-Trade. All of the collections can be searched by keyword (such as organization name, callsign, or location), while the event listing provides a more detailed search function including search categories such as state, AARL division, AARL Section and event date. Visitors are also invited to add a site to the listings and can connect to an FTP website and download Radio Mods. [VF]
http://www.robotics.com/robomenu/
Arrick Robots, makers of robot products, maintains this website as "a free service from Arrick Robotics so robot builders can show off their creations." The Robot Menu posts a photograph and some basic information about the robots built and submitted by individuals worldwide. Over 300 robots were featured at the time of this report and visitors are invited to submit a photo and description of their own creation using a simple online form. Other sections provide advice on building your first robot and, of course, detailed information on products offered by Arrick Robots, such as The ARobot, which is designed for Experimenters and Educators. Some additional robot projects developed by customers are described in the Projects section of the website. Because the founder of Arrick Robots, Roger Arrick, is the author of Robot Building for Dummies, there is also a link to a website that acts "as an extension to the book and give readers a place to share ideas, offer advice and solve problems." [VF]
http://psychology.about.com/od/psychologynews/a/news040705wom.htm
This article from About.com provides a psychological perspective on Why Women Shy Away from Careers in Science and Math. The article begins, "Girls steer away from careers in math, science and engineering because they view science as a solitary rather than a social occupation." The article reports primarily on a talk that University of Michigan psychologist, Jacquelynne Eccles, gave at the Society for Research in Child Development conference on how parents and teachers influence children's academic and career choices. The psychologist suggests that teachers tell parents that their daughters are talented in math and science and "provide girls and their parents with vocational and intellectual reasons for studying math or science." One major problem to address, according to the psychologist, are children's understandings of what scientists do. Rather than leaving young people with the impression that scientists are "eccentric old men with wild hair, smoking cigars, deep in thought, alone," we need to promote a richer, more nuanced vision of who scientists are, what they do and how they work. [VF]
http://genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/
The Mathematics Genealogy Project is maintained by the Department of Mathematics at North Dakota State University. The goal of this project is "to compile information about ALL the mathematicians of the world." It is soliciting information from anyone who participates in the development of research level mathematics or has information on mathematicians to include in the database. The site notes some of the challenges to this project such as imperfect data sources and the ways in which the model the project is using may be anachronistic for the earlier periods. Nonetheless, as of May 15, 2005, the project has amassed 86,827 records. The database can be searched by a variety of criteria, such as individual name, name of school, year of degree, country, math subject, or key word from a thesis. [VF]
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) was established in 1985 to promote "computer users' rights to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs." That is, the organization promotes the development and use of free software, particularly for the GNU operating system (GNU/Linux). FSF is the primary sponsor of the GNU Project, which was established to create new distribution terms that would prevent the project from being turned into proprietary software. The website provides information on current FSF projects, such as providing development systems support for GNU software maintainers and raising awareness about the Free Software license and how to use it. They also maintain the Free Software Directory, which catalogs "all useful free software that runs under free operating systems" and currently contains over 3,000 entries. The Directory can be accessed from this website and searched by keyword or browsed by application area, such as Business and Productivity, Database, Education, Email, Games, Mathematics, Network Applications, Printing, Science, Security, Software development, and Web Authoring. The website also provides information on how to add packages to the Directory and how to donate to the Foundation. [VF]
Protonic.com claims to provide "fast free technical support." Answers to questions about your computer problems are answered by an online community. The group aim to provide "the highest quality technical support" to its "clients." The support technicians are all volunteers, many of whom have been featured in media publications including USA Weekend, Yahoo! Internet Life and .net magazine. Clients are invited to submit questions regarding any computer problems, whether it's related to hardware or HTML problems, on your PC, Mac, Unix or PDA. Questions are submitted using an online form and answers are sent via email. Information on how to become a volunteer Tech is provided along with other ways to support the project. A discussion forum section is also accessible to those who complete a free online registration form. [VF]
