The wallabies are wasted

You’ve probably all heard it by now. Tasmanian wallabies are getting wasted in poppy fields and creating crop circles.

I was gonna blog this way back in last week. But then I had a farewell from work, a farewell from friends, social lounge, someone else’s farewell, clean, pack, uniquest, and then today I had to scramble to unpack and scan identifying documents in the vain hope of proving that I can afford to pay for potential accomodation (I can… I hope).

But man… those wallabies… that is awesome.

I wonder if that means there may be a grant out there on doing some studies on marsupials and drugs/addiction?

Image credit: mrmanc on flickr (CC by attribution & share-alike)

More than medicine

Hot on the heels of discussions about Pharma and digital media – GSK has recently launched a corporate blog More Than Medicine. They aren’t the first Big Pharma to do so, Johnson & Johnson is also present in the blogosphere with JNJ BTW.

The idea behind the blogs is to create a more comfortable dialogue between these large overarching organisations and the end-product consumers (i.e. you and me).

J&J: “Everyone else is talking about our company, so why can’t we?“

GSK: “Our goal is to encourage an open, productive discussion about a range of topics .. that doesn’t sound like it’s written in ‘legalese’.“

Already GSK has been called out for having pseudonymous bloggers – but while it might somewhat detract from their claim to broad openness, it’s hardly a rare thing amongst bloggers (ummm… does yours truly qualify?*) Relationships don’t have to be built up on a first name basis.

Already the two blogs have very different styles, and showcase positive ways in which Pharma can successfully harness this new media.

Tangled Bank #117 at Neural Gourmet

Check it out for yourself.

Quite a fine selection on display – even if some shoddy puritanical anti-sex tirade somehow slipped through the quality control.

Neural Gourmet

Lessons for teachers

This would be one of the best lists of advice to anyone considering teaching.

Number one is so true. If you do not get on top of things at the start, you will be in a lot of trouble. You can’t “get back into the swing of things” if you were never there to begin with.

The list below – but be sure to actually visit the original website, there is a detailed article on each topic (and even sets of articles for some).

10. Learn from the experience of other teachers
9. Set aside personal time
8. Implement measures to eliminate stress from your life
7. Maintain your old lifestyle after your first paycheck
6. Establish clear, concise, comprehensive classroom rules
5. Pacing
4. Make efforts to reach every student
3. Establish a small circle of teacher friends
2. Start a blog now!

1. Get a handle on classroom management early

Get netted

I’m trying to avoid shameless link-whoring, but still trying to promote my website.

How do you go about it?

One way is obvious, to join genuine social networks.

As I’m trying to be science-orientated online, the Nature Blog Network, seemed a logical network to join.

Not to be confused with another different Nature Network, the Nature Blog Network is a connection of Nature/Biology related blogs that have agreed to network. All it involves is hosting a button. NBN gets a person to check your site is okay. Then aproved webistes are ranked and categorized. You can read further in a review by The Canberra Times.

Currently around 440 blogs are involved in the NBN project. The top ten is unsurprising dominated by the unwavering sciborg creation, but three freedom fighters remain amidst the ranks of 5-10 – the anti-cute Ugly Overload, the colourful 10,000 Birds, and Julie Zickefoose.

**UPDATE**

Kevin reminds me that Deep Sea News has been de-assimilated from the sci-borg nexus. They are part of Discovery Blogs now, which is like totally different lah. Be sure to update feeds and sidebar links, I have now. Thanks Kevin!

**END UPDATE**

Currently I am sitting at no. 88. Whoop! Hottest 100 material.

And no. 2 for the “Mammals” category (I chose this category, because you can only pick one, and I generally post more about mammals and marsupials than any other animal group). The best in Mammals is an Italian blog about bears (google auto translate).

If anyone has any further suggestions of other good, social and non-link-whoring social websites for blogs on science, education, biology, Australiana, youth and writing let me know.

Vote for Science

The Seed overlords have unveiled their latest sciborg creation:

Vote for Science

VfS is a group blog set to follow the US presidential candidates’ opinions on science, education and research (and everything else).

Carnivale ahoy

Tomorrow is talk like a pirate day. YAARRR!

But in the meantime, two carnivals I need to post about (one features yours truly):

Tangled Bank #114 at Science Made Cool.

Carnival of Evolution #2 at Evolution Blog. Thanks very much to Jason who gave me a mention even though my submission was “unrelated to anything [Jason] actually know[s] anything about”. Don’t worry Jason, I have that effect on people.

And I had an excellent time at the Science Blogs 1,000,000th comment party. I think the comment of the hour was actually likely posted while we busy frittering away the tablescraps graciously past down by the SEED overlords on high. We almost got shuffled out by the staff for staying and chatting and boozing too long.

Both Tim and Dan were great hosts (all the best to Dan in his voyage to UK). Also met with some chaps from the Sydney Freethinkers who hopefully I’ll be able to catch up with at some later point again.

denialism blog : Cancer 101

denialism blog : Cancer 101

Posted using ShareThis

*update* so it works like that

You are in the right place

Do I even have any regular readers yet? (I have been getting at least 300 hits a week)

Anyway my “custom image header” (did I tell you how awesome it is?) appears to have run away. It’s still somewhere in my cybertoolbox see (this is partly just a personal test to check that it IS actually still there…)

It’s just not up there where it is supposed to be.

Maybe by blog has taken it’s title to literally and been making its own choices behind my back.

Bad blog. Bad.

(Apparently this may be resurfacing of an issue prevalent during recent New Year’s)

Taking the piss out of alchemy

One of the last posts of mine (actually the alleged “last post“) on the old blog was about the virtue of alchemy as predecessor to modern investigative science.

While alchemy’s main basis in Hermetic mythology and the ability to transmute metals into gold may have been grounded in woo – much of the foundation for chemistry – physical and organic was laid down by alchemists.

The AIRchives has an interesting art based portrayal of one of these science-based areas of alchemical expertise – extraction of phosphorous – from urine.

Now you know what’s in all those scientists beakers…

Firefox 3.0

While I’m still getting used to the new skin. I am liking some of the features of Firefox 3.0.

Something cool I noticed is the ability to autocomplete, not just from browsing history, but also offer suggestions from Bookmarks and Subscribed feeds.

Also like one click bookmarking. Handy for the blogger who is ever so wary about these “share on wordpress/facebook” buttons.

There are probably ways to further tweak this. But I guess I will discover that out in future.

You can get your own Firefox buttons here. (It took me a while to locate them).