The Myth of Multitasking

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Interesting piece by Christine Rosen…

More recently, challenges to the ethos of multitasking have begun to emerge. Numerous studies have shown the sometimes-fatal danger of using cell phones and other electronic devices while driving, for example, and several states have now made that particular form of multitasking illegal. In the business world, where concerns about time-management are perennial, warnings about workplace distractions spawned by a multitasking culture are on the rise. In 2005, the BBC reported on a research study, funded by Hewlett-Packard and conducted by the Institute of Psychiatry at the University of London, that found, “Workers distracted by e-mail and phone calls suffer a fall in IQ more than twice that found in marijuana smokers.” The psychologist who led the study called this new “infomania” a serious threat to workplace productivity. One of the Harvard Business Review’s “Breakthrough Ideas” for 2007 was Linda Stone’s notion of “continuous partial attention,” which might be understood as a subspecies of multitasking: using mobile computing power and the Internet, we are “constantly scanning for opportunities and staying on top of contacts, events, and activities in an effort to miss nothing.”

Election phobia, EU style

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I don’t much care for Simon Jenkins, the Guardian (and Sunday Times) columnist, but this time he’s spot on.

Have you noticed how the political establishment hates elections? It regards them as vulgar, foreign, exhibitionist and unpredictable. To those in power they are mere concessions to mob rule. If electors did not insist on them, elections would have been abolished long ago as Victorian gimmicks to appease proletarian sentiment.

There is no other explanation for Westminster’s reaction to Ireland’s weekend vote on the Lisbon treaty and to David Davis’s resignation over 42-day-detention. Nor is there any other explanation for the welcome that will be given to Hazel Blears’s forthcoming local government white paper. This will, it is rumoured, reduce the 95% of elections still held in Britain (local ones) to largely consultative status, to clear the ground for Gordon Brown’s Putin-style appointed regional government.

In the case of Ireland, the rule is clear. Any change in the constitution of Europe requires unanimity among the nations of Europe. Irrespective of what moved the Irish electorate, the treaty has failed and must be redrafted. Yet Britain, France, Germany and the rest are proceeding with ratification as if the vote had gone the other way. They are saying that Europe’s constitutional framework – good or bad – can be disregarded when inconvenient, for instance when democracy has rejected what they want…

Intelligent generosity

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Nice to see that Ros and Steve Edwards have given £30 million to New Hall, one of Cambridge’s most distinctive (but poorest) colleges. It was founded in 1954 by Dame Rosemary Murray with one shilling and no name. The intention that it would eventually be given a name when someone endowed it properly. Which is what has now happened. As a result, New Hall will become Murray Edwards College.

This is the biggest single benefaction that I can remember (of course there’s the £200 million Bill Gates donated to set up the Gates Scholars Trust — Cambridge’s answer to the Rhodes Scholars scheme in Oxford — but that doesn’t really count because it’s such small change to Billg) since the Radio Rentals tycoon David Robinson endowed Robinson College in the 1970s.

Ros is a former New Hall student.

Hmmm… Just remembered that New College, Oxford — which was founded in 1379 by William of Wykeham — still hasn’t found a proper name. They really ought to get a move on.

Great Firewall of China, Olympic version

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From Technology Review…

At the Beijing Olympics, foreign journalists may encounter systems designed to give the false appearance that Chinese Internet controls are minimal, according to Ronald Deibert, an associate professor of political science and director of the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto. Today, Deibert, whose research group makes the censorship-circumvention tool Psiphon, will address the Beijing Olympics and other issues related to Chinese censorship in testimony to the U.S. China Economic and Security Review Commission in Washington, DC, as part of a hearing on access to information and media control in China…

Sweden caves in to Osama

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Osama bin Laden’s campaign to eliminate civil liberties in the West has notched up another victory — this time in Sweden, formerly a paragon of sweetness and light in these matters.

Sweden this evening voted in favour of its controversial snoop law, after the proposal was amended earlier today.

Under the new law, all communication across Swedish borders will be tapped, and information can also be traded with international security agencies, such as America’s National Security Agency.

A total of 143 members of parliament voted to pass the bill into law, with 138 delegates opposed.

Earlier today, prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt failed to win the backing of his four-party coalition: the draft was sent back to the committee for revision. Key members of parliament who were likely to vote against the proposition were put under pressure by their parties, according to some reports.

Despite receiving copies of George Orwell’s book 1984 from protesters earlier this week, MPs from Sweden’s ruling party believe the law does not constitute the final nail in the coffin of democracy.

Flickr co-founders leave Yahoo!

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From TechCrunch…

Photo sharing site Flickr is one of the leading lights of Yahoo – but cofounders (and husband/wife team) Caterina Fake and Stewart Butterfield won’t be around to keep driving the product forward. They are both joining the mass exodus of executives from the company.

Fake officially left last Friday. Butterfield (who still officially runs Flickr) will leave on July 12. Kakul Srivastava, the director of product management for Flickr, will take over Stewart’s role as general manager of Flickr. Sara Wood will take over Kakul’s previous position.

From what we hear, neither has imminent plans to work on any new projects, but I suspect we haven’t heard the last from either of them.

Butterfield and Fake created Flickr in 2004. It began as a photo-sharing feature of a gaming project, has since blossomed into one of the premier photo sharing sites on the web. Yahoo purchased Flickr for $35 million in March of 2005. In June 2007 Yahoo shutdown Yahoo Photos, making Flickr their exclusive photo sharing website. Today Flickr hosts over 2 billion images.

Wonder what they will do next?

The Net and the 2008 US Election

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Very interesting study from the Pew ‘Internet and American Life’ project which, among many other things, suggests that,

A significant number of voters are also using the internet to gain access to campaign events and primary documents. Some 39% of online Americans have used the internet to access “unfiltered” campaign materials, which includes video of candidate debates, speeches and announcements, as well as position papers and speech transcripts…

Happy Bloomsday!

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JJ looking pensive in old age. We will have Burgundy and gorgonzola sandwiches at half past noon in honour of Mr Leopold Bloom, late of No. 7 Eccles Street, Dublin.