Made the news

April 28th, 2006 Stewart

Bloggers Bank On Mom And Dad - CBS News

Thanks to Melissa McNamara for linking to me from her Blogophile column on CBS News!

I get where We Interrupt This Broadcast is coming from when he posts:

The problem may be that most adult kids today don’t know that they can’t afford the lifestyle they want, and “paying their dues” isn’t in their vocabulary.

He’s got a point — Many Mils are unwilling to wait to earn the things they desire, whether it’s the plasma TV, the nice car, the mocha latte, or the better job that they don’t really deserve. Many of them compound their problems by adding to their debts after college by making purchases they cannot reasonably afford. And many parents aren’t really helping their kids when they keep sending them money to keep them in the “lifestyle” to which they are accustomed.

That said, I still think that a significant number of these kids, a majority I think, are trapped in spiralling debt, caused primarily by the brutally high cost of tuition and student loans that are basically mortgages.

What would help these kids more than anything would be a cap on the amount of interest that any guaranteed student loan can generate. Because of compounded interest, $40K worth of student loans ends up costing $70-80K in payoff, which is insane. How about instead treating student loans like reverse Certificates of Deposit? A $40K loan will cap at $45K, but must be paid off within, say, five years of graduation. This would make a far more managable debt situation for recent grads, still earn the banks a fair return on their investment, and allow new workers to shift their priorities from “paying off debts” to “saving and investing,” which would be better for the economy overall.

Obviously, it will never happen. If banks can get 100% ROI compared with 10% or 20%, then they’ll obviously go with the greedier option. It is well past time for the federal gov’t to step into this and start finding solutions that allow kids to graduate from college, get good jobs, and start investing for the future.

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Save the Internet

April 27th, 2006 Stewart

Save the Internet is a campaign to keep telecoms from charging information providers for the “breadth” of their pipelines — Whoever pays the most, gets the best service. I just sent a note to my legislators; here’s what I wrote:

The expansion and ubiquity of the Internet is the single-most important social and economic development of the past twenty years. As a medium of communication, it is fully democratic; all users are created equal.

The efforts of some telecommunications companies to turn the Internet into a meritocracy is misguided and exceptionally harmful. Internet neutrality must be preserved. A neutral net is better for businesses of all sizes. A neutral net is better for education, public health, and the promotion of a free society. A neutral net preserves freedom of speech, equality of representation, and a creative commons, all ideas cherished by the founding fathers.

We cannot allow backwards-thinking telecommunications companies to set back the clock. Please take all appropriate measures to preserve network neutrality.

Thank you for your kind consideration.

Please visit SavetheInternet.com today and let your legislators know that you care about this issue.

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The Bank of Mom and Dad

April 21st, 2006 Stewart

The Bank of Mom and Dad - New York Times (May need BugMeNot to login.)

One quote from the article:
Although some may argue that the willingness of parents to subsidize adult children is prolonging their coming of age, Dr. Schoeni said his study suggests that extended education, the exploration of career options and delayed marriage are the causes of the long transition to self-sufficiency. Parental support “is not the driver of a delayed transition, it is a response to it,” he said.

Or is it, perhaps, the soul-crushing burden of tens of thousands of dollars of college loans that these kids are forced to absorb that prompts many parents to try to assist their kids financially? I know I’m usually the first in line to blame Boomers for coddling their kids (which they do) but this article almost completely ignores one of the major causes of debt among late Xers and early Mils entering the workforce.

Another quote:
But they need help to make ends meet, or put another way, to maintain a middle-class way of life.

Yeah, but those aren’t even the same thing. Lots of recent grads would love to be able to afford to live like middle-incomers, but are frankly too busy drowning in easy credit, student loans, rising utility bills and other expenses. They do in fact need help “making ends meet,” or put another way, not losing their shirts. The author of the Times article should be ashamed of themselves for trying to make it sound like these are the same thing.

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Last post for the day…

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

So, you might have noticed that I’ve blogged a little bit more than usual this morning. Recently I fell in love with a new Firefox extension for MyStickies. MyStickies lets me slap a cute yellow Post-It(TM) note on any web page and then return to it later. Think del.icio.us but with little annotations that you can stick anywhere on the page, with or without tags. I’ve been using MyStickies to collect pages together with my own notes, so I can then blog about them all at once. Neat-o, don’t you think?

MyStickies is free to use and well worth a look!

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Jumping on the 2.0 bandwagon

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

ACRLog — What 2.0 Means to Me

A nice introduction to the basic concepts and mild controversy behind Library 2.0. Nothing wrong with the ideas here, but people should realize that it may be somewhat off-putting to librarians who have always supported these basic tenets to watch as a bunch of good ideas that have been around for a while are made to sound brand-new and slapped with a 2.0 label just to be trendy.

Library 2.0 will mean more when we’re all sharing an AJAX-based, social, tagged, open source integrated system. Of course, as long as vendors keep selling us the same old, slow, expensive systems, we’ll probably keep them in business.

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Helicopter parents

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

Inside Higher Ed :: Keeping Parents in the Loop

HPs given the tools & the opportunity to participate more closely in child’s education — Are we sure we want to be encouraging these people like this??

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Our time is coming…

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

Brian Mathews’ article, The Inevitable Gen X Coup, touches on many of the frustrations I hear from younger librarians who feel the generation gap in their workplace. A Boomer librarian once spoke to me about the “legacy,” and that she was very concerned that the new generation of librarians wouldn’t continue all the practices and policies that her generation had put in place. I asked her if there had been similar concerns about her generation of librarians, and she had to admit that there were. This article touches on some, though certainly not all, of the changes that the new generation of librarians will bring about.

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Students on the move

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

A. This type of classroom environment is going to catch on in a big way, especially in K-12.

B. We will inherit these learners in the next seven to ten years.

C. Combined with the Millennials’ belief that they should be able to learn as easily online as off, the whole concept of a classroom may already be a historical concept, replaced entirely by nontraditional learning spaces and experimental combinations of physical and mental activity.

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Blended learning

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

A nice, simple introduction to the concept of blended learning and Millennial students’ expectations regarding e-learning and support. Worth a quick read.

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I’m blogging as fast as I can: Super-Hero TM?

April 2nd, 2006 Stewart

BoingBoing stirred up a minor controversy a couple weeks back when they noticed Marvel and DC Comics renewal of their trademark on the word “super-hero.” Next thing you know, several dozen “me too” blogs are demanding that Marvel and DC give back the language that they are apparently stealing from us.

This is, of course, a complete non-issue, and one that resurfaces every few years. One of my favorite online comic strips, PvPonline.com, gets it right, though. Super-heroes were, for all intents and purposes, created by Marvel and DC and so they have legitimate claim to the word “super-hero.” And nothing keeps anyone from using the term in common, everyday use — The only thing the TM symbol really keeps others from doing is using the term in marketing or advertising without permission.

Hmm. All this typing is making me hungry. Think I’ll have a Twinkie (TM), wash it down with a Coke (TM), and dab the crumbs from my lips with a Kleenex (TM).

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