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Some writings worth reading[free ebook] "Multiagents systems: Algorithmic, Game-Theoretic, and Logical Foundations" http://masfoundations.org/mas.pdf "How Tetris became the world's favourite computer game" http://bbc.co.uk/news/ …"Bodily maps of emotions" http://pnas.org/content/early/2013/… via http://npr.org/blogs/health/2013/12/30/2583… see"High Finance and Financial Education" http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/12/30…[free ebook] via @siah "Introduction to Probability and Statistics Using R" http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/…[free ebook] "OpenIntro Statistics" https://dropbox.com/s/…"Rates of travel, from N.Y.C. in 1800" http://dsl.richmond.edu/historicalatlas/138/a/ … seeWith more "pressure to graduate more students (…) professors worry that the value of an education may be diminished" http://theatlantic.com/education/archive/…[free ebook] David Graeber's "Debt: The First 5,000 Years" http://libcom.org/files/… (I am glad to have a paper copy, should be finished soon)"Block by Block, Brooklyn’s Past and Present" http://bklynr.com/block-by-block… see"Extracting information from mega-panels and high-frequency data" http://escholarship.org/uc/… via @DEAGiles and http://bigdataeconometrics.wordpress.com/ The U.S. in 2050, "Here's How The Country Will Look Three Decades From Now" http://businessinsider.com/demographic… see"The Documented Life" http://nytimes.com/2013/1…"Here's Why I Don't Sweat The Haters"http://businessinsider.com/her… by @jbarro via @Noahpinion and @Frances_Coppola"The (amazing) history of the Nobel Prize, told in maps and charts" http://washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/ … see"Few of the politicians who so brazenly proclaim the benefits of drones have a real clue how it actually works" http://theguardian.com/commentisfree/… via @enraje and @FrenchRedFrog"The impact of blogging on reputation" http://deevybee.blogspot.ca/2013/12/th…, @deevybee's answer to http://nearemmaus.com/2013/09… via @ivanoransky and @edyong209"I'm not arguing that students and junior academics should sacrifice themselves on the altar of freedom of speech, but rather that they should have confidence in the positive as well as the negative power of the internet. If what they say is worth saying, they will get support. LePort focuses on the negative consequences of Rollston's blogging, but, as this post by Robert Cargill pointed out, he attracted huge support online and ended up in a better job, whereas Emmanuel Christian Seminary suffered massive reputational damage. LePort makes the important point that blogs are very different to more formal academic writing and often represent a point of view at a particular point in time, which may subsequently change. To my mind, this is one of the huge benefits of blogging – if you are lucky, your blog will attract comments that expose you to a wide range of reactions and help clarify and develop your thinking. This can be both fun and useful. LePort worries, though, that this may mean your incomplete and half-baked thoughts on an issue are used against you by those in positions of authority. As a senior academic, I hope I can offer some reassurance. In general, I see blogging as an indication that the author is a bit out of the ordinary – someone who cares enough about things to write about them, and who is willing to try and move discussion forward. If in addition they change their views on the basis of feedback, that's fine. Obviously, it's possible to reveal yourself on a blog as uninformed, irrational or bigoted, and that is definitely not good. But most of the blogs I read aren't like that. Well, I can hear you saying, that's all very well. You are someone who actually blogs and understands social media, but most academics aren't like that. My reply is that social media is an unstoppable force and even the most traditional institutions are starting to focus on developing strategies for harnessing its power. So I'd say, yes, LePort is right in that we need to be aware that blogging is a public medium, and anything we say on a blog can be read by anyone. But it would be a shame if we allowed ourselves to become so worried about potential problems that we failed to see the advantages of blogging for fostering academic debate.That would be like staying at home with the door locked because you're scared of what may happen if you go outside." [to be continued...]"Computers have entered the age when they are able to learn from their own mistakes..." http://nytimes.com/2013/12…"Iron Man: Addiction and the Lives We Tell" http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/white-noise/20 …"30 people draw a map of the world from memory, digitally merged the results" (via http://reddit.com/user/zaaakk ) the original drawings being http://imgur.com/a/1w6fC"Happy New Year: an illogical, unreasonable statement" http://theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2… via @garwboy"Do healthier foods and diet patterns cost more than less healthy options?" http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/3/12/… "A systematic review and meta-analysis"A brilliant ads, by the British Columbia Lung Associationet un peu de lecture en français"Comment évaluer la partie « enseignement » du métier d’enseignant-chercheur" …http://cooperationuniversitaire.blogs.docteo.net/…"Viralité du selfie, déplacements du portrait" http://culturevisuelle.org/icones/2895  (avec des selfies de @gunthert dedans, oui oui !)Did I miss something?