Six Links Worthy Of Your Attention #95

93Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?

My friends: Alistair Croll (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, the author of Complete Web Monitoring and Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks), Hugh McGuire (The Book Oven, LibriVox, iambik, PressBooks, Media Hacks) and I decided that every week or so the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person "must see".

Check out these six links that we’re recommending to one another:

•  3 Major Publishers Sue Open-Education Textbook Start-Up – The Chronicle of Higher Education. "Boundless Learning has a trick: make a book that’s like a copyrighted original, using free content. Turns out, publishers don’t like this idea at all. Yet another example of how the publishing business is in flux." (Alistair for Hugh).
• Cause and Effect: How the Media You Consume Can Change Your Life – Vimeo. "Ashley Judd struck back against the gossip industry this week, in a really well-written manifesto about recent criticism of her appearance. ‘I do not want to give my power, my self-esteem, or my autonomy, to any person, place, or thing outside myself,’ she said, in a break from her usual practice of ignoring what’s said about herself in public forums. This video by Miss Representation is an eye-opening look at what media does to young girls’ aspirations." (Alistair for Mitch).
• Life of Grass – Mathilde Roussel. "Artist Mathilde Roussel‘s ‘growing’ sculptures of earth and grass are things of stunning beauty. They float, motionless, suspended, and yet change completely as grass grows from them, transforming them from one thing into something quite different." (Hugh for Alistair).
• Cabin Porn – Free Cabin Porn. "There comes a time in our digital-everywhere lives when we just want to say: enough. I don’t want to see another pixel. One option when that happens is to smash all of our digital devices into little bits with a hammer, and head outside into the sunshine (or snow, or rain, or dark) and never look back. Another option is to visit a website that has pictures of cabins." (Hugh for Mitch).
• Caine’s Arcade – Nirvan Mullick. "Someone in our office sent this video over to me and it, literally, brought tears to my eyes. I’ve been spending a lot of time reading and thinking about creativity. It’s starting to really get under my skin that as we grow older there is this expectation to ‘fall in line.’ As I get older, I am finding myself wanting to rage against that machine more than ever. After watching Caine’s Arcade, it becomes abundantly clear how adults sometimes mis-perceive creativity. There’s no reason for it. Watch this. Show it to your kids. But, more importantly, think about how many arcades you never built because you thought it was a stupid idea or because someone talked you out of it." (Mitch for Alistair).
• Frank Warren: Half a million secrets – TED. "I’m fascinated by the human condition. Frank Warren’s TED Talk about his PostSecret project was, without question, one of the most memorable TED Talks from this past year’s conference. While the PostSecret meme is nothing new (and it has become an international sensation), you can’t help but shed a tear as you listen to Frank talk about the many new and fascinating ways we can connect and share experiences as human beings. There is a strong anti-Web sentiment lately. That the Web is making us impersonal and that we’re losing touch with our feelings. I think that can be true – depending on what you’re doing online. I also strongly believe that if you use the Web to find new and more interesting personal experiences, that they are just as readily available. I think PostSecret is one of those gems." (Mitch for Hugh).

Now it’s your turn: in the comment section below pick one thing that you saw this week that inspired you and share it.