18.1.03

VVV

Scholars Scour eBay Academic sleuths once relied almost exclusively on the archives of major research libraries to track down facts and colorful details. Now, historians, literary critics, and museum archivists across the country incorporate a regular search of eBay into their research routine... Concern among scholars over the influence of eBay has primarily been stoked by the threat of important objects being won by people with large fortunes but no intention to study the material... "It's one thing to know that something exists ... in a university library," says Pannapacker. "It's another to actually see a picture of it and worry that it will soon fall into private hands." Yet in such cases, some scholars have been able to contact the buyer by e-mail. A few have worked out agreements with private owners to gain access to the material.

The concern that items of potential research significance could wind up in a private bidder's hands first struck me as just an example of academic proprietorship -- the idea that any item that could have value to a scholar ought to be owned by, or at least accessible to, the academic community. It's usually premised on the idea that scholarly study is of such overriding importance to society that it takes precedence over the normal exchange of goods and services (a kind of academic eminent domain). As an archaeologist -- an academic specialty with one of the smallest and most irreplaceable sets of data -- I can sympathize with the feeling that precious information is being lost. But at the same time, I think many academics have an overblown sense of their own importance to the world and tend to forget that there are about 5 people in the world who care about each of 95% of the scholarly work done today.

Thinking about the eBay case a bit more, I realized that there's very few instances in which something going up for auction on eBay is bad for academics. At the very least, an item going up for auction lets the academic community know it exists. If the need for study really is the reason they want the item so bad (and isn't just a rationalization for the thrill of owning cool stuff that motivates the private collectors as well), then the ethic of sharing that arises from such academic institutions as libraries and museums should encourage much more cooperation among interested scholars in securing valuable artifacts for the academy. And if a private collector does wind up with the item, eBay is far superior to a private transaction in allowing outside parties to track down the new owner and request a look at the item in the interests of science. And if that fails, scholars are really no worse off than before -- the item is merely in a different set of private hands. The only situation in which eBay would be detrimental to scholarly access would be for an item that a scholar would be able to track down offline and offer a lower price to the owner because there would be no competing bids.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 22:55 -- link --

VVV

University of Michigan admissions point system 80 points — GPA 12 points — SAT scores 10 points — Academic strength of high school 8 points — Strength of high school curriculum 10 points — Michigan resident 6 points — Underrepresented Michigan county 2 points — Underrepresented state 4 points — Legacy admission 3 points — Essay 5 points — Personal achievement 5 points — Leadership and service 20 points — Socio-economic disadvantage 20 points — Underrepresented racial-ethnic minority 5 points — Men in nursing 20 points — Scholarship athlete 20 points — Provost's discretion -- via CalPundit

The main reason people are scrutinizing this list is, of course, that the University of Michigan has gone to the Supreme Court to defend the "20 points — Underrepresented racial-ethnic minority" line. But what I find striking is how few points are allotted for the essay (3), personal achievement (5), and leadership (5) (though happily legacies get only 4 bonus points). It seems that if the university is really interested in promoting a student body with diverse interests and experiences and contributions to campus, these things ought to be given at least as much weight as SATs. I think there's something to Goblin Queen's argument that the kinds of diversity that affirmative action is looking at could productively be ascertained by scrutinizing the applican't actual experience, rather than using the somewhat crude proxy of race (though I wonder what that would mean in terms of application processing time, especially for public schools with large student bodies).
posted by Stentor Danielson at 11:50 -- link --

17.1.03

VVV I'm not up to a long post today, or even typing out all the code for a news story quote, especially given that I'm headed over to Deb's house soon. So here are a couple of links to better publications than this one:

John Quiggin has some thoughts on boosting the economic prospects of Aborigines.

And it seems that global warming is good for archaeology.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 19:30 -- link --

16.1.03

VVV

The Northern Front When the U.S. asked for permission, as required by Turkey's Constitution, to use bases in Turkey from which to stage an invasion, dickering began over how many hundreds of millions of dollars would be provided to upgrade the bases and lengthen landing fields. While this dragged on with no concrete being poured, an economic aid package was sought that Ankara estimates at $5 billion and U.S. sources say is more than double that. ... the unseemly hard bargaining going on now over money for military assistance is demeaning and could change the nature of the two nations' alliance. What should Turkey's new leaders do? First, make prompt parliamentary and construction arrangements to welcome the U.S. troops. And then go the extra mile: Volunteer to mass 100,000 Turkish troops on its border with northern Iraq. (When it did this with Syria, which had provided the base for the harassment of Turkey by P.K.K. terrorists, the Syrian dictator got the message and booted the terrorist leader out of Damascus, which led to his capture.)

There's something unsettling about the arrogance of this argument -- that the proper role of the less-powerful is to volunteer aid to the more-powerful in hopes of earning the more-powerful's favor. The US in this picture is the emperor in his sedan, while Turkey is the street urchin getting in the way of the royal procession, who ought to be thankful for the emperor's benevolence, and perhaps put his coat over a mud puddle to get a pat on the head. It's reminiscent of George W. Bush's attitude toward the UN -- "you're either with us or you're irrelevant. You need us, but we don't need you."

The content of the actions Safire is proposing for Turkey aren't the issue. It would be valid to argue that such unconditional support is simply the right thing to do. Or that it's effective strategy for a country in Turkey's position to swallow its pride and -- to use the hottest new cliche in punditopia -- carry water for the US. Both of those elements are in the article, but there's an added layer that projects the idea of knowing one's place in a permanent and absolute power hierarchy.

Turkey's bargaining makes perfect sense. In the long run, the most important relationship it has to cultivate is with Europe, as EU membership is the guiding goal of Turkish politics, and theoretical equality within a neighboring confederation seems quite a bit more advantageous than being the client of a state on the other side of the world (even if that patron state does have more guns). Europe, you may have noticed, is not so gung-ho about war as the US (or Safire). And domestically, there's the need to look tough vis a vis a nation widely rumoured to want a war on Islam -- especially important given that the ruling party in Turkey depends on a largely Muslim base of support.

Even those strategic concerns, though, don't get at the real issue: Turkey has power here. The US needs Turkish air bases to mount a successful war on Iraq. Kuwait offers a tiny entry in the far south. Saudi Arabia's support is shaky at best, while there's no point even asking Syria or Iran for help. It's a frustrating prospect to those who have internalized the idea of total American hegemony. Turkey is, understandably, using its power to keep from being trampled on, to become a partner in a mutually beneficial exchange rather than a doormat for a war it's not entirely sure about. Relations between unequals are about patronage and favor-seeking. Equals, on the other hand, bargain with each other.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 23:04 -- link --

15.1.03

VVV One of the things that I'm really pleased with from last semester is that I read Peter Beaumont's 536-page softcover Drylands: Environmental Management And Development without creasing the spine at all.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 23:10 -- link --

VVV This X10 camera ad says "Expect to see the unexpected." But their sample picture is exactly what I expected -- a scantily clad woman.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 19:58 -- link --

14.1.03

VVV

Blunt Words About The Soft Press Several of these young journalists said that the average Serb heard more critical reporting about Milosevic during the height of his power here than the average American hears about the Bush White House today. Nikola Jovanovic, from the Belgrade daily Blic, sounded personally affronted by this state of affairs: "You have freedom of information, which we didn't have. You can question the government -- but you don't do that. I would love to have that opportunity every day." When Vrzic asked one editor if his paper would publish an article critical of a big advertiser, he was stunned by the shamelessness of the response: "Of course not," the editor told him, "we're here to make a profit." Vrzic blanched. Such lovely outrage got me thinking about an old idea I've bandied at least to myself: Take media out of the moneymaking business altogether. Why can't news coverage be strictly a nonprofit activity, funded perhaps by philanthropists if not taxpayers? Why not view it as primarily altruistic, more like social work than like marketing sneakers.

The point about the timidity of American news coverage is well-taken. Whether the press is said to be biased toward the left, the right, or its own laziness, it's become such a cliche to point out that the American press has been long on repeating both sides' spin and short on real journalism that it takes something like Serbian criticism to get anyone's attention.

But the author's suggestions for a solution seem misguided. Even if we limit ourselves to the timidity born of advertisers' pressure (which I'm far from convinced is the major factor), why would changing the funding source make things any different? Instead of being beholden to advertisers, the media would be beholden to rich donors or to the government. The rich donors may very well be the same people as the advertisers, since we don't have much wealthy landed gentry around anymore to counterbalance the wealthy corporate CEOs. And government-funded media is a spineless spin machine waiting to happen. The BBC manages to buck the trend quite admirably, and is able to do so because of its long tradition of editorial independence. Further, the UK doesn't have the large political faction that wants to eliminate such social expenditures as the national endowment for the arts and NPR. NPR survives and maintains a left-slanted critique of the government, I think, because it's small and drowned out by right-wing radio, and because its listeners can be dismissed as out-of-touch left-wing academics. A taxpayer-funded US media on the scale of the BBC, regardless of what supposed protections of editorial independence are built into its charter, would be careful not to anger a Republican party whose core would rather eliminate public media just on principle.

Ideally, if the press is beholden to anyone it would be to the public. In a roundabout sense they are under the current model, as advertising revenue depends on good circulation numbers. The fear of criticizing an advertiser described in the article short-circuits that dependence. So a press directly dependent on revenue from subscribers would seem to alleviate the problem (assuming that subscribers actually want decent journalism -- and I suspect too many Americans aren't media-savvy enough to use their power in the market to encourage the highest caliber reporting). But it would create other problems. A subscriber-based business model would be unable to compete with advertiser-based companies, since the price hikes necessary to cover the difference would be steep. And even if the whole industry eschewed advertising, it would contract the consumer base served by the media, thus leaving poor people uninformed (as well as people who buy the paper in part because of the ads).

So I don't think hard-hitting journalism can really be enforced by any external financial pressure on the media. The only solution left would be the media's internal culture -- somehow socializing editors and reporters to value good journalism over everything else. That's a much easier culture to foster when you can see the larger consequences more clearly, as the Serbian journalists could from being in an environment where the free press is stifled. So in that sense it's no irony at all that the country with the most freedom of the press makes use of it the least.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 13:13 -- link --

13.1.03

VVV

Turks Grow Wary In Easing Up On Kurds Just last August, Turkey lifted the ban on broadcasting and education in the Kurdish language. The parliament's vote to do so represented a push for social change - and a shove from the European Union (EU), which Turkey hopes to join. But Kurds, who make up as many as 20 million of Turkey's 68 million citizens, say the changes are not being implemented quickly enough. Here in the predominantly Kurdish southeast of Turkey, which borders Iraq, many are worried that their drive for more civil freedoms will be set back by a US-led war against Saddam Hussein. Turkey's Kurds have benefited in the last three-plus years from a dissipation of hostilities after Abdullah Ocalan, the head of the banned PKK [Kurdistan Workers Party], was captured and convicted - and called on his comrades to lay down their arms.

It seems to me that impending war ought to be a motivation for Turkey to accelerate the lifting of restrictions on Kurdish language and culture. The fear is of a separatist movement wanting to turn eastern Turkey and northern Iraq into an independent Kurdistan, or at least use force to win autonomy within the existing nations.

Repressions of the type Turkey has instituted seem calculated to strip the Kurds of any feeling of dignity or pride in their heritage. This can only feed discontent with Turkey, a feeling that Turkey doesn't want its Kurds. Taken far enough, this is raw material for separatist revolt.

But if Turkey were to speed up its rollback of anti-Kurd regulations (and a rollback will happen eventually, because Turkey's interest in joining the EU is stronger than its interest in keeping the Kurds down), it could undermine separatists' base of support among Turkish Kurds. There could still be incorrigible radicals, but they would find less love -- and perhaps even widespread opposition -- among their brethren. Having suffered so long under regulations that prohibit them from speaking their language or wearing their traditional clothes in public settings, Turkish Kurds (and Iraqi Kurd refugees who hoped to find sanctuary in Turkey) would respond with gratitude, not resentment, toward the Turkish government. They would have less to fight for and more to lose, becoming less receptive to separatists' messages.
posted by Stentor Danielson at 21:00 -- link --