Working outside of the system

The Deakin Studies Online (DSO) Learning Management System (LMS) forms the fundamental basis for tertiary education at Deakin University. This LMS is founded on Web 1.0 principles, however significant potential exists for engagement in Web 2.0 technologies to support learning and teaching in the design studio. A digitally enhanced design curriculum is discussed starting with html-based reflective folios in 2001, the use of blogs for reflection and resource creation and culminating in a Web 2.0 design studio based on social networking.

Wi-Fi security : wireless with confidence

Since the IEEE ratification of the 802.11 standard in 1999, continuous exploits have been discovered compromising the confidentiality, integrity and availability of 802.11 networks. This paper describes the justification for a project to assess the security status of wireless network usage in society. It reviews the status of both commercial and residential approaches to wireless network security in three major Victorian cities, Melbourne, Geelong and Mornington, in Australia. By War Driving these suburbs, actual data was gathered to indicate the security status of wireless networks and give a representation of modern attitudes towards wireless security for the sample population. Preliminary results are presented to demonstrate the extent to which commercial or residential suburbs address wireless security. At this stage in the research further work is required to completely analyse the results. It is anticipated that the results will be useful for providing input into a defence and attack methodology for improving the security of both residential and commercial use of wireless networks.

Book review : Kazakhstan: ethnicity, language and power

Review of Bhavna Dave, Kazakhstan: Ethnicity, Language and Power. London & New York: Routledge, 2007, xivþ242 pp., £75.00 h/b.

The pornography of trauma : faking identity in misery memoirs

Examining hoax memoirs by James Frey (2003), Dave Pelzer (1995) and Kathy O’Beirne (2006), this paper illustrates how anxieties about the inability of representation to provide a direct access to truth are mitigated via an emotional connection with the text. While the degree of faking varies, each scandal reveals concerns about authenticity and the need to find—or feel—something that can be accepted as unquestionably ‘true’. The mimicking performed by a fake unsettles the boundaries between fact and fiction to reveal a public investment in an undisturbed effect of the real, a willingness to accept a blurring of ‘truth’ in the interests of the sensational experience of literature.

Identification of 100 fundamental ecological questions

Fundamental ecological research is both intrinsically interesting and provides the basic knowledge required to answer applied questions of importance to the management of the natural world. The 100th anniversary of the British Ecological Society in 2013 is an opportune moment to reflect on the current status of ecology as a science and look forward to high-light priorities for future work. To do this, we identified 100 important questions of fundamental importance in pure ecology. We elicited questions from ecologists working across a wide range of systems and disciplines. The 754 questions submitted (listed in the online appendix) from 388 participants were narrowed down to the final 100 through a process of discussion, rewording and repeated rounds of voting. This was done during a two-day workshop and thereafter. The questions reflect many of the important current conceptual and technical pre-occupations of ecology. For example, many questions concerned the dynamics of environmental change and complex ecosystem interactions, as well as the interaction between ecology and evolution. The questions reveal a dynamic science with novel subfields emerging. For example, a group of questions was dedicated to disease and micro-organisms and another on human impacts and global change reflecting the emergence of new subdisciplines that would not have been foreseen a few decades ago. The list also contained a number of questions that have perplexed ecologists for decades and are still seen as crucial to answer, such as the link between population dynamics and life-history evolution. Synthesis. These 100 questions identified reflect the state of ecology today. Using them as an agenda for further research would lead to a substantial enhancement in understanding of the discipline, with practical relevance for the conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem function.

Everything was legendary with Robert

A music video for Dave Graney