CasaSugar

Get Smart(er) With MIT OpenCourseWare

GeekSugar — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 15:00:56 PDT

How cool would it be to study up with the best minds in the country at MIT without having to pay for the tuition? If you have a thirst for knowledge, let MIT OpenCourseWare be your tall glass of water.

Now with over 1,800 courses open for you to follow – spanning their entire curriculum – you can read through lecture notes and labs and watch the same demonstration vids that the smarty pants see at the prestigious college, but at a substantial discount. Like, 100 percent. Yup, that's right, it's all free. To see why I think it's so cool, just

When I first checked out OpenCourseWare, there was a small selection of classes to choose from. But since MIT knows that knowledge is for everyone, they've offered up their entire curriculum to the masses. You can go at your own pace, follow along with the assignments as well as tune in to the lectures. Granted, you won't get that engineering degree that you've been jonesing for, but at least you can impress your friends at your next shindig with your endless knowledge of Biomolecular Kinetics and Cell Dynamics! Or maybe study up on Script Analysis so you can learn how to write that play you've been thinking about for years now. There's plenty of free courses to choose from, so go learn something!

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This Just In: MIT Sues Frank Gehry

CasaSugar — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 11:47:15 PST

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has has filed a negligence suit against famed architect Frank Gehry for serious design flaws in the Stata Center, a campus building holding labs, offices, classrooms, and meeting rooms. MIT paid Gehry $15 million to design the building, which was completed in 2004, and spent $300 million to build it. The school alleges the flaws in Gehry's design have caused leaks, drainage problems, and mold growing on its brick exterior.

According to Gehry: "You never quite know where they went wrong. A building goes together with seven billion pieces of connective tissue. The chances of it getting done ever without something colliding or some misstep are small." The Stata Center’s builder, Skanska USA Building Inc., is also a defendant in the case, but Paul Hewins, executive vice president and area general manager of the company, told The Globe: “This is not a construction issue. Never has been.”
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Meeting My Sperm Donor

The Good Men Project — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 10:00:50 PDT

We're happy to present this story from one of our favorite sites, The Good Men Project. Ben Sommer, conceived through alternative insemination, is a young man now and tells the story of deciding to meet his donor.

I grew up in a middle-class home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with two loving parents, both of whom are women. My conception was perhaps the most organized and scientific miracle of the modern American family - my architecture, the dream of dozens of individuals conducting their work across thousands of miles.

Objectifying Ryan Gosling

I was conceived through alternative insemination. A donor submitted his sperm to the Sperm Bank of California in Oakland (TSBC). Later, it was sent to the Fenway Community Health Center in Boston. Since opening its doors in 1982, TSBC has helped families without the ability to conceive on their own to birth over 2,000 children. Two thirds of those have ended up, like me, being raised in a lesbian household. TSBC is also the first sperm bank to offer a donor-identity-release program, which allows children of alternative insemination access to their donors' information when they turn 18.

I am not as much an oddity as you might think. As of 2005, some 270,000 children in the United States had same sex-parents. We are a generation that is just now beginning to come of age and able to share our stories. This is mine.

Growing up in a lesbian household was much like growing up in any other family unit, I imagine: vacations to Cape Cod, parents working late and sometimes not, play dates with a diverse group of friends.

I never gave much thought to that mysterious figure across the country. I never questioned the fact that I didn't have a father. As far as I was concerned I didn't need one. Is having two moms really all that different than having a mom and a dad? Parents are parents, right? I didn't see a difference at the time. My parents didn't either - at least at first.

They decided to conceive through a donor, in part, to avoid the complications that a third parent would bring. Asking a close male friend to donate, like some couples have done, can create unforeseen consequences. In the past, there have been custody battles between the donor and the parents raising the child. This was the case with a friend of mine, whose parents arranged donation from a male family friend. With a semi-anonymous donor like the man my parents chose, it would be clear who my parents were. And it was.

That's not to say that it was smooth sailing. "When we first learned you were going to be a boy, we really panicked," my mother told me recently. "Who's going to teach him to throw a ball? We didn't have many male friends. There was even basic stuff, like who's going to teach him to pee standing up. That doesn't come naturally."

Read the rest of the story below.

Honoring Some of Our Favorite Geeks For Black History Month

Michele Foley — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 05:01:38 PST

We may have Valentine's Day on the brain, but February also marks an important time of the year - Black History Month. In honor of Black History Month, let's take a look at some of our favorite geeks, both past and present. Everyone on this list has made vast contributions to furthering tech as we know it.

Dwayne McDuffie - The recently passed McDuffie wrote comic books for both Marvel and DC (including Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight, the Fantastic Four and the Justice League of America) before founding his own company, Milestone Media, which helped pioneer the use of multicultural characters as its heroes.
Mark Dean - Nerd alert! Without Dean, there may not have been a PC - he holds three of IBM's original nine PC patents, leading the teams that developed the ISA bus and the first one-gigahertz chip.
Mae Carol Jemison - It doesn't get much geekier than space travel; Jemison was the first black woman to travel in space.
Philip Emeagwali - We can all blame Emeagwali for our Internet addiction. He developed the fastest supercomputer software in the world. His IQ is too high to be measured by conventional standards, and he's won a Gordon Bell Prize, which is like the Nobel Prize for computer science.

See the rest of the notables when you read more.

Udacity and 14 Other Free Sites For Online Learning

GeekSugar — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 12:51:42 PST

After seeing the success of a personal experiment offering a free Stanford University-certified artificial intelligence course (23,000 people completed the class!), Sebastian Thrun left his prestigious professor position to dedicate himself to teaching on a much larger scale. His new program, Udacity will offer free university-level computer science classes to anyone interested in advancing their tech knowledge.

The two courses currently up for the taking are "CS 101: Building a Search Engine" and "CS 373: Programming a Robotic Car." But that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to free online classes. Here, a list of places to point your web browser for free classes online, so you can soak up all the knowledge your brain can handle.

Yale Open Courses - Named one of Time magazine's top 50 websites of 2011, Yale's classes allow anyone to browse through lectures and course materials in subjects including engineering, chemistry, astronomy, sociology, Spanish, history, and more.
MIT OpenCourseWare - With over 2,000 courses available at your fingertips, MIT OpenCourseWare should be your first (and maybe your only) stop in online learning.
Online Education Database - This website offers up a list of 200 free classes you can take online. Take some physics classes and learn about the phenomenon of superconductivity, or retake that algebra class you struggled with in high school.
OpenCulture - This website offers up a list of free classes from top universities like Stanford and UC Berkeley, and even some video lectures you can find on YouTube.
Harvard Open Learning - Watch videos of lectures on computer science and abstract algebra, among others
Princeton Web Media - Browse through and take in archived lectures from Princeton's math, science, and engineering departments, and lots, lots more.

See more websites to get your online learning on after the break.

Apple Supplements iBooks 2 and iBooks Author With the iTunes U App

Kristy Korcz — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 07:59:59 PST

Over 700,000 people have taken in a free class or lecture on iTunes U, and Apple wants to make things easier for teachers to create an interactive online environment with their iPad. Educators can compile all the information needed for a class right inside the iTunes U app - syllabus, assignments, office hours, and teacher notes, and they can even stream from a full classroom. Over 100 courses have already been created from a number of prestigious colleges across the country, including Yale, Duke, Stanford, MIT, and more.

But now iTunes U isn't just for college levels. Apple is opening up iTunes U to K-12 levels as well, allowing teachers to create full courses and students to study, stream, and view assignments, teacher notes, and course details from their iPads.

The iTunes U app is available today for free in the App Store.

4 Free Science Courses From iTunes

Kelly Schwarze — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 12:28:00 PDT

Even if you've been out of school for years, there's no need to feel left out while watching kids head back to the classroom, as you have a free resource to get your learning on. iTunes U, available through the iTunes store, offers content from over 1,000 universities, and nearly half of these schools including those known for stellar science programs like Harvard, MIT, and Cambridge among others, offer course lectures to the general public. Download these video classes if you've always wanted to spout astrophysics and computer programming knowledge like an expert. Also looking for French help or history lessons? Take some time browsing through class offerings; with hundreds available, there's something for everyone.

Astrophysics: Frontiers and Controversies, Yale - Focusing on three areas of astronomy: extra-solar planets, black holes, and dark energy, this course pays special attention to how astronomers are learning more in the field and what is still unknown in the universe.
Introduction to Computer Science and Programming, Massachusetts Institute of Technology - For students with no previous programming experience, in 24 lectures this course teaches how to write small Python language-based small programs.
Developing Apps For iOS, Stanford - Intended for students with a background in C-language computer programming, this course teaches how to create efficient applications for Apple's iOS platform through lecture videos and PDF documents.
Women's Health, University of California campuses - Learn more about promoting personal health straight from the prestigious doctors and researchers from the University of California colleges. Lectures include tips for stress, diabetes in women, and research on aging.

90210 "To the Future!": Most Scandalous Moments

Becky Kirsch — Tue, 17 May 2011 08:02:54 PDT

No more teachers, no more books! The 90210 gang bid adieu to senior year in the third season finale, but the graduation ceremony is hardly the event of the episode. That would belong to Ivy and Raj's traditional Indian nuptials, which come complete with saris for everyone and an elephant courtesy of Naomi's party planning skills.

In the midst of the celebrations there are a few shake-ups and breakups. Adrianna's evil doings finally come to the light (though really, do we need a Javier appearance?), and Naomi and Annie face some unforeseen relationship issues as they plan their futures. It's not nearly as jaw dropping as last year's situation with Mr. Cannon, but there is an unexpected twist in the final moments. Ready to break it down? Just

Ivy and Raj make it official. Ivy and Raj take their marriage decision to their parents, but the outcome isn't what they were expecting: while Raj's parents give their blessing, it's Ivy's mom who doesn't approve. Knowing that Ivy will end up a young widow with a broken heart, Laurel refuses to attend the ceremony (she has important yoga to do, you know). When Dixon hears about the issue, he comes to the rescue and convinces Laurel that her absence will only hurt Ivy more, and Laurel gets to the ceremony just in time to walk her daughter down the aisle.
Adrianna sees dead people. Well, dead person. Just as things seem to be peachy between Adrianna and Silver again, the ghost of Javier shows up to haunt Ade. She's able to shoo him away at first, but the truth comes out: at Ivy's bachelorette party, Naomi gets a little too dance-y with the stripper and ends up flinging Adrianna's purse. The truth unravels as soon as Silver's pills come flying out (why hasn't she hidden the evidence yet?), and Ade is exiled. Silver won't accept her apology, and Adrianna contemplates suicide as ghost Javier eggs her on. It's barely a dramatic moment though, as she quickly talks herself off the ledge. I knew it wouldn't be long for the pill-swapping to come to the light, but I never could have predicted it happening in the presence of a stripping cop. Talk about a buzzkill, but hilarious.
Liam's on a boat. Liam decides to wait until five minutes before graduation to inform Annie that he's just not that into the future she's planned for them in Pittsburgh. Instead, he wants to blow off college and work on a fishing boat that's leaving immediately. Hurt, Annie breaks up with Liam because she feels like she can't trust him - but she changes her mind at Ivy's wedding and makes amends just before his boat sets sail. Is it just me, or has the chemistry between these two cooled completely? I was rooting for them when Liam's brother was around, but now they're kind of boring.
Naomi's got a geeky bun in the oven! Naomi and Max have to face the consequences of Naomi's plagiarized paper, and of course the teachers are quick to blame her over the valedictorian. Naomi tries to sacrifice herself, but Max's guilty conscience gets the best of him and he comes clean during graduation. The grand romantic gesture quickly comes to a bitter end when Max's parents forbid him from seeing Naomi and decide to ship him to the East Coast for the Summer in hopes he can still get into MIT. It seems like the relationship is pretty much dead and buried, but when Naomi stops by Max's for one more goodbye, she drops a bomb on him - she's pregnant. Do you think she's telling the truth, or is it just a ruse to keep Max in the picture?

What's your take on the season finale? Were you shocked by Naomi's revelation? How do you think the show will tie together next season with everyone in different directions? And do you think they'll ever forgive Naomi?

Photo courtesy of The CW

90210 "Women on the Verge": Most Scandalous Moments

Molly Goodson — Mon, 02 May 2011 22:35:31 PDT

It's one week 'til the prom episode of 90210, but there was enough action in this week's "Women on the Verge" to ensure it wasn't filler. The title of the episode may imply that the ladies of West Beverly High are headed toward trouble, but the men are having just as many issues in their complicated relationships. I'm still very much loving the Naomi and Max storyline, though just like every high school show before it, 90210 pretends like we don't all know how the college admissions process works.

Silver is headed toward a breakdown from the get-go, with Adrianna waiting in the wings to prey on a vulnerable Navid. Plus, there's a very unwelcome familiar face back in the picture. Ready to break it down? Just

Silver melts down. After harassing her alumni interviewer with manic late night phone calls, Silver doesn't get into NYU and has an angry outburst at Navid when he asks if she's still on her meds. Navid finally goes to the one person who has been through this before: Dixon. Dixon and Navid's setup to get Silver into the hospital seems sort of underhanded and Navid accepts Adrianna's appearance with way too much trust. Considering all they've been though, would Navid really confide in Adrianna and want to have a consoling drink with her? This part had me yelling at the TV.
Naomi the romantic? Someone is head-over-heels. With Naomi into CU and Max headed to MIT, she wants to plan their long distance relationship and he's not so sure that's a good idea. Naomi is falling hard for her sexy nerd, so much so that she's applying last minute to Boston University. When he finds that out, Max is ready to change his plans and attend Cal Tech instead. I'm all for these two together, but the scenes from next week imply their honeymoon period may be over.
Annie's discovery. Last week Annie stumbled on Marla's assisted suicide informational pamphlets, and instead of letting it go decided to confront her new mentor/employer. Marla passes it off as research, though she also opens up to Annie about her struggle with Alzheimer's. Annie convinces Marla to attend a screening of one of her old movies, and lo and behold the former star still has tons of fans. Even so, it's not enough to stop Marla from taking some sort of drastic action. We don't see the scene Annie comes across the following day, though it's implied that Marla has gone through with her plans.
She's baaaaaaaack! Jen is back to see her baby Jacques and Ryan isn't so pleased. Jen says she has changed thanks to therapy, though she's not a "natural" like Ryan. Jen has some unkind words about Ryan's relationship with Debbie, which is nothing new. Jen momentarily wanted to bring Jacques to Paris, but in the end she settled simply to be the one in charge of his sartorial choices, naturally.
Marco's big deception. Teddy's new man seems to be hiding something from him and in the end it's just that he's not as wealthy as the rest of his West Bev classmates. Marco and Teddy share a tender moment, and it all ends in happy times for the couple.

Did anything this episode shock you, or did you see all these twists and turns coming? Are you as excited about West Beverly prom as we are?

Photo courtesy of The CW

Teach Yourself With These Free Online Education Sites

Kristy Korcz — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 10:30:04 PDT

Truth is, there are an amazing number of ways you can get a quality educational experience online, without ever having to fork over any cash. The cost of a college education is pretty remarkable these days, and not everyone can afford to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a degree from an Ivy League school (especially in this economy). But nearly everyone can afford the cost of an Internet connection, or even a library card.

Named one of Time Magazine's top 50 websites of 2011, Yale's open courses allow anyone to browse through lectures and course materials that range from engineering and chemistry, to astronomy, sociology, Spanish, history, and more. But that's just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to free online classes. Here, a list of places to point your web browser for free classes online, so you can soak up all the knowledge your brain can handle.

MIT OpenCourseWare - With over 2,000 courses available at your fingertips, MIT OpenCourseWare should be your first (and maybe your only) stop in online learning.
Online Education Database - This website offers up a list of 200 free classes you can take online. Take some physics classes and learn about the phenomenon of superconductivity, or retake that algebra class you struggled with in high school.
OpenCulture - This website offers up a list of free classes from top universities like Stanford and UC Berkeley, and even some video lectures you can find on YouTube.
Harvard Open Learning - Watch videos of lectures on computer science and abstract algebra among others
Princeton Web Media - Browse through and take in archived lectures from Princeton's math, science, and engineering departments, and lots, lots more.

See the rest of the list after the break.