Read Neolithic carved balls could have been basis of the imperial measurement system (HeraldScotland)
I AM pleased that Jeff Nisbet has managed to do what I have tried in vain to do for the past two years which is to get media interest into what may well be the first examples of art in Scotland ("New theory sheds light on mysterious stone balls found across Scotland", The Herald, May 4) with the suggestion that the balls are, perhaps, apprenticeship pieces for entry into the profession of stone masonry.
Read Prehistoric Petrosphere - Carved Stone Spheres and Balls (Joy of Museums Virtual Tours)
Prehistoric Petrosphere – Carved Stone Spheres and Balls Prehistoric Petrosphere – Carved Stone Balls are spherical human-made objects made from stone. These ancient artifacts have been created by carving by up to up to 5200 years ago. These carved stone balls dating from the Late Neolithic to as late as the Iron Age, are mainly […]

Plotting the find sites on a map shows that these petrospheres were often located in the vicinity of Neolithic recumbent stone circles. 

Annotated on July 24, 2020 at 03:06PM

They are usually round of reasonably uniform size at around 2.75 inches or 7 cm across. They can have from 3 to 160 protruding knob shapes on the surface. These carved stone balls are nearly all have been found in north-east Scotland, the majority in Aberdeenshire. As portable objects, they are straightforward to transport and have been found on Iona, Skye, Harris, Uist, Lewis, Arran, Hawick, Wigtownshire, and fifteen from Orkney. A similar distribution to that of Pictish symbols led to the early suggestion that carved stone balls are Pictish artifacts. However, examples have been found in Ireland and England. 

Annotated on July 24, 2020 at 03:27PM

Read Unroll Your Twitter Threads Into WordPress by Gary Gary (The WordPress.com Blog)
Turn your recent Twitter thread into your next blog post.
I’m curious if they were following the recent functionality added by ThreadReaderApp using Micropub? I’m guessing the fact that they used the verb “unroll” means they were at least aware of it as a functionality.
Read Aggrieved ad tech types decry Google dominance in W3C standards – who writes the rules and for whom? by Thomas Claburn (The Register)
World Wide Web Consortium urged to get its governance act together
Earlier this week, 20 web advertising companies wrote to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)'s Advisory Board to ask that the standards organization revise its governance process to prevent ad tech giants like Google from running roughshod over the concerns of others with an interest in the web.
Read Thread by @AndrewMCrespo (Twitter)
Today on TV, the Deputy Director of the federal paramilitary force in #PDX discussed the infamous van video. He destbook example of an unconstitutional arrest. But... he doesn’t seem to know it. That is a BIG PROBLEM. Let’s unpa…
Read People Seem Confused about IndieAuth by David ShanskeDavid Shanske (david.shanske.com)
When I first started in the IndieWeb community, IndieAuth confused me. It confused me up until I built an IndieAuth endpoint for WordPress. It may confuse you as well. And that has been a problem in its adoption. The biggest confusion seems to be conflating IndieAuth and IndieAuth.com. IndieAuth.com...
Read IndieAuth.com vs IndieAuth by Nathan DeGruchyNathan DeGruchy (Verily)

David Shanske is one of the authors of one of the core IndieWeb plugins for WordPress: IndieAuth. It looks like he is depricating the use of IndieAuth.com as a provider. Makes sense with WordPress as the idea is really to use the built-in authentication method in WordPress itself, not another provider.

So, going forward, I’ve decided that I’ll be disabling the code from the IndieWeb WordPress plugin that allows you to use IndieAuth.com in favor of the built-in solution. Those who want to use an external service will still be able to do so, but this will be an ‘expert’ feature. Because enabling a plugin and it just working is what most people want.

David Shanske on the future of the WordPress IndieAuth Plugin

Honestly, I didn’t even know you could use IndieAuth.com as a provider. I assumed when I set it up that the entire idea was to use your site as a sort of IAM or SSO provider. I guess this confirms that my assumption was correct.

Keep up the great work, guys!

Read Colleges Are Getting Ready to Blame Their Students (The Atlantic)
As campuses reopen without adequate testing, universities fault young people for a lack of personal responsibility.
I love the attempt to reframe what is happening here. Administrations should be in a better place to see second and third order effects here, even if they don’t want to take responsibility for the costs themselves.
Read A Start-to-Finish Literature Review Workflow by Kimberly HirshKimberly Hirsh (kimberlyhirsh.com)
Remember how I was going to read Chris Guillebeau’s Side Hustle and see if it had any lessons for treating grad school like a side hustle? It does! One of the things Chris recommends is developing workflows for your side hustle. I’ve been tweaking my literature review workflow for a while, but ...
Read The American Death Cult by Anil Dash (Anil Dash)
A significant percentage of conservative culture in America defines “freedom” as death. This is causing a lot more problems right now than even its usual horrible effects. Some explanation, for those who may not have context. Why do we need to have guns? To protect our freedoms! Well, what about