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Amateur Professionalism
Amateur professionalism or professional amateurism (shortened to pro-am) is a blurring of the distinction between professional and amateur within any endeavour or attainable skill that could be labelled professional in fields such as writing, computer programming, music or film. The idea was used by Demos, a British think tank, in the 2004 book ''The Pro-Am Revolution'' co-authored by writer Charles Leadbeater. Leadbeater has evangelized the idea (in "amateur professional" order this time) by presenting it at TEDGlobal 2005. The idea is distinct from the sports term " pro–am" (professional–amateur), though derived from it. An example of professional amateurism on a large scale is the international open source and free software operating system project Linux which along with its many spinoffs has been developed by paid professionals at companies such as Red Hat, HP, and IBM working generally indistinguishably together with amateur professional coders. Amateur profes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Demos (UK Think Tank)
Demos is a cross party think tank based in the United Kingdom with a cross-party political viewpoint. Founded in 1993, Demos works with a number of partners including government departments, public sector agencies and charities. It specialises in public policymaking in a range of areas - from education and skills to health and housing. Demos houses the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media (CASM), which leads the study of how the rise of the digital world affects politics, policy and decision-making. The current Chief Executive is Polly Mackenzie, who joined the think tank in January 2018 and previously worked as the Director of Policy to the Deputy Prime Minister from 2010-15. The organisation is an independently registered educational charity. History Demos was founded in 1993 by former ''Marxism Today'' editor Martin Jacques, and Geoff Mulgan, who became its first director. It was formed in response to what Mulgan, Jacques and others saw as a crisis in politics in Brita ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies, and comets. Relevant phenomena include supernova explosions, gamma ray bursts, quasars, blazars, pulsars, and cosmic microwave background radiation. More generally, astronomy studies everything that originates beyond Earth's atmosphere. Cosmology is a branch of astronomy that studies the universe as a whole. Astronomy is one of the oldest natural sciences. The early civilizations in recorded history made methodical observations of the night sky. These include the Babylonians, Greeks, Indians, Egyptians, Chinese, Maya, and many ancient indigenous peoples of the Americas. In the past, astronomy included disciplines as diverse as astrometry, celestial navigation, observational astronomy, and the making of calendars. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doubleday (publisher)
Doubleday is an American publishing company. It was founded as the Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897 and was the largest in the United States by 1947. It published the work of mostly U.S. authors under a number of imprints and distributed them through its own stores. In 2009 Doubleday merged with Knopf Publishing Group to form the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, which is now part of Penguin Random House. In 2019, the official website presents Doubleday as an imprint, not a publisher. History The firm was founded as Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897 by Frank Nelson Doubleday in partnership with Samuel Sidney McClure. McClure had founded the first U.S. newspaper syndicate in 1884 ( McClure Syndicate) and the monthly '' McClure's Magazine'' in 1893. One of their first bestsellers was ''The Day's Work'' by Rudyard Kipling, a short story collection that Macmillan published in Britain late in 1898. Other authors published by the company in its early years include W. Somerse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States, and is more than twice as populous as second-place Los Angeles. New York City lies at the southern tip of New York State, and constitutes the geographical and demographic center of both the Northeast megalopolis and the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass. With over 20.1 million people in its metropolitan statistical area and 23.5 million in its combined statistical area as of 2020, New York is one of the world's most populous megacities, and over 58 million people live within of the city. New York City is a global cultural, financial, entertainment, and media center with a significant influence on commerce, health care and life sciences, research, technology, education, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Cult Of The Amateur
''The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet Is Killing Our Culture'' is a 2007 book written by entrepreneur and Internet critic Andrew Keen. Published by Currency, Keen's first book is a critique of the enthusiasm surrounding user-generated content, peer production, and other Web 2.0–related phenomena. The book was based in part on a controversial essay Keen wrote for '' The Weekly Standard'', criticizing Web 2.0 for being similar to Marxism, for destroying professionalism and for making it impossible to find high quality material amidst all of the user-generated web content. Contents Keen argues against the idea of a read-write culture in media, stating that "most of the content being shared – no matter how many times it has been linked, cross-linked, annotated, and copied – was composed or written by someone from the sweat of their creative brow and the disciplined use of their talent." As such, he contrasts companies such as Time Warner and Disney ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
User Innovation
__NOTOC__ User innovation refers to innovation by intermediate users (e.g. user firms) or consumer users (individual end-users or user communities), rather than by suppliers (producers or manufacturers). This is a concept closely aligned to co-design and co-creation, and has been proven to result in more innovative solutions than traditional consultation methodologies. Eric von Hippel and others observed that many products and services are actually developed or at least refined, by users, at the site of implementation and use. These ideas are then moved back into the supply network. This is because products are developed to meet the widest possible need; when individual users face problems that the majority of consumers do not, they have no choice but to develop their own modifications to existing products, or entirely new products, to solve their issues. Often, user innovators will share their ideas with manufacturers in hopes of having them produce the product, a process calle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Professional
A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and skills necessary to perform their specific role within that profession. In addition, most professionals are subject to strict codes of conduct, enshrining rigorous ethical and moral obligations. Professional standards of practice and ethics for a particular field are typically agreed upon and maintained through widely recognized professional associations, such as the IEEE. Some definitions of "professional" limit this term to those professions that serve some important aspect of public interest and the general good of society.Sullivan, William M. (2nd ed. 2005). ''Work and Integrity: The Crisis and Promise of Professionalism in America''. Jossey Bass.Gardner, Howard and Shulman, Lee S., The Professions in America Today: Crucial but Fragile. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Independent Scientist
An independent scientist (historically also known as gentleman scientist) is a financially independent scientist who pursues scientific study without direct affiliation to a public institution such as a university or government-run research and development body. The expression "gentleman scientist" arose in post-Renaissance Europe, but became less common in the 20th century as government and private funding increased. Most independent scientists have at some point in their career been affiliated with some academic institution, such as Charles Darwin, who was affiliated with the Geological Society of London. History Self-funded scientists practiced more commonly from the Renaissance until the late 19th century, including the Victorian era, especially in England, before large-scale government and corporate funding was available. Many early fellows of the Royal Society in London were independent scientists. Benefits and drawbacks Self-funding has the disadvantage that funds may ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Independent Scholar
A scholar is a person who pursues academic and intellectual activities, particularly academics who apply their intellectualism into expertise in an area of study. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or researcher at a university. An academic usually holds an advanced degree or a terminal degree, such as a master's degree or a doctorate ( PhD). Independent scholars, such as philosophers and public intellectuals, work outside of the academy, yet publish in academic journals and participate in scholarly public discussion. Definitions In contemporary English usage, the term ''scholar'' sometimes is equivalent to the term ''academic'', and describes a university-educated individual who has achieved intellectual mastery of an academic discipline, as instructor and as researcher. Moreover, before the establishment of universities, the term ''scholar'' identified and described an intellectual person whose primary occupation was professional research. I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amateur
An amateur () is generally considered a person who pursues an avocation independent from their source of income. Amateurs and their pursuits are also described as popular, informal, self-taught, user-generated, DIY, and hobbyist. History Historically, the amateur was considered to be the ideal balance between pure intent, open mind, and the interest or passion for a subject. That ideology spanned many different fields of interest. It may have its roots in the ancient Greek philosophy of amateur athletes competing in the Olympics. The ancient Greek citizens spent most of their time in other pursuits, but competed according to their natural talents and abilities. The "gentleman amateur" was a phenomenon among the gentry of Great Britain from the 17th century until the 20th century. With the start of the Age of Reason, with people thinking more about how the world works around them, (see science in the Age of Enlightenment), things like the cabinets of curiosities, and t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Software Engineering
Software engineering is a systematic engineering approach to software development. A software engineer is a person who applies the principles of software engineering to design, develop, maintain, test, and evaluate computer software. The term '' programmer'' is sometimes used as a synonym, but may also lack connotations of engineering education or skills. Engineering techniques are used to inform the software development process which involves the definition, implementation, assessment, measurement, management, change, and improvement of the software life cycle process itself. It heavily uses software configuration management which is about systematically controlling changes to the configuration, and maintaining the integrity and traceability of the configuration and code throughout the system life cycle. Modern processes use software versioning. History Beginning in the 1960s, software engineering was seen as its own type of engineering. Additionally, the development of s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Activism
Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range from mandate building in a community (including writing letters to newspapers), petitioning elected officials, running or contributing to a political campaign, preferential patronage (or boycott) of businesses, and demonstrative forms of activism like rallies, street marches, strikes, sit-ins, or hunger strikes. Activism may be performed on a day-to-day basis in a wide variety of ways, including through the creation of art ( artivism), computer hacking ( hacktivism), or simply in how one chooses to spend their money ( economic activism). For example, the refusal to buy clothes or other merchandise from a company as a protest against the exploitation of workers by that company could be considered an expression of activism. However, the mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
