Word of Mouth

For years, fear of skin cancer has had us slathering 50+ SPF sunscreen, donning hats or avoiding prolonged sun exposure under umbrellas or shade. Some unexpected research recently out of Edinburgh University could shift the perception of sun as unrelenting enemy. In the study, UV rays were found to release a compound that lowers blood pressure. On the line to explain how we might weigh the sun’s benefits and drawbacks is Doctor Richard Weller,  Senior Lecturer of Dermatology at Edinburgh University.

Humans are vastly more social than most other mammals. Neuroscientists point to the development of our social brain as key to the survival of our species; early humans survived by cooperating with each other in the rearing of children, by hunting in bands, by organizing night watches. A battery of research reveals that people still need people.

Our story today on trailer parks got the Word of Mouth team dreaming about the perks of living in a home on wheels. Here's our list of some of the nicest mobile home parks in the best locations. Because even in the world of mobile real estate, it's all about location, location, location.

1. The Shady Dell

The mass retirement of baby boomers could trigger yet another housing crisis. Boomers were responsible for roughly 80% of home construction in the 80’s and 90’s, and many of those homes were big, too big for empty nesters transitioning to a fixed income. Enter a housing solution that’s been with us all along: mobile home communities, or trailer parks.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of poet Sylvia Plath’s death by suicide, the singular lens through which many readers and academics have viewed her life, writing, and marriage. Now, a new generation is re-discovering Plath from a fresh perspective, one not colored by her sad and macabre death. 

A new data collection tool is being heralded as the first “mood ring” of the social media world. The “twittersphere” has become the home for millions and millions of micro-stories - fleeting tales of everyday life broadcast to the masses. Now, researchers at the University of Vermont are looking to extract a social pulse from Twitter’s vast output. Millions of tweets have been processed through UVM’s Hedonometer, which measures collective levels of happiness over space and time. Here to discuss the project - and the newly launched website, is Chris Danforth, associate professor at the University of Vermont’s Department of Mathematics and Statistics and one of the developers behind the Hedonometer.

In the four weeks since the Boston Marathon bombings, the One Fund set up to collect donations for victims has raised more than twenty-eight million dollars. The decision on how that money gets distributed goes to Kenneth Feinberg, the so-called “great decider”. 

At public hearings held last week at the Boston Public Library, Feinberg stated that there is not enough money in the One Fund to satisfy everyone. Here to discuss how dollars get assigned to tragedies is Juliette Kayyem, national security and foreign policy columnist for the Boston Globe. She’s former assistant secretary for intergovernmental affairs at the department of homeland security.

After every errant tweet from another major news outlet, or the announcement of fresh layoffs from another print newsroom, many shake their heads and talk about the good old days, before false reports of WMD’s and internet news aggregators. We remember a time when Edward R. Murrow and other icons of objectivity were our revered national watchdogs, serving up the truth...one newspaper column or TV broadcast at a time.   But what if our idealistic view of American journalism's "golden age" is nothing but a nostalgic myth?  Todd Gitlin teaches journalism and communications at Columbia University. His recent article “The Myth of Journalism’s Golden Age” was recently featured in the Utne Reader.

A government lab announced earlier this month that it’s been operating a quantum internet at Los Alamos for the past two years. Which led us to wonder, um, WHAT IS A QUANTUM INTERNET???

In this special edition of Word of Mouth: Girl Power Interrupted.

A government lab announced earlier this month that it’s been operating a quantum internet at Los Alamos for the past two years. Which led us to wonder, um, WHAT IS A QUANTUM INTERNET???  Joining us to explain it is Rob Fleischman, Chief Technology Officer at Xero-Cole, and the guy we call to help us understand things like, you know, quantum technology.

Syria’s civil war is now in its third year. More than 70,000 people have been killed; more than 1.4 million people have fled their homes; lives and families have been shattered; landmarks decimated and the economy is crumbling. Among those seeking refuge in neighboring Jordan are innovators and diaspora entrepreneurs who may well be seeding the ideas and infrastructure of Syria’s future. Patrick Clark is a reporter for Bloomberg Business Week covering small business and entrepreneurship and wrote about a tech boot camp for Syrians working in Jordan with Sarah Topol.

Google Glass -- a glass-lens like device  which allows users to access the internet, take photos and film short snippets, is slated for retail release at the end of this year or in early 2014. Already, the wearable computer has been preemptively banned in large parts of Las Vegas, and legislators in at least one state are trying to make it illegal to use while driving. While there could be some tough legal battles ahead, that may not be the biggest hurdle facing Google Glass. Marcus Wohlson is a staff writer for Wired Business…and he wonders if Google Glass may just be too dorky to go mainstream.