"I'm going to keep having fun every day I have left"

Those of you who missed Randy Pausch's lecture yesterday can view portions of it here. You can read about it here (which also has a link to video) and here.

UPDATE: You can watch the lecture in its entirety here. 

Jonathan Potts

Now presenting avatar musicians

For many years classical music organizations have struggled with technology. Some traditional musicians question technology's role in classical music, thinking it could ruin the authenticity of the music. Some see it as a way to enhance the classical music experience. Recently, Newsweek reported that digital music downloads have increased the sale of classical music recordings. But it seems that now more than ever musicians are finding creative ways to present their music through technology. On September 14, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic will perform a concert in Second Life -- literally, a step into a new dimension for classical music.

Carnegie Mellon University's School of Music has embraced technology while walking the fine line to respect the traditional practices of music training and performance. The school was the first conservatory school of music in the country to webcast its live concerts and recitals. This academic year the school can now present these concerts in high-definition video. Now you can view concerts and recitals on a computer with the clarity and quality of television, reminding viewers how classical music can be a spectacular live experience. It may just be that classical music fans don't have to choose between tradition and technology.

Eric Sloss

You've got bike mail

In the late 19th century, artists were drawn to the distribution methods and various communication opportunities created by the postal system. Artists created various types of stationary, stamps and postcards to express numerous ideas through the mail. In the mid-20th century, artists inspired by the Fluxus movement built an international mail art system reacting against the exclusivity of institutional art.

At Carnegie Mellon, artists Ally Reeves and John Peña, two Master of Fine Arts candidates in the School of Art, have been inspired by the postal system, too. They decided to create their own postal service. During the Three Rivers Arts Festival the artists collected handwritten mail with the future task of hand delivering it to residents around the western Pennsylvania area. The two created the Pedal Postal Project, building a generic mailroom in the College of Fine Arts building and organizing and delivering the mail they collected by bike. Some recipients have opened their doors to the Reeves and Peña, others were just not home, leaving lots of mail still left to deliver. Clearly this project could not have happened six years ago when, in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, anthrax-infested letters were sent to members of the media and U.S. lawmakers. But what the artists have been able to tell us through this project is, optimistically, we may be entering into a new era of trust, compassion and personal interaction rather than being fearful and private.

Eric Sloss

Unintended consequences

A disturbing new study out of the University of Illinois at Chicago shows that teen suicides climbed 14 percent in the year following an order by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to put a so-called black  box warning on antidepressants, advising that they increased the risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors among adolescents. This resulted in a 22 percent drop in prescriptions for antidepressants for teens and children, and researchers fear this is behind the spike in suicides:

A similar drop in prescriptions in the Netherlands led to a 49% increase in youth suicides over a two-year period, the team reported. They estimated that every 20% drop in antidepressant use among all ages in the U.S. would lead to a nearly 10% increase in suicides, an additional 3,040 deaths per year. 

Regular readers of this blog will recall that Carnegie Mellon Statistics Professor Joel Greenhouse has been studying the purported connection between "suicidality" and antidepressant use among teens. His previous results have suggested that the FDA may have overstated the risk of antidepressant use by teens, and Greenhouse has noted that none of the teens involved in the studies upon which the FDA's decision was based committed suicide--and the number of suicide attempts was too low to be statistically significant.

If you are a member of the media who wishes to speak to Greenhouse, contact me at jpotts@andrew.cmu.edu.

Jonathan Potts