And I sang and danced about a high-rise

Pittsburgh = awesome.
SPEP = pretty cool.
Open bar at philosophy events = priceless.

Had a great time at SPEP with the posse. Photos and details will follow sometime when I have 15 spare minutes and my laptop at the same time.

Right now, its time for a "Dear So-and-so..."

Dear Professors of Universities Everywhere,
I'm a big fan of yours, generally speaking. You do one of the most important jobs around, and its one I would consider for myself if academia and university politics weren't so market-driven, counter-educational, and egomaniacal. That said, I like what you do, and wish I were not so delicate a person that the organization imposed on the post-secondary educational system caused a visceral reaction in the approximate region of where I would imagine my soul would be, if I had one, which I probably don't.
This is why I will one day open up a charter school that will change the American educational model, and hopefully make your jobs much more productive, fulfilling, rewarding, and socially significant. You can thank me later.

...

IN THE MEANTIME!
What, precisely, is with you people? That's right. I said "you people". Now you know I'm pissed. Whenever the sweeping generalizations hit the pavement, you can bet the gloves are off, and I'm going to come at you swinging like the drunken low-down dirty Mick I am.
My job -- you know, the one I actually get paid for? The one that makes it possible for me to participate in your classes, while racking up astronomical amounts of debt (that's $75,000 and counting not including interest for any of you keeping score) -- that job is specifically to help you compile, acquire copyrights for, scan, crop, clean up, copy, print, bind, and sell your course packs. It is a large part of what I do, and I'm pretty damn good at it. You've even said so.
What boggles my mind, what cooks my noodle, what makes me irritable and grouchy, is how you make this ideally simple task completely torturous.

No bibliography? Really? What if your students are looking for more source material for their papers? Do you submit papers or anthologies for publication without any citation? No? Well, then. WHY ON EARTH WOULD YOU GIVE IT TO ME LIKE THAT?? Why. I have to obtain copyrights (which is an entirely different rant, given that I'm an anarchist, and sort of skeptical about intellectual property to begin with) in order to make sure that you are protected from copyright infringement liability. Yet NONE of you EVER give me the information that I need to acquire those copyrights quickly, efficiently, or migraine-free.
I want to stress: It is totally rad that you provide me with lists of articles, for those of you that give me at least this much with which to work. Please don't stop doing that. If you don't do it already, please start.
But I don't know how to be clearer. Obviously, you have the original source material. It had to come from somewhere. Why would you not give me the publication year at least? Or the authors' names? I have in front of me a list of 67 articles that I now have to hunt down in all corners of the interweb (*bows head in thanks to GoogleScholar*) for each article, which often has multiple publication dates, journals, and anthologies, because all of you still live by the adage, "Publish or Perish," therefore making multiple articles with almost identical names and content being published in six different journals an occupational necessity for you, and an occupational hazard for me.

Whoa. BIBLIOGRAPHY! Maybe you should try it.

I am going to go impale my face on copyright law now.

Thanks for your time, and have a lovely day.
Sincerely yours,
Prag.