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7/31/2006

CNN announces I-Reports

Did anyone else notice CNN’s almost hourly unofficial video reports from YouTube over the past three weeks of the Middle-East Crisis? Vacationing in CA, we did!

We’ll it seems today that CNN has decided to go into their own with this format and has launched Exchange where users can submit their own I-Reports.

Yup, another change to the media machine and an even bigger acknowledgement of how information is changing.

Discovered via Business2Blog.


LibVibe Podcasts

Via my favorite librarian in black, Sarah Houghton, I just learned of this new offering -- library related news via weekly podcasts at LibVibe. Subscribe for yourself and remember you don’t need an iPod to listen to these, just a PC with headphones or speakers.

The premiere cast talks about DOPA & reviews lots of other developments from the week. Take a listen yourself.

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7/30/2006

Ignorance is a powerful thing…

Deleting Online Predators Act overwhelmingly passes House

“The days of Myspace and other social networking sites could be numbered at schools and public libraries. The Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) has overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives by a 410 to 15 vote. If it becomes law, the act will force public schools and libraries to bar access to social networking websites and chat rooms."

Yup, I’m back from vacation and after catching up on news of the pass few days I’m wishing in a small, small way that I was back at the beach. But NO GO!

Please, please, PLEASE join me in writing and emailing your state senators in support of blocking this bill in Senate. This is too, TOO, TOOOO IMPORTANT for both the future of libraries and freedom of information access to disregard!! A block on social networking websites would in effect render over half of the information found on the Internet today useless including Associated Press blogs, Wired news, Wikipedia, Flickr photos, even access to Library blogs like this one. This is too important for libraries, schools and the public at large to ignore.

Read ALA’s, Leslie Burger's response.


Read YALSA's very excellent document on the educational value of social networking sites.

Read this (another good arguement against DOPA)

And then please join me in emailing your state senator (contact info)

As already proven by the House of Respresentatives, Ignorance can be a powerful thing. Please join in the campaign to help educate the members of the Senate and public, so that this uniformed bill doesn't pass!

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7/18/2006

We interupt this regularly scheduled vacation ...

Well the laptop came on our vacation anyway. The lure of posting vacation pics and working on digital album pages after the girls go to bed was just to hard to resist. And although I'm completely living up to my promise to not open up work email or even glance at my Bloglines account, I knew I just had to post 'this' the minute I met our rental host and found out what she did ...

She's a writer --- remember my comment last week about my favorite monthly read -- for, yup! you guessed it ... Wired! How coincidental is that?

BTW: The house is fantastic. Here's the view - and this is only half of it :)


PS: With a view like this, I don't expect I'll be posting again until I get back. Have a great week :)


7/10/2006

Vacation bound & Summit ahead ...

The preparations are underway and the countdown has begun ... 48 hours until vacation and a long overdue one at that. In the meantime, I'm finalizing plans for August 3rd, when both Michael Stephens and Michael Casey will joining myself and our library's staff for PLCMC's second Technology Summit. I can't wait!

This year's summit is focused on -- what else -- Library 2.0 and along with this focus I will also be using this event to kick off an exciting new program for staff called Learning 2.0.

The L2 project has gobbled up nearly every available moment of my free time since the beginning of June. In fact, so much so that my husband has threatened to quarantine my laptop on more than one occasion. Anyway, the good news is that with a vacation looming I have absolutely no plans to cart along a 4.5 lb appendage and actually hope to devour several titles that have been parked on my must read list for far too long. :)

So what is Learning 2.0 you ask? Well check back August 3rd for the official unveiling. In the meantime, you can view the site for a brief description of the program with more details being added soon.

And for PLCMC staff who may be reading this, be sure to get yourself signed up to attend the Summit (see the the training calendar on the staff intranet) for this is one afternoon you'll not want to miss!!

PS: If you didn't catch the announcement earlier this week on the ALA TechSource blog, the invitation to neighboring libraries can be found here. If you're in the Charlotte area, I hope you can join us.

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7/06/2006

Fab Friday Salute

Configuring and replacing nearly 450 PCs in less than 6 months is no small task, especially given the fact the units you are replacing are spread across eight different locations and are indispensable to the every day operation of the branch. Add in wiping the aged and obsolete units down to DOD (department of defense) standards and coordinating the public sale of used equipment all within the same week and you’ve pulled off a feat just one memory chip shy short of a miracle. Well that’s exactly what our IT department has done so far this year and last Saturday’s public used equipment sale at the Morrison Regional branch was no exception.

This week’s Fab Friday Salute is well earned by Lino Scala and the IT technicians -- David, James, Jimmy, Jeff A, Jeff G, John, Greg & Elston. You guys are amazing! Thanks for all you do!!!

Here’s some pictures from Saturday’s sale. 68 used units bought, sold and carted out of the branch in an hour and half. Yes, another branch full of happy PCs users and staff - Now that's progress. :)


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7/05/2006

Barcode Fun

You can’t buy an item these days that doesn’t have a bar code on it. Even within our libraries almost everything from the books on our shelves to the library cards we use to check them out with have these familiar black-n-white images on them … so why not make them attractive.

Check out this Barcode Gallery.

Six trends driving the future of libraries

Wired Mag (one of my favorite monthly reads) has a great piece on Six Trends Driving the Global Economy. Simply substitute the phrase”global ecomony” with “future of the library” and there’s some great food for thought here. Here’s a brief recap of the six trends…

  1. People Power: Blogs, user reviews, photo-sharing – the peer production era has arrived.

  2. Video Unlimited: Any time, any place, any format, any screen – there’s always something on.

  3. Personalize it: Jeans cut just for your hips, drugs designed just for your genome. The new me decade is a perfect fit.

  4. Carbon Killers:Hug that tree- For some companies, going green is generating serious greenbacks.

  5. Buy It Now: Forget old-school R&D. These companies purchase their ideas one startup at a time.

  6. All Access Ecomony: Closed systems are dead. From software to supply chains, open is the new standard.

Here are some of my thoughts …

  1. Are libraries harvesting this wealth of peer production capabilities and user generated content? I think we’re just beginning to …
  2. Is your library offering downloadable video yet? Is you library keeping up bandwidth demands that this format demands? We all know users want it … how are we supplying or helping to fulfill this information need?
  3. We heard this over and over from our users in our website focus groups – users want control of their options and they want it personalized to their needs.
  4. PLCMC’s latest building project, ImaginOn, was the city’s first “green building” to earn LEED certification. I wonder are other communities asking this from their library building projects as well?
  5. I think we’re starting to see lots of partnering and positioning by library vendors to do the same. This item made me wonder how many offers LibraryThing has already entertained. I for one hope they never sell out, but rather continue to push the idea of what online catalogs can become.
  6. Open source, APIs and mashups – that’s the future…

What are yours?