Study Guides Come to iPod

iPreppress on Wednesday announced a collaboration with SparkNotes to bring 11 study guides of classic American and British literature to the iPod. They’re priced at US$4.95 each.

Aimed at high school and college students, study guides include The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Catcher in the Rye, the Great Gatsby, Hamlet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies, The Odyssey, Pride and Prejudice, Romeo and Juliet, the Scarlet Letter and A Tale of Two Cities.

The study guides feature the same content as SparkNotes study guides, including context, plot overview, summary and analysis, and more. What’s more, the study guides include quizzes and audio hyperlinks.

The content works with video-capable iPod, iPod nano, iPod photo and third-generation iPod and higher and iPod mini models.

DVDs vanish off library shelves

Thieves in Gwinnett County have lifted enough DVDs from public library shelves to fill more than two video stores and wipe out nearly half the system's collection.

The thefts got so bad — nearly 17,000 discs in all — the library board quietly shut down the 5-year-old program last month and began selling off the remaining inventory.

McCloy and others want the program back. But the library board isn't likely to relent.

"The economics don't add up right now," English said.

The lost discs have already cost the taxpayer-funded library system about $250,000, administrators estimated. They say better DVD security would cost at least $150,000 a year, money the system can't afford for a collection that accounts for less than 4 percent of all checkouts.

Gwinnett's collection included only children's titles, such as those featuring Barney and Wiggles, and educational selections from producers like National Geographic. The only feature-length movies were "Cinderella" and similar titles.

Librarians first started noticing DVDs were missing a couple of years ago. Parents arrived home from the library with DVD cases that turned out to be empty. Or DVDs would be missing from shelves, even though the library's computer system showed they had not been checked out.

Library workers didn't catch on to the scope of the problem until early 2004. A routine inventory showed the DVDs were missing at a higher rate than books, CDs, magazines and other materials.

Suspicious, administrators called the system's 12 branches and asked librarians to look inside the cases to see if they still contained discs. Many were empty.

In all, thieves made off with 44 percent of the system's roughly 39,000 DVDs. Theft rates for other types of materials, such as books, are less than 2 percent, marketing director Cindy Murphy said.

Google Database Service

Word is ripping around the web that Google is testing a new subdomain called base.google.com. A screen shot - the site has been up and down - shows a Google database of sorts where you can "Post your items on Google." It's a tagged database of stuff that heads directly into the world of Paul Ford's classic "Google Takes All" essay.

Apparently this will be debuted at Google's invite only Zeitgeist conference today. Philipp has more.

Interesting "Browse" of Amazon Books!

An experimental image-browsing interface by jim bumgardner, of krazydad.com displays book covers from amazon.com. Move your mouse over the covers to see more information, click to view the amazon page. The graphic novels are arranged horizontally by price, and vertically by color. Cool!

"Shaft" lyrics in Chaucerian English

Study: iPod users are prolific influencers

And we’re better looking, too.

Market research firm Intelliseek reports that iPod users are among the most likely on the Internet to create and spread consumer-generated media. The company also thinks this will increase with the proliferation of Apple’s new video-enabled iPod hardware.

iPod users are twice as likely to have authored a weblog than consumers who don’t have MP3 players, according to Intelliseek’s 2005 Consumer-Generated Media and Behavior Study.

Intelliseek also reports that iPod users are 2.5 times as likely to exchange text messages on cell phones, three times as likely to take photos with a camera phone, and three times as likely to download video clips and movies to their computer. They’re more likely to own Digital Video Recorders (DVRs), PDAs, digital cameras, laptops and cell phones, too.

The study looked at the habits of 660 online consumers and was conducted in August, 2005. The full study — which focuses on all consumer generated media, not just that which is iPod-related — will be released in November.

Stanford and Apple Present "Stanford on iTunes"

Stanford University is making hundreds of Stanford podcasts available free to anyone through iTunes Music Store. The podcasts include lectures by the university's professors, music from its students, and play-by-play descriptions of its football games.

Check it out!
Stanford on iTunes

ALA 2006 to be in New Orleans

The following statement has been issued by American Library Association (ALA) President Michael Gorman:

"We realize that many sections of the city, and particularly the Ninth Ward, have suffered tragic damage, and that many New Orleans residents have lost their homes forever. If we truly care about the residents of New Orleans, however, the best thing that the association and its members can do is to go to New Orleans and lead the reconstruction by example. Our conference will help to provide the jobs and tax revenues needed if residents are to reestablish their lives and for the city to fully restore services, including library services. We speak often of how libraries build communities, and we now have chance to show the country and world that librarians build communities, too.

I hope that you will join me in New Orleans. I am certain that we will have an extraordinarily productive and enjoyable conference, as we enjoy the welcome and celebrate the rebirth of a city we all love."

World Usability Day

November 3, 2005 is World Usability Day (WUD), an event that will spread the word about making products and services easier to use:
http://www.worldusabilityday.org

Part of WUD will be the Accessibility Channel -- an exciting, 24-hour global conversation about accessibility and usability:
http://www.inclusive.com/WUD_access

From World Usability Day (WUD) website:

* On November 3,2005, people in more than 80 locations, and 30 countries around the world will celebrate World Usability Day. The theme is "Making It Easy!"

* Every citizen and customer has a right to expect products and services that are easy to use. World Usability Day events will highlight how this can be achieved.

* From cell phones, to call centers, to customer service websites and more, there are countless opportunities to "Make It Easier to Use."

* World Usability Day events are designed increase awareness of every citizen's and customer's right to expect things that work right. Events will also emphasize the responsibility to drive the development of usability improvements.

Cellphones learn to recognize their owners' faces

Oki Electric Industry Co. Ltd. this week began marketing a technology that inexpensively adds face recognition to camera-equipped cellphones. Oki's "Face Sensing Engine" (FSE) "middleware" decodes facial images within 280mS on a 100MHz ARM9 processor, and can restrict access to mobile devices by recognizing their owners, the company says.

Oki says its FSE technology can help protect sensitive personal information such as phone numbers and email addresses from unwanted access, in the event of loss or theft of a mobile device. The use of face recognition, based on the mobile device's built-in digital camera, eliminates the need for users to enter passwords to use their devices, and provides a faster and more natural method of authentication. Oki points out.

FSE can acquire facial images from within a larger image. It works by locating and mapping key facial features -- such as eyes, eyebrows, and mouth -- and adapts to changing facial conditions such as winking and smiling, according to Oki.

Oki lists the following key features of its FSE technology:

• Compact system footprint -- requires approximately 260KB on an ARM9 processor


• Fast image processing -- requires approximately 280mS on a 100MHz ARM9 processor


• Face recognition algorithm automatically adjusts to ambient lighting conditions


• Supported processor architectures -- ARM9, SH Mobile, and others


• Supported software platforms -- Symbian, uITRON, Linux, BREW, WIPI, Windows, Solaris, and others

Humorous slipcovers for books

Flapart sells funny book-covers to wrap around your reading material to impress strangers on the subway. Covers include "Coroner by Correspondence" and "Fast Track to Prison - Exploring the Many Benefits of Life Behind Bars." LINK

Google sued by Association of American Publishers

The Association of American Publishers (AAP) today announced the filing of a lawsuit against Google over its plans to digitally copy and distribute copyrighted works without permission of the copyright owners. The lawsuit was filed only after lengthy discussions broke down between AAP and Google’s top management regarding the copyright infringement implications of the Google Print Library Project.

The suit, which seeks a declaration by the court that Google commits infringement when it scans entire books covered by copyright and a court order preventing it from doing so without permission of the copyright owner, was filed on behalf of five major publisher members of AAP: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Pearson Education, Penguin Group (USA), Simon & Schuster and John Wiley & Sons.

Latest ePaper entry

Latest to show their own ultrathin display solution is Siemens, who claims their new color screens are quite actually paper thin, and that they actually cost relatively little to manufacture—$52 US per square meter. That’s still a bit much for newspaper use, of course, so it looks like they want us to hold out until 2007 on this one, when they suppose it’ll be a little more affordable in mass market pricing.

Google's Librarian Center

Librarians and Google share a mission: to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. We support librarians like yourself who work each day to further that mission. This page is a first step toward improving and expanding that support.

Check it out:
http://www.google.com/services/librarian_center.html

Average age of newspaper readers: 55

Newspaper readership is down. Fewer young people are picking them up, and the average age of a newspaper reader is now 55, according to a Carnegie Corporation study. Many papers have been losing circulation at alarming rates across all age groups.

Link to article.

OCLC's Presentation/Publication Bank

A handy collection of conference presentations and publications on library/information science subjects.

Japanese restaurants introduce RFID Payment System

Beef Bowl Chain Nakau introduced an RFID-based Payment System (JCB's QuickPay) on October 5. Customers can just show their RFID-chipped wallet phones to a paymenet machine to quickly pay for their meals. They are likely the first Beef Bowl Restaurant Chain to introduce RFID payment.

Beef bowls are one of the most popular fast food in Japan and they cost around $5.

Beloit College Student Mindset Lists

In the coming weeks, millions of students will be entering college for the first time. On average, these members of the Class of 2009 will be 18 years old, which means they were born in 1987. Starbucks, souped-up car stereos, telephone voicemail systems, and Bill Gates have always been a part of their lives.

Each August, as students start to arrive, Beloit College releases the Beloit College Mindset List, which offers a world view of today's entering college students. It is the creation of Beloit’s Keefer Professor of the Humanities Tom McBride and Director of Public Affairs Ron Nief.

For the class of 2008:

1. Andy Warhol, Liberace, Jackie Gleason, and Lee Marvin have always been dead.
2. They don't remember when "cut and paste" involved scissors.
3. Heart-lung transplants have always been possible.
4. Wayne Gretzky never played for Edmonton.
5. Boston has been working on the "The Big Dig" all their lives.

75 more...and links to seven other class "Mindsets"

Stealth Surfer USB Flash Drive

This is a product that caters to the extremely paranoid, but nevertheless it is a pretty good idea. StealthSurfer is a Windows PC compatible key-sized USB device that is preloaded with Firefox, Anonymizer, RoboForm, and Thunderbird software configured and integrated for optimum privacy. When using StealthSurfer, all your sensitive Internet files such as cookies, history, and cache are stored on the StealthSurfer device instead of your computer.

A Comprehensive Privacy Solution – ALL integrated under one hood! Preloaded with:

• Firefox - high-speed browser with enhanced security


• Anonymizer - anonymous surfing complete network security and IP masking
• RoboForm - one-click form-fill with secure user ID/password management application


• Thunderbird - portable e-mail accessHushmail - high security web based e-mail solution

Digital Divisions

There are clear differences among those with broadband connections, dial-up connections, and no connections at all to the internet

Sixty-eight percent of American adults, or about 137 million people, use the internet, up from 63% one year ago. Thirty-two percent of American adults, or about 65 million people, do not go online, and it is not always by choice. Those who are currently offline have had varying levels of exposure to the online world. One in five American adults say they have never used the internet or email and do not live in an internet-connected household. At the other end of the spectrum, 53% of home internet users have high-speed access, creating a new divide among internet users.

Pew Report Link

The Lulu Blooker Prize is the world's first literary prize devoted to "blooks": books based on blogs or websites. Awarded in three categories:Fiction, Non-Fiction and Comics.

Blooks are the world's fastest-growing new kind of book and an exciting new stage in the life cycle of content, if not a whole new category of content. Learn more

The Lulu Blooker Prize is sponsored by Lulu, the world's fastest-growing provider of print-on-demand books, including an increasing number of blooks. However, the judges of the short-listed books are independent of Lulu and no favor will be shown to books published on Lulu.

Google formally declares war on Microsoft

GOOGLE HAS confirmed that it will launch free spreadsheet and word-processing software online and take on Microsoft in one of its biggest markets.

Under the deal, Google will allow web users to access Sun's OpenOffice from a toolbar.

The other day, when Sun's Scott McNealy and his former employee now Google chief Eric Schmidt met up, Sun was wary about doing that.

When asked point blank, McNealy said it was something to be investigated. However Sun's Australian spokesman Paul O'Connor was a little more forthright about the deal which he said was "huge".

He bubbled that the deal was a wake-up call for Microsoft.

"At the moment most people are used to having to pay for software packages, but at the end of the day, the value is in the content and services – not in the software itself," he said.

More at the Brisbane Courier Mail, here.

Retired Librarian Wins $1.6 million on slot machine

Jacquelyn Sherman had not had much luck since Hurricane Katrina sent her fleeing from her New Orleans home.

That changed on Tuesday, when the money flooded in.

The 57-year-old retired librarian won $1.6 million playing the slot machine at Evangeline Downs in Opelousas, Louisiana.

Said Ms. Sherman, "You just don't realize what done happened until the person next to you hits you and says, Well, you done did it."

LINK to article.

Gallery of Bellydancing Librarians

LINK to gallery.

America's Fall in R&D: "Nobody Cares"

From "Business Week" via Greg Lee:

There's a major university in the [San Francisco] Bay Area that you would have thought was one of the best-funded universities in the world. And one of our fellows at National is a professor there. And he said they just got a new gift of a network analyzer from Agilent. It's worth about $110,000 and they put it on a metal cart, and professors will hide it away and hoard it. And to use it, you have to sign up for it days in advance, and they roll it around from lab to lab.

And then he was invited over to China to give a speech and was given a tour of Tsinghua University. And he was shocked and amazed that every lab had one of those very same Agilent network analyzers. Some of them had never been used or turned on, but they had them just in case they ever needed one. The funding is incredible, and meanwhile we're sitting here thinking we're doing fine.

LINK to article.

B&N, thanks in no small part to the seductive smell of coffee, has become the new public library.

Put it this way: When was the last time you couldn't find a seat at your local branch? When was the last time you went to the library on a Saturday night? For fun. Just to browse. Please, if you're that guy, don't write. It's OK. I'm sure there's someone out there for you.

In fact, public libraries are struggling in the Internet age when millions have easy access to information without leaving home or office. Having noticed the marketing success of Starbucks, some universities, and even a few high-school libraries, are now offering coffee. Vendors can be found in libraries at Virginia Commonwealth University, the University of Richmond, the University of Tennessee, the University of Pittsburgh and Auburn University, to name a few.

Students reportedly are clamoring for the library. Who'da thunk? Brew it and they will come.

LINK to article.

RSSor

In very very very beta, RSSor is a del.icio.us clone (seriously, look at it!) for feeds. The concept is interesting. Tag a feed and a unique page is created for the content for the feed (ie, the the "page" for Library Stuff content) You can then add blog posts to del.icio.us or Furl (I love that!), comment on each post post (which didn't seem to be working this morning [lots of other 404's on the site as well]).

One of the slickest aspects of RSSor is that the main site or your feed tags is an aggregator. Very neat and useful. I wonder how often the feeds update.

Again, this tool is in very early beta and needs to work out a bunch of kinks, but there are a few interesting pieces to it. Another similar to look at is Feed Maerker which has been in development for about a year. (link via Oishii)

Read more about it here

Read on your iPod

iPodulator is a new web service that lets you convert a web page or RSS feed into the proper text format that can be transfered viewed on your iPod. The service works with 3G and 4G iPods and iPod minis.

“Enter a URL above (starting with http://) and hit ‘iPodinate.’ Some sites may not work, like Digg.com. It will take a moment to process. The URL can be a web page or an RSS feed. This will give you a plain text formatted version of the site you enter, perfect for reading on your iPod. Note: the page will look badly formatted on your computer. Don’t worry, it will look great on your iPod. To save it to your iPod: After hitting ‘iPodinate,’ use the ‘Save As’ command in your web browser to save this file to the ‘Notes’ folder of your iPod or save it to someplace on your computer for later copying to the ‘Notes’ folder. That’s it!”

Slawesome lets you send emails with your voice

Slawesome is voice for your email. It basically allows you to send voice mail (whether that’s love mail, hate mail, music mail or street noise - I don’t know what I’m talking about - mail) to any email address in the world. You have some vocal love that needs to be shared? Slawesome’s the tool for the job.

Top Three States in Library Circulation

Microsoft's nightmare inches closer to reality

Yet another article

In an extensive memo called "The Web is the Next Platform" that was introduced as evidence in Microsoft's antitrust trial five years ago, Microsoft engineer Ben Slivka described a "nightmare" scenario for the software giant.

"The Web...exists today as a collection of technologies that deliver some interesting solutions today, and will grow rapidly in the coming years into a full-fledged platform (underlined for emphasis in the original memo) that will rival--and even surpass--Microsoft's Windows," Slivka wrote.

Microsoft, however, didn't heed the warning. Instead, it embarked on a strategy--championed by Jim Allchin, who today heads up development of the next version of Windows--that was fanatically focused on the operating system.

Google becoming a very real threat to Microsoft

Try imagining a future where developers will write to Web platforms without thinking about an individual computer or operating system. That once was Netscape's dream. If this does come to pass, Google could build an ecosystem around itself in much the same way Microsoft did with Windows. If Microsoft's latest moves can't clear out its corporate arteries, the future could be all Google, all the time.

Link to article.

GoogleTV is hiring

Google is laying the groundwork to enter the TV business, judging from a job posting for a GoogleTV product manager.

Google's anticipated entry into TV land has been an evolving process, which has included the debut of a prototype earlier this year to search TV programming. And on Wednesday, Google's TV efforts were a topic of discussion on several blogs that pointed to the job posting on Google's site.

According to the posting, Google is looking for someone to help get its search and advertising technologies into products that enhance viewers' TV experience. Google said it is seeking someone to "identify key market trends that are shaping user behavior when watching television."

Librarians Protected in Patriot Act Case

HARTFORD, Conn. -- A federal appeals court has ruled that the names of Connecticut librarians who had been asked to help in an FBI terrorism investigation under the Patriot Act will remain secret pending arguments from prosecutors.

The American Civil Liberties Union is seeking the identity of the librarians who received an FBI demand for records about library patrons.

On Tuesday, the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York put on hold a lower court's decision that had lifted a gag order shielding the identity of librarians.

U.S. District Court Judge Janet Hall in New Haven had ruled earlier this month in favor of the ACLU, which argued that the gag order prevented its client from participating in a debate over whether Congress should reauthorize the Patriot Act.

Prosecutors said the gag order prevented only the release of the client's identity, not the client's ability to speak about the Patriot Act.

Prosecutors also argued that revealing the identity of the librarians would be "an alarm bell" that could tip off suspects and jeopardize a federal investigation into terrorism.

Hall rejected many of the same FBI arguments in her ruling to lift the gag order.

"The government may intend the nondisclosure provision to serve some purpose other than the suppression of speech," Hall wrote. "Nevertheless, it has the practical effect of silencing individuals with a constitutionally protected interest in speech and whose voices are particularly important in an ongoing national debate about the intrusion of governmental authority into individual lives."

The Patriot Act, passed shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, removed the requirement that the records sought be those of someone under suspicion. Now, anyone's records can be obtained if the FBI considers them relevant to a terrorism or spying investigation.

Google to offer free Wi-Fi

Google, the online search leader, confirmed Tuesday it has begun a limited test of a free wireless Internet service, called Google WiFi.

The existence of the Wi-Fi service, which offers high-speed connections to the Internet over short distances, is confirmed by public pages on the company’s Web site and was first reported in a Silicon Valley newspaper in July.

Google spokesman Nate Tyler said the current test is limited to two public sites near the company’s Mountain View, California, headquarters -- a pizza parlor and a gym -- located in the heart of Silicon Valley.

“Google WiFi is a community outreach program to offer free wireless access in areas near our headquarters,” Tyler said.

“At this stage in development, we’re focused on collecting feedback from users. We’ll determine next steps as the product evolves,” he said.

Free wireless communications would take Google even further from its Internet search roots and move it into the fiercely competitive world of Internet access providers and telecommunications companies.

Tyler said the project was started as part of a Google engineer’s “20 percent time project.”

Google encourages its engineers to spend 20 percent of their work time developing independent projects. Several of Google’s new products have grown out of such projects, including Google News, contextual advertising program AdSense and social-networking test project Orkut.

10,000 Articles Not Found On Other Search Engines

From the site:

"FindArticles is focused on delivering the best and most essential search results. There are different kinds of searches. You can cast a wide net and see what you catch, but we believe there's a better way. Why not rely on credible, freely available information you can trust? By working with the best sources, we have assembled all the essential publications covering a wide range of subjects — and are continually adding to our collection.

Our publications and subjects are organized by major categories: Arts & Entertainment, Automotive, Business & Finance, Computers & Technology, Health & Fitness, Home & Garden, News & Society, Reference & Education, and Sports.

Discover exactly what you need at FindArticles, using either browsing or searching techniques. Select a specific publication up front, or start with a general search and then include or exclude publications. Insert new search terms as needed to pinpoint the most relevant results. Then sort results by article date, length, relevance or publication name. It's all very easy to do here.

FindArticles has articles from thousands of resources, with archives dating back to 1984. That means you get to search for exactly what you need, from millions of articles not found on any other search engine. Please think of us any time you want to Find Articles."

Libravox: acoustical liberation of books in the public domain = free audiobooks

LibriVox is an open source audio-literary attempt to harness the power of the many to record and disseminate, in podcast form, books from the public domain. It works like this: a book is chosen, then volunteers read and record one or more chapters. We liberate the audio files through this webblog/podcast every week. LibriVox is a VOLUNTEER project: if you have problems with the quality of a recording, get busy and make another one; If you wish to listen, please enjoy; if you wish to record, please contact librivox.

Cool New On Line Music Service

Pandora, a project of the Music Genome Project, creates a streaming radio station built personally for you and your musical preferences (sort of like Amazon's "if you like this book, try these" approach.)

They also have a blog with RSS.

Katrina's Impact on Libraries

From the American Library Association.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina's August 29 landfall on the Gulf
Coast, the fate of many of the region's libraries is still uncertain.
American Libraries will post news of any library-related damage on an
ongoing basis as we learn of it. Watch this site for updates.

Houston (Tex.) Chronicle, August 31:
Craig Nocaise, 21, a police officer, waited out the storm inside the Pass
Christian (Miss.) Public Library, a branch of the Harrison County Library
System, with 12 other town police. They noticed about a dozen of their
police cars circling the building on a current of water. Then one crashed
through the front door. Water poured in and rose quickly. When the back
glass door wouldn't open, the officers pulled their guns and fired at least
50 rounds into it before it shattered. They each then grabbed a cable line
and climbed onto the roof, where they spent the next three hours in
130-mile-an-hour winds. "We lost every patrol car," said Nocaise. "We still
haven't found some. They're probably in the Gulf somewhere." Asked more
about the experience in the library, Nocaise choked up and walked away.

Baltimore (Md.) Sun, August 31:

In Gulfport, Mississippi, Katrina chewed up such everyday items as
furniture, computers, and a piano and spat them back onto the city's
crumbling streets and beaches. In what was once the public library, wet
books formed a mound of soggy pulp.

Biloxi (Miss.) Sun-Herald, August 29:

In Gulfport, windows were blown out and the business district was partially
underwater. The damage was described by Fire Chief Pat Sullivan as
"massive." Waves were breaking across U.S. 90 and there was water standing
in the Gulfport Library.

Biloxi (Miss.) Sun-Herald, August 30:

Beauvoir, the Jefferson Davis home in Biloxi: The bottom floor of the
Presidential Library and the home itself were gutted. A Confederate flag,
though, still draped over the arm of Davis's statue in the library.

Jackson (Miss.) Clarion-Ledger, August 31:

The University of Southern Mississippi, Alcorn State University, and Jackson
State University, as well as private Tougaloo College, remained without
power and communication access on Tuesday afternoon. On Tuesday at JSU,
students slept on makeshift beds in the student union and library, where
generators could provide light.

"I would say 90 percent of the structures between the beach and the railroad
in Biloxi, Gulfport, Long Beach, and Pass Christian are totally destroyed,"
Gov. Haley Barbour said Tuesday. "They're not severely damaged, they're
simply not there. . . . I can only imagine that this is what Hiroshima
looked like 60 years ago."

Cincinnati (Ohio) Post, August 31:

Kentucky Gov. Ernie Fletcher declared a state of emergency Tuesday afternoon
because of the heavy Katrina-related rains. The order triggered
implementation of the Kentucky Emergency Management Plan, which coordinates
response and relief activities in response to the emergency. The heavy rain
exacerbated leaks at the three-year-old Boone County Justice Center in
Burlington, Kentucky. "I've never seen anything like it," said Union,
Kentucky, attorney Edwin Kagin. There was a leak in the fourth floor men's
bathroom, which deputy sheriffs closed down, he said, and a leak in the law
library. "I couldn't believe it. I was in the law library and I hear this
plunk, and there's a bucket catching water," he said.

Tyler (Tex.) Morning Telegraph, August 31:

Tyler Public Library sent its bookmobile to the hurricane shelter Tuesday
afternoon. It provided books, magazines, and other reading material to
evacuees from Louisiana.

Other sources:

Evacuees from New Orleans are also being sent to the Houston area. The
Harris County Public Library in Humble, Texas, north of Houston, has
announced that evacuees are being given full residential privileges by the
library.

Water Damage FAQ:

The ALA Library has a fact sheet with some links to sites on the proper
steps to take in cleaning up a library after a disaster.

Posted August 31, 2005.

Libraries of the Future?

Here are a couple of examples of traditional libraries morphing into forms that more closely fit the needs of their user communities. So, what does the future hold?

From: Is this the library of the future?

By Megan Lane
BBC News Online

The word library is set to fade from our vocabulary - but not because we've fallen out of love with books. Today's libraries are being made over as "idea stores", complete with cafés, crèches and multi-media offerings.

From: Bye, Bye, Library

By Kris Axtman
Christian Science Monitor

The UT library is undergoing a radical change, becoming more of a social gathering place more akin to a coffeehouse than a dusty, whisper-filled hall of records. And to make that happen, the undergraduate collection of books had to go.

Talk Like a Pirate Day - Sept. 19

Libraries with Pirattitude: The North Regional/Broward Community College library in Coconut Creek, Florida will celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day on Sept 19 starting at 6:30 PM with a showing of "a popular pirate movie" whose name they can't publicize because of contractual requirements.

You, too, can talk like a pirate!

Google to Release "GoogleTalk" Tomorrow

From Search Engine Journal

Google Talk - Instant Messaging and VOIP App from Google?
When Google talks, the world listens. People get ready to open your ears, because Google is about to speak loud and clear as the Internet anticipates the release this week of Google Talk - the Google Instant Messaging service. Google executives have hinted that the company will be releasing a new communications tool on Wednesday and most clues and leaks point to the messaging and/or VOIP tool from Google - Google Talk.

Unlike most net rumors, the buzz around Google Talk has legs to stand on. First reason is that the subdomain talk.google.com is live and redirects usersto www.google.com/talk/ which now serves a 404 error message. For the most part, if Google is not using a subdomain it does not exist at all and would not redirect or serve any message.

Chances also exist that the Google offering will go beyond messaging or chat and be a total voice operated communications system, offering VOIP technology with the ability to do VOIP to telephone calls as well. Google’s recent acquisition of Android may also point to the new Google Talk tool also being mobile friendly.

Book Vending Machines in Paris

Readers craving Homer, Baudelaire or Lewis Carroll in the middle of the night can get a quick fix at one of the French capital's five newly installed book vending machines.

Stocked with 25 of Maxi-Livres best-selling titles, the machines cover the gamut of literary genres and tastes. Classics like "The Odyssey" by Homer and Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" share the limited shelf space with such practical must-haves as "100 Delicious Couscous" and "Verb Conjugations."

Regardless of whether they fall into the category of high culture or low, all books cost a modest $2.45.

What's the hottest brand on the Web these days? The orange RSS icon.

There is now a venture capital fund, called RSS Investors, which is based in Cambridge, Mass. Currently, the fund has $20 million, although it plans on raising as much as $100 million. Jim Moore, one of the fund partners, says the fund will focus on Series A investments of $3 million to $5 million.

Where does he see the sweet spots? He sees opportunity in infrastructure products, such as those that will allow better filtering, search, scalability and security.

He thinks developers will leverage RSS into enterprise products. How? Well, an RSS platform can help employees collaborate on projects. It could even help with collaboration with alliance partners and suppliers.

He also thinks RSS will result in the emergence of thriving online communities. For example, a community of cancer specialists can use RSS to share their findings. No doubt, the growth from communities can be staggering, as seen with the success with MySpace.com, a social networking site catering to young music fans.

Link to Forbes Article.

Smart Light Bulbs

Fujitsu has developed a light bulb that, when it dies, sends an SMS message out through the electrical wires to the internet to an SMS phone saying, in essence, "I am dead, buy a new bulb." Cool!

The Ministry of Reshelving

This weekend, prankster/gamer/performance artist Jane McGonigal and The Ministry of Reshelving launched an effort to put copies of Orwell's 1984 in its "appropriate" section of book stores.

From the site:

How to Serve the Ministry of Reshelving

1. Select a local bookstore to carry out your reshelving activities.

2. Download and print "This book has been relocated by the Ministry of Reshelving" bookmarks and "All copies of 1984 have been relocated" notecards to take with you to the bookstore. Or make your own. We recommend bringing a notecard and 5-10 bookmarks to each store.

3. Go to the bookstore and locate its copies of George Orwell's 1984. Unless the Ministry of Reshelving has already visited this bookstore, it is probably currently incorrectly classified as "Fiction" or "Literature."

4. Discreetly move all copies of 1984 to a more suitable section, such as "Current Events", "Politics", "History", "True Crime", or "New Non-Fiction."

5. Insert a Ministry of Reshelving bookmark into each copy of any book you have moved. Leave a notecard in the empty space the books once occupied.

6. If you spot other incorrectly classified books, feel free to relocate them.

7. Please report all reshelving efforts to the Ministry. Email your store name, location, # of 1984 copies reshelved, and any other reshelving activities conducted, to reshelving @ avantgame.com. Photos of your mission can be uploaded to Flickr, tagged as "reshelving", and submitted to the Ministry of Reshelving group.

Their goal is to relocate one thousand nine hundred and eighty-four copies, and to complete successful reshelving of 1984 in all 50 United States. Global contributions are welcome.

Free Wi-Fi? Get Ready for GoogleNet.

From Business 2.0

What if Google (GOOG) wanted to give Wi-Fi access to everyone in America? And what if it had technology capable of targeting advertising to a userís precise location? The gatekeeper of the worldís information could become one of the globeís biggest Internet providers and one of its most powerful ad sellers, basically supplanting telecoms in one fell swoop. Sounds crazy, but how might Google go about it?

First it would build a national broadband network -- let's call it the GoogleNet -- massive enough to rival even the country's biggest Internet service providers. Business 2.0 has learned from telecom insiders that Google is already building such a network, though ostensibly for many reasons. For the past year, it has quietly been shopping for miles and miles of "dark," or unused, fiber-optic cable across the country from wholesalers such as New Yorkís AboveNet. It's also acquiring superfast connections from Cogent Communications and WilTel, among others, between East Coast cities including Atlanta, Miami, and New York. Such large-scale purchases are unprecedented for an Internet company, but Google's timing is impeccable. The rash of telecom bankruptcies has freed up a ton of bargain-priced capacity, which Google needs as it prepares to unleash a flood of new, bandwidth-hungry applications. These offerings could include everything from a digital-video database to on-demand television programming.

An even more compelling reason for Google to build its own network is that it could save the company millions of dollars a month. Here's why: Every time a user performs a search on Google, the data is transmitted over a network owned by an ISP -- say, Comcast (CMCSK) -- which links up with Google's servers via a wholesaler like AboveNet. When AboveNet bridges that gap between Google and Comcast, Google has to pay as much as $60 per megabit in IP transit fees. As Google adds bandwidth-intensive services, those costs will increase. Big networks owned by the likes of AT&T (T) get around transit fees by striking "peering" arrangements, in which the networks swap traffic and no money is exchanged. By cutting out middlemen like AboveNet, Google could share traffic directly with ISPs to avoid fees.

Encyclopedia Britannica - RSS Feeds

Encyclopædia Britannica now has RSS feeds. It might make for an interesting addition to a library site.

Read more about it here

Google pauses library project

Google will temporarily stop scanning copyright-protected books from libraries into its database, the company said late Thursday.

The company's library project, launched in December, involves the scanning of out-of-print and copyright works so that their text can be found through the search engine's database. Google is working on the project with libraries at Stanford University, Harvard University and other schools.

The plan has come under fire from several groups, including publishers, who object to what they claim are violations of their copyrights.

Google said on its blog late Thursday that, following discussions with "publishers, publishing industry organizations and authors," it will stop scanning in copyright books until November, while it makes changes to its Google Print Publisher Program.

WorldCat adds One Billionth Holding!

From It's All Good

About 40 minutes ago, a library somewhere in the 96 countries and territories in which OCLC has members added the billionth holding to WorldCat! A billion things that OCLC and its members know the whereabouts of, in public libraries, academic libraries, theological libraries, law libraries, medical libraries, historical society libraries and all the other kinds of libraries that are represented in the OCLC family of over 53,500 libraries. A billion holdings added to over 60 million records over a span of about 34 years by at least three generations of librarians working collectively to build WorldCat from the small, local database it began as to the stellar international resource it is today.

Britannica ships Ultimate Reference Suite 2006

Encyclopedia Britannica today announced the 2006 edition of Encyclopaedia Britannica’s Ultimate Reference Suite. The reference guide, now available on DVD and CD-ROM, is the latest version of Britannica’s multimedia software, which includes Homework Helpdesk, a collection of special features aimed at helping students complete assignments at home. Helpdesk has guides to preparing papers and oral presentations, learning games and activities, and easy access to statistics on the countries of the world, among other features. The 2006 edition offers an updated interface, improves performance, and also includes features on history, people and animals that are updated daily (via the internet). It will be available later this month for $50.

The Ultimate Reference Suite has three encyclopedias: the entire 32-volume Encyclopaedia Britannica, Britannica Student Encyclopedia and Britannica Elementary Encyclopedia. Each encyclopedia forms the cornerstone of an integrated “reference library” with its own distinctive interface that includes a dictionary, thesaurus, atlas, and historical timelines appropriate to the age of the user. The company says that this allows students to advance to the next level when they're ready as well as offers a solution for adults.

Getting Ready to Award My Prizes

The Man Booker Prize for Fiction represents the very best in contemporary fiction. One of the world’s most prestigious awards, and one of incomparable influence, it continues to be the pinnacle of ambition for every fiction writer. It has the power to transform the fortunes of authors, and even publishers. In 2004, not only did Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty reach the bestseller lists, but previous winners The Life of Pi (2002) and Vernon God Little (2003) were also amongst the bestselling books of the year.

List Here.

Spanish Set to Become Official Language of Seven Denver Public Library Branches

In a sharp break from American tradition, the Denver Public Library is promoting a plan that would make seven of its branches "Spanish focused," banishing English language books to the backroom. The "Languages and Learning" plan would dramatically increase Spanish language offerings and staff, designating some locations as Spanish dominant. The proposal is currently under review by the Library Commission and an advisory board. LINK

Something Fun! OCLC’s Top 1,000 List

Something Fun! OCLC’s Top 1,000 List

OCLC Research has compiled a list of the 1,000 books held by the greatest number of libraries in WorldCat. OCLC used FRBR algorithms and human analysis to pull together editions, translations, and printings of each title in order to rank the intellectual work rather than a specific manifestation. The resulting list is fascinating in itself, but then they subdivided the list by useful categories (e.g.: Children’s, Drama, Books Into Film), added fun factoids (e.g.: William Shakespeare has the most works on the list and Stephen King didn’t make the list at all), and included links to libraries for people who might want to find one of the titles. They also compare the list to other “top 100” lists. You can even download the list, if you so desire. To explore the list yourself, go here

Be careful! As OCLC warns, the list can become addictive!

Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest

First Place: Dan McKay - Fargo, ND

As he stared at her ample bosom, he daydreamed of the dual Stromberg carburetors in his vintage Triumph Spitfire, highly functional yet pleasingly formed, perched prominently on top of the intake manifold, aching for experienced hands, the small knurled caps of the oil dampeners begging to be inspected and adjusted as described in chapter seven of the shop manual.

Runner Up: Mitsy Rae - Danbury, NE

When Detective Riggs was called to investigate the theft of a trainload of Native American fish broth concentrate bound for market, he solved the case almost immediately, being that the trail of clues led straight to the trainmaster, who had both the locomotive and the Hopi tuna tea.

Grand Panjandrum's Special Award: Bryan Semrow - Oshkosh, WI

Captain Burton stood at the bow of his massive sailing ship, his weathered face resembling improperly cured leather that wouldn't even be used to make a coat or something.

Gets worse

Michael Palin's Travel Books - Free Online

Former Python Michael Palin has made a name for himself lately as a brilliant travel-writer and the host of a series of excellent travel documentaries. He has put the full text of all of his amazing travel-books online for free. They're spread out across multiple html pages, unfortunately, so they're not suited to downloading for reading on your phone on the Tube in the morning, but man is this ever a step in the right direction.
READ THE ENTIRE BOOKS FROM EACH SERIES HERE:

• Around the World in 80 Days


• Pole to Pole


• Full Circle


• Hemingway Adventure


• Sahara with Michael Palin


• Himalaya

The Rap Canterbury Tales

The Rap Canterbury Tales started in 1999 as an experiment, an attempt to adapt Chaucer's stories into a rap style to make them accessible. It is designed to bring the Tales to a wider popular audience as well as assisting educators to communicate Chaucer's themes and narrratives easily to students. The translations stay as close as possible to the tone and thrust of the original Tales, while completely updating the language into a lively hiphop rhyme style. They are occasionally a bit raunchy, but I relinquish all due credit (and blame) to Chaucer, as he did to his "sources".

Microsoft Launches MSN Virtual Earth

Microsoft has released a beta version of Virtual Earth, a web-based application that combines local search with maps and aerial photography.

Read more about it here

Search podcast by Spoken Word

OK, now this is totally and unbelievably cool.

You know, don’t you, that podcasts are like little downloadable radio shows, often made by amateurs? They’re so personal and quirky, they’re almost like the audio version of Web logs.

Unfortunately, they’re also audio, so you can’t exactly search them with Google. You can’t search for words inside an audio file, right?

Wrong. Somehow, the folks at Podscope.com have figured out how to do it. Introducing: the first search engine that can find podcasts according to the words spoken during them! It’s in beta, but I tried it, and it really, truly works. The search results offer you a ten-second preview of the podcast, plus links to the whole thing.

The Centered Librarian Beamed into Space Daily

Blogs in Space

Some 60 years ago humans first began transmitting television signals powerful enough to reach beyond our earth's atmosphere. Since then the media has continued to broadcast messages from I Love Lucy to the five o'clock news into space, potentially reaching intelligent alien life forms beyond our solar system. Blogs In Space is the first entity to allow everyday bloggers to transmit the news and thoughts of an everyday person into space. Simply put they take our feed and transmit it out on a powerful deep space transmission dish. We are the future! Cool.

Really Funny Post by a Circ Librarian re: Menopause

From LISNews

I am Barb the human Barb-eque grill checking out your books. You could roast a chicken on my sternum and a hotdog under each boob. The amount of sweat that rolls off the back of my neck could support a flotilla of Baleen whales. I now believe in spontaneous human combustion. It happens to menopausal women. One minute they are thinking they might die of a hot flash and seconds later they do, leaving behind just a cranky little pile of smoking ashes and a melted wedding band. I am afraid this will happen to me at the circulation desk one day. And there are several things that could help it along.

A.) The Xerox machine.
On a good day, it auto-senses correctly the size of paper it needs and makes that happy little bup-a-dom yup-a-dom song that sometimes I whistle along with. But. On a bad day, Xavier the Xerox turns into Javier, the evil twin. It chokes on its own paper. It spits out projectile copies of its own eyelid at the closest human being, myself, ten feet away. I can feel it come alive and purr with malevolent intent. I talk it to it like I am a dominatrix and it is my slaveboy. I believe this might also be a symptom of menopause. I say, "Uh oh, who's being a very baaad boy? Who needs a punishment?" Unplugging is the nastiest thing I can think of to do to Javier. After all, he is a guy.

B.) The bathroom and water fountain fixated patron.
Sometimes I think people must not have bathrooms or water here in Artsy-Fartsy Small Town, Connecticut. That is why they come to the library. One person in particular only checks out three things- the first two are the water level of the bottle of spring water and the cup situation. "Excuse me," she'll say "Did you know that you are all out of cups?" Or, "Excuse me, this water bottle is empty." Her favorite place, though, is the bathroom. Lots can go wrong in there. If someone before her has left the seat up, spilled soft soap, used all the toilet paper or dropped paper towels on the floor, she gleefully reports it in full detail. The most excited I ever saw her get was when someone forgot to flush. This was cause for some of the most inventive language I ever heard all because she didn't want to say "poop" at the circ desk. So, I said it for her. "Oh, you mean there's a POOP in the toilet?" Then, I unplugged her.

C.) The random reference question. They don’t care what the answer is, they just have to ask it:
"Have you lived here all your life?"
I make like a Maine-iac and drily say, "Not yet."
"What percentage of the population here is from New York City?"
"All of them," I say. "When they leave on Sunday afternoon, I have the whole damn town to myself."
"What was Lincoln's favorite food?"
"Cornbread."
"What is the square footage of the library?"
"28,000."
"How many books are there in the collection?"
"28,000."
"How much money did this place cost to build?"
"28,000." (In 1889.)
As improbable as it seems, all of the 28,000 ones are true. The guy that asked me the last three questions didn't believe me and I don't blame him. I felt sorta like Sponge Bob Squarepants with his random response of "1924" whenever he doesn't know the answer to something. And don’t forget, I have a chicken on my chest.

What Americans know about internet terms

Click image to enlarge.

20 Technology Skills Every Librarian Should Have

From The Shifted Librarian

1 Word Processing Skills
2 Spreadsheets Skills
3 Database Skills
4 Electronic Presentation Skills
5 Web Navigation Skills
6 Web Site Design Skills
7 E-Mail Management Skills
8 Digital Cameras
9 Computer Network Knowledge Applicable to your School System
10 File Management & Windows Explorer Skills
11 Downloading Software From the Web (Knowledge including eBooks)
12 Installing Computer Software onto a Computer System
13 WebCT or Blackboard Teaching Skills
14 Videoconferencing skills
15 Computer-Related Storage Devices (Knowledge: disks, CDs, USB drives, zip disks, DVDs, etc.)
16 Scanner Knowledge
17 Knowledge of PDAs
18 Deep Web Knowledge
19 Educational Copyright Knowledge
20 Computer Security Knowledge

Finally! Rid of those pesky fruit labels.

Produce industry service company Durand-Wayland, Inc. developed a system for identifying produce with laser-etched codes. These "fruit tattoos" would replace those little stickers that always get stuck in your teeth when you bite into a nice, crisp apple while distracted. The technology's beginning to catch on, according to a NYT story.

Broadband eyes a quantum leap

Internet access 50 times faster than current speeds could arrive via TV cables as early as '06.

HELSINKI (Reuters) - Broadband Internet access via TV cables will be able to hit 100 megabits per second as early as next year, 50 times faster than the average broadband speeds now offered to cable TV homes, a Finnish firm said Wednesday.

Similar data transmission speeds are possible over fiber networks, but these cost much more for the operators to build.

"This is a cost-efficient technology as we use the cable TV networks which are already in place," Jukka Rinnevaara, chief executive of small-cap Finnish broadband equipment manufacturer Teleste, told Reuters.

Become.com Offers Comparison Shopping

Become.com, a shopping research site, has added integrated comparison shopping and several additional features designed to simplify and expedite your online shopping experience

Read more about it here

New Image Search Site

Pixsy is a new engine that provides access to imagery posted on various social networking services, blogs, mobile blogs, and other web sites.

Results pages include thumbnails along with direct links to the image url and the page where the image is posted. I ran a couple of searches and spotted images posted to TextAmerica.com (a moblog service) and Buzznet. I also came across images from sites like the BBC, SF Gate, and Sportsline.com.

The right side of a results page includes keyword ads that often include images. The images appear to come from various web sites and then combined with ads from Yahoo Search Marketing.

Stop your presentation before it kills again!

Sometimes the best presentation is... no presentation. Ditch the slides completely. Put the projector in the closet, roll the screen back up, and turn the damn lights back on!

A most excellent blog with an excellent article on the dangers of PowerPoint and some tips if you must use it.

Compare Book Prices in 34 Stores

Booksprice.com compares the price of selected books in your shopping cart in 34 different stores.

Downloadable MP3 Walking Tours

AudioTreks™ tours are digital audio walking tours of fun, popular neighborhoods. Instead of following a person or a book, you can download audio walking tours to your own MP3 player or iPod.

Leave heavy guide books at home. We'll tell you just as much, and more!

Go sightseeing at your own speed, and on your time. Stop for lunch or shopping, then turn it back on.

They're easy to follow. Like the audio tours in museums, they're recorded in "segments" that are easy to locate on your MP3 player. Each tour also comes with a map to download and print.

An AudioTreks™ Tour is like having a friend who lives in the neighborhood show you around!

Parents Against Bad Books in Schools: If not so sad, this would be funny

From: "boingboing.net"

I think PABBIS (Parents Against Bad Books in School) is a little too interested in in "bad" books. This link takes you to its "SAMPLE BOOK REVIEW DOCUMENTATION FORM." Mild warning for some language.

Finally - ePaper

Fujitsu has announced the launch of bendy electronic paper that can store and display images wirelessly.

Bendable colour screens have been in the pipeline for some time (see related links), but Fujitsu is the first company to announce a wireless version that it hopes will hit shops sometime between April 2006 and March 2007.

According to Fujitsu its newly developed e-paper features an image memory function that enables “continuous display of the same image without the need for electricity”, although it does require a smidge of power to switch images. Plus, the images don’t warp or lose quality when the e-paper is bent or rolled up.

Fujitsu has even outlined some applications for its smarty-pants paper, including wireless transfer of photos and text messages from mobiles onto the ultra-portable e-paper. Here are just a few other uses it envisages for launch:

• It can offer more convenient digital-media devices that can be carried from room to room in the home.


• Operating manuals and other short-term information displays, facilitating the trend toward paperless offices or factories.


• Electronic shelf display tags, restaurant menus, and other in-store uses. Can also be used for pricing displays or product information displays that stand out in full color and can be readily updated.

"Stink-In" planned for Houston Library

The Reverend G. Todd Williams of the New Covenant Church in Houston is looking for a few good men. And women. And by "good," he means men and women with enough stanky body odor to choke a rhino.

Williams says he'll be holding a "Stink-In" July 9 at the Montrose Public Library to protest a new city ordinance that says library patrons can be forced to leave if they have "offensive bodily hygiene."

The law clearly discriminates against the homeless, he says. And so, as an announcement of the protest puts it, "We are encouraging folks to mow their lawns, play tennis, play hard and get all sweaty…don't SHOWER, then plan to head to the public library."

At 3 p.m., all the fragrant revolutionaries -- including the many homeless members of Williams's congregation, who probably won't need to play tennis beforehand -- will descend on the library. Hilarity will ensue, no doubt, along with a heartwarming message that the stench-ridden need love, too.

"This is an ordinance about hate," Williams says. "And it's got the seal of approval by the city on it."

In honor of the protest, the Storytime Book that day will be the children's classic The Stinky Cheese Man. Or it should be.

Comparison Shop for Books and Music on Any Phone

You are in a bookshop or a record shop. You found something that interests you. You can't decide whether to buy it now or later online. What you need is a price check and a quick review, perhaps some ideas of something similar that others might recommend. Amabuddy can help! Amabuddy will quote Amazon.com's price, a typical used price and a 1-5 reader rating. Grab a book or CD off your shelf and try it!

To use amabuddy first make sure you locate the ISBN number on the back of the book or inside the book on first few pages. To enter X in an ISBN number use the # key.

Dial toll-free 1-888-WESIGNAL (1-888-937-4462) and enter the data. Cool.

Studies using eye-tracking technology

A new report offers fascinating, in-depth insights on how users interact with Google search results, based on studies using eye-tracking technology. Keeping an eye on Google

What's Cooking in Search Engine Labs

Want a peek behind the scenes at the research and development efforts going on at the major search engines? Here's where to find the freshest info. Of particular interest is a collection of papers published by "Googlers" - some quite applicable to our efforts here at CCLA, here

U of Michigan agreement with Google available

The U of Michigan has posted their confidential agreement with
Google in response to a freedom of information request. The request comes from Daniel Brandt who runs the aggressively anti-Google site, Googlewatch. His Freedom of Information Act request resulted in this posting. I'm linking here to the page with comments from other readers, scroll down for article, other links and comments.

User Taxonomies at Yahoo

First introduced in April and significantly updated this week, Yahoo's MyWeb allows users to designate sites as share-worthy and to search what others in their Yahoo-based communities or the larger Yahoo user base find relevant. When a user logs into MyWeb, she can search through what others in her communities have saved, through what the MyWeb community at large has saved, or search the Web without the MyWeb interface. If the user finds a site she likes, she can select "Save," which calls up a separate window. A user then titles the page, adds some keywords (to aid others in their own searching), and then designates if she wants to save the site for herself alone or to share with others in her community or the rest of Yahoo's visitors.

Read more here.

Ex Libris SFX Sites upgrade with MetaLib

Read more about it here

Estimating Realistic Project Deadlines

from: The Economist

A Project Duration Formula

Combine the awareness of obstacles and their need to have buffer time built into the project time line with a good project duration estimation formula and you'll begin to be more accurate in your ability to meet those project deadlines. Snead and Wycoff provide a simple way to calculate a realistic duration for the project or for the individual next actions within it:

Te=(To+4Tm+Tp)/6

Key:
• Te = Realistic time estimate
• To = Most optimistic time estimate (the Sunny Side estimate with no setbacks)
• Tp = Most pessimistic time estimate (with every obstacle happening)
• Tm = Most probable time estimate (this makes you think realistically; some setbacks happen, others don't)

Let's say we have a project of developing a departmental newsletter. The variables break down as follows:
• Tm = 14 days
• To = 10 days
• Tp = 30 days

The calculation would be:

Te = (10+(4X14)+30)/6

The best estimated duration for the project would be 16 days.

By applying both strategies of building in buffer time for obstacles and using a good project duration formula, consistency in estimating deadlines will develop. Being known as someone whose projects come in on time and under budget is always a career helper and improves one's perceived competence. Besides, it also makes us more confident in our abilities and that confidence helps to improve our performance, which boosts our confidence, which, again, elevates our performance. As one can see, there is such a thing as an upward spiral.

iTunes 4.9 Incorporates Podcasts

You can use iTunes to create your own personal digital music library and easily organize and listen to your collection of digital music files. You can also create your own custom audio CDs and transfer your music to an Apple iPod. If you are installing iTunes for use with an iPod, after installing iTunes, use the cable that came with your iPod to connect your iPod to your computer.

In addition, with iTunes 4.9, you can now browse and subscribe to podcasts from within the iTunes Music Store. Podcasts are frequently updated radio-style shows downloadable over the Internet. You can also transfer podcasts to iPod, for listening on the go. Pretty cool.

Free Download

L-net

Pretty cool use of blogs, rss, and wikis in one place!


Read more about what Oregon's doing here

Blogs as Instructional Tools in Libraries - A Survey

From www.librarystuff.net

Help out librarians Lani Draper & Priscilla Coulter by taking part in their blog survey:

"The purpose of this survey is to find out how librarians are using weblogs (blogs) to interact with and teach library users. The results will be presented at the Off-Campus Library Services Conference in Savannah, GA in April 2006. Your participation is greatly appreciated."

OCLC's e-serials pilot project

From OCLC's web site:

"The pilot will make eSerials as visible as print materials in WorldCat, the world’s largest database of items held in libraries, and will expose those records to searchers on the open Web through the Open WorldCat program."

Will be interesting to see how this interacts with Google Search and libraries' use of Serials Solutions and SFX/MetaLib A'-Z list" (that LINCC Libraies will have in August).

Read more here.

Publishers' Group Asks Google to Stop Scanning Copyrighted Works for 6 Months

From "The Chronicle of Higher Education"

The Association of American Publishers has asked Google to stop scanning copyrighted books published by the association's members for at least six months while the company answers questions about whether its plan to scan millions of volumes in five major research libraries complies with copyright law.
LINK

Dina Merrill to appear in librarian documentary

MADISON, WI – The producers of the “The Hollywood Librarian: Librarians in Cinema and Society” announced today that Dina Merrill has agreed to be interviewed for the documentary about librarians.

The actress, now vice chairman of RKO Pictures, starred as “Sylvia Blair” in one of Hollywood’s more positive portrayals of librarians, together with Katharine Hepburn, Joan Blondell and Sue Randall. “Desk Set,” released in 1957, was Ms. Merrill’s film debut vehicle after nearly 10 years on Broadway. In the movie, all four women are seen as competent and professional research librarians as they navigate the reference department in the wake of a newly-installed, 1950’s computer.

Since her film debut, Ms. Merrill has acted in dozens of motion pictures, television shows and miniseries, as well as establishing her position as a leading philanthropist.

Ann Seidl, the writer and director of the documentary, says she was thrilled to talk with Ms. Merrill and delighted with her participation in the film. “‘Desk Set’ contains some of the most recognizable librarians in American cinema,” said Seidl. “And the issue of technology in libraries is one of the major themes of the movie and of the time period. Being able to talk with one of its stars on camera will add greatly to the documentary.”

Seidl plans to interview Ms. Merrill about the film set, her co-stars and the movie’s adaptation from the stage sometime in late summer or early fall in New York, where Ms. Merrill resides. Financing is being sought from documentary grantmakers and library corporations to fund this and other scheduled interviews with librarians and location shoots.

2/3 of Top Chefs Stream Restaurant Music via iPod

From tuaw.com

As part of a "best of" article in this month's "Food & Wine" magazine, the editors surveyed 70 of America's top chefs about a variety of topics, from ranges, to knives, to restaurant sound systems. It turns out 2/3 of the chefs use iPods to program the ambient music in their dining rooms. They didn't ask how many use iPods to blast the requisite punk rock and techno mixes that keep restuarant kitchens moving, but I think we can assume the percentage there is even higher. Some restaurants, like New York's Little Giant even offer "open cradle" nights where regulars can bring pods and take over the speakers for the evening, something to keep in mind the next time you want to create the perfect evening with that special someone at the little bistro around the corner.

Search Google via SMS

With the new Google SMS service, you can do basic Google queries from any SMS-capable phone (which is darn near all of them) by sending text messages to 46645 (GOOGL). Results usually come within a minute, and are text-based only - no links or other craziness that could screw up an SMS.

Teleporting over the internet

This is very cool and not too far into the future....


Read more about it here

TechConnections conference

From Gary Houk (Vice President, Cataloging and Metadata Services Division, OCLC) at the Ohio Regional Library System's TechConnections6 on the topic of “Connecting Users to Library Services in an Amazoogle World: Trends in Information Discovery and Delivery.”

Need to factor in the habits of these “digital natives” when you’re planning your services and the delivery of them. If you’re spending a lot of money on your portal, is that the best use of your money? Most likely your users aren’t starting at your portal.

A few months old, but still very interesting

A short movie about the evolution of Google through 2014 and its impact on society as it becomes the sole repository for information (and acquires Amazon.com). LINK

"GoogleExpand" -- well, actually, I made that up, I just mean what Google has purchased and what they may purchase in the future. Interesting speculations from Kuro5hin.

Sirsi and Google Scholar

"Sirsi Corporation announced today a new service that permits a library to link its holdings to Google Scholar via Sirsi Resolver, Sirsi's OpenURL reference linking tool. Using this service, library users can search Google Scholar, rely on a link between Sirsi Resolver and Google Scholar to indicate whether or not the library has access to the particular e-resources, and then have one-click access to full-text articles from those licensed e-resources. This linking service will be available at no charge to Sirsi libraries that are already using Sirsi Resolver, including those using Sirsi Resolver through Sirsi Hosted Services. Sirsi has completed the development of this service and is currently working with several academic libraries on its installation, including Bucknell University, the University of Virginia, and Veracruzana University."

Press release

OverDrive Announces Video on Demand for Public Libraries

"OverDrive, the leader in download audiobooks and eBooks for libraries, announced today the addition of Video on Demand (VoD) services and materials to its Digital Library Reserve network. The new Video on Demand service will be demonstrated to the over 20,000 librarians attending the 2005 American Library Association Annual Conference at Booth #1244 McCormick Place, Chicago, June 24-28. The service is scheduled to go live for patron use later this year."

PRESS RELEASE

Old-time radio shows via PodCast

Dozens of old radio shows - variety, mystery, music, sci-fi - available for download here.

Free - download all 9 Beethoven symphonies

The BBC is releasing all nine of Beethoven's symphonies (five are up now) as unencumbered MP3s.
LINK

Internet Marketing Opportunities Through RSS

posted by Rok Hrastnik in RSS Marketing

When it comes to new internet marketing opportunities for your business, RSS just might be the answer you were looking for. Here are just some of the new opportunities it can provide you with …

1. Podcasting and Videocasting

Podcasting (delivering internet audio content) and Videocasting (delivering internet video content) allow you to communicate via rich media messages, not only making your content more attractive and powerful, but also enabling a more personal »conversation« with your audiences.

Up until know, the internet was predominantly a textual channel. Adding audio and video to the mix, delivering both via RSS, goes beyond the basic capabilities provided by »traditional« internet content delivery channels.
Rich media personalizes the internet experience and gives your company a distinguishable face, while at the same time providing you with a media platform to convey your message so that it is easier to understand, see and feel.

Think about ...
• Delivering press releases in audio or video
• Sending your customers a personal video message from the CEO
• Doing audio interviews to expand your reach and provide more content to your visitors
• Delivering video demonstrations of your products
• Using video and audio to demonstrate how your customers and readers can easily resolve various issues that you are helping them with
• Delivering important messages to your readers, customers and business partners via a more personal audio experience, instead of using impersonal e-mail communications
• And so on ...

In addition, Podcasting and Videocasting form the basis of new business models, giving you the opportunity to expand your product base to include these formats with higher perceived value.

Customer education & support are improved as well, since you can now demonstrate key product usage points via online video  providing customer support content in a format, which can easily demonstrate everything you need to convey to your customers.

2. High Frequency Content Updates

High frequency content updates, even on a daily or hourly basis, are now finally possible with RSS. No more need to hold on your important messages, news and other content for a week or even a month to include it in your e-zine --- with RSS you can update your content as often as you want/need, and your subscribers won't mind.

3. Appcasting

Appcasting goes one step further, giving you the ability to deliver critical software updates and patches to your existing clients, without them having to visit your web site every week to see if the much needed update is already available or not.

4. Product News, Releases And Updates

Product news, releases and updates are now finally possible in an easy-to-consume way. Using RSS, you can provide your customers or prospects with simple tools to create their own »product feeds«, through which they'll be immediately notified when new products that precisely match their interests are available.

As soon as your product portfolio changes, so does the content in the RSS feeds that your customers are subscribed to.

Just think of the following possibilities ...

--> The search tool is one of the most often used in larger web stores, giving your visitors an easy way to find the products they are interested. But the same search results can be delivered via RSS as well. Imagine your customer doing a search for one of your product categories, and then also receiving a link to the RSS feed for those very same search results, to find out immediately when a new product matching his terms is released or available for order.

--> This works for complex searches as well. If your customers are in the habit of searching for specific product categories, but only in a specific price range, you can deliver those very same results to them via RSS, but with a small twist ---> as soon as a new product matching their terms, including the desired price, is launched, they are notified about it via RSS instantly. No need to visit your site again to do the time-consuming search; the release comes directly to them.

--> Of course, the same approach that many are already using for e-mail alerts can be used for RSS. Give your visitors a simple form using which they enter their criteria, and then give them access to an RSS feed bringing them product updates based exactly on their criteria. Why not just use e-mail? Because no one really wants more e-mail messages in their inboxes and no one wants to give away their personal information, while RSS is anonymous, doesn't require an e-mail address and is read when the customer decides he has the time.

5. Personalized Content Services

Personalized/customized database listings are quite similar to product updates, but relate to any kind of complex information you provide to your visitors, such as …
• Job listings
• Dating
• Real estate
• Etc.

Using RSS, your visitors can decide exactly what kind of »content« (in this case, an individual content item could be a new job listing) they are looking for and then have that content delivered directly to them, via their own personalized RSS feed.

And yet, all of these are just some examples of what you can do with RSS. The possibilities for new content delivery & business development models are quite endless.

For example, some companies are already giving their visitors the opportunity to track their FedEx, UPS and other packages via RSS feeds. Yet others are creating new services that allow you to receive critical information from an RSS feed to your mobile phone via SMS (such as getting an SMS notifying you that a new job matching your criteria is available). Yet again other sites enable you to keep track of when you need to return your library material, and even when your holds are ready and when they are about to expire, all this using RSS.

All of these are new business opportunities made possible with RSS, and each of them in a way improves lives of end-users, without placing a larger burden (more e-mail messages) on them.

Google's "Summer of Code"

The Summer of Code is Google's program designed to introduce students to the world of open source software development.

This summer, don't let your programming skills lie fallow. Use them for the greater good of open source software and computer science. Google will provide a $4500 award to each student who successfully completes a project by the end of the summer. LINK

Brazil adopts open-source software

In Brazil's Ministry for Cities, staff are busily at work.

The scene is much like any other modern office: an open-plan work space crammed with desks, telephones and computers.

But there's one big difference. The word 'Microsoft' is nowhere in sight.

Instead, computers here now use the Linux operating system. It has many similar functions to Microsoft's Windows - but unlike Windows, it is available for free. LINK

Yahoo Launches Sorting Tool For Search Results

"Yahoo Inc. has released in beta a tool that sorts search results according to whether they are commercial or more informational, such as from academic or research-oriented sources.

Called Mindset, the tool is available through the Yahoo Research Labs site Yahoo Next."

Yahoo News story here.