// December 31st, 2007 // 3 Comments » // My Kids
I am glad that this is the last day of 2007. It’s been a wild ride, and I look forward to a calmer 2008. Perhaps if I stay in one state, one house and one job, that will help. 
I hope that this version of Jingle Bells helps you to usher in a pleasant new year.
PS the lyrics are: “Jingle bells, jingle bells, Christmas on the way / all the fun, mister ride / something something sleigh, hey!”
// December 14th, 2007 // No Comments » // Libraries, Web Stuff
Yay! Teh Tubez!
I love YouTube and have posted several videos to my blog over the last few months. Here is one that I haven’t posted here before but enjoy very much:
That’s quality stuff!
// November 30th, 2007 // No Comments » // Libraries, Web Stuff
The newest video from Michael Wensch’s Digital Ethnography @ Kansas State project is titled Information R/evolution. It picks up where the first video that we watched, “The Machine is Us/ing Us,” left off. Go ahead and watch it; I’ll wait:
There is so much to love about this video, not least of which that it begins in a library and is seemingly pro-librarian: “Managing information IS managing categories; it requires experts.” Then the fun begins… “[W]e must rethink information” and “Yahoo, faced with with possibility that they could organize things with no physical restraints, added the shelf back.”
Fast forward through the concepts teased out in David Weinburger’s excellent Everything is Miscellaneous. Are we as human beings beginning to be able to think about information without the shelf? I think of it as a vast, jumbled pile (sorry, but I do) at which we aim different lenses in an effort to tease out just the right piece of information.
Another idea that hit me full in the face from this video was the idea that there are 5 trillion words on today’s web, which is about 15 years old, a microsecond on the timeline of human history. Information generated by humans is generated at an astonishing and increasing rate. It is already, as Wensch points out, hard to find the right bit. It will not get any easier. If classification systems are no longer important–”there is no shelf”–what is a library’s role here? I would argue that libraries are more important than ever here, and that our role MUST continue to be to teach users to sift good information from the bad by being deft searchers and critical thinkers, but also to create environments in which users of information can connect with each other as well as information they need and create themselves. John Blyberg said in a recent interview [Quicktime] that the library of his dreams is “a place where, [from] the moment you walk in, you’re being engaged by your surroundings, by the people, by your fellow patrons,” and upon leaving, it is still “present in your life,” on any devices used to locate and utilize information: phones, PDAs, computers, TVs, DVRs. I agree wholeheartedly and hope that librarians continue to set aside our pride and get out there and become engaging.
Wensch points to Wikipedia as an example of the idea that “together, we create more information than the experts.” Well, yeah. Debates about the scholarly (or not) usefulness and applicability of Wikipedia aside, this, too has implications for librarians and for users of information alike.
A note on the videos themselves: the method of delivery–YouTube–is very Web 2.0, but the medium of the message itself, which is largely text, is distinctly 1.0. We listen to soothing music and watch animations, but what we are doing is *reading* *static* *text,* a very “1.0″ activity, if I may assert as much. It is very interesting that Wensch chose to deliver his message in the form of animated text, often in the context of the websites about which he speaks, rather than or in addition to having a spoken narrative. To me, this underscores the continued and perhaps increasing importance, particularly in higher education, of critical thinking skills, information evaluation skills and traditional literacy skills. Well done.
// November 20th, 2007 // 4 Comments » // U2
…and it really probably should have stayed in the vault. Yikes!
This overwrought piece of crap accompanies my least favorite, most maudlin songs on The Joshua Tree, and it’s been released this week in conjunction with the (just past 20 years) re-release of JT.
Wow, I think this post marks the first negative thing I have ever said about the band, and I know I’m inviting flames by saying so, but they really should have kept this embarrassing footage under wraps, from the lamentable canaries tossed by Adam and Edge to Larry’s faint and foppish brow-mopping to Bono’s Bruce-Willis-style black tank top–not to mention the Messiah shot at the end. Awful.
The best U2 concept video is still “All I Want is You.” Go watch it, it will make you feel better.
// July 8th, 2007 // No Comments » // Libraries, Web Stuff
Kathryn Greenhill wrote a very articulate post on why learning about emerging technologies is a part of every librarian’s job. It’s very timely for me, as my library started the Learning 2.0 program this week. The coolest thing about it, though? She got lots of content for this post from her friends on Twitter, including me.
So, if you are participating in the Learning 2.0 program at EKU Libraries, please take a moment to read the 20 reasons why learning emerging technologies is a part of every librarian’s job. Library staff, too!
On to the first week’s assignment: participants were to watch the Web 2.0: the machine is us/ing us video and comment.
I love the short history lesson given by this video: first HTML then XML. The separation of form from content really was the shot heard round the web world that enabled the collaborative, malleable web. (and AJAX, though I only tangentially understand that. The serious use of CSS is about the time that web work and I parted ways…).
The message that I don’t want to get lost in the myriad points made by this video is that web 2.0 technologies are very much about connecting with other people. That has really hit home to me in the last week, as I’ve been in near-constant touch with several people that I stepped up and introduced myself to at ALA in Washington. On the one hand, if it weren’t for web 2.0 technologies, I would not be keeping up with them; on the other, if I had not met and interacted with them in person, I would still feel like a lurker rather than a member of their community. There’s a lot more to think about, here.
Several Learning 2.0 participants commented that the music in the video really adds to it. I have to agree. It’s subtle and gentle, just the right backdrop for this powerful video.
// May 23rd, 2007 // No Comments » // Web Stuff
Warning: serious navel-gazing to follow.
A colleague of mine turned me on to MyBlogLog yesterday, and I am immediately addicted. Entries from this blog turn up in the weirdest places! Today’s artifacts:
1. My post lamenting the “return” of Andy Kaufman is hit #2 (second to the Wikipedia entry) when searching Google for “andy kaufman god.” God is the title of a play that he wrote. My post has nothing to do with the play. [ftr: "dipship" is an obvious typo that I'm choosing not to correct ]
2. My post linking to Eric Faden’s short film “A Fair(y) Use Tale” is the first hit in a Google search for “fairy use stanford.” Above Youtube! How strange is that??
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