You too can You Tube!
I selected this short video, which captures the heart beat of Toronto sublimely...
This Library vid was a clip taken from the excellent spoof movie UHF by Weird Al Yankovic:
But this short one is a great public service ad for libraries:
This short advertisement would be a great deal of fun to emulate for TPL, perhaps starring Dewey, our KidsSpace mascot. Now that YouTube has a Canadian version, it might be possible to highlight our showcase branches to students, newcomers and other Toronto residents who may not realize all TPL has to offer. However, it would have to be tastefully done and that isn't cheap. In our cash-strapped city, this might be a more cost efficient marketing ploy than the lame "The library isn't a fad" trapped-in-the-Sixities poster campaign.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Friday, November 2, 2007
23 Things Assignment #7
Podcasting
I finally had a reason to get around to listening to Mugglecast. When you go to the recommended list site for podcasts, on the right sidebar is a list of the TopTen Podcasts, and, sure enough, Mugglecast was there. It's broadcast by the people behind Mugglenet.com, one of the top Harry Potter fan websites out there.
So I sat at my desk for a little listen... 90 minutes! The podcast is 90 minutes long. So, basically, I listened to the intro, the ads and the opening theme and a few bits of the commentators gasping over the Dumbledore Revelation. I will go back to this.
I tried a few more of the podcast recommendations.
Cinema Slave was rather interesting. I did love the ad for a Doctor Who podcast. It was a good intro to the kinds of special effects this media supports. This podcaster had sound clips of the movie he was reviewing and promised trailers and news updates. Again, it was quite long so I only listened for a short while.
Anime World Order's description sounded good but features far too many obscure movies and rather amatuerish interviews with creators to be too interesting.
When I was adding the podcasts to the Bloglines Feeds, I looked into my ComiPress Manga News RSS to discover there was a brand new MangaCast. I subscribed but that cast was not supported by our networks, needing more DIVx decoding and such or subscriptions to i-Tunes or its ilk.
One thing I discovered on this blocked podcast was that podcasts post text scripts of the contents, maybe to help people reviewing, quoting or just having a had time understanding the dialogue.
I finally had a reason to get around to listening to Mugglecast. When you go to the recommended list site for podcasts, on the right sidebar is a list of the TopTen Podcasts, and, sure enough, Mugglecast was there. It's broadcast by the people behind Mugglenet.com, one of the top Harry Potter fan websites out there.
So I sat at my desk for a little listen... 90 minutes! The podcast is 90 minutes long. So, basically, I listened to the intro, the ads and the opening theme and a few bits of the commentators gasping over the Dumbledore Revelation. I will go back to this.
I tried a few more of the podcast recommendations.
Cinema Slave was rather interesting. I did love the ad for a Doctor Who podcast. It was a good intro to the kinds of special effects this media supports. This podcaster had sound clips of the movie he was reviewing and promised trailers and news updates. Again, it was quite long so I only listened for a short while.
Anime World Order's description sounded good but features far too many obscure movies and rather amatuerish interviews with creators to be too interesting.
When I was adding the podcasts to the Bloglines Feeds, I looked into my ComiPress Manga News RSS to discover there was a brand new MangaCast. I subscribed but that cast was not supported by our networks, needing more DIVx decoding and such or subscriptions to i-Tunes or its ilk.
One thing I discovered on this blocked podcast was that podcasts post text scripts of the contents, maybe to help people reviewing, quoting or just having a had time understanding the dialogue.
23 Things Assignment #6
Office Tools
A friend who is a high-up corporate administrative assistant said that her organization uses Google Docs all the time and I can see how it would be helpful in a setting where many departments may have to contribute.
I haven't yet been invited to the class group doc nor has 23Things made any additions to my doc so I cannot comment much on the experience.
However, the other librarian at my branch is also doing these assignments and google docs won't take her addition to the group document because, apparently, there's no connection to the website??? Sigh. We've had dropped circ sessions and slowing shared drive access for the past few days.
It just goes to prove that a good tool like google docs is only as good as the speed, bandwidth, and connectivity of the network being used.
A friend who is a high-up corporate administrative assistant said that her organization uses Google Docs all the time and I can see how it would be helpful in a setting where many departments may have to contribute.
I haven't yet been invited to the class group doc nor has 23Things made any additions to my doc so I cannot comment much on the experience.
However, the other librarian at my branch is also doing these assignments and google docs won't take her addition to the group document because, apparently, there's no connection to the website??? Sigh. We've had dropped circ sessions and slowing shared drive access for the past few days.
It just goes to prove that a good tool like google docs is only as good as the speed, bandwidth, and connectivity of the network being used.
Monday, October 15, 2007
23 Things Assignment #5
I did find the "video" to add the my.del.icio.us buttons a little insulting. They could have just said "add as a Link under Favourites and put on your toolbar". It wasn't rocket science.
However there are 2 of us at this branch doing the assignments, so my opposite will have to do this assignment on a different computer or the link will send her to my del.icio.us list. Obviously this site is not meant for shared workstations.
I looked in my Favourites and found "Daily dose imagery" which I had added when I was doing the first 23Things assigment. To my surprise, this blog had a del.icio.us button on its front page. I posted it and checked some similar sites. I found a nice also-Canadian photoblog called WatchThisSpace so I added that one.
I tried a search next and looked up "Doctor Who". I found an interesting Fanfiction Archive but noticed that the Canadian Fan Club wasn't in the list so I added DWIN.org. It's odd but the stats on my.del.icio.us page seemed to suggest that 5 or 6 people added the 2 Canadian sites almost as soon as I posted them with the tags. I suspect there must be an automatic tag alert option.
This is an interesting concept but again the use is limited as a reference tool. It has a little more "peer review" cachet than google hits but it is time consuming. I hadn't been aware of it so I might take more time -- when I have it-- to explore what is available.
However there are 2 of us at this branch doing the assignments, so my opposite will have to do this assignment on a different computer or the link will send her to my del.icio.us list. Obviously this site is not meant for shared workstations.
I looked in my Favourites and found "Daily dose imagery" which I had added when I was doing the first 23Things assigment. To my surprise, this blog had a del.icio.us button on its front page. I posted it and checked some similar sites. I found a nice also-Canadian photoblog called WatchThisSpace so I added that one.
I tried a search next and looked up "Doctor Who". I found an interesting Fanfiction Archive but noticed that the Canadian Fan Club wasn't in the list so I added DWIN.org. It's odd but the stats on my.del.icio.us page seemed to suggest that 5 or 6 people added the 2 Canadian sites almost as soon as I posted them with the tags. I suspect there must be an automatic tag alert option.
This is an interesting concept but again the use is limited as a reference tool. It has a little more "peer review" cachet than google hits but it is time consuming. I hadn't been aware of it so I might take more time -- when I have it-- to explore what is available.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
23 Things Assignment #4 Part 2
Generating fun.
I'd actually used generators before. I found my Elvish name at The Elvish name Generator. Apparently I'm Alatariel Seregon in Middle Earth. I'd also tried the Mary Sue generator which is a parody of fan fiction's worst problem and monthly the section of KidsSpace I check has a grammatical story generator -- give some nouns, verbs, etc. and the story is written for you. It can be quite hilarious with "broccoli crashing the angry blue boot".
For this assignment, I tried the complaint generator. I would have liked more control over the rant's content for it to be truly amusing. Too long, too.
Then I simply could not resist the generator featured on the recommended generator blog -- the Harry Potter Doll generator. Shocking, giving my past posts, I know. I -- surprise surprise -- tried making a Snape doll. See above.
23 Things Assignment #4Part 1
Photoshopping Fun
I decided to try the fake magazine cover option. It was fun but did not allow much editing of the uploaded picture, as you can see from the results. Snape is a little pixelated in the second shopped picture. The first fitted better.
Friday, October 5, 2007
23 Things Assigment #3
I tried both Bloglines Feed Search option and Google's list of the top 100 RSS feeds to choose the feeds I would add, besides the Library Journal one.
I added National Geographic News and read all about the Crow Cam (cameras on crows' legs to follow their daily activities). I'm not sure I'm ready to know the secrets of the Tasmanian Devil.
I added Dictionary.com's Word of the Day feed and was pleased that I knew today's word Paroxysm (though not it's pronunciation) but was stumped by past word Boulereversement.
I added Boing Boing, which features the latest gadget-y thing in the world of technology. Some of the tidbits were quite bizarre. These three RSS feeds are all in the top 50 feeds according to Google.
Last, but not of least interest to me, I added ComiPress-Manga News and Information, found by searching "Manga" in Bloglines' search. It mentioned ADV Presses' revived interest in Manga and talked about what is sure to be the next big thing: Blue Dragon, based on a video game by one of the creators of Final Fantasy and drawn by the creator of Dragon Ball Z. Sure to be a top request here in the library, although I'll be avoiding reading it myself -- I don't like that artist's work.
The news feeds are interesting. Boing Boing, Word of the Day and NG are good time wasters but not really relevant to work. The manga one I am quite happy to find. I'm afraid that the Library Journal one is rather snoozeworthy and so full of the organization's news that it provides more irrelevant news to wade through to get to anything useful. A filter would make it more useful.
It makes little sense to me to use Bloglines. Unless you have 100 RSS you want to check, you could just as easily Bookmark the homepage of the news provider and access it daily. Most of these feeds allow email alerts which would be just as convenient.
I added National Geographic News and read all about the Crow Cam (cameras on crows' legs to follow their daily activities). I'm not sure I'm ready to know the secrets of the Tasmanian Devil.
I added Dictionary.com's Word of the Day feed and was pleased that I knew today's word Paroxysm (though not it's pronunciation) but was stumped by past word Boulereversement.
I added Boing Boing, which features the latest gadget-y thing in the world of technology. Some of the tidbits were quite bizarre. These three RSS feeds are all in the top 50 feeds according to Google.
Last, but not of least interest to me, I added ComiPress-Manga News and Information, found by searching "Manga" in Bloglines' search. It mentioned ADV Presses' revived interest in Manga and talked about what is sure to be the next big thing: Blue Dragon, based on a video game by one of the creators of Final Fantasy and drawn by the creator of Dragon Ball Z. Sure to be a top request here in the library, although I'll be avoiding reading it myself -- I don't like that artist's work.
The news feeds are interesting. Boing Boing, Word of the Day and NG are good time wasters but not really relevant to work. The manga one I am quite happy to find. I'm afraid that the Library Journal one is rather snoozeworthy and so full of the organization's news that it provides more irrelevant news to wade through to get to anything useful. A filter would make it more useful.
It makes little sense to me to use Bloglines. Unless you have 100 RSS you want to check, you could just as easily Bookmark the homepage of the news provider and access it daily. Most of these feeds allow email alerts which would be just as convenient.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
23 Things Assignment #2
I wanted to find images I would be putting on my own personal computer.
In searching for an image of Derek Jacobi in his Doctor Who appearance, I was pleased to find this picture on a cool Doctor Who blog http://www.behindthesofa.org.uk/ which has some great Doctor Who commentary. But the picture was wallpaper size so I went for a smaller picture on James Bow's site bowjamesbow.ca (I know him as a local Canadian author of Doctor Who fiction and was pleased to find his site). James described the revelation that the so-nice Professor Yana played by this British acting legend was actually the evil Master as a "Squee" moment. Absolutely spot on. I remember squeeing quite loudly last week at this revelation and I thanked the stars that I managed to be unspoiled by friends and articles so I could have this absolutely perfect shocker moment. And that it came from the actor who's title role in "I, Claudius" inspired me to take Latin was a bonus.
Trying a different font now...
In choosing my second and third pictures, I was inspired by one of the panels at the Prophecy 2007 Harry Potter Symposium I recently attended. The panel was called "Why do we love Snape? Is it canon, fanon, or Alan?" These two pictures illustrate a more canonically inspired artwork of the ugly, greasy and unpleasant professor and the delicious movie counterpart. I must admit that I watched the first movie before I read the books and my love of Snape came from Alan Rickman's voice and portrayal. However, the nasty misunderstood misanthrope is also appealing and I realize that I often like viciously sarcastic characters.
At the Harry Potter Symposium, there was a Hall of Memories with memorials for all the characters J.K. Rowling killed. Offerings were welcome: poor Snape's memorial received only the hotel's free shampoo bottles. Sigh.
Saturday, September 22, 2007
23 Things assignment #1
Finally had a chance to try setting up a blog after my return from my vacation. Lots to catch up on.
What I hope to learn through the 23 Things training:
I am familiar with much of the technology we will be exploring but I have never seen the appeal of the emotional dumping ground of LiveJournal or the personal confidence-filled mating services of MySpace or Facebook and certainly don't approve of any arena which supports riting lk a IM teenie instead of demanding proper English communication. Encouraging young people to be lazy and clique-coded does them a disservice when they finally enter the workforce. I've been using ListServs and Yahoogroup mailing lists for years and have found them to be great and lucid channels of communication with like-minded people around the world. So, in this course, I will have a reason to explore those sites which I would otherwise avoid personally.
What makes a good blog:
The best blogs enhance the website they are connected to in that they follow an event or project step by step like a diary or they provide an expertly filtered selection of news feeds or links. Authors sometimes write about their progress on a novel and it's a great insight into the creative process. I've seen blogs of personalities on kids TV related sites and they enhance the personal connection between the children and the world they see, making the personalities into people, a valuable lesson in reality versus imagination. The blog has to suit the purpose or flavour of the site.
What I hope to learn through the 23 Things training:
I am familiar with much of the technology we will be exploring but I have never seen the appeal of the emotional dumping ground of LiveJournal or the personal confidence-filled mating services of MySpace or Facebook and certainly don't approve of any arena which supports riting lk a IM teenie instead of demanding proper English communication. Encouraging young people to be lazy and clique-coded does them a disservice when they finally enter the workforce. I've been using ListServs and Yahoogroup mailing lists for years and have found them to be great and lucid channels of communication with like-minded people around the world. So, in this course, I will have a reason to explore those sites which I would otherwise avoid personally.
What makes a good blog:
The best blogs enhance the website they are connected to in that they follow an event or project step by step like a diary or they provide an expertly filtered selection of news feeds or links. Authors sometimes write about their progress on a novel and it's a great insight into the creative process. I've seen blogs of personalities on kids TV related sites and they enhance the personal connection between the children and the world they see, making the personalities into people, a valuable lesson in reality versus imagination. The blog has to suit the purpose or flavour of the site.
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