Technology + Ancient Art = Awesome

Read the full article here, but the gist is, a music artist and a Turkish paper marble artist, having never met, put together a music video for the band's new song.


"Lucky Me" by Project Jenny, Project Jan from sammy rubin on Vimeo.

This is why technology and ancient arts can and should have a long and healthy marriage together. 

 

Best Article Ever

My sweet cousin Jentry sent me a link to this NPR article titled "In Which, Emphatically And Forever, I Decline To Care About How Books Smell."


It says it much better than I attempted to and it's funny to boot.

SShhh, don't tell him about the Kindle

or the host of other very successful e-readers on the market today. In preparation for my thesis project I have been going back over my old notes from my coursework.  I read this article entitled "10 reasons why the internet is not a substitute for the library" and this reason got me riled about my favorite soap box topic.

#6 Hey, Bud, You Forgot about E-book Readers

Try reading an e-book reader for more than a half-hour. Headaches and eyestrain are the best results. Besides, if what you’re reading is more than two pages long, what do you do? Print it. Where’s a tree hugger when you really need one? Moreover, the cost of readers runs from $200 to $2,000, the cheaper ones being harder on the eyes. Will this change? Doubtless, but right now there’s no market forces making it change. Will it change in less than 75 years? Unlikely! A-freakin-men!

How silly must he feel right about now when Kindle sales exceeded 8 million last year?

I don't disagree that libraries are very important for many reasons, but I reject the idea that libraries are at war with technology.  In fact, if you work in a library or have ever been in one, you know that is just plain silly.   

Have you seen those "I pledge to read the written word" icons on blogs?  As if to suggest that printed words are better, more enlightened than digital ink and that authors need our tactile observance to survive and write good books.  My husband and I have contemplated creating an "I pledge to only read cuneiform on stone tablets" icon for my blog, but that seemed a bit too snarky.  

The point is, reading is reading and one form, as long as it works for you, is not superior to another.  But what about potentially loosing your e-books?  E-books don't really let you own titles.  What about the feel of a book in your hands? I love a real book for those reasons - but they are not about reading; they are about having, owning and touching - not bad things - but not about content consumption.

Luddites and techies - we are all in this together.  Buy or check out, download or pull back the cover, paper or digital, whatever.  Just read.    

Teaching Technology (The Blog Lives)

Sadly, during the most exciting semester of my library career my blog suffered tremendously. I had the most to write about, and I wrote the least!

Anyway, every Thursday night I help teach blogging classes as the local library and I absolutely love it. Today was my first class back from a short break, and it's just the best way to spend an evening. There was a dear elderly woman tonight who just couldn't keep up and I sat with her throughout the class and we worked together to create her blog and make a few posts. She actually typed on one of her practice posts "I am at the library tonight. A very nice young girl is helping me". How sweet is that!?

I had forgotten how much I LOVE teaching technology. It's one of my favorite parts of being a librarian. So, I guess we'll add one more specialization to the growing lists of specializations I'd like to have... archives, special collections, public libraries in general, outreach/programming, technology..... That kind of makes me a plain old generalist doesn't it?

Technology - who needs it?

We do! That's the answer. We, as librarians, certainly do. I have been pretty surprised at the aversion and downright ----- expressed about technology by many of my classmates...who are earning their masters degree in a technological science...via the internet. I love books just like the next librarian and bibliophile, but if there are technologies that will make our libraries better let's use them danget.

On a similar note, I had this idea the other day that I think would be awesome for a public library to implement. Keep in mind that I have no idea what kind of cost or man power or equipment this might require, it's just pie in the sky at this point. So, you know how you can personalize your google account and when you log in it will not only look like you want it to (personalized skins and what not) it will display information in a way that you want? If not try it out, it's awesome. Or how Amazon gives book recommendations when you log in based on your previous purchases?

What if you could log onto your library account and it would would display all of your hold information, RSS feeds about your favorite authors and their latest projects, personalized reading recommendations from librarians, "shelfs" that you could create "to read" lists on that could actually link to the catalog, the list is endless. Anyway, the more I think about it, the more awesome I think it would be. I'll keep working on it.