more on Everything Bad is Good for You

If everything "bad" is indeed good for you, what does this mean for the world of Libraries and/or Educational organizations?

I think this just means that libraries and other educational institutions will have to learn to adapt and embrace new things, just as they have done for decades. There was a time when people felt that novels weren't appropriate materials for libraries, but in this day and age no one even questions whether or not the public library will have the new James Patterson or Nora Roberts. At this point, we say "as long as they're reading."

So it will go with gaming. We'll say "at least they're in the library" and "at least they're learning something" (if, indeed, everything bad is good for you and they really are learning something). We already offer magazines that embrace pop culture like US Weekly, Electronic Gaming Monthly, and Lucky, and we circulate DVDs and VHS and we have computers available that people use to keep up with their Facebook pages. Gaming is just the next step in library adaptation and staying relevant to users.

After all, I don't think it's really for libraries or librarians to make value judgments, but rather to provide the information resources that people want (and in the "everything bad is good" context, I think we can call video games "information resources"), just as we would when checking out a book we find personally distasteful.

Second Life

I felt more comfortable in Second Life after going through the exercises on Orientation Island, but overall, it wasn't my thing. I guess I just didn't get the point. For me, it wasn't useful or entertaining. I guess if that's where the patrons are, I should get used to it, but...it's just an uncomfortable medium for me. I'd even prefer a video chat where people could see actual-me, rather than avatar-me.

As we've been reading in the Farkas book and elsewhere, a lot of people use these online social tools primarily to interact with people they already know. I'm totally one of those people and so spent a lot of my time in Second Life feeling concerned that a stranger might try to interact with me and that I wouldn't know what to say or do. For one thing, don't these things always have complicated social rules and their own vocabulary and whatnot?

SCILS 598 do's and don't's

I think the only change I'd like to see in this class might be difficult to implement due to the nature of the course. I feel like a major aim of social software use in libraries is collaboration and the whole, y'know, social aspect, so I would've liked more synchronous chats or collaborative projects like the week we did the wiki. However, I realize that my classmates and I are spread around the country, living in different time zones, and that many of us work full-time and that is part of the reasoning for our online course participation. These factors, and others, make synchronous and collaborative efforts difficult.

As for my general review of the course, I liked it. I really feel like I learned a lot and I'm much more confident with wikis and with the sound of my own voice in recordings, in particular! I had a lot of fun (I think the video week was my favorite!) and I've also already started implementing some of these tools into my work life. I did really struggle with keeping up with the constantly growing number of tools we were using each week, though. At this point, I'm checking the three e-mail accounts we created, Facebook, Bloglines, MySpace, Twitter, and I don't even know what else...it's very difficult to manage.

Slingo!

Here's a screencast of me playing Slingo! Check Slingo! out at Yahoo! Games.

Is pop culture making us dumb?

From what you've read (read first), is Popular culture (games, tv, film) just a method to "sophisticatedly deliver stupidity" (Steve paraphrasing George Will)?

I can only assume that Steve is paraphrasing this George Will. If that is the case, then I find Will's stance quite interesting as he is a consumer of one of American society's oldest and most profitable forms of popular culture: sports.

Now, before I continue with this line of thought, let me give the disclaimer that I, too, am a huge sports fan. Like Will, I am especially fond of baseball and am actually sharing my desk with a bobblehead figure of the Red Sox announcers on the New England Sports Network right this moment and just counted over 30 sports memorabilia items in my office.

And yet, I can't help but think that if there ever was a field of popular culture that was dumbing us down and generally being a negative influence, it would be athletics. First on the list of negative effects of our love for sports: the fact that athletes make millions of dollars a year and teachers don't even bring in six figures. Second is the fact that athletes behave just as badly as any other type of celebrity and are just as easily influencing fans to behave badly (hello, baseball steroids scandal; professional athletes that get slapped on the wrist for drunk driving; and men who brag about having slept with thousands of women). And of course, the aspect of athletics that may actually be making us dumber as a society: the tradition of passing athletes in their academics that starts in middle school and continues right through college.

Anyway, I'm with Johnson that popular culture may actually be making consumers smarter in some ways and I'll go back to the example of baseball. Baseball is a game that is easy to enjoy even if you know very little about it, but it is actually a very complex game. Understanding baseball to a point that you can comprehend strategy and statistics is actually quite difficult. Baseball can teach a person a lot about numbers just as television can teach him or her about interpersonal relationships in Johnson's example.

To Wii, or Not to Wii

(Sorry about the title, I just couldn't help myself!)

I work in a medium-sized public library (though definitely on the smaller end of that range). We were fortunate to win a Wii for our library at a CTLS event, but if we were planning to purchase a video game console my selection criteria would include: price, ease of use and set-up, availability and price of games and accessories, and user interest.

Researching the first three would be pretty easy. There are several Web sites I could use for price comparisons and video game reviews, some of which were cited on the SCILS 598 wiki. There are several methods I might use to determine which console would be most desirable to our patrons. First and foremost would be asking the users through surveys available in the library, on the Web site, and in local electronics stores and other places where gamers might be likely to see them. Another method would be to ask local electronics stores and rental stores like Blockbuster which games and consoles are most popular with their customers.

My choice would be the Wii and for my reasons, look no further than the Library Garden post on gaming consoles. It's the best bang for the buck, essentially.

And, you can play Rock Band and Guitar Hero on it.

Screencasting 101

Here are the two most important things I've learned about screencasting this semester:

• Rehearse your screencast prior to recording. A few dry runs will help you to find any snags such as dead links, changed pages, etc. and will make you more comfortable with the topic and the idea of speaking aloud into "thin air."
• KEEP GOING even if you make a mistake. If you stop and start all over every time you say "um" or make some other minor mistake, you'll never get through it.

Facebook Photo Albums

Creating a photo album in Facebook.

to Ning or not to Ning

I didn't really know much about Ning until today. In fact, I only even knew it existed because someone mentioned the SCILS Ning on the wiki or Twitter or somewhere.

After poking around a little and watching LT's very informative screencast, I see that its major attraction to users is that each individual Ning is more exclusive than Facebook or MySpace so users feel more secure using it in terms of privacy (whether they are or not, I'm not sure). It also seems that some people who resist using Facebook or MySpace are more compelled to use a Ning because of its specific purpose. Rather than just signing up and seeing who you see, you join a specific group with a particular end in mind, to learn more about bicycle repair or to connect with other chihuahua lovers, for example.

However, it seems to me, that with the exception of the "sense of security," Ning's aims could also be achieved with a Facebook group (although, again, we've touched on something I don't know that much about; despite belonging to several, I primarily just lurk).

reflections on the boyd articles

Wow, the two boyd articles assigned this week really gave me a lot of food for thought. My initial reaction to the question of what librarians should take away from these articles was, "uh, every word." After reflecting for a while, I think I was able to distill a few tips, pointers, and things to think about from the articles.

• The first article mentioned that many users of SNS's are daily users. Libraries that create profiles on social networking sites need to be mindful of this and update their content often to stay fresh, relevant, and interesting.
• Both articles touch on the fact that online networks often reflect existing offline networks. The first also mentions that SNS's are more often used to connect friends-of-friends than strangers. For this reason, it might be in the library's best interest to let volunteers or regular patrons know about your online presence first so that they will "friend" the library (thus reflecting an offline relationship) and their friends will see (thus introducing friends-of-friends).
• Both articles discuss the importance of image in social networks, how users can "type themselves into being," etc. The library needs to be conscious of the image it projects in its profile.
• In the first article, the importance of comments (on walls, etc.) is brought up. Discourse is an important aspect of social networking. Librarians need to consider whether they want to just "push" information on a profile page or if they also want to engage in conversation by replying to comments left by patrons (the method I might suggest based on the literature).
• Finally, when choosing an SNS for the library and creating a profile, as with any other library programming, librarians need to consider their user population.
  

Sticky Wicket

I think there are three big reasons that social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace are such "sticky" Web sites (or, as I like to say, such "timesucks").

The primary reason these sites take up so much time is that they are constantly changing. Another site I visit often is my hometown newspaper, but I know that it will update once a day unless something really exceptional happens, so...I check it once a day. On the other hand, something new is posted on Facebook every second. Every time you go back to the site, there will be something new to look at, you can count on it.

The second reason is the sheer number of links and information on a site like Facebook. You go online, check your profile, and the next thing you know, through a series of links you've followed through from your home page, you're looking at pictures of people you went to high school with but haven't spoken to in ten years and an hour of your life is gone. There's just so much to get sucked into.

Finally, I think people get sucked into social networking sites is the voyeuristic aspect of them. You just have to know what Jane ate for lunch or where Jim is traveling on business this week. It's kind of weird, when you think about it, how much blogs and social networking sites and the like have brought the mundane details of our lives out into the limelight and somehow people actually want to know those details.

My Foray into Screencasting

with the very fun-ly named Jing!

This screencast is a brief introduction to searching the Pflugerville Community Library's online catalog.

PCL Catalog How-to

You've heard of the Oscars...

Now, check out the Beccas for best educational video and best entertaining video from a SCILS 598 classmate.

Best Educational Video: Did You Know? from SL



I chose this one because it's a cause that's really important to me, too, and I'm glad SL is getting the word out about dogs in need of homes.

Best Entertaining Video: LaserBugs from JS



I chose this one because it made me laugh out loud. It's hard to beat that!

I also have to give an honorable mention to MD. I loved the editing in her videos that give the scrapbook and film reel effects to them.

Educational Video

Here's a short video on how to make hot chocolate. You have to watch all the way to the end to "get" the music! Enjoy!


Click to play

Original video here.

Entertainment Video

Here's a quick video of photos from several Rustic Overtones shows over the course of two weekends in August 2007 taken with my cousin's cell phone and set to a fun song of theirs, "Check."




Original video here.

What Our Photos Say About Us

Looking at our class flickr pages (here and here) it's easy to recognize a few patterns and see what we have in common. Our differences are harder to determine from these images, though.

Similarities

• Looks like we've got a lot of animal lovers!
  
• A lot of the photos are of pieces of art or are artistic themselves, so it seems we have a general appreciation for art and design.
• I see pictures of vacation destinations--we're a group of globetrotters (or, maybe we just all really need a vacation!).
• Computers feature very prominently in our home, school, and work lives.
• But many of us also included pictures of books. Who says print is dead?
  

Differences

• We're spread out geographically.
• We work in different types of libraries.

Education vs. Entertainment

Do education videos stand a chance against entertainment videos?

Of course they do!

First of all, who says the two have to be mutually exclusive? In fact, don't many people prefer their educational experiences to have an entertaining element?

Secondly, as we've discussed time and time again in this course, there are many different types of learners, including visual ones. In Social Software in Libraries, Farkas references dual coding theory, which states that learning is best accomplished through a combination of visual and auditory channels. (206) For these reasons, I think educational videos on the web will continue to be very popular.

I think one of the major benefits of 2.0 technologies and of technology in general is that in our day and age the line between education and entertainment isn't as solid as it once was. The other day I used an online video to learn how to draw a goat (don't ask). This may not be "educational" in the same way our grandparents might conceive of education, but I did learn something! Education has left the classroom and can be found anywhere and everywhere. When I did the 23 Things program with CTLS one of the first topics was lifelong learning. While lifelong learning is nothing new, the internet and things like YouTube make self-directed learning much easier.

Blogging vs. Podcasting

I'm much more a visual learner than an audial learner, so my preference is for blogging. Blogging is also much more in line with my communication style because I can take time to deliberate over each thought and can go back and edit easily and often. Another reason I prefer blogs to podcasts is that, with blogs, I can control the rate at which I consume information. I can read much faster than most people speak in podcasts; I can also more easily choose to scan parts or to skip some parts altogether with text. Finally, I just don't have much of an attention span for listening to podcasts; when I listen to something, I have to also be doing something else-- cleaning, driving, etc.--whereas with text I can easily focus on just reading.

Still, podcasting does have its "pros." Being able to speak or to listen often gives nuance to language that is hard to capture textually. Also, the very fact I mentioned above, that I like to do other things while listening, is great for learners on-the-go.

A little story about Shakes and Nikki...

Here's a little story about how our cats, Shakes and Nikki, came to live with my fiance and I and about how Shakes got her name...

Librarians as Tastemakers

Like others, I suspect that Anderson addresses "New Producers, New Markets, and New Tastemakers" in his book, since I can't find those concepts referenced in the original Wired articles. Still, while I can't address Andersons constructs specifically, I do have an idea of librarians as tastemakers and market-creators that I can address here.

Obviously, librarians have the power to be tastemakers based on the books they recommend; the materials they display prominently in the library, and simply by collecting certain items and not others. I think librarians factor specifically in creating markets in the "long tail," though because they provide free access to things that patrons might never try if they had to pay for them. For example, you might be hesitant to buy a CD by an artist you've never heard of or even one that's been recommended to you but that you've never heard a song by, but you might go ahead and pick up a CD by an unkown artist from the library because the worst that can happen is that you hate it and you bring back the CD early. No big deal, nothing lost.

I also notice that my library creates a market for DVDs that would probably be considered in the "long tail" for the very reason that they are in the "long tail." It's harder to find foreign films, documentaries, and PBS specials at Blockbuster, so those things check out like crazy at the library. I know I personally often use the library for long tail items that I have a hard time finding through retailers like obscure or out of print books; sometimes I have to resort to ILL, but I'll still do it to get that last book in a series or whatever.