Week Ten: Video on the Web

This week the 23 Things Kansas program leaves its visual mark on the blogosphere. The goal for this week is to create a video about anything, edit the footage, and then post it online.

Creating and posting were not an issue, but surprisingly, editing the footage was difficult. I used Windows Movie Maker, because I had heard good things about it.  However, after several frustrating attempts and various words all starting with &*(!@!!@, I was able to cobble together a nice video.  I intend to try a few other video editors over the next few weeks and I will report on what I find.

This video was taken at the Denver Aquarium.



Any suggestions on editors to try instead of Windows Movie Maker?

Week Eight: The Conclusion

In my first Week Eight post, I discussed my plans to create a collaborative document using Google Docs for the 23 Things Kansas program that would allow my colleagues to add to a list of favorite, or infamous, reference questions received during their careers.

As promised here is a link to the document. There are some whoppers listed!

Anyway, the exercise was fun, but there were a few aspects of Google Docs, and cloud computing, that I thought were interesting.

• Things only work well when everyone is a member. It is nice that Google Docs has a method for sharing a document that does not require a person to become a member or sign-in.  However, not all the features work as well for "guests" as they do for members. 
• How secure is this thing anyway? Copyright anyone?  In order to give access to a broad range of users, I had to make the document so anyone could edit.  All edits are label as "by guest" so there is no way to tell--easily--who made what changes.
• Where did I put that thing? People got lost. That's the short of it.  People lost the link; forgot to save their changes; saved their changes, but saved the document to their computer in the process; and a host of other equally annoying challenges.  They were all easy to fix, but again, things work best when everyone is a member.
• When it works, it really works.  The plus side is that when people finally figured out how Google Docs functions, ignored that anyone could change their edits, and remembered how to access the document, the whole process was great.  People from various locations were able to easily and quickly access the same document and make changes.  The process became truly collaborative.

For small and mid-sized libraries who can not afford centralized servers, Google Docs or other service are extremely useful for sharing documents among staff.  As these services continue to grow and improve they should become a cost effective alternative for large libraries.

How does your library use cloud computing? Also, feel free to continue to add to the reference question list, via comments on this post.

No Ink, No Paper: What's The Value Of An E-Book?

A colleague sent me the NPR article, No Ink, No Paper: What's The Value Of An E-Book?, on the impact that e-books are having on the publishing world. I found it quite interesting and think it brings up some interesting questions that will have a direct impact on libraries.

The biggest question is simply, if publishers become more e-book friendly, i.e. publishing more e-books, how will the library continue to supply these items? Current e-book providers (Overdrive, NetLibrary) are extremely clunky and restrictive.  However, once they catch up to e-book publishers and e-book reader developers, will there be a need for a library? Once e-books become ubiquitous and you can check out an e-book easily, what is the role of the library?  Print is not dead yet, but what happens when it expires?

Here is the article by Lynn Neary:

The growing popularity of e-books has raised a difficult question in the publishing marketplace that used to have an easy answer: What's a book worth?

Because they cost less to produce, consumers think e-books should be cheap. But publishers are afraid that if the price goes too low, they may never recover from the diminished expectations.  
Continue reading the article...

Week Nine: Instant Messaging

For this week, 23 Things Kansas is focusing on instant messaging.  Instant messaging (IM) is now ubiquitous.  You can IM from most social networking websites, customer service pages for large companies often have an IM component, and IM is built into many email services. However, IM is still growing. Using SMS (Short Message Service) protocols, you can now send and receive text messages with many IM services.

I have used IM since the early days of AOL and was even part of the short-lived KANAnswer program. (KANAnswer was the State Library of Kansas' attempt to create a statewide online reference service similar to the AskColorado program in Colorado.)  I have seen the evolution of IM and for the most part it has been positive (You can debate its impact on the decline of grammar and writing skills amongst yourselves.)

There are many programs and services out there, but most fall into two categories, simple or complex, without much in between.  Therefore, while there are many services available, choosing an IM service for a library can be difficult.

For small to midsized libraries, Meebo is probably the standard and what most organizations look at first.  It has a simple widget that is easy to install on library websites, and is user friendly. It also works with existing IM user names (AOL, Gmail, etc.)    However, while it excels in usability, it lacks in functionality.

Week Eight: Cloud Computing, The Beginning

We are well into the eighth week of the 23 Things Kansas program and have reach the topic of cloud computing.

I understand the purpose of cloud computing--a centralized online place to store and share documents--but have yet to have a need for the service.

At work my department shares a common drive on the Library's server, giving everyone access to the same documents, folders, etc.  This drive sharing combined with Microsoft Word's revision features, allows for an effective, efficient way for multiple users to work on documents.

For personal items, I rarely need to access documents immediately. My resume and other files I tinker with occasionally are stored on a flash drive--remember those old things--and therefore I don't use cloud computing services.

That being written, I am dedicated to the cause and therefore examining various cloud computing services.  After spending a week thinking about what project to use as a testing tool, I decided to go with an old favorite.  I will create a document via cloud computing and ask my colleagues and library friends to document their favorite reference questions.  These question can be funny, crazy, involved, or just plain memorable.

I will create a post with the results.

In the meantime, feel free to add your favorite reference question to this post and I will include them.  When I get the document up and running I will add the link to this post.

An Interesting New Pew Study

A new study by the Pew Research Center announced this week shows that most Americans get their news via multiple platforms.

This news is not surprising given that the media has been reporting on the decline of paper newspapers and magazines for some time.  However, there were a couple of items in the summary of the study that I found interesting in their implications for libraries.

• "The internet is now the third most-popular news platform, behind local and national television news and ahead of national print newspapers, local print newspapers and radio. Getting news online fits into a broad pattern of news consumption by Americans; six in ten (59%) get news from a combination of online and offline sources on a typical day." (emphasis mine.)
  
  
• "In addition, people use their social networks and social networking technology to filter, assess, and react to news. And they use traditional email and other tools to swap stories and comment on them. Among those who get news online, 75% get news forwarded through email or posts on social networking sites and 52% share links to news with others via those means." (emphasis mine.)

What these two items show is that patrons are using the internet to find their information and then using the internet to tell their friends, family, and others.  This focus means that libraries must be online in a variety of ways: e-newsletters, RSS, Facebook, Twitter, etc.  In fact, libraries need to be on anything and everything that their patrons are using online.