A Test of the Emergency

More Greenstone is Evil

2010-11-15T14:03:00.001-08:00

Installing Greenstone on a Mac is a GIANT DRAG!

2010-11-12T14:27:00.000-08:00

but I did it..... This post is for me...so I remember how to do it on my lap top. I hope it works because I don't want to have to drive to Indianapolis to finish my digital archive.

OK, pay attention.

install the bitch using all the defaults.

Make internet Explorer (bleeech) your default browser

open Terminal and type this:

"/users/kay/greenstone/gs2-server.sh" without the quotes

That opens the browser interface, go into settings and make it look like this:

open terminal and type this

"/users/kay/greenstone/gli/gli.sh" again, without the quotes.

This makes me feel queasy

2010-09-15T16:22:00.001-07:00

I mean, I understand that you need to make people want to buy stuff, that's what the modern day American economy is based on, but it still grosses me out to see such cut and dried, infographic backed strategies to use your company's "humanity" (it's people, Soylent Green is people!) to build "Kinship" to drive purchases.

Bastard greenstone!

2010-08-31T09:07:00.000-07:00

Greenstone is a suite of software for building and distributing digital library collections. It is not a digital library but a tool for building digital libraries. It provides a new way of organizing information and publishing it on the Internet in the form of a fully-searchable, metadata-driven digital library. It has been developed and distributed in cooperation with UNESCO and the Human Info NGO in Belgium. It is open-source, multilingual software, issued under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
— http://www.greenstone.org/factsheet
Great, I got that, it's installed on my mac, but I'm such a programming idiot that I can't even make terminal work.
I feel:Frustration
I type in ./gs2-server.sh and I get "no such file or directory"

The story so far

2010-08-12T06:39:00.000-07:00

because I am a visual thinker.

The five websites I use everyday

2010-08-11T13:38:00.000-07:00

I use Mint for my personal finances
I use Memiary to track my work
I use Dailyburn to track my weight and calorie intake
I use Evernote to organize my Schoolwork
I use Grooveshark to listen to music
I use facebook to organize socially
I use Flickr to stalk people I'm interested in
ok...that's more than 5, but it all works out because I only use memiary, grooveshark and mint every third day.

Digital Preservation Project

2010-08-08T07:13:00.000-07:00

So.....I was sitting around, avoiding work on my final paper. I remembered a discussion I had with my friend about the seven inch record, mainly, what a pain in the ass they are to listen to and organize and everytime you play one, you have to immediately jump up and flip it over and blah, blah, blah....
I had a stroke of caffeine induced insight: Make my collection of 7" into a digital archive and document the process.
1. Scope the project
2. Introduce the hardware
3. Introduce the collection
4. Show the process
5. Evaluate

The bean and the damage done

2010-08-02T18:56:00.001-07:00

back on the bean
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

I crunched the numbers and my morning cup of coffee costs 1.36...And I have to make it. If I buy the hippy dippy stuff from the Co-op, it comes to .75. and I have to make it and the beans are all small and weenie. if I buy the stuff from meijer the price drops to .70....but do I really want to live like that?

My WIAR for June

2010-07-31T14:21:00.001-07:00

Here is the latest in the What I Am Reading, or WIAR series. The Allen County Public Library is encouraging it's employees to create a short video post about what they are reading for fun or work, and post it to the WIAR blog. http://ACPLwiar.wordpress.com

Bug Lady

2010-05-19T14:58:00.001-07:00

Library Camp Graphic

2010-05-06T13:20:00.000-07:00

Here are a couple of graphics that I whipped up for this year's library camp at the Allen County Public Library on September 23rd. The Wolf one won.

Works Hard 4 the $$

2010-05-05T13:42:00.001-07:00

Works Hard 4 the $$
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

Yep.....the grind of the desk job, the relentless task masters making you work on your lunch hour. Not really, just goofing with chicken. Anyone know how to make Tumblr the CMS for your website?

What I am Reading

2010-04-19T06:22:00.001-07:00

2010-04-08T08:23:00.000-07:00

Calendar Test

2010-04-08T08:14:00.000-07:00

Puppet Show

2010-04-01T07:02:00.000-07:00

Here are some stills from the much awaited ACPL Puppet show that I taped with the PDX 170, on manual focus. I deleted the right channel of room noise, and doubled the left channel with 0 panning. The Line out of the (little) PA was a bit cracky, but I used it anyway.

2010-03-03T08:52:00.000-08:00

Test for Deb!

2010-03-03T07:14:00.001-08:00

Hey!
here is the Edirol MP3 recorder all hooked up as an external drive, I have the bottom flipped down so you can see the flash media card. I've made a little test MP3 and hosted it here at the free hosting site PodBean

You should get an account and do some podcasting. It's grrrrreat!

Powered by Podbean.com

obsessed with brush pens!

2010-03-02T09:18:00.001-08:00

nude1
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

It is true.....I've become completely consumed by them. I 've found that (of all places) Elmer's makes some that can be retrofitted with flesh colored inks.

Web Page Usability

2009-09-29T11:28:00.000-07:00

jakob-nielsen
This guy has some great points about usability testing. Tesying is not something that crosses my mind on a daily basis, but he makes the point that
1. don't use your friends
2. anything that takes longer to load than 1 second is too long
3. you only need 5 users to test.

My Vampire Weekend

2009-09-14T06:33:00.000-07:00

For this topic, I went to MP3.com and navigated over to the Free Mp3 page. I clicked on Vampire Weekend's infectiously groovy "Cape Cod Kawassa Kwassa" and listened to the streamed "Play Now" option and then downloaded the Mp3 Version onto my computer's hard drive and listened to each file, one after another using headphones.

Before I compared the files, I needed a quick lesson about streaming audio and down loadable audio. Apparently there are there are two ways to deliver audio over the Internet . In downloads, the compressed file is stored on the user's computer and played using an installed software player like Windows Media Player, or iTunes. Mp3s are a very popular format, but AIFF, WAV and ACC can also be delivered through a web or FTP site. With streaming audio, the sounds are not stored, only played. This process is similar to analog radio signals, only sent through the series of tubes that is the Internet rather than the airwaves. The streamed audio is can be "On Demand" meaning that the file starts playing when the user clicks the "Play Now" button, OR listeners can "tune in" into live audio streams such as disk jockeys playing music, or speeches as they happen. These signals are picked up by applications embedded in the user'sInternet browser, or can be tuned in using Windows Media Browser or iTunes.
All this is interesting, but the core question is: How do they compare?

Mp3s: This format is much maligned by audiophiles as the end of listenable audio itself. It has been my experience that this is true to a certain extent. The terrible beauty of the MP3 is its small size, which makes it able to squeeze into ipods and through skinny Internet tubes. Compression ratio is the root cause at work. Audio sound waves are squished and flattened and chopped and channeled into a small size with only the most prominent frequencies surviving the process.

Streams: If audio lovers hate MP3s because of the loss of all but the most obvious parts of the waveform, you can imagine what they say about streamed audio. Not only are the sounds compressed like mad, but they are also subject to the vicissitudes of real time playback. The signal is chopped up into little "packets" and sent through the originator's server and through the listener'sInternet connection. When the tubes are full, packets get rerouted or forced to wait until bandwidth opens up. These Internet traffic snarls cause the dreaded buffering that interrupts playback.

The MP3 was passable audio quality. Sound quality was enhanced by the headphones and I was able to adjust my iTunes equalizer to goose up the lows by selecting the "Small Speakers" option.

The streamed option was limited by my sluggish connection and the lower quality/low bit-rate inherent in streamed audio formats. The highs exhibited the tinny, digital decay that is a hallmark of overly compressed sound-waves. The lows were dull and lacked the rounded sustain of natural sound waves.
So, in conclusion I would say that both formats are going to disappoint a few audio purists, but as an easy, portable Internet integrated listening option, both can't be beat.

What does E ink smell like?

2009-03-12T08:19:00.001-07:00

Will we be the last generation to sit and leaf idly through the book in our lap? What about the smell? I used to be about to identify certain publishers by the way the book smelled when I opened it, probably something to do with the particular inks used in a particular print house. Will that sense be deprived as well as touch? I was wandering through the SONY mega store recently in San Francisco, a city of tech savvy, early adopters if ever there was one, when a bookish looking man materialized at my elbow. "Hi" he enthused, "do you want to see the new SONY eReader?" He pushed it into my hands. I looked, I saw a consumer electronic device that I want. The text seemed to levitate 1/8 inch off the surface of the Epaper it was displayed on. The screen itself didn't glow, it accepted the available light, like a printed thing. The man walkd me through the features, how to turn a page, what art looks like, how new titles are added... Which brings us to the first question I have about all eBooks:

1. How do you get the words in there?
I looked at 3 different portable books, the Kindle 2, the SONY Prs-700 and the iPhone. I realize that the iPhone is not technically an eReader. It doesn't have the fancy E Ink that sends little electrically charged capsules of pigment flopping and wallowing around like seals to form the letters of the alphabet, but it is small, it is wirelessly networkable and with the download of Stanza (http://www.lexcycle.com/) it allows you to read your stories anywhere. In a nutshell, The Kindle and the iphone uses 3G technology, like the smart phones that are constantly in communication through the wireless networks that transmit telephone calls. The SONY uses a connector, you have to have a computer to download the books onto SD cards, which the 700 accepts, or you can transfer the files via a USB cord. Mac users are out of luck, you have to use Windows to interact with Prs-700.

2. What is so special about eInk? It's an endlessly recycleable resource. The words are not back-lit like most other displays, so they take less energy to use. I've read a few descriptions about how it actually works and the best answer I can come up with is the tiny little capsule one in the paragraph above.

3. Will low-income serfs like me ever get a piece of the action?
Yes, I think that the price of an eReader is out of my range. the Kindle2 is $360, the prs-700 is $400 and the iPhone costs $200, not including service pack. A CD player cost $800 in 1985, now I can buy one for $12. The prices will come down just like any other consumer electronic. The question is, will publishers try to make their own proprietary readers that you can only use with their subscription? How will the print industry make selling eBooks and eMagazines profitable once the technology become ubiquitous?

In the future...we will still be reading books. Will they be bound collections of flat, dry cellulose based composite covered with solvent based deposits? Sure, just like there are radios in a world of digital televisions. Will libraries have row upon row of them? Yes. Will libraries have invested in the kind of technology that allows you to wirelessly connect to the library's main content server, or subcontracted, vendor provided file storage system and acquire everything on the New World Time's 2029's top ten list? Maybe. I'll be old and grumpy by then, perhaps I'll need my robot to read me the last book from Salman Rushdie's clone while my new corneas grow in. Well, that probably won't happen because it seems that a computer reading a digital book out loud is considered a "Performance" and subject to the collection of royalties, at least according to the president of the Author's Guild, Roy Blount Jr. This is a new twist in the age old problem of singular content, multiple formats. The Reuter's tech blog MediaFile quotes Blount as saying "... the technology Amazon uses to turn text into a human voice is quickly improving, and authors need to be 'duly vigilant' about this new means of transmitting their work."
Copyright issues aside, I am reminded of something digital librarian David Lee King (http://www.davidleeking.com/) said in an interview I taped with him recently. When asked about what will happen to books he said that a truly good book transports the reader out of their chair and puts them in the story as an unseen observer. The reader experiences the actions of the story in a way that transcends the words on the page and the container of the story itself. I believe that it really isn't about a book, but about the content.

SPECS: The latest entry to Sony's family of eBook readers, the PRS-700, includes a touch-screen and virtual keyboard Sony's PRS-700 is approximately 174.3 x 127.6 x 9.7 mm, weighs about 10 ounces, sports a 6-inch diagonal display with a 170 dpi/8-level grayscale resolution and contains 512 MB of memory. It uses a lithium-ion battery that allows 7,500 page turns per charge, and also has a built-in LED reading light. For Windows, Sony Reader contains Sony's proprietary Sony Connect (a.k.a. Sony eBook Library).

SPECS: Kindle 2 weighs in at 10.2 ounces, downloads books in less than a minute and sports a 25 percent longer battery life than the original Kindle. It allows users to peek at newspapers from around the world, download up to 230,000 books and also access blogs and 22 magazine titles. Storage is greater than the earlier Kindle, with 2 GB overall (enough for 1,500 books) and 1.4 GB available for user content. Display-wise, Kindle 2 offers 16 shades of grayscale and has a "Read-to-Me" function that offers text-to-speech

SPECS: The iPhone weighs about 5 ounces Screen size: 3.5 inches, Screen resolution: 320 by 480 at 160 ppi, Storage: 4GB or 8GB: ( 3000 to 6000 books) There were no specific details about battery usage for just reading, but the battery is said to last up to 5 hours for internet and phone usage. playback Dimensions: 4.5 x 2.4 x 0.46 inches. You will need to download eBook software such as Stanza or Shortcovers to access books online.

Sources Cited:
Belopotsky, Danielle. A Walk Through a Crop of Readers ,The New York Times. February 25th, 2009. (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/26/technology/personaltech/26basics.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper) Accessed March 2nd, 2009

Sage, Alexandria. Your Kindle is Talking-But Not Paying , MediaFile, Ruters. February 25th, 2009. (http://blogs.reuters.com/shop-talk/2009/02/25/your-new-kindle-is-talking-but-not-paying/") Accessed March 2nd, 2009
Kindle And Beyond: 15 E-Reading Devices, Channel Web. Accessed Feb. 29th, 2008 (http://www.crn.com/hardware/213403930;jsessionid=PYVIJS0ROFFWCQSNDLOSKHSCJUNN2JVN?pgno=2) Accessed March 2nd, 2009

Mod Art 4 Mod Kids

2009-02-27T14:17:00.000-08:00

This is a link to my latest Library School Project. We were tasked with making a Pathfinder consisting of mainly online resources about a certain subject that was suitable for Late Middle Schoolers. I started out with the idea that I would make a website for Contemporary Art, a subject that is near and dear to my heart. Sadly, there is not enough material about straight up Contemporary Art out there to merit 30 links, So I expanded out to include Modern as well.

I remember when I was an earnest 14 year old, I hated Modern Art. I thought it was stupid, and lazy and a pointless exercise in frivolity. Hmmmmmm, where do you think I got that atitude? My teachers! They scoffed and derided Modern Art concepts such as expressive line and color emotional relationships. I, in turn, applied myself to learning how to draw like a draughtsman, to painting like an uptight realist.

It wasn't until I went to college and started hearing teachers speak in loving terms about the way perceptions could be rendered in paint and pencil that I got a clue about how didacticism diminishes your life. Hopefully kids exposed to modern art and Modern Art concepts won't sound like the idiotic hillbilly I was when I first started talking about art.

brickwall

2009-02-20T17:48:00.000-08:00

1. Til it's Gone Girl.
2. Redneck alien/ex boyfriend
3. Hungover on the Outside

Buffalo Bill, the comic

2009-02-16T07:44:00.000-08:00

Hi, I've decided to post some of my assignment for class. Here is a comic I made using the excellent "Comic Life " software from plasq. I used old Wild West posters from the Library of Congress.

Ha, Ha

2008-11-15T07:46:00.000-08:00

I troll around on a site called Yahooray, It's a classic aggro, topic obessed sausagefest, but occasionally I find good info about printing and such, anyway, it has the obligatory LOL post and here are a few of my favorites.

c'mon, c'mon

2008-09-14T08:27:00.000-07:00

Hi
It's been a while. How ya been? Me? Well, yesterday I went back to the ancestral family home town and celebrated my granny's 100th birthday. It was good to see cousins and 2nd cousins and twiced removed and what have you. I spent the afternoon hopping between the grown-up children's room and the adult room. The first room carried on a lively discussion about smart phones, IT, motion graphics and internet porn. The adults chatted about absent family members and weather and vacations and such.

As the day wound down, I went in to tell my grandmother how wonderful it was to see her looking so fine and staying so strong. She told me that she couldn't believe so many people remembered her. Then she told me that she'd seen technology changing so quickly that she can't follow it, then she looked a little sad. I told her not to feel too bad, and that I get confused all the time.

That brings me to aging and technology. As I sat with a table of friends later that evening, I wondered aloud what was in store for us. My grandmother suffers greatly from the aging process. She is nearly blind and almost completely deaf. Her bones are weak and she is wheelchair bound. Will medical technology advance far enough to spare us that fate? Would an implant, chip or wearable electronic device change our lives? Does exist now in a way that can enhance my grandmother's life with out being too intrusive or intimidating?

ths is beyond cool

2008-06-09T07:46:00.000-07:00

DONE...done...done...DONE

2008-05-01T11:17:00.000-07:00

Yes. I am now done with my paper. That was Hard. I received my degree in OIL-painting fercryinoutloud. Shout to Chicken for the formatting info.

Now I'm engaging in my post project ritual of blasting music, drinking coffee and tidying up my virtual and real life desktop.

2 weeks til summer session starts...what have I done?

We now return to our regularly scheduled programming

2008-04-28T06:46:00.000-07:00

So, the last few months my blog has been dedicated to the Slis 544 class I was attending. 12 entries dedicated to the details of class life and minutia. But, All I have to do is write a 6 page paper and I'll be done. Then my blog returns to the details and minutia attending my JOB. Perhaps some Personal lite stuff. I hate boring people with the details of my life. Srsly, all I did last weekend was clean my sty of an apartment. Someone broke into my garage and stole my radial arm saw, just tore it off the bench, good luck pawning that cheap, now broken thing. Idiots, they deserve the lives they wind up with.

Digital Video In Libraries

2008-04-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

Retrospect Part I (slis544#12)

2008-04-21T14:37:00.000-07:00

The project I've been working on for my first ever class in the bid for a Master's of Library Science is nearly complete. It's been a learning experience. And that's what I paid for. Building a wiki was a multi-stage process that was fraught with the kind of unknown quantities that drive me absolutely nuts. Even so, there was always a little core deep inside that told me not to worry too hard. I would catch myself tossing and turning, compulsing about some detail or element that needed attention, and I'd have to say to myself "Stop it! Put that DOWN!" much in the way that you would to a toddler that has something in his/her mouth. I have a very active inner child. I have to discipline it sometimes. Last week I caught it stealing money from my purse.

Making the training videos was a challenge but I learned so much about how to stream line the process of editing. I used iShowU and was tweaking the capture settings through the whole process. What I settled on was recording on a high setting and adjusting the point of interest for each step rather than re recording a separate close up. I'm loving Final Cut Pro. This project finally prompted me to add more RAM to my home computer because video is a tall order. So, there you have it. More Retrospect to follow...

Usability Testing (s544 #11)

2008-04-13T09:35:00.000-07:00

Here I sit, In the Allen County Public Library's Public Computing Center...On a Sunday. This is not an easy gig. Sundays are notoriously rough. I understand why. If you spend you week working and don't have a computer, sometimes a Sunday is the only time open for computing. This center is open from 12 to 5 pm during the school year. It is always packed on Sundays, with a 25 to 60 minute wait. Tempers flare towards the end of the day amongst late arriving patrons who can't reserve a computer because they are all booked until closing. This makes for drama because these patrons are :
1. Pissed off at you because you are sitting at the desk in the computer center that is full.
2. In a last minute panic.
3. Upset because they see kids playing games on the computers they so desperately need.

This puts staff in a bad place.
1. You have to absorb the anger that is directed at you without taking it personally. You are not intentionally denying them access to a computer. The number of workstations is limited and it is based on a first come, first served basis and library staff do not make any kind of value judgments about what patrons do with their system-alloted 1 hour of computer time.

The pace picks up, I'm up and down the aisles, helping people access their government assistance accounts. I help a middle aged man and then a teen boy set up an Email account. I inform residents of Allen County who wish to use library computers that they are required to have library cards. The time goes quickly most of the time. It grinds to a halt when the room is full and there are six people standing in line, each needing personal attention. Or when a small child starts to cry hysterically. Or when there is a special needs patron who requires all of my attention. Or I look at the clock and calculate that I will be here another 4 hours.

CML and Helene Blowers (s544 #10)

2008-04-01T13:12:00.000-07:00

I recently made a trip to Columbus, Ohio to visit with Helene Blowers.(I'm the ham with the cheesy smile on the left, she's the one humoring me on the right.) The manager of the ACPL's IT department (Sean Robinson) really respects Helene and her philosophies regarding a library's relationship with its community and the form that relationship takes. We were given a tour of the CML's opperations Center and had a chance to chat with her team of smart, talented library professionals. Sean interviewed Helene for a podcast and I was struck by several points she made.

But first, a little backstory. Helene is Director of Digital Strategy for the Columbus Metropolitan Library. She is the creator of Learning 2.0 which is series of self propeled learning modules based loosely around free web-based social networking tools like Flickr, Google, Delicious etc.

The beautiful thing about Helene's strategy is that the benefit is way bigger than the sum of its parts. Getting library employees to label themselves life long learners creates a tech friendly state of mind that is much more important than being able to post pictures on the internet for the world to see. These small steps gang together to make technology less scary or silly to a population that might be reluctant to align themselves with something called "Druple" or "Twitter", but might be less threatened by the surge of technology they will be expected to be familiar with. Anyway I had a lovely time in Columbus and you can see pictures of my visit here.

Library 2.0 (s544#9)

2008-03-20T08:08:00.000-07:00

The T-shirt I designed as a gift to all participants of ACPL's Library Genius 2.0 program has turned up in the current issue of ALA's American Libraries. I love spontaneous product placement. This brings me to today's topic. In class we are starting to explore 2.0. I finally feel like we a covering territory that is familiar to me. It is so exciting to check the syllabus and see topics that are near and dear to my heart.
Podcasting? Love'em! I just listened to one today about on of my favorite cartoonists, Drew Friedman
Screencast? No Problem! I do them all the time using an great Mac only piece of software called iShowYou.
My laptop has a built in camera and mic and I can use my still camera to make short movies too. Soon the syllabus will return to uncharted territory for me, but I'll enjoy it while it lasts.

Take Me To Your Portal (s544#8)

2008-03-07T11:23:00.000-08:00

In the readings for this week, it was stated that the patrons who interface with their libraries through the internet are expecting to customize their experience more and more. Similar to the practice of "Pimping" your myspace or facebook page, personalizing an online experience is becoming de riguer these days. My question is, does it enhance the patron's interaction or is just a way to build "Brand Loyalty" to a library.

If both are true, who loses? The more you can get people to identify with an institution, the more they will support and protect it when times get tough. If the changes made by a patron to her page make it functionally easier for her to do tasks such as renewal, holds and fine payment, great! But does it encourage association? MyACPL, for example would allow people to receive direct RSS feeds from the library's calendaring software that have been screened to reflect that person's interests. "Cooking with Librarian Louise" would show up in a section set aside for upcoming events of interest. The site would recognize returning users and greet them by name, pop ups would announce when holds have arrived. Creepy or seamless? you decide.

Exercise is Torture (s544#7)

2008-02-29T10:24:00.000-08:00

The phrase "Exercise in tedium" is redundant. I hate exercising. I've done it 3-4 times a week for the last million years and everytime it sucks. Every day I have the same conversation with myself that involves whining and cajoling and bribes. Luckily I have learned to distract my inner 3 year old with pretty, colorful magazines and an ipod shuffle. I prefer to use the elipsoidal because I don't have to use a second of brain power to pay attention to where I am going or what I am doing. Even still, I find that as the end of the preprogrammed routine gets closer, the more I have to bargin with myself, "Micro-goaling" is what the experts call it. The dialog goes like this:
Me: "Bah! This is boring, let's go eat cookies"
Me: "Come on, you're at 27:00, let's go to 28:00, then if you want to stop we will.
Me: "Does it really matter if we quit 3 minutes early?"
Me "Yes, remember that quitters wind up miserable and alone, penniless and unloved by all."
Me: "Geez, ok, we are at 28:30 now can we quit?"
Me: "Look, just another half song and we will be done, and riteous because we reached our goal."
Me: "You are seriously no fun."
Anyway, tangent aside, I feel like working on a widely scoped project needs to be micro-goaled. If I look at a project like the Wiki as a whole, I start to freak out and demand cookies. If I break it down to pieces and trust my team mates implicitly, I spend less time trying to fit my brain around the task and more time being creative.

Wiki Wackiness (S544 #6)

2008-02-21T06:42:00.000-08:00

Sorry, sorry, I couldn't resist the silly name. This week I ran into a little bit of a roadblock on my Web 2.0 journey and here we get to the crux of the issue. I want to customize my test wiki site and it's kind of a pain in the butt. I spent a good long time trying to remove the grid lines from my table. The CSS for wiki pages is weird because it's all prefaced with wikithis and wikithat. Plus, space is usually divided up with DIVs in CSS and not tables. I wish I could just design up a section to go into the wiki shell and dump it in. and this is what you find with the warm fuzzy 2.0 applications. It's easy for anyone to start, but once you know a little bit, you can quickly run into limitations and start to resent them. I know you can customize, but each site is different, over at MysSpace you can use html to hack your profile by planting it all in the "About Me" window. Anyway, It's back to the drawing board for me, I'll bet I'm not the only one who is experiencing these problems in my class.

The Death of 2.0 (s544 #5)

2008-02-15T06:26:00.000-08:00

Sean Robinson and I made a podcast about Sean's opinion that "2.0 stuff well that’s dead also. The .com bubble burst so will the 2.0 bubble. Sorry I really liked this trend but it’s gone. This is fashion not technology." The rest of the list is here.

I tend to side with Steve Rubel on this issue, he says "Web 2.0 is definitely here to stay. The tools overall empower people to do what they have been for thousands of years and that's express themselves."

I see Web 2.0 as a revolution. Not in the vein of the Gutenberg Press, more along the lines of what happened when artists in Medieval Europe stopped using tempera paint and started using oils. If you were a painter in the Middle Ages, you used a very difficult to work with medium called egg tempera. The egg acted as a binding agent to the pigments. This sucked. The stuff went bad over night, it had to mixed up in little batches and pigment was so expensive and hard to get during this time that if an artist mixed up too much, it was a waste.

Then, in the Netherlands at the beginning of the Renaissance, the practice of mixing pigments with slow drying oils such as linseed became popular. This changed everything. Artists could mix up large amounts of the stuff. Trade routes opened and pigments became cheaper and more easily attained. The physical process of painting became easier. People didn't have to know arcane paint recipes, they could just buy it and do it. Artists didn't have to understand every single stinking step in the manufacture and application of snooty egg tempera. This change in medium and its ease of distribution leveled the playing field, allowing people with a vision to create without having the limitations of the medium tripping them up.

I see a correlation between egg tempera and the difficult process of building and maintaining a web presence the old way, i.e. owning or buying server space, hosting your own video and pictures, writing your own html code, actively collecting and organizing all your contacts. I see oils as being the easy to use 2.0 applications that move the power of communication out of the hands of the few and into the realm of the many.

s544 #4

2008-02-08T12:22:00.000-08:00

I was grabbing a quick dinner at Henry's last night when an acquaintance walked up to my booth and set a cd of his latest poetic work down on my table. He retreated quickly, saying as he walked away,"This is some of my latest stuff." I don't know the guy very well, but our paths cross occasionally and I was intrigued. The whole interaction was interesting to me, talk about peer to peer file sharing. It couldn't have been more direct unless he sat down and recited the poems into my ear as I sat chewing away at my salad.

While I respect the guerrilla marketing technique of handing your work to someone in person, I was less impressed by the packaging. Sharpie on a CD-r in a plastic sleeve. This gets to the core of my posting today. You have to be able to effectively market your service/idea/vision/work. I think there is a resistance to hustling in my life, my library department and my library. It seems, er, unseemly to worry about gussying up your pure information so that people will want it. They should want it based on its academic merits. I know, I get it, I feel the same way, but not all advertising is evil. Making someone feel fat or unattractive so they buy something symbolic yet useless is an abuse of power. Persuading someone to use your service to increase their access to life enhancing information is almost a mandate.

But back to the poet. As I sat there looking at his offering, turning it over in my hands and my mind, I felt compelled to help him. Perhaps use my computer and my printing press to whip up some unbelievably compulsively over-designed CD case/objet d'art. Would that be offensive to him? Or would it be as inspiring to him as it had been to me?

s544: Everything I Know, I Learned from a Coffee Grinder

2008-01-24T13:31:00.000-08:00

It all started with a bag of coffee. In an effort to cut costs and economize now that I'm a "Returning Student", I thought it wise to start cutting back on my coffee expenditures. These new austerity measures included buying the basic components of coffee and assembling them in the privacy of my own home. I inadvertently bought whole beans instead of pre-chewed and realized I was going to have to grind them up before I could extract the caffeinated goodness. It struck me that for Christmas I'd received some small device that had blades and a motor and had a chopping/grinding shape. I dug it out of a closet and set to assembling it. That was tough because like most red blooded Americans, I'd thrown the manual away at some point, thinking "It's a chopper, how hard?" How hard, indeed.

I 'd filled it with beans and struggled with the locking mechanism for a good twenty minutes before it started to sink in that I might be in over my head. Then through some one-million-typing-monkeys style stoke of fortune I managed to get it locked. "Hot Damn!" I yelled, a bit prematurely in that I'd forgotten to engage the blade apparatus. Flash forward twenty additional minutes to a really vile and disgusting cup of coffee. I sat at my table ignoring the now cold cup of turpentine/rat poison flavored liquid. As I looked at the grinder it dawned on me. It was a food processor, not a coffee grinder. I could grind away forever on the thing and it would still not make the bits small enough to make good coffee. I was using the wrong technology. Like when patrons come in and use Microsoft Paint to make a brochure when we have Microsoft Publisher. They can work on it for hours and it will still look awful. My protestant work ethic tells me that if I work hard enough on something it will be good. But that is not the case when I'm using the wrong tools. The challenge is to get the right technology into the hands that need them as seamlessly as possible.

Blog#2 for S554

2008-01-17T20:16:00.000-08:00

I had a small moment of introspection this evening in class. It came to me as we were defining ourselves into the technologically Brave or Timorous categories. I don't consider myself confident at all when it comes to new and strange situations and when it comes down to it, exposure to new technology is an new and strange situation. I feel anxious and I'm afraid I'll miss some important piece of information and then I'll have to ask a stupid question. I know, I know, "No such thing as a stupid question." Try being the only one in the room that glossed over some key element. I feel a mild panic rising when everyone else seems to know what's going on. At that point I can pretend that I'm in the know, but I'm just cheating myself.

This reminds me of when I went to the mother-ship in Seattle. The Seattle Public Library (splorg!) has got to be the most imposing piece of glass I've ever seen. Just finding the public computer area gave me hives, forget about trying to figure out what was the protocol for out-of-towners. It was only after I'd returned for another daily session that I was informed that outsiders got one half hour of sweet lady Internet before they were cut off forever, cast out to the streets to fend for themselves in distant, over priced "Internet Cafés" that were dirty and anxiety inducing in their own over-caffeinated way. Had I known, I wouldn't have squandered those precious minutes sending off Emails to friends and relatives back home. I'd have been filling out the online complaint form. I felt dumb when the man told me to go away, I felt like I'd done something wrong.

Michael Stephens Interview Done!

2008-01-17T12:31:00.000-08:00

I've finished editing the 4th "Conversation" piece. I'm really liking how they are coming together as a collection. It was great to meet Michael Stephens and he had some very encouraging things to say about the future of librarianship. An all around nice guy/visionary.
Helen Bowers is visiting soon and hopefully Sean and I can get an interview with her next,

Poster Idea

2008-01-13T19:42:00.000-08:00

I was digging around and found this post from the Librarian in Black, sadly the post it references is broken. Anyway, I wish I could make a fun poster, or better yet, short video clip debunking some common library myths like, "Everyone who works in a library is a librarian." heh heh. Perhaps for library week.

Vimeo Review

2008-01-09T09:55:00.001-08:00

vimeo2.jpg
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

I recently ran into a dilemma about a video clip I'd edited. The director had put a lot of work into making it look and sound great. When it came time to put the 19 minute piece up on the library's YouTube account, it looked and sounded terrible, all pixilated and tinny, bleh, plus it was a pain to compress it down below 100 megabytes. Don't get me wrong, YouTube is fine for shorts under 5 minutes because you don't have to worry about ultra compression. So, I thought I'd give Vimeo a try. A friend in the art scene had told me about it. He said that it was a cut above the YouTube scratchers and he was right. The site is well designed, the interface is clean and easy to use and there is a generous weekly limit of 500MG. It makes a Quicktime download of the clip available right there on the page, as a link, amazing! Gone is the clutter of ads that plagues YouTube's home pages. The page design is blog-like and sports an intuitive interface. Snappy drop downs keep the site looking spare but organized. What can I say? I'm a complete sucker for rounded corners. Any way, check it out for yourself.

Tecumseh is Done!

2008-01-03T11:54:00.000-08:00

I had to put it up on Vimeo because it was too big and urmmm, it was over the time limit for YouTube. So, without further ado.

Computer Center Trend 2008

2008-01-03T07:10:00.000-08:00

I'm just Idly surfing here in the CC, looking at all the new trends for 2008, here's a color trend projection from the folks at Pantone. Chicken or Egg? Do designers look at the color combos picked out by the Pantoneers and say to themselves, "My that's pretty, and it's in style too, I guess I'll use them"? Sometimes it is easier to look at a preselected set of color than to slog through a whole book.

I've taken to picking up those paint strips at Lowes where they suggest combos.

Tecumseh Branch History

2007-12-31T08:08:00.001-08:00

I'm waiting for the piece Nick Treber and I made for the Tecumseh Branch's birthday to cook down for posting on YouTube. It's a great 20 minute chunk of oral history about Tecunmseh's 80 years of service to its neighborhood. I think each branch should have an historical documentary made.

K's muppet hands

2007-12-20T08:29:00.001-08:00

K's muppet hands
Originally uploaded by webchicken

Chicken caught me jazz handing in the Library2.0 open labs, you should come on down, you never know what might happen!

Way to Rock the iCONS 2.0

2007-12-18T06:39:00.001-08:00

Here is a great example of Library 2.0 cross pollination. The Harris County Public Library in Texas made up this bling using the icons I'd designed as a basis. They adapted the batch to include some icons of their own, way to go!

Digital Collaborative Meeting

2007-12-13T09:34:00.001-08:00

Digital Collaborative
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

We hoofed it out to the lovely Grabill Branch for the latest DC meeting. Melissa was a gracious host and I even found a book I wanted to check out. We discussed calendar services amongst other things.

Not...Enough...Time

2007-12-04T08:03:00.000-08:00

Recipe for disaster:
Drink a bunch of "DeCaf" Coffee
notice computer screens getting wavy
have racing, hyperactive thoughts
make plans to install Joomla on test server
edit, (Under GoDaddy Hosting Connection, then Content Management)
make plans to draw a short comic a week based on random russian fairy tales
make plans to start fake band to use as test subject for test server

start jumping up and down and getting really excited like I was 10, before everything got boring and difficult.

realize that was for real coffee

crash horribly.

Ho, etc.

2007-11-27T12:54:00.000-08:00

So, I'm finished with this week's PSA. I crafted every little piece of it, down to the soundtrack. I couldn't find the jingle bell sound in GrageBand, so I had to paste in a clip over and over... What a pain! It's worth it. Here's a screenshot from FCP.
Here's the Link

1.0 Patrons II

2007-11-20T07:59:00.000-08:00

Here is an interesting link. The idea of charging a small, refundable sign up fee, in this case $5 to get people to show up to free classes.

Web 1.0 Patrons

2007-11-14T12:41:00.000-08:00

Here is the response I gave to a colleague who wanted to know how I handle Patrons who are completely new to the computer.

Yup, it's definitely a slippery slope. Do you sit down and devote 30 minutes to one person when there are 5 more standing waiting for help?
I say:
"Well, I can get you started..."

When people come up and want to find something specific, like a phone number, I help them reserve a computer and then I stand behind them and verbally direct them,
"Double click the blue "E" on the desk top, Click, click, quickly....no, not on the word "Explorer" but on the big blue "E"
"Click in the address window using the mouse"
"Now type in people.yahoo.com, use the mouse to click in the search window and enter the names, you can use the "Tab" button to navigate between entry fields."
"Every blue underlined word is a link that can be followed to a new site full of more information."
tedious, but it's all I can do, I work in a public computing center with 25 terminals and 2 printers. There is ALWAYS someone who needs help.

We also have brochures that are pretty good at directing through the steps of getting a gmail account or filing an unemployment voucher.

If they can't manage to grasp the functionality of a mouse and keyboard combo, I send them to Reader's Services for the class schedule.

I am quick to point out that when it comes to specific websites, I'm clueless to the details because there are thousands of websites. I can't know it All.

I also allow myself to say "I've reached the limits of my knowledge, I can't help you because I just don't know anymore than what I've already shown you."

By this time there are usually a bunch of people standing around waiting for my help and I can scurry off.

Is this a cultural issue?
Is this an age issue?
Is it a class issue?
In the Computer Center it's usually a Class/Economic issue, people who have fallen through the cracks in the educational system are being asked to be computer literate.
I can give them the tools, give them a few starter tips and then they are on their own because I don't have the time to individually tutor each and every person that comes through the door. I'm as helpful as I can be.
I hope this helps and I hope you understand that I'm not trying to be callous to people who need help, I'm protecting myself from burning out and being useless to the other people who need help.

thumbtest2

2007-11-13T11:57:00.001-08:00

thumb test

2007-11-13T08:08:00.001-08:00

Gloria, up close.

2007-11-12T12:25:00.001-08:00

Gloria, up close.
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

Former FCC Commissioner, Gloria Tristani gives a rousing Keynote Speech at the luncheon.

Me at IOLUG

2007-11-04T17:22:00.001-08:00

Me at IOLUG
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

I went to "Reaching Digital Natives and Immigrants: Library 2.0" held November 2, 2007, at the Plainfield-Guilford Township Public Library to present to the Indiana On Line User's Group with Sean. It went really well, everyone was quite attentive and it was wonderful to see so many people.

Checklist for tomorrow

2007-11-01T08:52:00.000-07:00

OK, Gotta get my act together. Poster session for the IOLUG session tomorrow:
Buy today

1. Black Duct Tape
2. Push Pins
3. Hanging card thing
4. Spray Tack
5. Energy bar

List for tomorrow
1. Laptop
2. Cameras
3. Cords
4. printed materials, cards, licenses, outline sheets
5. Poster

testing........

2007-10-26T14:45:00.000-07:00

Bad...bad2.o

2007-10-23T06:37:00.000-07:00

"Every human spent about half an hour as a single cell.

Each square inch of human skin consists of twenty feet of blood vessels.

An average person uses the bathroom 6 times per day."

These facts are from some tedious myspace posting and may or may not be true. However, the first one intrigues me. Just a half hour, so in the time it took me to bumble around this morning getting breakfast and finding a sock's mate, decades ago, I did the same thing on a much smaller scale. Could I have said "Forget this, I leaving." and go back to being a no celled creature?

Anyway, I've been bad, I've done little in the way of 2.0, aside from setting up a myspace account. The Central States Conference has eaten all my time and it shall only get worse.
Here is a selfportrait as a single cell

Out of the Box

2007-10-12T08:30:00.001-07:00

Out of the Box
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

Here we see the handywork of the children of Fort Wayne. Yesterday Heather from the Children's Department allowed her car to be painted on with water soluble paint. It's the brightest thing in the parking lot!

Falling Patron

2007-10-11T07:40:00.000-07:00

About 10 minutes ago I heard a strange strangluated cry and a thud. Then I saw a Gref Librarian run past the Computer Center. It seems a patron had become light headed and passed out over at the entrance to reader's services. The cry had come from a woman standing next to him. Appearantly she thought she was being attacked by the man who was pitching forward.
A cluster of security guards appeared and then the ambulance driver arrived. the last time I looked, they were asking him how he felt.

Everything I Lose.

2007-10-08T09:27:00.000-07:00

In an effort to spot trends in my Losing Arc, Im going to start noting everything I lose, If it is indeed lost and were I find said article. I will tag each entry "Lost and Found" and then feel like I am actually using technology to enhance my life.

Item # 1 My Pay Check Lost: Friday out of my pocket Found: Monday on my desk.
Items #2 All of my jump drives Lost: last week sometime Found: In my old tote
Item #3 Key to my Department Lost: I took it off my neck, put it in my pocket: Found:in the washing machine.
Item #4 My new glasses Lost: somewhere between SeaTac and home: Found: Not

Open Lab

2007-10-08T08:33:00.001-07:00

Open Lab
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

I've posted some snaps from lat week's Open Lab. Don't forget, I have a Geek Out, Don't Freak Out coming up on Halloween. It's a TubeTorial on shooting and publishing video.

A OK bunny.

2007-10-05T14:56:00.000-07:00

I drew this after eating way too much sugar and thinking about a presentation I'm to give. PS...It's FRIDAY!

Mac

2007-10-01T07:17:00.000-07:00

I erased Staff One and reinstalled the os\iLife and FCP. Then I ran the updater. I did not, however, install any of the other software.
More later

lost book

2007-09-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

When I was a little girl, I read a book about a dragonfly larvae that lived in a pond and at the bottom of the pond was an old dog food can that had a picture of a dog holding a dog food can that had a picture of a dog holding a dog food can, etc. It was called "Beyond the Last Possible Dog" or something like that. Does anyone remember this book? It blew my little mind.

Stephen Abram at the ACPL

2007-09-21T06:36:00.001-07:00

Stephen Abram at the ACPL
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

I finally had some time to look at the footage that was shot for "Abra-polooza" 2007. Can't wait to get to it.

MAC stuff

2007-09-20T09:36:00.000-07:00

I can't remember the account I made for the access fort wayne blog, so I'll just put it in here. Today I unpacked the 2 public drives and put them in check out. I didn't bother partitioning them because I think it only leads to confusion with the already totally confused public. Plus I found out that "staff one" has my software on it.

My new animation

2007-09-19T15:40:00.000-07:00

I made this after a very interesting meeting with Sean and Stephen

Long live fishie

2007-09-17T17:06:00.000-07:00

He's dead, I fished him out of the tank today when I got home. He lived a long life, blah, blah blah. There were times I wished him dead so I wouldn't have to take care for him. Some nights I would lay and stare at his glowing tank for hours, feeling consoled and soothed by his floating nonchalance. There were scares, I didn't really know how to care for him, I didn't know the details, his care giver gone and me with no clue. The internet was helpful. He was a killer, He would murder all the fish I put in to keep him company, except for one, I named him "Tail" because I assumed that was the reason Fishie didn't kill him, he thought Tail was just that, a piece of him. Tail stayed by Fishie while dying, only swimming around after I'd removed and flushed the dearly departed (I'm not insane).

"...the only subjects worth writing about are Love, Loss, Religion and Ambition."

2007-09-17T13:15:00.001-07:00

This is a quote by this amazing cartoonist, Hugh Macleod. I love 'em, I do, I do. Here is more about him off Drawn, I love that blog, I do, I do.

Good Morning!

2007-09-14T06:40:00.000-07:00

Today I sit quietly and prepare the Genealogy clip for play on the channel and for duplication. This will be a nice break from yesterday's frantic pace of the Alliance for Community Media: Central States Regional Conference and Trade Show brochure. Here's a snap of the promotional materials so far.

Worried Bunni

2007-09-07T10:41:00.000-07:00

I'm here in the lab, goofing on the Queeky.
Here's the latest.

link

Conversation Piece

2007-09-07T06:47:00.001-07:00

I've uploaded the interview Sean did with the director of the Allen County Public Library, Jeff Krull. We spent a long time crafting the clip and I'm really pleased with the results. This is just the first segment in a 3 part collection. I've posted the camera and sound layout to the right. That loopy line is the path of the hand held camera. I want 2 for the next round.

Check it out on YouTube.

Vacation!

2007-08-31T09:11:00.000-07:00

I made a short video while on vacation last June. I used the video function on my Panasonic digital still camera. The clips were saved as small (320 x280) Quicktime files and I edited them in the latest version of iMovie. I LOVE the idea of tapeless video, I didn't have to sit around waiting for my computer to capture the footage from a tape, it was a simple file transfer, from camera to hard drive.

Whooooo. Computer Center Time!

2007-08-31T06:26:00.000-07:00

Yep, I'm here for 4 hours, send your queeky requests.
10:12, yay! first request, Bunny and Chicken are friends!
10:44 Tah Dah!
What's cool about this online drawing program is that it shows the process.

Maria is great!

2007-08-29T10:08:00.000-07:00

She came down and helped me replace my monitor AND she tamed the cable under my desk in 2 shakes. Here's a snap of her in action.

Queeky! Nuts!

2007-08-24T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here I am, doodling 2.o. On the computer Center Desk, rocking the queeky, I'm taking requests until 2:45.

Conversation

2007-08-23T09:38:00.001-07:00

I'm working on a short interview I shot with the director of the library, Jeff Krull. It's an interesting piece. Jeff talks about his early life and the people who inspired him to read. Good stuff, I can't wait to finish it. I used a boom stand and the electovoice 256 mic, three different cameras and the afw studio A

Meme goes viral

2007-08-20T08:32:00.000-07:00

A Houston Library was already adapted the 2.o bling I designed. They've added a few and are using them as incentives for their learning program. Thanks to Sean for pointing this out.

Librarian from the Black Lagoon.

2007-08-20T06:44:00.000-07:00

I was cruising around on line, waiting for the caffeine to kick in and I came across 2 sites I liked.
casanovawasalibrarian a clearing house of hipster librarian stuff
and
Librarian From the Black Lagoon
a short animation with a drawing style I enjoy.

T shirt Update.
I washed my 2.o shirt and it still looks good, nothing cracked, peeled, mutilated or spindled. It did shrink a tad, I plan to wear it to the gym and represent.

Computer Center

2007-08-16T08:12:00.000-07:00

The Summer Help we hired in is almost gone.
I return to putting in slightly less than 20 percent of my time at work in this room.
I've decided to use this as an opportunity to get all 2.0 on ya. 9-12 hours a week to blog this, flickr that, RSS like a stone mo'. Perhaps I'll even institute a weekly IM session were I'll be available for Questions 2.0. or even "Make Kay Draw Something" day on Queeky
I'm drawing right now 11:34 am

link list

2007-08-11T13:13:00.000-07:00

Here's a list of links of stuff I find enchanting 2.0 right now
Bittorrent
Drawn
Type design
Laura Park
I am consuming a turkey sandwich, awaiting the taping of ROCK THE PLAZA. Which will be more like JUMP AROUND FOR 10 MINUTES THEN WILT THE PLAZA owing to the extreme heat.

Library Genius Shirts

2007-08-08T14:44:00.001-07:00

Library Genius Shirts
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

Whee, I'm a genius, or so my t-shirt tells me. These are going to be used as incentive for the DC's Learning 2.0 presentation. Photo Credit: Lisa Worrell

Kay's wish list

2007-08-08T13:12:00.000-07:00

1. Wireless Lapel MIC system
2. XLR to mini cable
3. Light weight Tripod
4. 4 more hours of sleep

Check one Two

2007-08-07T16:05:00.001-07:00

Peter has a list of MP3s that he has recorded on his very informative Human Resources Blog. He has turned his computer into a Podcasting Machine with the help of Audacity. Check out the fun facts!

Podcast Central

2007-08-07T13:04:00.000-07:00

here

awesome poster

2007-08-07T11:16:00.000-07:00

I found this while looking for photos of Stephen Abram.

Melissa with Del.icio.us Ice Cream

2007-08-03T07:03:00.001-07:00

Melissa with Del.icio.us Ice Cream
Originally uploaded by Kay Graphic

Here's a still from the tutorial shot I did yesterday in the library's cafe. I used a wireless mic and it turned out good. The lightings not the greatest but hey, that's what filters are for.

Some Helpful Links

2007-08-03T06:35:00.000-07:00

Here is a wiki about LAME, the translator that works with Audacity to make MP3s.
Here is where you can get it.
This is a Link to CD EX that Wikipedia says also translates Audacity Files to MP3s. I'm going to check it out because LAME is making me blind with rage.

What to take to a Genealogy shoot

2007-07-27T10:09:00.000-07:00

camcorder
monitor
head phones, tripod, tapes
notated script
lav mics
xlr cords

wow...

2007-07-26T08:11:00.000-07:00

Now I can't get my Blogger to work.

Screen Cast

2007-07-26T08:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I met with Melissa to talk about video screencasts. I was a little frustrated with myself for not knowing how to use PC based screencasters like WINK, but luckily Sean stopped by and gave us both a quickstart tutorial. Good thing because it did not work at all like ishowU, the Mac platformed screen capture software I use.

The important thing to remember when using WINK is that you have to start and stop the controls using keyboard commands, rather than mouse clicks. I find it unwieldy but once I make a few, things might be different.