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On The Net - The Terrible Twos: Web 2.0, Library 2.0, and More

On The Net - The Terrible Twos: Web 2.0, Library 2.0, and More.

On The Net
The Terrible Twos: Web 2.0, Library 2.0, and More
By Greg R. Notess | Reference Librarian, Montana State University
Online Magazine | Vol. 30 No. 3 — May/Jun 2006

Parents often describe the trials and tribulations of raising 2-year-olds as “the terrible twos.” Movie sequels, although not called the terrible twos, rarely equal and even less frequently exceed version 1.0. So what is a searcher to make of the recent spate of sequels and twos on the Net? We have Web 2.0 and its offspring, and relatives such as News 2.0, Library 2.0, School Library 2.0, and 2.0 Culture. Do the sequels live up to their hype?

Typically, new software releases bear a version number such as 2.0. The version-numbered releases have new features and capabilities for one specific program. This is not the case with the latest round of 2.0s on the Web. They are a conglomeration of technologies, ideas, and approaches that, at least to some, represent a new way of interacting online. Their meanings are ambiguous and sometimes contradictory. In fact, one of the concepts of the 2.0 movement is being a movement away from new software releases.

Even though much of the 2.0 technologies are the playground for Web designers and programmers, knowing the terminology and sample sites allows the information professional to converse about the new trends and to find both useful sites and new capabilities to integrate into information products. Rather than debate the overall merits of the 2.0 movement, information professionals should explore the territory, techniques, and examples to find the most useful applications in your own work environment.
...
Greg R. Notess [greg@notess.com; http://www.notess.com/] is a reference librarian at Montana State University and founder of SearchEngineShowdown.com.

Always readable, often not-miss insights.. read Greg's notes, and feel all caught-up with the 2.0 uber-wave...

Google U.S. Government Search

Google U.S. Government Search.

Google U.S. Government Search

Just launched, Google U.S. Government Search offers a single location for finding U.S. government information, as well as state and local government websites. You can also use this site to keep up to date on government-related news from official government sources and the press. And finally, personalize the page by adding content feeds on government or other topics that you're interested in.
Source: Google Friends Newsletter, June 2006

Featured Story: When the Librarians Come Marching In - New York Times

Featured Story: When the Librarians Come Marching In - New York Times.

Op-Ed Contributor
When the Librarians Come Marching In
    By BOB GREENE, Published: June 29, 2006

New Orleans | THEY'VE recarpeted hell.

They've given it a deep cleaning, taken a deep breath and opened its doors for business.

This week an estimated 18,000 men and women from around the United States have been attending the annual trade convention of the American Library Association. The gathering, which ended yesterday, was remarkable not so much for what was being discussed and merchandised — books, library equipment, software — as for where it was held: The Ernest N. Morial Convention Center.

Last September, if you had dared to suggest that by June this city would be playing host to genteel trade shows inside this building, shows punctuated by the lilting sounds of laughter and music, you would not have been believed. The convention center, as much as the Superdome, was New Orleans's symbol of wretched helplessness, of utter degradation.
...
Bob Greene is the author of "And You Know You Should Be Glad: A True Story of Lifelong Friendship."

And the librarians shall lead them

And the librarians shall lead them.

And the librarians shall lead them
Big convention brings a tourist-starved city back to life
Tuesday, June 27, 2006, Chris Rose

I don't think I'm quite ready to climb to the top of the Superdome and scream "We're BACK, baby!" But as harbingers of recovery go, the American Library Association convention this weekend was a serious step in the right direction.

I walked the Convention Center aisles for four days and noted this: I have probably covered 100 conventions in this building over the years and the difference in appearance between this one and all the others was . . . nothing.

It was simply a big, splashy convention with all the proper trappings: High-tech displays, A-list speakers, big-name entertainment and lots of sore feet and sleepy eyes.

I walked down Bourbon Street on Saturday night to get a feel for the revelry of the crowd after their workday was done, and the difference between this gang -- the first major post-Katrina convivium -- and all the other convention crowds I have seen out here over the years was . . . nothing. It looked, sounded, felt (and smelled) like Bourbon Street. For better or worse.

A friend of mine passed on to me a story from the Windsor Court Hotel, where, one night, a group of drunken librarians raced up and down the hallways in a juvenile thrall in the wee hours of the morning, raising a holy ruckus.

I don't mean to read too much into this event, but it's a sign that New Orleans is ready to be, once again, New Orleans when drunken librarians in relax-fit jeans and plaid shirts cavort in the halls of fancy hotels. It's one small (wobbly) step for man, one giant step for New Orleans.

Library of Congress User Survey

Library of Congress User Survey.

Library of Congress User Survey

Outsell, Inc. is conducting this survey about Library of Congress services, resources and programs to assist the Library in its efforts to better serve the needs of its patrons. Your responses will provide valuable feedback for continuous improvement. All responses will be kept confidential. Only grouped data will be reported; your responses will not be singled out in the analysis.

First time I can remember Library of Congress surveying users at large.. I imagine they have tracked and surveyed Congress usage for quite some time.. check the link to take the survey...

NPR : New Orleans Marks a Recovery Milestone

NPR : New Orleans Marks a Recovery Milestone.

People & Places
New Orleans Marks a Recovery Milestone
Listen to this story... by Chris Arnold

All Things Considered, June 29, 2006 | The New Orleans convention center, site of much misery during Katrina, is open for business again. The American Library Association just held the first major gathering in town since the storm. In a city where conventions are a crucial part of the local economy, the event was watched very closely.

Give a listen (link on the site) to the great story, about the ALA (American Library Association) Annual Conference 2006 in New Orleans.. good piece by reporter Chris Arnold.. a group of librarians with incoming ALA President Leslie Burger at heard at Emeril's restaurant...

The End of Authorship - New York Times

The End of Authorship - New York Times.

Essay
The End of Authorship
    By JOHN UPDIKE, Published: June 25, 2006

Booksellers, you are the salt of the book world. You are on the front line where, while the author cowers in his opium den, you encounter — or "interface with," as we say now — the rare and mysterious Americans who are willing to plunk down $25 for a book. Bookstores are lonely forts, spilling light onto the sidewalk. They civilize their neighborhoods. At my mother's side I used to visit the two stores in downtown Reading, Pa., a city then of 100,000, and I still recall their names and locations — the Book Mart, at Sixth Street and Court, and the Berkshire News, on Fifth Street, in front of the trolley stop that would take us home to Shillington.

When I went away to college, I marveled at the wealth of bookstores around Harvard Square. In addition to the Coop and various outlets where impecunious students like myself could buy tattered volumes polluted by someone else's underlinings and marginalia, there were bookstores that catered to the Cambridge bourgeoisie, the professoriate, and those elite students with money and reading time to spare. The Grolier, specializing in modern poetry, occupied a choice niche on Plympton Street, and over on Boylston there was the Mandrake, a more spacious sanctum for books of rare, pellucid and modernist water. In the Mandrake — presided over by a soft-voiced short man, with brushed-back graying hair — there were English books, Faber & Faber and Victor Gollancz, books with purely typographical jackets and cloth-covered boards warping from the damp of their trans-Atlantic passage, and art books, too glossy and expensive even to glance into, and of course New Directions books, modest in format and delicious in their unread content.
...
John Updike's most recent novel is "Terrorist." This essay is adapted from his address to booksellers at the Book Expo convention held last month in Washington.

Web 2.0: Where will the next generation Web take libraries?

Web 2.0: Where will the next generation Web take libraries?.

Web 2.0: Where will the next generation Web take libraries?
By Tom Storey

Remember when it was cool to surf the Web? Log on, type a few words, view a few pages, log off. As the latest technology tool, search was exhilarating, informative—and dramatically changed the way people looked for information. Just ask librarians! A record 6 billion searches were conducted on search engines in January 2006.

In Web 2.0, the Web becomes the center of a new digital lifestyle that changes our culture and touches every aspect of our lives. The Web moves from simply being sites and search engines to a shared network space that drives work, research, education, entertainment and social activities—essentially everything people do. You and your mobile and nonmobile devices—PDA, MP3, laptop, cell phone, camera, PC, TV, etc.—are always online, connected to one another and to the Web.

In technology terms, the Web is the operating platform to which programmers write reusable, constantly updated software components that are embedded or loosely coupled with other Web applications. It’s the open, programmable Web, and quite a change from monolithic, proprietary operating systems and programs of the past characterized by long development times and software release cycles.

TCPalm: Travel: Explore Key West through Hemingway's eyes at annual July festival

TCPalm: Travel: Explore Key West through Hemingway's eyes at annual July festival.

Explore Key West through Hemingway's eyes at annual July festival
By SHERYL ESTRADA, sheryl.estrada@scripps.com June 25, 2006

KEY WEST -- Tropical breezes; literature; Latin rhythms; swashbuckling; Running of the Bulls; Sloppy Joe's and a sea of Papas -- an eclectic combination. But for an adventurous writer or Hemingway aficionado, that combination just may be your cup of tea.

Each July, Key West celebrates one of its most famous residents, Pulitzer-Prize winning author Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway, who usually sought literary inspiration outside of theUnited States, lived in Key West throughout the 1930s. He was enchanted by its eclectic culture enough to pen his only novel set in theUnited States, "To Have and Have Not."

In its 26th year, Hemingway Days, July 18-23, has a cornucopia of events to celebrate the accomplishments of the author. A major event that runs in conjunction with Hemingway Days is the announcement of the winners of the Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition; taking place on July 21.
...
For a complete schedule: Visit www.hemingwaydays.net

Hollywood - New York Times

Hollywood - New York Times.

36 Hours
Hollywood
By CINDY PRICE, Published: June 23, 2006

"Strip away the phony tinsel of Hollywood, and you'll find the real tinsel underneath," Oscar Levant, that Algonquin wit, once observed. And though the lights do shine brightly for the fabulous here, the back streets of this gritty pocket of Los Angeles hold hidden gems for the everyman. Wander a recently dolled-up stretch of Hollywood Boulevard and cut into side streets that lead to unexpected pleasures.

Discover restaurants stylish enough to make West Hollywood blush, or head to the rising hills and discover Hollywood's most becoming angles. Try something wacky — don't even look at Mann's Chinese Theater. Hollywood is on the rise again, and the granddaddy of glamour and glitz has never looked better.

Disney Online to Offer Public Libraries Free Access to Playhouse Disney Preschool Time Online(TM)

Disney Online to Offer Public Libraries Free Access to Playhouse Disney Preschool Time Online(TM).

Disney Online to Offer Public Libraries Free Access to Playhouse Disney Preschool Time Online(TM)
Quality, ad-free educational programming emphasizes kindergarten readiness through online learning
June 23, 2006 08:40 AM US Eastern Timezone

NORTH HOLLYWOOD, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 23, 2006--Disney Online, part of the Walt Disney Internet Group, today announced it will offer public libraries free subscriptions to Playhouse Disney Preschool Time Online(TM), a safe, ad-free interactive learning experience for preschoolers. Developed in conjunction with education experts, Playhouse Disney Preschool Time Online offers entertaining, story-driven games and activities that teach skills in crucial areas such as letter and number recognition, shape and color identification and counting. Disney Online will be showcasing the service at the American Library Association (ALA) Conference in New Orleans from June 24-27th in booth #240.

"Librarians often play a significant role in helping preschool-age children prepare for kindergarten," said Renee Cherow O'Leary, professor at Teachers College Columbia University and President of Education for the 21st Century, an educational consulting firm in New York City. "Resources that support early learning are valuable and allow parents and children to work together."

Techdirt: Is The Internet Diluting Friendships?

Techdirt: Is The Internet Diluting Friendships?.

Is The Internet Diluting Friendships?
from the or-just-making-old-studies-obsolete dept

Okay, sure, you may have 50,000 friends on MySpace, but how many would you consider close confidants? A new study is suggesting that the combination of the internet and longer work hours means that Americans have fewer "close" friends. We may know new, interesting and different people from around the globe -- but have fewer and fewer really good friends than we did twenty years ago. Of course, as the researchers admit, one reason this could be true is the way the survey was worded. They asked about how often people "discuss" important matters with friends -- but admit that many people may not consider emails or instant messages "discussions."

25 Comments | Leave a Comment..

There's something to this one.. I have more "virtual friends" now, but I have fewer closer friends in my close circle.. interesting comments on this site for the post...

Daily Kos: Science Friday: The Edge of Infinity

Daily Kos: Science Friday: The Edge of Infinity.

Science Friday: The Edge of Infinity
by DarkSyde, Fri Jun 23, 2006 at 04:43:40 AM PDT

One of the neatest things about the blogosphere is that you can talk directly to experts in any field. Professor Sean Carroll is such an expert. From the fourth grade, Dr. Carroll wanted to be a physicist and a cosmologist. Fortunately for us, he happened to become one at a time when anyone can head over to his group blog, Cosmic Variance, and talk to cosmologists and physicists about the deepest mysteries in the Universe. They've even put together a great online pictorial about Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the Cosmos. Sean studies it all, from the infinitesimally small to the grandest edge of infinity.

DarkSyde (DS): How big is the universe?
Sean Carroll (SC): We've learned amazing things about the universe in the last hundred years.  Our Milky Way galaxy has about a hundred billion stars, the observable universe has about a hundred billion such galaxies, and it all started about fourteen billion years ago.  So it's a big universe, and getting bigger.

Gulf Coast libraries get almost $18M

Gulf Coast libraries get almost $18M.

Thursday, June 22, 2006, Last updated 11:38 a.m. PT
Gulf Coast libraries get almost $18M
from THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

METAIRIE, La. -- Public libraries hit by hurricanes Katrina and Rita are getting nearly $18 million to rebuild and set up bookmobiles or temporary mini-branches while they do so, three groups announced Thursday.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is giving $12.2 million, the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund is giving $5 million, and the Institute for Museum and Library Services, a federal grant-making agency, is offering $500,000 for staffing temporary facilities.

The announcement at the Jefferson Parish Library's Eastbank Regional Branch came as the American Library Association opened a week of meetings and convention sessions in New Orleans. Its 18,000 attendees make it the first major convention to return to the city since Hurricane Katrina devastated the region in late August.

"Libraries are part of a community's pulse. It's that simple," former President George Bush said in a statement.

Wonderful news, and grand joint effort.. the groups are to be commended for joining together to help in a significant way.. communities can re-build around resources like public libraries...

YouTube - Rock 'n' Roll Library

YouTube - Rock 'n' Roll Library.

Rock 'n' Roll Library

About This Video
Added on March 31, 2006, 06:50 AM by stephlibrarian (2 videos)
A geeky guy is transformed by the library's resources into a rock 'n' roll star. Tags: library   rock   books

Video on YouTube by students at the Pittsburgh library school.. very nice touch, Rock 'n' Roll Library Card.. why not? :) ...