Author: ahniwa

Categories
libraries music

Library Music Video (and Clipmarks test)

I’m tentatively dipping my toe into the world of Firefox extensions, after being a longtime vanilla user. If I like how it works, expect to see more posts like this, linking to interesting stories from the interwebs. (edit: Due to its extensive use of divs and tables, Clipmarks posts are getting the thumb down. I do like Scribefire though, so far, so perhaps I’ll continue using that.)

From geek.lisnews.org

An Anonymous Patron writes ” *I want to be a librarian*. a music video (4:10) by New Zealand band HauntedLove, which performs ghostly pop tunes about werewolves, haunted museums, vengeful librarians, love inside computers, and ponies that just won’t go. Filmed on location at the Dunedin Public Library. Camera work by Claudia Babirat, direction and editing/effects by Don Ferns. Starring Haunted Love (Rainy McMaster and Geva Downey) and Henri Davidson…. YouTube, Apr. 9?

Categories
internet libraries

libSite: a Recommendation Service for Library-related websites

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by the incredible number of library and library-related (and heck, information-related) websites out there, then perhaps libSite, which launched just today, will be able to ease your anxiety. Among the services it lists, libSite allows users to recommend sites, rate other people’s sites, save sites to a favorites list, create rss feeds and email alerts, and more. You can also create a libSite widget to put on your homepage, keeping you and your users up to date of the newest library-related sites to make the list.

It seemed a fitting diversion to stop in and mention it, since otherwise I’m sitting here trying to write a paper on what the next ten years hold for library services and collections. I don’t know if libSite is it, per se, but it’s certainly facing in the right general direction, plus you don’t have to wait ten years. That’s always nice.

Check it out now: libSite.org.

You can also check out the widget over on my sidebar. Neat-o.

Categories
personal

A year older …

… if only a day. It wasn’t the best of birthdays.

My only real wish is that I make it through the next couple weeks without dying from this palpable ball of stress that has taken up habitation just below my sternum. Should I live, there will be driving, companionship, homecoming, and deep, deep relaxation.

Yea, those are the things from which a birthday should be made.

Categories
cinema

300: It wasn’t the Persians …

… who killed King Leonidas.

It was the bloody narration.

300 was entertaining at best, and worth watching in the theater if you enjoy stylized battle cinematography. Otherwise, the superb acting of Gerard Butler as Leonidas, and Lena Headey as his queen, don’t do quite enough to pull the film’s head out of its ass and give us something interesting to watch. I enjoyed the sylistic fighting, but I wasn’t invested in it, mostly because I felt like the film kept me at arm’s length the entire time. And I think a lot of that was because of the narration. I would find at times that just as I was getting drawn in to a moment in the film, all of a sudden I’d be slapped in the face by the narrator’s voice, telling me what the character was thinking, describing to me a moment that I could plainly see on the incredibly large IMAX screen.

Following the annoying narration present in Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, I’m really hoping that this isn’t going to become a new trend in Hollywood. Some narration is fine: see Chocolat and Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain for examples. Too much narration strangles the story, and constantly reminds the viewer that they are sitting in a movie theater, watching something.

A further, excellent and concise review may be read over here.

Categories
personal poetic webcomics

A Paragon of Productivity

Due to my complete and utter lack of drawing skill (except for when I was in Paris and became, inexplicably, endowed with the spirit of Henri Rousseau), I’m always looking for some way to create a webcomic that doesn’t involve my creating images. Okay, so this is no great artistic ideal, but I’m quite taken with the medium, and want to find some way in which I can contribute. I thought about becoming a critic, but I found that that was already something that Websnark was doing incredibly well and that Fleen was doing incredibly in bulk. Disappointing.

Anyway. Yesterday I came up with an idea for a webcomic that I could create that would match three of my (currently) major interests. Libraries, World of Warcraft, and … webcomics. Okay, so maybe the third one is redundant. Drawing or no, creating a webcomic requires a large committment of both time and energy, so I wouldn’t get my hopes up that such a thing will actually be created. I was just excited about the idea. Who knows, maybe I’ll become endowed with the spirit of Alexandre Dumas and become a paragon of productivity.

As if.

Note: Alexandre Dumas’ collected works fill 277 volumes, and he claims to have written 1,200 volumes, though that was in the day of multi-volume novels. (from Trivia Library)

Categories
game humor libraries

I smell nice.

Maya sent me two comics that are currently sitting over on the Salon website. If memory serves, Salon limits non-member access to fairly recent materials, so you should check them out while the checking is good (while noting that “if memory serves” is really the key operator here, and that memory, often, doesn’t).

The comics involve librarians, censorship, and a dog scrotum. In my book, that right there is what we call a winning combination. Oh, and it involves how nice librarians smell, which is always a plus (and totally true). They’re sequential, so read this comic first, and then move on to this one.

In other news that ranks similarly in awesomeness but has no other discernable association, Penny Arcade is going to have a video game, and there is a trailer for it that is very, very wangtacular (which is a good thing). I was heartened to see that the Fruit Fucker (that lovable little bastard) appears to have a fairly large role in the game, which pleases me to no end. If you’re not familiar with the FF, then you should start here, and continue onward if you’ve got the stomach. If you have a particularly positive inclination towards fruit, and might therefore have issues with its … violation, then you might want to skip that link. However, if you laughed during American Pie then you should know that you’re a goddam hypocrite.

That is all.

Categories
personal school

On the snow-slick precipice of April.

The past couple weeks have been spontaneously draining and invigorating. The same could be said for any particularly busy, productive period, I imagine, so long as the work is rewarding in some way. That hasn’t always been the case, unfortunately, and I’ve spent nights awake, fingers to keys, really annoyed and frustrated with each moment of productivity. Inevitably, by the time I’ve finished, I feel at least reasonably satisfied, either with the process, the creation of something from my mind and through my body, or, occasionally, with the final product itself. For instance, I wrote a killer strategic plan.

April approaches and marks, among other things: the end of the term; the return home; and yet another year of life in my increasingly impressive resume (I’ve almost collected 27 of them!). Sure, I’m average among my age group, but I’m exceptional when compared with those younger than me. It’s been a fine collection, so far. Sure, some years are a little shabbier than others. Looking at them, it’s obvious that some have been through the proverbial ringer. No amount of polish can make those years shine, but they have a certain, grizzled charm to them, nonetheless. Though I do admit a certain bias; it’s my collection, after all.

This year, when hung up and compared with the others, has been exceptional. There’s no doubt of that. It’s got adventure written all over it; a few major decisions etched indelibly into its surface; the fulfillment of one dream and the birth of many more. It’s had its grey days, certainly. It’s had it sunny days as well. It’s even had a few fairly large blizzards. But when all is said and done, it’s been a year; it’s been three hundred and sixty-five days; it’s been one more eventful trip around the sun.

And just like every year that’s preceded it, it’s been my favorite year to date.

Categories
photo

Insurmountable Odds

toughodds

Sometimes this is what life feels like.

Categories
wordpress

Because change is overrated

I’ve upgraded to WordPress 2.1.2 for whatever reason, but mostly because the site was being incredibly sluggish today – to the point where I couldn’t load my login panel – which made me want to try and fix something. Ergo the WordPress upgrade. Immediately after the upgrade, I went through and tried to make it so that as little as possible actually changed.

Today is the day to fight off the blues. Somewhat contradictory to this purpose, it’s also the day to play Tom Waits and Johnny Cash. Perhaps most pressing, it’s also the day to write my collection development policy project. First and foremost, however …

It’s a day to go get some lunch. Ciao.

Categories
book humor

Books! Tasty, tasty books …

threadlessbooks

Threadless just released this shirt today, available as a tee for guys, girls, and kids! The kids get it on light blue, which is my favorite of the three colors offered. Combine it with your “Reading is for awesome people” t-shirt, and you’ll truly be a force to be reckoned with (even if you will be sending mixed messages, I mean, do you read the books, or eat them!?).

Categories
montreal personal

Sometimes I forget …

Sometimes I forget the events that led to my being here. Sometimes I forget the days before the voyage, the glimmer of an idea of a thought, a glint of the mind, sent out so far to the east that it seemed more fantasy than possibility.

The first time I mentioned Montreal was in November of 2004. Politically motivated, I was determined to abandon the festering conservative madhouse that I felt the United States had somehow become. At the end of my rant, a brief remark: “Well, I’m off to explore the web, and see if I can find any viable ways to move to Montreal.” By the next day, I had found McGill, and my “escape route” was all planned.

Sometimes I forget the tribulations that followed;
relationships ended for my imagined lover,
a city that I’d never met.

“I’ve been thinking about Montreal. If I end up going, I have to go alone. I need to leave my attachments and start fresh, to seewho I am.”

I remember clearly reading the first letter from McGill,
“We’re sorry, better luck next time”,
and my first conversations with the administration that,
then chimaera, invisible roadblocks in my path,
are now just another everyday
part of my existence.

I continued my illicit love affair regardless,
my obsessive stalking;
I knew what Montreal was doing as I
peeked through the windows into its secret mechanisms.
I lifted up its skirts and found an impenetrable wilderness:

Beware of what comes out of Montreal, especially during winter. / It is a force corrosive to all human institutions. It will / bring everything down. It will defeat itself. It will establish / the wilderness in which the Brightness will manifest again.

– from ‘Montreal’, by Leonard Cohen

Sometimes I forget this path that led me here.

Now I’m here. All that build-up and anticipation,
and now I’m here, wondering what to do with it all.
There’s magic here, absolutely,
loneliness too, as I wander through this wilderness;
remembering, and
waiting for the Brightness to manifest again.

Categories
cinema humor internet

The Mighty Boosh!

Old Gregg, from The Mighty Boosh! Just more proof that the British are batshit insane.

Categories
photo

Photo Friday: Sky

sky

My first Photo Friday entry ever! This was taken flying over the great lakes on the way to D.C. The only thing that can make a redeye flight worthwhile is getting to watch the sun rise from the air.

For Photo Friday: Sky.

Categories
music socialweb

[Burnout] Flame [music] Wars

My friend Yuri lives in Bellingham, WA, and is in a band called the Planets. They used to be the Jetsons, but I imagine that certain copyright issues were discussed, and a name change ensued. But hey, the Planets is good. I like ’em.

So there’s a bit of a competition going on right now for new bands to try and get a demo gig with Virgin Records, and to get their song on the next Burnout soundtrack. theplanetsAnd you guessed it, the Planets have a song entered. Personally, I think it’s awesome. You should too. But more importantly, you should click on over here to the MySpace Burnout Bandslam Contest Page, click to “Listen and Rank” the U.S. Gallery, and find the Planets submission, which looks like this:

You don’t have to do it for me. But you should do it because their song is actually really great.

Categories
libraries school

A day in the (educational) life …

This week was my first week of assignments being due. The opening weeks of a term always seem a bit lazy; it’s easy to keep up with the reading (most of the time), but difficult to visualize where it’s all going. What it lack in actual workload, it makes up for in the absolute tedium of theory.

Monday, my group turned in our documentation of the presentation we did last week on collection development issues in public libraries. We talked about collection issues involving serials, government documents, electronic materials, and finished with some discussion on particular issues found in bilingual or francophone libraries. The presentation was fun enough, but I’m just glad to have it finished.

On Tuesday, Maya and I handed in an evaluation of a research article. Within our evaluation we had to answer four questions; involving previous research, statements of hypotheses, organization and communication, and problems within the research, including possible solutions. The research article was on transformed gaze conditions in a Collaborative Virtual Environment, particularly focusing on augmented gaze. If that doesn’t mean anything to you … well, you might be better off.

Wednesday I handed in a user needs assessment based upon an interview I did over the weekend. I had to pick someone who represented a user community, and based upon my interview, determine what sorts of information needs that community might have, what information seeking behaviors it exhibited, and possible obstacles the community faced. The interview was fun, and the write-up, once I figured out how to turn an interview into a needs assessment, went pretty smoothly.

Now I’m full swing into the term, with something new due every single week, it seems. It’s nice to have things spaced out a bit, though it means that there’s always a deadline looming, and that I have to stay on top of my work, i.e. I have to try and suppress my procrastinative nature as best I can. I have to prepare a strategic plan for next Friday. After that, we have a week off, and Abigail is coming to visit, so chances are I won’t be very productive. The following week I have a midterm, and then a couple weeks after that the next big collection development and information services and users projects are due.

It’s fun times, for me, despite my occasional proclivity to get involved in hallway conspiracies. But that’s an issue for another day. Things can always be better, but honestly I enjoy the things we’re doing, the multiple aspects of the field I’m in, and the direction I feel like this education is taking me. I admit I may be a bit of an optimist at times, but like Poe said: Man’s real life is happy, chiefly because he is ever expecting that it soon will be so.

Categories
school

Death by Powerpoint

I wish someone would show this to my professors.

It’s not that they don’t have interesting things to say … but my god, I just get SO DAMN TIRED OF POWERPOINT. Granted, this would still be powerpoint, but at least it would be more interesting.

On the other hand, would these ideas work in an educational, weekly-powerpoint kind of setting? We have to give a presentation near the end of March, so maybe we’ll give it a shot.

Categories
internet wordpress

Keeping the “me” in metrics

I’m really interested in talking about Seth Godin’s blog about “High resolution mistakes”, and how concern about metrics, and drawing the Digg crowd (or blogging for popularity in general), can ruin what might otherwise be an entertaining, personal blog. I mean, if you can write, you can write, and you can find stories in your life that are interesting. Following the cookie cutter model to popular blogging means you’ll just end up with another robotic technopolisci blog among thousands. I like his list of “common metrics”, and their possible real points, but to me the crux of his article lies here:

There are literally millions of bloggers that have become so focused on measurable traffic that they end up posting nonsense designed to do nothing but attract a Digg. Look back at a blog like that a month later and it appears to be a series of gimmicks, all designed to maximize a metric that’s almost totally irrelevant to what the blogger set out to do in the first place.

I wanted to be popular once. Thankfully, these days I just want to be me.

Categories
game libraries news

Round-Up Follow-Up

The Maplewood Library, who I previously mentioned were planning on closing their doors immediately after school to cut back on “teen rowdiness”, has now decided to remain open, after a unanimous decision by the board of trustees just one day before the first closure was to take place.

Teens are a valuable part of a community, and of the library that serves it. Granted, they can be rowdy and tough to manage. I personally once had to break up a fight between two teenage girls right in front of the library, so I know how it can go, but I think the answer, rather than to lock them out, is to bring them in and to give them some outlet for their energies. The Lester Public Library in Wisconsin created a Teen Advisory Board whose job it is to do just that: arrange events for teens, by teens. I understand that not every library is going to have a librarian interested in playing DDR, or even having video games inside the library (feelings definately remained mixed on that one among professionals), but that doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be something available, inside the library, to engage teens on a level they’re interested in.

Categories
book libraries news school

Is “teen reading” an oxymoron?

According to this librarian’s story, it may be becoming one:

I recently spoke with a junior who was stressed about her decreasing ability to focus on anything for longer than two minutes or so. I tried to inspire her by talking about the importance of reading as a way to train the brain. I told her that a good reader develops the same powers of concentration that an athlete or a Buddhist would employ in sport or meditation. “A lot out there is conspiring to distract you,” I said.

She rolled her eyes. “That’s your opinion about books. It doesn’t make it true.” To her, the idea that reading might benefit the mind was, well, lame.

On the one hand, I appreciate librarians using things like DDR to connect with teens, but I’m anxious that with more “engaging” (i.e. distracting) pursuits, reading will continue to be set aside, to our (as a society) long-term detriment.

Categories
libraries music

All librarians know how to breakdance

That’s just the way we roll.

I’m referring, of course, to the end of this music video by Cascada. In my opinion, it’s all fun and games until she starts throwing the catalog cards around. At that point, I’d throw the tramp out and ban her library privileges indefinately.

Then I’d breakdance.

If you want to watch a library music video of an ENTIRELY different persuasion, you should click here. It’s very cartoon network, i.e. annoying but catchy anyway.