LibraryTechie » On the Web

World Builder by Bruce Branit

pat — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 01:18:39 +0000

World Builder from Bruce Branit on Vimeo.

Keeping Tabs on Santa via the Web

pat — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 12:54:31 +0000

The State Library of Kansas pulled together all the important information for tracking Santa’s whereabouts and posted it on the web for your convenience:

Kansas Government Information

Be sure to check these resources later tonight so that you’ll be in bed before Santa’s arrival. You know the rules: “There must be no peeking or he might pass you by!”

Foray into YouTube

pat — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 15:31:08 +0000

My library has finally made it’s first foray into YouTube. Here’s a video:

Science Gets Funky

pat — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 19:25:22 +0000

This is a fantastic video! Great to see physicists get down on youtube. : )

LibraryThing for Libraries

pat — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 15:58:09 +0000

I blogged about LibraryThing a couple of years ago as a great tool for readers. But it’s also a great tool for libraries.

One of the very popular programs presented at the library where I work is a series called Brown Bag Book Reviews. Staff members review some of their latest finds while the audience snacks on cookies or eats their lunch. It’s a great way for patrons to pick up some new titles and authors, and they love to hear the reviews.

In our last web incarnation, I had put the lists of the books reviewed on our site – basically, a separate list for each date we did the reviews. Books were listed alphabetically by author – not an easy way to find something you’re looking for, but better than nothing as I worked on building a searchable database. The idea was to come up with a way for patrons who, for example, loved everything reviewed by Carol, to easily find all Carol’s titles. Or if they missed last January’s review program, they could sort the data to find everything reviewed that date.

It occurred to me recently that everything I was trying to put into the database (title, author, reviewer’s name, review date) was able to be done easily on LibraryThing, with no need for me to try to become a master at MySQL or PHP. I had one of those “D’oh!” moments.

I brought this up at a meeting and one of our new librarians enthusiastically jumped at the chance to create our Brown Bag LibraryThing catalog, and tagged the items for easy sorting.

Take a look at our catalog and see what we’ve all been reading. If your library maintains lists of titles for various things, this is a great way to put it out there for the public.

bnet: Present like Steve Jobs

pat — Tue, 13 May 2008 13:46:45 +0000

I’ve signed up for email newsletters from bnet. The information provided is concise and highly useful. This video, in particular, is worth sharing with anyone who has to give a presentation. Whether your presentation is a one-time thing or if speaking is what you do for a living, there are tips here that will help you do a better job, and ultimately reduce that anxiety so many of us feel when we give a lecture. All in a seven minute video.

After the video, check out bnet’s crash course on presenting like Steve Jobs. Cost? $0. You can’t beat that!

Alternative to YouTube

pat — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 11:33:32 +0000

Need a new place to look for free user-generated video? There’s more than just YouTube out there.

Blip.tv is another place where video is easily uploaded, tagged, sorted and found. While poking around the site, I came across this video created by Bernhard Drax. It’s a nice summary of what libraries are doing in Second Life, for those who haven’t taken the time to get in-world yet:

Another venue is mefeedia. Mefeedia is more of a “Program your own TV Station” site. It sorts video into channels for easy viewing, such as Sitcoms or Gardening. I find this a much more valid sorting system than YouTube’s favorites.

Googlism

pat — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 14:14:10 +0000

http://www.thechurchofgoogle.org/

Daily Literature: Free in your Inbox

pat — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 22:05:35 +0000

A co-worker just sent me a link to this site that provides free reading directly to your inbox every day. http://www.dailylit.com/about It’s easy: sign up, read books, and post to the discussions if you want. There’s quite a nice selection. I’ve just signed up and am looking forward to seeing how big a chunk of reading they send each day.

From their website:

“We created DailyLit because we spent hours each day on email but could not find the time to read a book. Now the books come to us by email. Problem solved.”

My profile:

Kids Critique Children’s Books

pat — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 22:04:30 +0000

How cool is this?

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/12/18/childrens.books/index.html

CNN has audio slideshows of kids reviewing kids’ books. This would be a nice feature on any library website — not just for kids, but for all age levels. People would eat this right up.