la neuvième semaine - 22e chose. [overdrive at pbclibrary: downloadable audiobooks]

well, i finally got around to perusing our own system's available e-books online. and noodled around a bit with the titles available through overdrive, and i'm glad i did...as i hadn't really explored much of what was available.

i wasn't able to download or listen to any titles on my pc, but it was curious to see that certain titles whose physical print copies were once in high demand are available online.

one thing that wasn't too clear to me [as a novice browser] on our system was, is there a waiting list for e-books? are there an indefinite number of copies for the audiobooks available? or do you have to wait, just like for hardcopies in the branches, for the digital copy to be returned by another patron?? [i noticed there were e-holds]...did i miss an online explanation for these issues?

lastly, i thought it was interesting [and this would pique my interest, because A} i'm geeky, and B} i work with a lot of activities directors at various nursing homes who are always looking for materials like this] that a lot of the old radio shows are available for download through overdrive's services.

so, if like me, family hour growing up meant gathering around for the latest episode of "The Shadow"...check out Lux's collection of "Fibber McGee and Molly"...or "The Best of Jack Benny" and spend an hour or so getting lost revisiting a simpler time.

la neuvième semaine - 21e chose. [podcasts]

still navigating my way around podcasts, i really tried to follow our assignment and listen to library journal's 'open libraries episode 4' but the website was extremely difficult to navigate...episode 4 began stating "this is the 5th episode of the open libraries podcast"...and then what followed was an introduction of all the guest panelists, and already the sound quality was so murky it was excruciating.

so...i happily previewed several NPR selections i had been interested in...subscribed to a few including, all songs considered ...and took a rambling trip down memory lane when i discovered:

thistlepod

oh, yess! the official podcast of fiona ritchie and the thistle and shamrock. my, how technology would have re-written my nerdy adolescence of music geekery when i would get up at 5:30 in the morning before middle school just to tape the celtic hour on public radio, and weep regularly while listening to the silky brogue of fiona introduce my folking heart to the likes of Scotsman robin williamson weave his spoken-word reminiscence of childhood..."with the minister in one ear, and the drunkard in the other"...in sum? podcasts: just another reason, my irish eyes are smilin'.

la sixième semaine - 15e chose. Web 2.0.

okay. i must admit.
i've been mired for a small bit in reading our assignments for

week 6 - thing 15 - web 2.0.


and it's difficult for me to adequately express the complexity of issues that rise to the forefront when i consider all that a concept of library 2.0 could comprise.

it's interesting that within our own system, the range of opinions can be downright polarizing: from the static, predictable, staid caution of "wait and see" to the more progressive awareness that if we do not change with the times, then we will cease to become relevant to mainstream culture.

while the purist in me has a hard time envisioning moving away from building a physical collection of items as presented in OCLC's 'Away from Icebergs' article...[of course, that concept would make a girl shudder who owns nearly 4,000 cds and almost 2 thousand books]...i know the trend towards information [our stock and trade] is virtual and digital...i subsequently found rather amusing the thoughts presented by Dr. Wendy Schulz in her article "To a Temporary Place in Time" as she imagines the pendulum swing through library 2.0 through 3.0 to the nostalgia of a library 4.0 as a reprieve from the technohustle and a place that functions more like a salon and knowledge spa.

i think some interesting watermarks of change with regards to an awareness of how emerging technology is altering our time-honored traditions is the recent Obama-McCain Twitter presidential debate on technology and government. could it be the the blogosphere is finally bringing about the hope for equanimity in society that Thomas Paine envisioned? it was his championing of free access to printing presses and subsequent pamphleteering that helped inspire our own American Revolution after all.

la sixième semaine - 14e chose. Technorati.

[Protesters at a candlelight vigil on a street leading to the U.S. embassy and the presidential Blue House in central Seoul on Tuesday. (Lee Gwang-ho/Newsis, via Reuters) ]

still working on the 6th week of my list of web 2.0 technologies to explore for work, and i've been assigned to navigate the monster that is technorati. at the time i completed the first discovery exercise for this task and searched for how many blogs linked to our library's website, there were a total of 74 listed reactions. as others have observed, it seems the PBCLS's Mousing Around Tutorial is a hot commodity on the web!

Searching then blogs with the tags of web 2.0, there were listed 29,764 postings in English only blogs with authority...the apparent search default. searching through blogs with any authority [or none] in any language yielded 65,057 postings tagged web 2.0. it seems kind of surprising that there are so few given its prevalence as a buzz word of late. perhaps not everyone is tagging their blog posts [or tracked by technorati]. one of the most interesting related tags i found were postings highlighting the phenomena of 'protest 2.0'. not entirely unused to the concept, i immediately reflected on certain tidbits of 'technology as survival' i've been made aware of just this last year:

for instance text [or sms] messaging being used to keep abreast of civil unrest in kenya, and alternately, to stoke the fires of hatred post the disputed elections there.

or, blogging as a bastion of free-speech in a state ruled by a politically oppressive regime: see NPR's segment on Cuban Yoani Sanchez's blog.

web 2.0 was also instrumental in organising protests to the Olympic torch both here in America and abroad.

but, i think the most remarkable recent use of protest 2.0 can be seen in South Korean's protest to beef imports from the U.S. which reportedly threatened to topple the government there.

troisième semaine - 7e chose. technology that matters to me.

bearing the rare brand of a native of this transient state, Florida, i've long grown up under the shadow of an architectural invention envisioned by one of my long geek crushes and endless self-study fascination. thing is, when the Epcot center opened at Disney World in october of 1982, i had no idea its iconic golfball-like dome could be the precise shape that someday saves my life.

buckyballs - as the specific arrangement of carbon molecules or Fullerenes are known - were named after the noted architect and futurist Richard Buckminster Fuller, who popularized the geodesic dome.

now, i have long been drawn to the legacy of such an intriguing man who, in his life formulated over 28 patents…and countless other inventions that were scoffed at and never pursued by industry. but what keeps drawing me to him as an orient point in my own bookish, rambling-student-of-life education and exploration is that Buckminster Fuller was a remarkable visionary.



demonstrating a prescient understanding for how things work, R.Buckminster invented and streamlined his inventions from his earliest years. he was such a charismatic tinkerer in fact, that he was expelled from Harvard University twice: once for entertaining an entire dance troupe, and eventually for his seeming lack of interest and general irresponsibility. but it wasn't until 1927 when he lost his young daughter to polio and spinal meningitis that he determined to embark on "an experiment, to find what a single individual [could] contribute to changing the world ... benefiting all humanity."



his own tragedy focused his intentions on tackling the question of whether humanity really has hope of surviving on this planet and how to most successfully do so. how fitting then, to return to that image of the dome in consideration of why technology matters to me.

the discoverers of Fullerenes won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1996, but the remarkable trends incorporating their studies have recently been making a lot of noise in the scientific community. seems like buckyballs are transforming developments in nanotechnology to make the most microscopic elements of medicine more stable, improving the eventual success of transplants.

living daily with juvenile diabetes it's eerie to think of how the globe-like dome of a nearby tourist destination could symbolize my hope for a better life. for more about how the physical structure of Fullerenes are transforming the realm of nanotechnology. click here.

seems like the smallest things in the realm of science might just offer me and countless others living with this potentially life-limiting disease the greatest hope. work is already being done to make the practice of daily blood glucose testing more streamlined. and further developments in nanotechnology will only increase the efficacy of experiments to ultimately cure diabetes like those being done at the University of Alberta, Canada.

somehow, i think Buckminster would be honored. his lifetime of renegade scientific vision coupled with humanitarian imperative might exponentially improve the chances for survival on this planet after all.