Archive for Techno

Knol: Google’s Wikipedia

28 July 2008 at 8:24pm · Filed under Techno, Where I'm Surfing

According to Google, “a knol is an authoritative article about a specific topic.”  Read all about Google’s answer to the online, user-edited encyclopedia at ABC News.

The actual Knol site is right here.

I like the idea, of course.  I lost a lot of faith in Wikipedia when I was looking for information about Dance Dance Revolution and learned that it’s a game involving used contraceptives.  Knol is pretty darn new to the scene, so I guess time will tell how many butts on the kick butt scale it will earn.

Thanks to kick butt and very tech-savvy Adam for sharing!

Leave a Comment

Check Out Kindle!

24 March 2008 at 6:21pm · Filed under In the News, Techno

Thanks to my kick butt librarian friend Teresa for pointing this out…

Oh my! The time has finally come, my librarian friends. The book as we know it will soon be dead.

Naaah, I still don’t think books will ever disappear, but for those technophiles out there, this electronic book reader from Amazon looks like a pretty nifty catch! Watch the video here.

Leave a Comment

23 Learning 2.0 Things from PLCMC

31 July 2007 at 8:38pm · Filed under Techno

The Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County in North Carolina came up with a neat-o incentive program for its staff called Learning 2.0, “a discovery learning program designed to encourage staff to explore new technologies and reward them for doing 23 Things.” Other library systems all over the country are adapting this program left and right. So what are these magical 23 Things, you wonder? Peruse the list here!

The Head of Public Services at my library wanted me to check into these 23 Things and see if we could someday manage a similar program. After returning from the ALA Annual Conference newly inspired and a little bit dreamy (in a good way!), she added a few original Things to the list for me to explore (like Federated Searching and facebook.com).

Here are the Things I already dabble in and feel pretty good about:

  • Thing 3: Setting up my own blog and posting to it.
  • Thing 7: Creating a blog post about anything technology related.
  • Thing 8: Utilizing RSS feeds and setting up a Bloglines newsreader account (though I never, ever check it since I just check the ones here on Kick Butt Librarian.)
  • Thing 9: Locating a few useful library related blogs and news/feeds (again, I’ve compiled my current faves here on my blog).
  • Thing 14: Exploring Technorati and learning how tags work with blog posts.
  • Thing 16: Learning about wikis and discovering some innovative ways that libraries are using them (I can’t say enough about the Webster Public Library’s wiki, the Children’s Series Binder!)
  • Thing 20: Messing around with YouTube (though I need to explore some other video uploading sites.)
  • Thing 22: Browsing NetLibrary (available at my library) and downloading audiobooks.

I’ll now be playing around a bit more with this 2.0 stuff and will post any interesting discoveries on my blog. I’m sure by the time this procrastinator finishes, 21 of the 23 Things will be obsolete, and brand new Thing One and brand new Thing Two will be vying to join the list.

Comments (1)

CNET.com

22 May 2007 at 9:34pm · Filed under Techno, Tools of the Trade, Where I'm Surfing

Did you ever have one of those work projects that you just keep pushing aside and never quite find the time to deal with? I’ve been meaning to research digital camcorders to purchase for my library for months now, and somehow it always ends up at the end of my Outlook task list. I finally started delving into the research this morning, but was bombarded with way too much technical information that meant nothing to me. Who knew there were so many darn species of the camcorder?

Fortunately, my extremely kick butt coworker Adam told me about CNET.com, a website featuring loads of free tech product reviews, news, and comparisons. I got sucked into this site for a few hours after work, and after checking out product ratings, watching video reviews by tech experts, and comparing breakdowns of prices and specs, I feel like much more of a camcorder expert than I did at the beginning of the day.

Librarians like myself could use CNET when tasked with purchasing gadgets for the library, and could also point gizmo-buying patrons to it as a helpful resource, along with Consumer Reports. I’m sure I’ll be returning for CNET’s helpful Tips and Tricks section of articles and videos—especially when the shooting and editing of my FAB group’s Blair Witch Parody gets underway at the end of the summer!

Comments (1)

E-mail: The New Snail Mail?

3 May 2007 at 9:40pm · Filed under In the News, Techno

Here’s an interesting article from the Cape Cod Times. Is e-mail really becoming a thing of the past? According to teens–yep!

I shouldn’t be surprised, really. I’d say that at least 75% of the teens that visit my library’s teen room are there to use MySpace. The most entertaining is when they’re commenting and messaging the people sitting right next to, behind, and across from them–a common practice, interestingly enough. Go figure!

That would also explain why half of them never see the e-mails I send them, and this is exactly what prompted me to start fabnet, the Frisco Advisory Group’s blog.

I’m trying to keep up, really I am. But as someone who texts, blogs, and uses MySpace (my teens haven’t found me yet, and I’m trying to keep it that way!), I’d still have to say that I’m happiest with my trusty gmail account. Guess that makes me an old fogey after all!

Leave a Comment

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.