Bollywood Clip: Solla Solla Enna Perumai

Melinda Barnes turned me on to this totally fun Bollywood clip. rock on!

calexico radio from pandora

Wow, this is a really cool environment. has its own blog site or will use typepad, so I've posted this manually.

here is a tinyurl to my first explorations of it.

http://tinyurl.com/syhf8

Vermont Launches Cow Power

Vermont residents can now opt to receive percentages of their electrical power from dairy farms that produce electricity from methane gas produced by cow manure. How far we have come from lighting farts around the campfire.

Tycho sings!

As cute as you can get

This is a link to a short video of Tycho (my nephew) singing a lullaby to his little sister Lyra.

for those of you going to NOLA, a Video Round Table plug

Are We There Yet? Digital Delivery of Motion Image Media in Libraries Video Round Table 2006 Sunday 1:30-3:30 Morial Convention Center rooms 298-299 http://ala.org/vrt/

Just think of it! Library patrons and instructors streaming dvd quality video into the home or classroom with access thanks to their library! High quality networked video streaming has been a topic of interest for libraries since before broadband Internet access had a foothold in the U.S. marketplace, and digital media delivery for libraries and the classroom grows closer to being a reality each year. Join the Video Round Table   for a panel discussion   of the technologies that make digital media delivery   possible. The technological, infrastructural and institutional hurdles we face will be discussed along with expert presentations of digital media delivery initiatives happening today.

Morial Convention Center rooms 298-99 Sunday, June 25th 1:30 - 3:30

VRT Welcomes     Panel Moderator: Claire Stewart     Digital Media Services, unit head, Marjorie I. Mitchell, Multimedia Center and Coordinator of Digitization Projects, Northwestern University Library Ms. Stewart will speak about digitial collections projects, integration with courseware for reserves/instructions, digital formats and standards.     Alan Rough    Univ. Md., College Park or Jeff Clark, Director of Media Resources, Carrier Library, James Madison University Mr. Rough will present on facilities and network infrastructure for Digital Video, licensing from media vendors and changes in this over recent years, experience with delivering online video, formats/standards.     Taylor Surface    Product Manager for Metadata Harvesting, OCLC will cover OCLC projects and digital video metadata.     Judith Thomas    Robertson Media Center, University of Virginia Library Ms. Thomas will present on delivery issues related to a centralized distribution model.

Look for a short bibliography for digital video and digital rights management, the presenter's presentations and the "Streaming Video Vendor Grid" compiled by Monique Threatt included on the VRT Web site, http://ala.org/vrt/. For information about joining Video Round Table visit the Web site or talk to a member of the round table at our booth #3453 in "The Stacks" or at the program.

-- SB 06/06

sorry for cross postings!

available Sunday afternoon?

http://ala.org/ala/vrt/newsandevents/newsevents.htm
1:30-3:30, Morial Convention center

Video Round Table Program: (coordinated by yours truly)

Are We There Yet?
Digital Delivery of Motion Image Media in Libraries

Just think of it!

Library patrons and instructors streaming dvd quality video into the
home or classroom with access thanks to their library!

High quality networked video streaming has been a topic of interest for
libraries since before broadband Internet access had a foothold in the
U.S. marketplace, and digital media delivery for libraries and the
classroom grows closer to being a reality each year. Join the Video
Round Table for a panel discussion of the technologies that make digital
media delivery possible. The technological, infrastructural and
institutional hurdles we face will be discussed along with expert
presentations of digital media delivery initiatives happening today.

Where: Morial Convention Center, Rm. 298-99

When: Sunday, June 25th 1:30 - 3:30

yours truly,
Steve B.

--
Steve Brantley
University of Illinois at Chicago
Daley Library
M/C 234
Box 8198
Chicago, IL 60680
312-996-4032
jbrant1@uic.edu

Beatrix Lily Brantley

I have been away for two months because Elizabeth went into labor 2 and a half weeks early and we had our baby May 10! We will call her trixie and she is great. I've posted a huge number of pictures on my flickr account, http://www.flickr.com/photos/brantles/. In addition, we bought a house, moved into it, and have been trying to get used to a newborn while unpacking our lives. The former owner left me a mower (thanks Wayne) but it needs repair. (thanks Wayne). Anyone interested in making an outlandinsh gift purchase can find our registry on babies 'R' us, Target and thethingsIwant.com.

two levels of remove

Via Sarah Houghton (the librarian in black), Via Bill Drew (the baby boomer librarian): "Bill Drew (Baby Boomer Librarian) has created a simple Google search box for the FindInALibrary books. Nice work!"

I've reproduced the code here:

Here is a better form for the Google libraries search I am working on:

Search WWW Search in Libraries

Tags:

• Google
• Libraries

Lyra at 1 stone

1 stone girl
Originally uploaded by you're schmoopie!.

My niece Lyra Tuulikki Severine Wagner. She drools.

Using blogs like a content management system

Someone suggested that we create a blog for every library faculty member. That way we can replace the static staff directory with blogs that allow the owner to update regularly and syndicate subject-specific announcements to a targeted audience. The idea makes me think about incorporating applications like blogs, which have the mystique of being frequently updated and up-to-the-minute-current, for uses that are generally thought of as static, like a directory. Is it "wasteful" to utilize blog technology this way? Is it analog to using a home theater stereo system to listen to AM radio on headphones? What does "wasteful" mean when talking about software or disc space?

RSS reader vs. a bloglines account

The presentation went relatively well. I discovered that of the fifty percent of reference librarians at my institution who use RSS either to read or to post, they all have a bloglines account, rather than using a stand alone reader. Strange, I never would have thought to use bloglines, although it seems very useful for checking feeds on the go...

a new training blog

I made a new blog , brantles-train.blogspot.com specifically to post step by step training modules. My first post is a quick and dirty guide to readng, subscribing and creating an RSS feed which I will present to my colleagues this morning.

Social Networking, Steve Jones, VOA radio

The Radio Service, Voice of America featured Communications Professor Steve Jones on their program "Talk To America" yesterday. Web 2.0 social networking is the topic of conversation and the 50 minute program is available as real media or an mp3 download here: http://www.voanews.com/english/NewsAnalysis/TTA-New-Past-Shows.cfm
Steve Jones has published a number of studies on young people Internet activities in conjunction with Pew Internet & American Life project

short hiatus

I haven't posted in a week because my wife and I arew negotiating for a house. Cross your fingers for us!
brantles

Ajaxwrite and other ajax apps.

Check out "AJAXLAUNCH ajax applications for everyone". AjaxWrite is the first major launch, but as ajax applications are developed, ajaxLaunch will publicize and provide them. Ajax or "asynchronous javascript and xml" is a web application development script incorporating javasvcript, CSS, and xml to allow a great deal of manipulation of content and layout by the user.
From the Website: "ajaxWrite is a powerful word processor that can read and write Microsoft Word formatted documents. Anytime you need a word processor, need to open a .doc file or edit a .doc file, simply point your Firefox browser at ajaxWrite.com and in seconds a full-featured program will be loaded. For 90 percent of the people in the world, the need to buy Microsoft Word just vanished. This won't make Microsoft happy, but software users should be very excited that software just got cheaper, immediate and modern."
As has been stated so often before, the commercial model for software development and distribution is changing rapidly. No longer will companies be able to charge expensive porices for software products when people can use opensource products or simply point their browsers to a Web service that provides most if not all the same functions for free.

Happy Birthday Eric!

Sunshine Week

One of UIC's incredibly well informed and dynamic librarians, Aimee Quinn, hosted a forum on secrecy in government as part of Sunshine Week: Your Right To Know!. Sunshine Week, March 12-18 2006. The first Sunshine Week was March 13, 2005. It was initiated by a group of jounalists, publishers, librarians and academics to promote the idea of open government for a healthy democracy. A brief clip from their 'about' page is pasted below:
-snip-
During Sunshine Week, participating daily and weekly newspapers, magazines, online sites, and radio and television broadcasters run editorials, op-ed columns, editorial cartoons, public forums, and news and feature stories that drive public discussion about why open government is important to everyone, not just to journalists.
Backed by a grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation in Miami, Sunshine Week's success was due in large part to the many journalism groups, media companies, state press associations, open-government and First Amendment advocates, librarians, civic groups, educators and student journalists who participated. Sunshine Week 2005 exceeded expectations, with more than 730 participants producing thousands of articles.
Sunshine Week is an offshoot of Sunshine Sunday, which began in Florida in 2002. Led by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors, Sunshine Sunday was developed in direct response to moves by the state legislature to severely restrict public information after the terrorist attacks against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.
-/snip-
pasted from http://sunshineweek.org/sunshineweek/about accessed March 14, 2006.

I recorded the class I taught today.

I want the real thing!

I want the real thing!
Originally uploaded by MFinChina.

One of the oldest jokes around, but still funny! Found in the Yunnan University Guesthouse. - from MF Capiello, she do rock.

Preaching Gaming to Academic Audiences

Yesterday at our all-staff meeting I gave a presentation summarizing the "Gaming in Libraries" symposium from Chicago in December.

I work at a large academic library and many people were confused about how understanding videogame culyture and videogamers could be instructive in our setting.

I think they liked it because we had a long dicussion afterward about ways to make our web presence better more interactive and ways to appeal to native gamers. Many closeted gamers spoke up and we had a sort of "AA" type confessional. "Hi I'm J. and I'm a Gamer."

Libraries are the places one goes to get "correct" information, as my colleague Francis Kayiwa stated. If we can appeal to a gamer generation mindset wherein shared information is valuable, and correct information is the best, then we can communicate more easily with gamers as a "clan leader" as opposed to an authoritarian defender of the secrets.