Archives
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Sign of intelligence?
Boing Boing: MPAA exec can’t sell A-hole proposal to tech companies
The final question summed up the problem: “This is a room full of people whose living depends on this working. You’re getting pushback to the point of hostility. If you can’t sell this to us, how are you going to sell it to the target 16-45 demographic?” Hunt said the marketplace would ultimately sort it out.
Um, the marketplace (or at least half the demographic) already has. They’re ignoring the legal offerings and using file-sharing apps because it’s easier.
Copyright — laura
Saturday, February 25, 2006
10 Tips for Attracting More Comments
10 Tips for Attracting More Comments | Performancing.com
Setting up all the community stuff on the library’s website won’t be much good if no one uses it.
Blogging — laura
Open Access in Student Government
OA as a campaign issue in a student government election
Gavin Baker is running for the Student Senate at the University of Florida. Baker co-founded the Florida chapter of Free Culture and is making open access a campaign issue.
… His candidacy and position could make a difference: At UF, the Student Senate controls an $11 million budget, the third largest in the US.
Open Access — laura
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Big Mistake
Boing Boing: Copyright office head denounces “big mistake” of extending copyright
The head of the US copyright office has accused Congress of making a mistake by extending the length of copyright in America, calling the term “too long,” and saying that Congress made a “big mistake.”
How’s that for ammo?
Copyright — laura
Brain Exercise
Creating Passionate Users: Brain death by dull cubicle
Experiencing and learning new things is literally exercise for the brain!
…
dull and/or stressful work environments with low stimulation suppress neurogenesis, which means less or no new brain cells.
Library Links — laura
Usability for Rich Internet Applications
As library websites evolve, will parts of them become online applications like Google maps and Flickr? I can almost visualize one for aggregated database and catalog searching that users could personalize to their needs. It could be a solution to the simplicity vs. power debate.
Digital Web Magazine - Usability for Rich Internet Applications
Rich Internet applications (RIAs) can provide opportunities to design much better user experiences. They can be faster, more engaging and much more usable. However, this improvement is not without its downside—RIAs are much more difficult to design than the previous generation of page-based applications. The richer interaction requires a better understanding of users and of human-computer interaction (HCI). Although there is a lot of HCI material and research available, it can be difficult to determine how it applies to this new environment. In this article, I provide some practical tips for designing usable RIAs, based on fundamental principles of HCI.
Website Design — laura
Friday, February 17, 2006
Aquabrowser
Christina’s LIS Rant: Everyone wowed about NCSU, how about HCPL’s Aquabrowser implementation?
She’s right that I haven’t seen it anywhere else. She’s also right that it rocks. I was browsing through the alternate terms like I was a tag person ;-). I’d love to sit behind a regular patron and see how it worked for them.
Library Links — laura
Thursday, February 16, 2006
Ways to Improve the Sex Life of Your OPAC
Library Web Chic » Blog Archive » Lipstick on a Pig: & Ways to Improve the Sex Life of Your OPAC
More great opac ideas.
Library Links — laura
RIAA: CD ripping isn’t fair use
Boing Boing: RIAA: CD ripping isn’t fair use
The RIAA has filed comments with a federal agency in which they claim that ripping a CD isn’t fair use.
They really are suicidal, aren’t they.
Copyright — laura
Playlist: Libraries turning to iPods and iTunes
Playlist: Libraries turning to iPods and iTunes
A nice piece about the troubles libraries are having with digital media.
Library Links — laura
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Social Opacs?
blyberg.net » If you build it…
Our users are smart, clever, interesting, positive, intuitive, and social. They may not know it yet, but they’re waiting for their public libraries to be a catalyst for the community. There is something wonderfully special and intimate about shared experience–that is why Web 2.0 is so successful. When those experiences are centered around books, movies, and music and they’re aggregated at the local level, the product becomes highly personal–how inspiring would it be to have patrons who are proud of the job they’ve done for their library?
This feel a need I felt for my own library when I first started work here. We’re a long way from this but it’s a nice goal to aspire to.
Library Links — laura
Blogs amplify impact of scholarly publications
Tom Wilson, Open access and Weblogs - working together, Information Research Weblog, February 10, 2006.
We’ve had occasional instances of the value of Weblogs in spreading news about papers in Information Research and we have another at the moment. Nahyun Kwon’s paper on virtual reference service has been noted in a number of Weblogs and, as a direct result, the hits have soared to more than 2,400 in less than one month. By comparison, the other papers in the issue have an average hit rate of about 400. There’s a lesson here for authors - if you want your paper to be noticed, make sure it’s noticed in the ‘blogosphere’ - and you are the ones who will know which Weblog authors are likely to be interested, so get to it!Comment. Good point. I’d only add that the best way to harness this power is to make the article OA. This works two ways. First, OA helps bloggers and other meme-spreaders (who might prefer to use listservs or private email) discover the work in the first place and learn that it’s interesting, important, and worth spreading. Second, OA helps them spread the word to other potential readers. Readers are much more likely to read the article –and spread the word further– if they receive a link to free online full-text than if they receive a link to a stop sign or pay-per-view page.
Blogging, Open Access — laura
Gamers are as good as bilinguals at solving mental problems
Boing Boing: Gamers are as good as bilinguals at solving mental problems
Gamers are as good as bilinguals at solving mental problems Video gamers may have the same mental agility as bilingual people — an ability to swap out one task and bring another online quickly, which is useful in multitasking and is linked to lifelong mental acuity. A study at Toronto’s York University showed that gamers performed like bilinguals in hard mental tests, and that bilingual gamers were even better.
See! it’s good for you! 
Gaming — laura
Only big companies’ PCs will play high-def DVDs
Boing Boing: Only big companies’ PCs will play high-def DVDs
Only big companies’ PCs will play high-def DVDs PCs with expensive video-cards won’t be able to play high-definition DVDs unless they’re built by big companies like Dell and Sony. PCs you build or upgrade yourself with “HDCP”-compatible high-end video cards will be locked out of high-def DVD playback by the copy-restriction system on the discs.
… However, true HDCP compatibility is controlled by an inter-industry consortium of giant CE companies and Hollywood studios, and these companies have ruled that merely buying a HDCP-compatible graphics card is insufficient for gaining access to HDCP-locked video. Only systems designed from the ground up by OEMs (such as themselves) will be able to gain access to these videos.
… The only good news here is that this will spur unauthorized P2P systems into developing the capability of sharing high-definition video more reliably. After all, you may not be able to play Matrix Impossible 2000 at high rez on your PC if you buy the DVD, but you’ll sure be able to do so if you download it instead.
Way to fight piracy, guys.
Copyright — laura
Friday, February 10, 2006
KISS or not to KISS
But is simplicity what librarianship is all about? Is our job to present the complex world of information searching as something so simple a baby can do it? And, is doing so ultimately a good marketing strategy? I don’t think so.In fact, marketing in this way could harm the profession. After all, if we strive to make our services appear Google-esque, we could be obfuscating a big chunk of our competitive advantage - our collections’ depth and sophisticated organization. The complexities of our databases and services are what give users control over their searching. I’m not saying that we need to make our offerings overly-complicated and intimidating, but that we need to let patrons’ needs guide what shape our marketing takes and they don’t all want simple. (It’s true!)
Library Links — laura
The Commons and Commerce in the Pull Economy
The Commons and Commerce in the Pull Economy
It’s not widely appreciated that “Centralized Media” - broadcasting, cable television, films, recorded music - have a serious Achilles’ Heel. They have huge overhead costs. A small number of large companies are able to dominate their respective markets primarily because they control critical “choke points” of product development and distribution. But it costs A LOT to control these choke points — and those costs are only going up even as the costs of online alternatives go down.
… Meanwhile, new software technologies are radically re-organizing markets so that newcomers can more readily enter and compete. The technologies also enable companies to leverage bottom-up, decentralized social energies in ways that Centralized Media simply cannot. It turns out that the most serious threat to Centralized Media is not piracy, but a veritable explosion of user-generated content and creativity. It is consuming far more of people’s finite attention and time than ever before - mostly at the expense of mediocre, mass-market product.
… What is notable about many online commons is that many of them are out-competing conventional markets. They often produce value more efficiently than conventional corporations. But they do still more: they generate value in more flexible, personally satisfying and culturally authentic ways. Most companies can’t begin to compete on those terms.
… The power of networked content-sharing was vividly demonstrated when friends of an unknown remix artist, D.J. Danger Mouse, released the Gray Album on the Internet. The music — an accomplished (but illegal) remix of The Beatle’s White Album and Jay-Z’s Black Album — was acclaimed by many critics as one of the best albums of the year. At one point in 2003, more people were illegally downloading the Gray Album than were buying Norah Jones’ Feels Like Home, the best-selling CD at the time.
… High-handed forms of “push” marketing are likely to flop in the pull environment, where people want - and can insist upon — a more genuine, transparent and accountable relationship with any vendor.
If you have time, read the whole thing. It’a well-written, knowledgable article that kept even my scattered attention.
Copyright — laura
Thursday, February 9, 2006
New JISC project will feed tables of contents into library catalogues
A new JISC project is developing an RSS news feed service that will automatically feed publisher and e-journal information into library catalogues.
… The open source software developed by the TOCRoSS project will be freely available to further and higher education establishments, publishers, and library management systems developers.
Very cool. Unfortunately, not ever publisher does RSS tables of contents and they will have the latest issues. Still, I’m sure someone out there with more imagination will come up with great uses for it.
Open-Source Software — laura
Tutorial Sharing
COPPUL Animated Tutorials Sharing Project
Recognizing that creating and updating Tutorials for each online resource is a daunting task for any library to undertake on its own, librarians in COPPUL got together to find a way to share in their development. This project is an outgrowth of that initiative and our goal is to create a critical mass of Open Source Tutorials for online resources used by libraries everywhere. Participation in the project is both welcome and essential to it’s success. So please to join us in an initiative that we hope will greatly benefit library users everywhere!
This sounds like a wonderful idea. But …
Am I the only librarian who as a user hates tutorials?
If I’m looking to learn something specific, html-based ones are great. Graphical ones that are worth sitting through are few and far between. I’m quick to write off any service that I need instructions to use. It seems like a waste of time.
Seeing the students who come to me for help on a daily basis, I know I’m not alone. I can’t help but wonder how much use these are going to get. Yet I also don’t have a better answer. Services can only be “dumbed-down” so much without losing needed functionality.
Tutorials — laura
The Good in Library 2.0
Steve and Michael do a great job of getting to the real point of the Library 2.0 ideal. It has nothing to do with the technology (That isn’t going to stop changing for a while.). It’s all about revising our attitudes towards ourselves, our patrons and our jobs.
Library Links — laura
Monday, February 6, 2006
Evaluating the Usability of Search Forms Using Eyetracking: A Practical Approach :: UXmatters
Evaluating the Usability of Search Forms Using Eyetracking: A Practical Approach :: UXmatters
- Clearly label input fields. Doing so won’t bother pro users, but is a great help to your novice users.
- Drop-down lists are very eye catching form elements. You should always consider very carefully whether you should include a drop-down list in a search form. Use a drop-down list only if no alternative element would serve its purpose as well. Maintain adequate distance between the drop-down list and other elements in the search form. In general, if you want to create a simple search form that is easy to use for even novice users, avoid using drop-down lists in the form, because they tend to cognitively overload users.
- Compactness makes search forms easier to peruse. Therefore, make search forms as compact as possible. Most users visually navigate a form broadly before they can understand its scope, so the smaller the area of a page over which they’re forced to navigate, the better. In our tests, the site search form that performed best was that on Flickr. Their search form is very compact, with a label placed over the input field, so users need look at only one place on the page. Thus, our test results suggest that the ideal location for the label of an input field in a search form is left aligned, immediately above the field.
- Consistent placement of search forms in a standard location on Web pages overcomes some of the problems of unlabeled input fields. If you don’t want to label the input field, at least place your search form in a discrete area of the page where it’s simple for users to understand its purpose. If you do so, your form will serve not only pro users, who usually don’t look at the labels, but also rookies, who rely heavily on such labels to perform their tasks.
Website Design — laura
The Laughing Librarian
Carnival time! Go check out the great links.
Library Links — laura
Thursday, February 2, 2006
The Value of Middle Men
Earlier this week, I was contacted seperately by a faculty member and an IT guy about the same issue. The teacher’s department had bought access to a database. Thus far registration had been complicated for the students and the teacher was anxious to streamline the process. He apparently contacted the IT guy directly and IT guy had worked out how to allow registrations through our proxy-server. So all the students had to do was click on a link, if they were off-campus login to the proxy-server, and register.
This is the point they came to me, wanting me to put the link someplace on the library website because all the links to databases are there. The problem was that the contract restricted access to just students taking certain classes. Putting it on the llibrary’s site would give access to all the students, faculty and staff.
I remembered that the university used web-based course software for even the on-campus classes, so I advised the teacher to put the link there. He was thrilled by the idea that put it where the students could get to it easily and satisfied the terms of the contract.
I was struck by the fact I was getting credit for doing essentially nothing. A couple of emails and a phone call and it was settled. I was the middle man. My contribution came from my understanding of how the IT guy’s technology worked, how the contract worked and how the teacher taught his classes.
Until now I’ve had an overall negative opinion of middle men, formed by library vendors who seem to have forgotten the part about understanding how we work and what we need to do and publishers who keep hiking prices for very little added value. But I’ve been reminded that good middle men really can be tremendously helpful. Now if only we could find some.
Library Links — laura
