Musings on "Feed"

This book is so meg rad...there is something about it that I really love (2nd time reading it)!

SG: "What do you think of Anderson's idea of the future?"
GC: "It's horrifying."

SG: "Possible?"
GC: "I really hope not."

SG: "Desireable?"
GC: "No."

M.T. Anderson has really hit on something that is (to me) quite frightening...the corporate manipulation of the collective American mind. (I won't talk about the Borg again, but I'm pretty sure they're relevant here). I didn't realize until I had kids how powerful advertising can be. My family, in general, watches a fair amount of television, and my kids can recite certain ads (that I don't even notice) verbatim. If you do watch TV, you are likely to notice the following patterns in advertising...

• Commercials during women's shows = tampons, birth control, department/bargain stores, shoes, debt management.
• Commercials during men's shows = Viagra, Cialis, beer, pickup trucks, debt management.
• Commercials during kid's shows = toys, minivans, debt management.

Wait a minute, why minivan and debt management commercials on shows whose target audience is children? My son says, "Those are for the moms that might be watching." To a certain extent, he's right, but I also think it might be because advertisers know that kids wield tremendous marketing power. Just because the feed is, as Amy so aptly phrased it in her post, "less...physically invasive", does not mean it's not there already.

For those of us who shop online, use e-mail, or surf the Internet, our online feeds can be more individually tailored. I recently got an e-mail (in my gmail account) that a classmate was following me on Twitter. When I opened the e-mail, this sponsored link appeared at the top of my inbox: "How Twitter Can Help at Work" from the NYT. If I had not been reading "Feed," I probably wouldn't have given this a second thought. Since I was reading "Feed," I felt a shudder at the insidious nature of online tracking. Could this be a coincidence? Maybe. I am not generally a conspiracy theorist, but it does make me pause and wonder who has access to all this information about me? And what might they be using it for?

I recently saw this "real" bionic woman on 20/20 (or Primetime), and it made me wonder if having a feed implant is really that far off. I hope so. I can always delete my cookies, turn off my computer, and read a book instead of watching tv. I like to believe that having my own thoughts (and keeping them private) is something that will always be an option for me and my family. Also, I can't imagine anything more disgusting than a filet mignon farm.

That's it for now. The ShamWow guy is on, and my family wants me to watch...

Bloglines vs. Google Reader

Before this week, I had never used Bloglines or Google Reader, so here are my bullets about each:

Bloglines (+)

• Setup was pretty easy, after I got over the default "Blog" tab, which I thought might mean "subscribe to blogs," but really meant "set up a Bloglines blog" (don't worry, I stopped the setup in time).
  
• Feed subscriptions arranged themselves alphabetically, which I like. I did check out the "Edit" feature, where I can make changes to this.
  
• I dragged a "Sub with Bloglines" button onto my Firefox bookmark bar (I think that's what it's called). Whenever I'm looking at a blog I like, I click to button to subscribe. :-)
  
• I like the options for customizing the search feature (on the right side of the screen), where I can search "My Feeds" for a search term like "bloglines" and see all the posts from my feeds on that topic. Very cool! You can also exclude your feeds, search the web, etc. This is my favorite Bloglines feature.

Bloglines (-)

• I completely agree with Jenna when she says "Bloglines was cumbersome to set up". Too many options to (in my case) de-select when you enter the URL.
  
• I had a hard time finding where to login from the Bloglines main page. I can't understand why they don't have an "Already a member, sign in" link right in the giant "Register for your Free Account" window.
  
• I don't like having to go to Bloglines to look at my feeds. I'm lazy! I looked at all the feed options, basic settings, etc., and I can't find a way to make Bloglines send me an e-mail when I have new feeds (if anyone knows how to do this, please let me know).

Google Reader (+)

• Easy to set up, especially if you use a lot of other Google products (which I do).
  
• Discovered that any blogs I was already following in blogger were already added to my feed subscription list. Sweet!
  
• Can be added to my iGoogle home page, saving me a "trip" to Google Reader every day. Awesome!

Google Reader (-)

• When I subscribed to SCILS598Announce, I got a huge list of entries. I had to fiddle around with the settings to only show new posts (unlike Bloglines, which defaults to the new post only setting).
  
• I don't like all the trends, etc. (that I can't get rid of). It reminds me that Google keeps track of everything I'm doing, which I don't like.

Bloglines has some great features, especially the search, but having to go there every day is a deal-breaker for me. I definitely see myself adding Google Reader to my "real" iGoogle home page as a lazy way to keep track of what I'm interested in.

Web 2.0 "New to Me" = Scrapblog!

Personally, I love the idea of scrapbooking. I have even created some (2 or 3) fantastic mementos from vacations.

Sadly, my good intentions are paving the road to photographic hell. I am the lady on the commercial whose family is trapped inside her digital camera (or in her computer). I also have boxes and bags of photos from the past ?? years of my life and the archival boxes where they will one day be lovingly stored (in order by date or occasion or something). Until that day arrives, I have been satisfying my extended family with .jpg files attached to e-mails.

Sure, I make the occasional flickr web album,

and I also use Picasa,

but those take me almost as long to organize and post as they would if they were actual pictures in an actual album.

So, this leads me to why I immediately focused on the scrapblog link in Kathy Schrock's list of web 2.0 applications. It took me about 7 minutes to put together this lovely 1-pg. scrapblog. I used a preset template, made a few changes with the text, grabbed some photos from my computer, and voila! Here it is........

If you click the "Play" button, you'll see what happened when I selected the "Ken Burns effect" for my photo....

I could happily mess around with this all day (I won't), and I definitely will be trying this in my personal life. Like other photosharing sites, scrapblog is also a community, allowing users to comment on each other's scrapblogs, create and share new templates, etc. They also have a show called "Get Crafty," where you can see short video demos of various techniques. Fun!

How to use this in the library, you ask??

• What a great way to easily embed customized "scrapbook" pages into your library blog or website! You could include photos of programs, photos of new books or other materials nestled on their shelves, waiting to be checked out...the possibilities are endless!
  
  
• You are not limited to photos! With the pre-set templates, you can quickly make some attention-grabbing ads for upcoming events. In addition to customizable text, there are also options for including video and/or audio!
  
  
• Easy, easy, easy to use, but lots of opportunity for customization, if you have the time and/or the inclination. The embed code is right there when you save, making it simple to grab and embed in your website or blog.
  
  
• Free! :-)

I see myself using this in the future, both personally and professionally. This is the kind of blogging I can get on board with!!

p.s. - I do find it a tiny bit creepy how quickly people were viewing and commenting on my scrapblog. I enjoy crafts as much as the next person, but I get the feeling that some scrapbloggers have a lot of time on their hands...

Musings on "The Social Life of Information"

.....I will begin by saying I feel a little misled by the title of this book. I expected it to be fun. I anticipated that Information would have an exciting social life. Sadly, this was not the case, at least in the Preface and in Chapter 3. Brown and Duguid paint a compelling portrait of a technological landscape that is not complete unless information is properly situated within its social (human) context. Although technology has been much ballyhooed, for decades, as ultimately having the capability to eliminate human error, Brown and Duguid explain why this continues to be unlikely: "People...are impressive at identifying others as individuals and dealing with them in context--a complex, highly situated form of interaction that computers are unable to replicate" (p. xii).

.....This got me thinking...Computers may be "smarter" than people, but they do not, as yet, have "a-ha" moments. It is unlikely that a computer will connect with a fellow computer and make a serendipitous discovery. The only light bulb that goes off in the computer is the one letting you know the power is on. However, technology provides new methods of connectivity every day, and in the not-so-distant future we can probably look forward to a Borg-like collective mind that represents the fusion of technology and humans, right? "Resistance is futile..." (SNG, "The Best of Both Worlds").

.....Then, I got to Chapter 3, "Home Alone." The home office diary is sure to resonate with anyone who has attempted to make their own way through an ISP setup -- the isolation and (often) ineptitude one feels when trying to install a network at home, the horror of not being able to pick up the interoffice phone and get an IT guy/gal to come look at the problem, the endless calls to unhelpful tech support. It certainly brought back bad memories of my own upgrade from dial-up to broadband, which included many site visits from a variety of technicians and an eventual utility pole replacement (before I could begin the six-hour installation process). It is unlikely that this is the scenario most companies envision when they tout the benefits of telecommuting. I was particularly struck by Brown and Duguid's assertion that "information technology, by ignoring the role played invisibly by the social system, is keeping people out of the home and in the conventional office, and not the other way around" (p. 79). People need to see each other "in context;" humans working in a communal environment can tap into a type of collective intelligence that is not readily available to them in the perceived isolation of their home offices or at their library terminals.

.....Since I haven't read beyond our assignment, I don't know whether Brown and Duguid propose that social networking tools can bridge the existing gap between humans and computers. For me, this reading has made me reflect on the ways in technology allows me to build community with people whom I have not met. Taking online classes allows me to be part of a community of people who can provide the type of "collective knowledge" that Brown and Duguid describe (p. 77). Perhaps social software is the breakthrough technology that can provide the social context that information has been waiting for.... For libraries and librarians, this means engaging actual people (members of the community, not just other librarians) in the rollout of new technologies. We cannot expect that using new technology will automatically appeal to users or attract new users...in fact, it may alienate some of our current users if they think the "old" way of doing things is no longer available to them. Communication with and feedback from the members of our library community is essential if we want to prevent disenfranchisement of our current patrons; outreach and advertising will be necessary to draw in new ones. Perhaps classes/demonstrations should be the first thing on our agenda when we, as librarians, want to implement new tech services in our libraries.

Works Cited
Brown, J.S. & Duguid, P. (2002). The Social Life of Information. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Star Trek: The Next Generation. The Best of Both Worlds, Part 1. Air date: 06.18.1990. Stardate: 43989.1.[http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/library/episodes/TNG/detail/68454.html] Accessed 09.20.2008.

Blogger vs. WordPress

Blogger (+):

• Super easy to set up and get started.
• Wysiwig editor and easily accessible editing of html.
• Dashboard is easy to use; tabs let you see where you are and what you're doing.
• Simple and clean layout.
• Easy to import/set up gadgets/widgets, etc.

Blogger (-):

• Limited templates to choose from. I don't have the time or the inclination to design my own.
• Only allows for listing of one IM contact in the profile setting.

WordPress (+):

• Beautiful templates! I wished I could choose more than one.
• Wysiwig editor and easily accessible editing of html.
• The html editor includes buttons for links, tags, etc., which makes this html editor better than Blogger's; also adding a link in the "visual" menu gives you the choice to add titles and targets, which is great!
• Easy to add widgets from their list (if they are not on the list, that's another story).

WordPress (-):

• They e-mailed my blog username and password!!!!!!! Aaaaargh.
• They say "howdy" when I sign in. I hate this.
• I had a little trouble adjusting to the Dashboard; it's very different from Blogger's and it took me a while to figure out what I was doing.
• Overall, the layout is very busy and there are so many choices!
• I wasted 1/2 hour trying to embed a twitter flash badge and finally had to settle for an RSS feed. For some reason, WordPress scrubs out most of the code.
• Weird formula for time that I had trouble figuring out (English major). They note that they are working on changing this.
• Snapshots of where links will take you is cool (but sometimes takes a long time to load and can be a little distracting).

For this course, I prefer Blogger. It was fast and easy to set up, and simple to use and modify. If I were going to be blogging a lot, WordPress is really pretty and has lots of bells and whistles. As a novice, I found the WordPress site to be a bit overwhelming.

I'm looking forward to hearing about other people's experiences!

My Favorite Library Blog...

...was harder to find than I first anticipated. Of course, I wanted to follow Steve's advice to look for blogs in an area that is different from what I'm normally doing (school libraries), so I started out by perusing lists of library blogs.

This blog has an annotated bibliography of "Select Librarian/Library Blogs." There are some interesting blogs here, but nothing that really catches my eye, and I'm pretty sure it was current in 2004. Next!

This list of "Library Weblogs" is cool, but it includes a lot of blogs that are not affiliated with libraries and seemingly has not been updated since 2006. Moving on....

Yes! My pick for the best place to find Library blogs is (insert drumroll here) "The Blogging Libraries Wiki"! Divided into easy categories (e.g., Academic, Public, School, and Special), the categories yield beautifully alphabetized lists of library blogs. But what's this, near the top of the page? It says, "Looking for a list of librarian blogs?" Well, no, I'm not right now, but since you asked....

I digress. I won't tell you how many hours I spent with the Annoyed Librarian, A Librarian's Guide to Etiquette, and Miss Information, but it was more than one. I also spent some time reading about a Twitter experiment and admiring this guy.

My favorite library blog is the Camden County Library Teen Zone Blog.

This is my favorite because:

• It is integrated into the library's teen space page.


• The tone and information are both appropriate for the intended audience.


• The links open in the Teen Zone page or in the main library page, so it's very easy to navigate and backtrack.


• When you hover over the links on the left, you get excellent descriptions of what you might find when you click on them.


• Technorati tags take you to earlier blog entries of interest and add a "cool" factor (for me, anyway).


• I couldn't look away from these shoes.