I have had a netLibrary account for a long time., I even helped with the initial audiobook FAQs. But this was the first time I actually downloaded a title successfully. I found a small file, selected radio quality, and downloaded it. It was strange that there was nothing to track the download, it notified me when it was starting, and automatically opened WMP when it was done. It only took 10 minutes (56K modem), and it played fine! I chose a book of Emily Dickinson poems. Only problem was that there is no way to select only parts of it to listen to, such as specific poems. For a novel that you are going to listen all the way through this would not be an issue.
Gee, one more entry into my blog, and I will be able to download and transfer audiobooks to my MP3 player!!!!!!
Finite to fail, but infinite to venture. - Emily Dickinson
Showing posts with label plcmcl2. Show all posts
Showing posts with label plcmcl2. Show all posts
Monday, October 30, 2006
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Library 2.0-Resistance is Futile
From reading some of the perspectives, both listed and from the Wikipedia article, its seems that individuals who "oppose" the Library 2.0 concept are exactly the ones who might be, or perhaps need to be, left behind. It has always been argued that libraries cannot be all things to all people. This attitude is reflected in the Wikipedia entry by the views of Walt Crawford, who argues that Library 2.0 is old ideas and and "incorrectly places libraries as the appropriate source for all users to gather all information"[1].
I prefer the view of Dr. Wendy Schultz and her growth of libraries into an experience. Traditional libraries, you know--the kind with books--will always have a place in the libraryland of the future, it will simply be absorbed into something new. Great, so now libraries are amoebas! The future library being more and more experiential, she describes physical libraries as storefronts, kind of a starting place, that will be one aspect of libraries, in combinations with virtual retrieval of virtual information formats. This helps to make libraries suitable for, and accessible to, more and more people for more reasons--closer and closer to being all things for all people. I particularly like her concept of the knowledge spa: meditation, relaxation, immersion in a luxury of ideas and thought. We seem to rush so now, putting out fires and moving onto the next, the idea of relaxing with information is inspiring. Maybe as people adjust to limiting and refining the growing amount of info we need to sconstantly sort through, there will actually be less information overload even with more information.
Whether you consider Library 2.0 new or old, libraries are changing rapidly and dramatically. Resistance is futile.
I prefer the view of Dr. Wendy Schultz and her growth of libraries into an experience. Traditional libraries, you know--the kind with books--will always have a place in the libraryland of the future, it will simply be absorbed into something new. Great, so now libraries are amoebas! The future library being more and more experiential, she describes physical libraries as storefronts, kind of a starting place, that will be one aspect of libraries, in combinations with virtual retrieval of virtual information formats. This helps to make libraries suitable for, and accessible to, more and more people for more reasons--closer and closer to being all things for all people. I particularly like her concept of the knowledge spa: meditation, relaxation, immersion in a luxury of ideas and thought. We seem to rush so now, putting out fires and moving onto the next, the idea of relaxing with information is inspiring. Maybe as people adjust to limiting and refining the growing amount of info we need to sconstantly sort through, there will actually be less information overload even with more information.
Whether you consider Library 2.0 new or old, libraries are changing rapidly and dramatically. Resistance is futile.
Sunday, October 08, 2006
AARRRRRRRRRGHHHHHH!
OK. I consider myself fairly technically literate. OK, very literate. So imagine my surprise when it tok 2 and a half hours to complete the RSS tasks. Listened to the podcast, watched the tutorials, no problem. Signed up for a bloglines account, no problem. Located lots of blogs, including the assigned ones and several staff blogs, no problem. Then came the part about the public blog and blogrolls. You mean blog!#$$^*%G&*%^$^&% ( Don't know why this wanted to turn that garbled mess into a link???) First, the screenshot wasn't there that explained the step. It wasn't clear once I generated the script where to put it. After an hour of messing with it, I saw that there was a new BETA version of blogger. I found this by going through blogger help and Googling for bloggroll help. My very talented co-worker (OK she is on my staff and she is finished and I will probably be the last of my department to finish oh the shame but at least she knew what she was doing) said that she had switched to the beta and that it was indeed easier to "add elements" which is what adding a bloggroll is. So I switched my blog to the beta, which meant signing up for a Google account. Fine. Well the "Add Page Elements" option was not there. She even pulled up her page to show me what it should look like, but mine wasn't there. Something got lost in the translation between the regular and Beta. So, I logged off and on again, and Voila!!!! it was there! Surely my problems were over. I found the right place, added the script, and........ No feeds. I hadn't shared my profile. Huh???? So I had to figure out on which of the many screens of options on bloglines did I tell it to share. I found it. Refreshed the blog and ....it only displayed three of my 15 feeds. After a lot of looking and detective work, I realized that I actually had set up a bloglines account previously, and it was pulling those feeds. Another hour (over 2 different days) I finally fixed it all. Of course, I couldn't just delete the one bloglines account, so I had to change info and profile names, and keep updating the script element in Beta Blogger. Well, it is real purty now. Of course, I haven't had time to read all my feeds, because I have been getting this to work. My public blogroll is http://www.bloglines.com/public/vintageradiance
To end this rant, I need to comment that if I got this frustrated, it could be bad enough for others to give up. And they are exactly the ones that this wonderful program is meant for, to show them that these cool tools are not something to be afraid of, but discovered and used. I love this program. I think it is great that it is discovery based. I also think it is great how we are encouraged to utilize fellow staff to troubleshoot. However, I believe that certain things should have a little more guidance. For me it was blogrolls, but others have had trouble with other things that simply didn't work the way they were supposed to. This is basically hindsight now, but identifying after this is over what were problem areas for staff and adding "cheat sheets" for especially tough areas (or troubleshooting tips) would benefit those looking at modeling programs after Learning 2.0. This is not a criticism, simply an opinion on my experience, and the hope that this is as wonderful a discovery experience for everyone as possible. Of course, you can always chalk it all up to operator error, and leave it at that. I personally will keep plugging away, I am truly enjoying understanding all of the 23 things.
To end this rant, I need to comment that if I got this frustrated, it could be bad enough for others to give up. And they are exactly the ones that this wonderful program is meant for, to show them that these cool tools are not something to be afraid of, but discovered and used. I love this program. I think it is great that it is discovery based. I also think it is great how we are encouraged to utilize fellow staff to troubleshoot. However, I believe that certain things should have a little more guidance. For me it was blogrolls, but others have had trouble with other things that simply didn't work the way they were supposed to. This is basically hindsight now, but identifying after this is over what were problem areas for staff and adding "cheat sheets" for especially tough areas (or troubleshooting tips) would benefit those looking at modeling programs after Learning 2.0. This is not a criticism, simply an opinion on my experience, and the hope that this is as wonderful a discovery experience for everyone as possible. Of course, you can always chalk it all up to operator error, and leave it at that. I personally will keep plugging away, I am truly enjoying understanding all of the 23 things.
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