JMS returns

The Amazon Screening Room's Blog has an audio interview with J. Michael Straczynski regarding the forthcoming "Babylon 5: The Lost Tales". He says that there will be more if the first one sells well. So, go pre-order one now.

White Chicks & Gang Signs

Michelle posted the following photo from ALA:

To which I see and raise

Nixon reincarnated

He's sounding more like Richard Nixon ever day. Now Bush is claiming executive privilege on documents.

My only planned post on this subject

<fingers in ears>nah nah nah iPhone nah nah nah I can't hear you nah nah nah</fingers in ears>

Uncontrolled Vocabulary, episode #1

Last night I participated in the inaugural episode of Greg Schwartz's new podcast Uncontrolled Vocabulary. The Hollywood pitch is that it's TWiT meets the library world. It was the most fun I've had on the phone with my pants on.

Death Star Help Desk

More dramatic prariedog

No folks, it's not a chipmunk...

No, don't hold back. Tell us what you really think.

The ALA wrap-up blog posts are starting to come in and of course I'm going to read KGS'. And, as usual, she's got a way with words. Here's the best part in all its poetic glory:

"Speaking of which… seeing the wireframes for the proposed ALA website and feeling underwhelmed. It’s not grotesquely ugly like the current site, but it’s a static organizational page about as inviting as a cold speculum. Where’s the engagement? Why are blogs squeezed way down on the right? Why does the “divisions” link exclude the Round Tables? I give it an “ix-nay,” and I’ll go into depth later."

Which Punctuation Mark Am I?

Your Score: ellipsis

You scored 38% Sociability and 64% Sophistication!

Your life can be difficult because of your insecurities, but you should know that it isn't your fault. YOU didn't ask to be thrown in around thirty times per page in every bodice-ripper on the shelf! Those who overuse you can kiss your . . . you know. You need to learn to hold your head high and glory in your solitude. You really do have excellent, scholarly tastes. You must never forget that your friend, the period, will be there to support you at the end of every sentence where you truly belong, and, if what is left out is as important as what is said, why, then you are as vital as the alphabet!

Link: The Which Punctuation Mark Are You Test written by Gazda on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

The Cult of the Amateur a (partial) response

Yesterday I started reading The Cult of the Amateur by Andrew Keen a 228 page polemic, a la Michael Gorman, against Web 2.0, blogs, Wikipedia, "citizen journalism", and mashups, and that's just in the first 50 pages. I call this a "partial response" as 50 pages is all I've read so far. I do plan on reading the rest of the book but I've been taking notes and I've got a lot to say already. At this rate I'll respond to what I've read so far and then probably not blog about the book any further. Based on how much I have to say from just over 20% of the book, I won't have the time necessary to do this five more times. So, here we go...

Mr. Keen starts out by explaining how he got to where he is regarding his opinion on Web 2.0. It all began at the Friends of O'Reily (FOO) weekend in which the current digerati were practically worshiping the concepts Keen is writing against. The point of the point of the weekend, as is Web 2.0, was to participate. Instead Keen "stopped participating and sat back and watched." I would argue that this is exactly the central problem with the book. Instead of participating and trying to change things that he doesn't like, he instead watches from the outside, sitting on the pedestal he's placed himself on, and complains about practically everything. This just turns into an "the old way was the better way" argument and won't bring many people to your side. It just makes you sound whiny and impotent.

On page 17 Keen equates intellectual property theft with stifled creativity. I don't want to turn this into a discussion of the current state of our copyright laws but when I first read this I thought "but what about mashups? They're creative." Well, Keen speaks of mashups later and views them as nothing but theft and utterly lacking in creativity. I defy anyone to listen to either The Grey Album or American Edit and tell me there's not creativity there.

On page 19, Keen gives two example of how mainstream media (MSM) has exposed information posted on blogs as being totally false yet completely ignores the fact that blogs have exposed falsehoods in MSM also. Has he forgotten the conservative bloggers that exposed the inaccuracies in 60 Minute's reporting on Bush's National Guard service record?

On page 20 Keen dives into Wikipedia and complains about the inaccuracies reported within minutes of Ken Lay's death on Wikipedia's Kenneth Lay page. He "demonstrates" Wikipedia's "problems" by quoting how the page inconsistently reported his death within the (what one assumes to be) first six minutes after his death was announced. Since this was a developing event that's hardly a great way to prove it's inaccurate. No matter what the medium inaccuracies will be reported, and later corrected, when it comes to developing stories. Go back and read things that were reported on CNN and the like within minutes of the planes hitting on 9/11. I'm sure that within the first minutes you could find some inaccuracies having been reported within MSM too.

Pages 29-30 talk about the Long Tail and how despite there being more content there is a "scarcity of talent". Now, I'm not one to argue using statistics but my theory is that there isn't a scarcity of talent, just that there's more talentless people than talented ones. So, the more people you throw into the pool the more it will seem like there's less talent. For example, if you have a group on 100 people and 20 of them have talent, that seems like a lot of talented people. However, if you have a group of 1,000 people and 200 of them are talented it seems like there's not that many talented people. 20% are still talented, it's just maybe a little harder to find them in a larger pool. Additionally, the more opportunity there is, as afforded by the tools Keen is complaining about, I would argue that the more likely a talented person is to get a chance to prove how talented they are. Not everyone needs a Doctorate in music to be a great musician.

Page 31 has Keen pointing out a central failing of blogs, as part of the long tail, is that no one is making any money at it. This assumes that all bloggers are, or at least should be, in it for the money and if they aren't we shouldn't care what they have to say. False premise. False conclusion.

Page 32 states "artificial intelligence is a poor substitute for taste" when comparing online automated recommendation systems to reviews printed in the New York Times, the Financial Times, the New Yorker, and the Chicago Sun-Times. To use an old cliche, apples and oranges. There's a difference between a review of a movie and "if you liked this, you might like this". In the first case, with limited exception, the review is of the single film (album, book, etc.) while the recommendation is in a context of other films (albums, books, etc. and in many cases cross-referencing the different types of media. When did you last hear Roger Ebert say that if you likes that album, you'd like this film.)

"The professional is being replaced by the amateur, the lexicographer by the layperson, the Harvard professor by the unschooled populace" Keen says on page 37 in his comparison of Wikipedia to the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Oxford English Dictionary. I would counter that the idea of Wikipedia was not to replace but to supplement. Those that don't understand that difference should be instructed in it, not told to ignore one source out of hand.

On page 40 Keen brings up the often used story of essjay, a well-known Wikipedia editor "was discovered to have made false claims on his Wikipedia user page and in a phone interview concerning his age, job, activities, background, and academic credentials." (This quote is from the linked Wikipedia article, not Keene's book as I feel it described the situation better than what Keen wrote.) The trouble is, neither Keen, nor anyone else I've read (including the Wikipedia article itself) whether essjay's edits were ever incorrect. My suspicion is that he was good at what he did as all anyone can attack him for is that he lied about his credentials. I'm not justifying his lying but think about it: would anyone have taken him seriously if he had told the truth. I'm sure Mr. Keen wouldn't have.

In Keen's overly brief bio of Jimmy Wales on page 41 he says "...Wales first discovered the Internet as a teenager playing Multi-User Dungeon (MUD) fantasy games such as Zork, Myst, and the Scepter of Goth." This is just wrong. As far as I recall neither Zork nor Myst were connected to the Internet nor were they MUDs. Zork came on 5.25" floppies and Myst on CD-ROM. (Correct me if I'm wrong but it looks like someone didn't do their research on this statement...) Also, the way it's written it implies that anyone who played online D&D-like games as a kid obviously has something wrong with them today as an adult.

On page 45 Keen practically blames Wikipedia for layoffs at Encyclopedia Britannica and "no doubt more lay-offs are to come". If Wikipedia's to blame so is Microsoft for putting out Encarta (both on CD/DVD and online). Let's ignore the US economy too.

On page 47 Keen is clear to point out (parenthetically) that "in February 2007, the Middlebury College history department banned students from citing Wikipesia as a source for research papers." Good for them. However, if they're allowing college students to cite an encyclopedia they're still being irresponsible. Even Jimmy Wales says that Wikipedia shouldn't be used as a primary source. If you need to set up rules like this for your students there's a problem with how and what they're being taught, not a problem with a particular resource.

Lastly, on page 49, Keen quotes Al Saracevic, deputy business editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, saying the following: "In America, bloggers don't go to jail for their work. That's the difference between professionals and amateurs." The date on this quote is "fall 2006" so I'll possibly cut Keen some slack, but this statement is no longer true, and may not have been at the time it was said. Check out this article from the Washington Post about blogger Josh Wolf who, by March 2007 had spent six months in jail for contempt of court "for refusing to turn over a videotape he shot of a violent San Francisco demonstration against a Group of Eight summit meeting." Six months as of March would have put him behind bars in October (the fall of) 2006. Mr. Saracevic may not have been aware of the case at the time, or it may have happened after he made that statement but it's both no longer true and chilling.

Like I said, I'm going to finish reading the book if for nothing else than to better know the arguments of that side of the debate. I am a teacher after all and should know these things whether I agree with them or not. However, I'm finding myself wishing it was over already. The book is unashamedly one-sided and so far contains not a single "well maybe the other side has a point".

When I posted on Twitter (not mentioned in the book, I checked the index) that I was reading this I was thanked for "taking a hit for the team." After just a 10 pages I responded that it felt "more like I'm taking a bazooka to the face."

Make Firefox spell-check all form fields

I love Firefox's built-in spellchecker, especially when I'm blogging. Unfortunately, by default it only runs spellcheck in text-boxes (the form fields that allow for multiple lines of input). Well, with one small tweak of Firefox's config file you can make spellcheck work in every form field!

• In the address bar enter about:config
• Filter for layout.spellcheckDefault
• Double click the value and change it to 2
• Restart Firefox

via kevinhasablog

I got me some tickets!

With the exception of the 30th Anniversary Tour I've been to a show on every Rush tour since 1989. This time around I'm going to see them in Bonner Springs, KS (Kansas City) on August 23rd! (What's 200 miles each way when it comes to Rush?) I'm a little bummed that they decided to play Red Rocks this year but that's much further and the date was bad for my schedule so KC it is.

"Bob"

Think about it. You'll get it eventually.

Library break-ins "solved" by Internet filters

I'd decided not to blog about this unique library filtering saga until the story was resolved. Well, it was resolved last week exactly as I predicted. Here's the salient points:

• Library board doesn't install filters. It's been this way for years with no significant complaints.
• Library experiences a series of break-ins.
• Turns out teen boys were breaking into the library to look at porn on the library computers.
• City shuts off library's Internet access.
• Board meets. Agrees to "solve" problem by installing filters on the computers.
• Library gets Internet access back.

There's no two ways about this one folks, the library board caved into the pressure. Ultimately I believe the actual problem, teens committing a crime by breaking into the library, wasn't actually addressed. No article I read about this story mentioned that maybe the building's security needed to be improved. Really, the old library non-filtering policy wasn't the issue since the boys obviously felt the need to break in after hours to view porn. I'm sure that if they felt that they could get away with looking at porn during normal library hours, they would have done so instead of taking the risks involved in the crime they ended up committing.

I've learned something new as a result of this story. It turns out that break-ins can be stopped by porn filters. Go figure.

Xtreme Irony

Protesting rule 101. Your argument should at least make some sense.

More human than human. That's our motto.

Blade Runner: The Final Cut

I'm not sure if I should be happy or upset over yet another version of this film.

That's not a pocket.

Tickle-Me Emo

Rainbow video

Amazing Rainbows

There was a reasonably-sized thunder storm in town this evening and I was sitting in my garage watching the end of the storm when I looked up and saw the most amazing rainbow. You could see it from almost a full 180 degrees at at some times, at either end, you could see a second one. Here's just one of the better photos. Click on it to see the rest of the set.

Richard Dawkins speaks about Second Life

You can find the video on the Telegraph.co.uk site. (I was unsuccessful in my attempts to embed it here.)

What's my blog rated?

I was just going to post the rating itself but when I read "why" I got that rating, I just had to share the whole page.

Funny, but for the wrong reasons

This comic is funny but only because I know of so few librarians who would actually be bothered by the actions of the non-librarian. Ah, stereotypes.

Speechless

This page from the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has left me practically speechless.

"The Oversight Committee has learned that over the objections of the National Archives, Vice President Cheney exempted his office from the presidential order that establishes government-wide procedures for safeguarding classified national security information. The Vice President asserts that his office is not an 'entity within the executive branch.'"

Ok, maybe Spore isn't vaporware just yet.

According to Next Generation - Interactive Entertainment Today EA says that Spore delay is "Misinformation".

Edublogging

I'm currently giving a talk on Edublogging at Doan College here in Lincoln.

Richard Dawkins reads the new preface to The God Delusion paperback

Online Reader's Advisory

I don't generally check out Web sites that people e-mail me about through my contact form asking me specifically to blog about their site but debbiesidea.com sounded interesting enough to peek at. Basically it's a user-driven reader's advisory site. So far there doesn't seem to be an overwhelming about of information about many authors but it's got potential if enough people contribute. Check it out. Maybe it's something (like LibraryThing) that the greater library community can get behind.

New things in Vista

I'm going to start posting semi-regularly about the sometime subtle yet wonderful changes from XP to Vista. To start here's the screen you get when you attempt to move or copy a file into a directory in which a file with the same name already exists. Not only is this screen helpful but the new third choice to "Move/Copy, but keep both files" is a great "I'm not sure" option.

What's your chance of suviving a zombie apocalypse

53%

When your first life and second life merge

Just where is Coruscant anyway?

via TheTrukstoP.com

Spore delayed until 2009

Fine. Actually get me excited about a video game and then put it off practically indefinitely. I'm considering Spore officially vaporware at this point. Oh, and when did "United States", "UK", and "Brasil" become languages?

Beacuse my blog needs a little drama

More on Sicko being pulled from YouTube

Reuters is reporting the story behind Sicko being pulled from YouTube. Here's the two best quotes from the article:

"Every DVD screener that comes from the Weinstein Co. is watermarked and traceable," Weinstein Co. general counsel Peter Hurwitz said. "We are actively investigating who illegally uploaded 'Sicko' to the Internet, and we will take appropriate action against that person(s)."

"I think the music industry's response to Napster was misguided ... and for me, it's about getting people to see the movie and that's what I want, so they will talk about it," Moore recently told Brandweek magazine. "I would never want to prosecute anybody who would download (his film)."

Granted, one is complaining about the uploaders, while the other is defending the downloaders, but you can't have one without the other.

Some people are having a better day than you are

Say hello to Sir Salman Rushdie and Dr. Michael Stephens. You decide which is the more momentous of the two. Congratulations to you both!

Nerdvana

I think my office is finally set up to cover what I need. Ok, it took three computers and an additional DSL line to do it, but now I can really get some work done ;-)

I'm in Walt's index

I just got our copy of Walt Crawford's Balanced Libraries: Thoughts on Continuity and Change and lo, what do I find in the index, but my name!

"Do you have a carefully developed acceptable use policy for internet access within the library? Why? What makes internet resources different from books or magazines, in terms of acceptable use within a library setting? Wouldn't it be more straightforward to have an overall acceptable-use policy that applies to all library resources? Eliminating redundant policies saves time and makes application more consistent and defensible. For that matter, you might be able to simplify library policies in general by taking a different approach. Read "Don't doesn't work" by Michael Sauers. I find his case for consistent, simplified, behavioral policies compelling—and almost certainly time-saving."

Thanks Walt! I can't wait to read the rest of the book.

Sicko isn't on YouTube any more

It was reported over the weekend that Michael Moore's new film Sicko was available in it's entirety on YouTube. Well, despite Mr. Moore being on record saying as "I don't agree with the copyright laws and I don't have a problem with people downloading the movie and sharing it with people as long as they're not trying to make a profit off my labour. I would oppose that… I do well enough already and I made this film because I want the world to change. The more people who see it the better, so I'm happy this is happening." it seems he isn't in charge. Lionsgate films has ordered it taken down.

I just reversed the polarity of the neutron flow.

If you know why the title of this post is funny, you'll especially love the Random Technobabble Generator.

I'm in boingboing!

ok, not really. I used the Boing Boing Blog Post Generator

Shunning Dewey on NPR

Arizona Library Shuns Dewey System
Weekend Edition Saturday, June 16, 2007 · When a public library in Gilbert, Ariz., opened this month, the books had no Dewey decimals on their spines. The library is organized like a bookstore. Library official Marshall Shore explains why.
Listen to this story...

My response, every reason he gave for why they got rid of Dewey could have been down without getting rid of Dewey.

What song was #1 on the day you were born?

Ugh! According to the site #1 Song on This Date in History I get "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" by Diana Ross. A great reference resource but blech!

8 Random Things

I've been tagged by Nicole. I've been putting it off but here I go...

1. I almost lettered in Girls Soccer in high school.
2. I played trumpet and was rather good at it. I'm not about 15 years out of practice and wish I had a reason to pick it up again.
3. In grad school my nickname was CyberRat. This was the source of the name of my consulting business in Las Vegas, CR Associates Internet Consulting.
4. Favorite music, in no particular order: David Bowie, Norah Jones, Rush, Queen, Miles Davis, Chet Baker
5. The last PC Game I played was Burn:Cycle. If I play games, I'll play games. I think Guitar Hero is starting to suck me in. Spore will probably kill me.
6. I share my birthday with Ani DiFranco.
7. I get books on CD from the public library and rip them to my iPod. (Bad me)
8. I have two nieces, one nephew, and my second nephew should arrive tomorrow.

I hereby tag Laura. I guess she'll have to post them on Twitter as she doesn't have her own blog.

More flickr reprints on the way

I got a request from the folks at Mouse House News to use some of my Disney photos from last August. (They weren't specific as to which ones.) With appropriate credit I've given them the permission they've requested. The results will be shared when they arrive.

lolwho

TARDIS
Originally uploaded by Sean Grimm

I posted some screenshots of the latest Doctor Who episode Sunday morning and a few hours later I got lol'd. (I've never actually created an lolcat, I'm just not that amused by them, so it was fun to be on the receiving end of this one.)

This one's for you, Travelin' Librarian!

This one's for you, Travelin' Librarian!
Originally uploaded by Biker Librarian

Thanks Betty!

One library's solution

I visited the Scottsbluff Public Library in Scottsbluff, NE on Monday and I loved their solution to the Dewey "problem". To them, it just seemed like the right thing to do and have been doing it for years. I was told the public love it. (They also do something similar in fiction.)

If interested in doing this in your library, you can order them(well, a close version anyway) from DEMCO. They're called "DEMCO® Sturdy Colored Shelf Markers". Sorry, their site doesn't allow for linking directly to a product's page. (Hey Demco, fix that, I'm trying to sell some of your stuff here and you're not making it easy.)

Safari for Windows... Maybe not

Maybe you should wait for beta 2 of Safari 3 for Windows it seems that there's a mojor security flaw in the current version.

Safari 3 for Windows

Apple has announced that Safari 3 Public Beta is also available for Windows. They also claim it's "the fastest web browser on any platform, Safari loads pages up to 2 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2."

Blogging from Scottsbluff

This morning I'm in Scottsbluff, NE teaching 11 area librarians how to blog. Of course, nine of them are sitting in the back row. Only two brave souls are sitting in the front row.

Cross-site tag searching

TagsAhoy! is a new service that searches your tags across multiple online services. At this time it searches for tags in del.icio.us, Flickr, Gmail, Squirl, LibraryThing and Connotea. (I'm not familiar with that last one.) All you need to do is sign up for a free account and then point it to your accounts on the other services. The service works as described and they claim that more searches will be added shortly. (I'd like to see it search YouTube and SlideShare for example.) This photo shows my search results for the tag "wiki". I can say that I'm impressed with the service. It's nice to be able to search for items I've tagged without having to go to multiple sites to do it. (I'm planning on writing an OpenSearch plugin for it but sites that you have to log into, don't always work as well as I'd like.)

I Am Legend trailer

The third version of this Richard Matheson classic finally gets the same title as the book. (The Last Man on Earth & The Omega Man were versions one and two, for those not in the know.)

Mashin' up with Granny Teller

Weinberger Interview

For those that missed it, the OPAL archive has an MP3 of yesterday's interview of David Weinberger, author of Everything is Miscellaneous.

Pop-up porn sub gets new trial

I'm so happy to hear that "Julie Amero, the substitute teacher who could have received 40 years in jail after porn appeared on classroom PCs" will get a new trial.

D&D

Susan reminded me of this song, and it's a classic I just have to share.

Contains adult language.

Geek Plate

*This

Here's a list of the social networks I'm actively participating in:

• Flickr
• YouTube
• SlideShare
• LibraryThing
• Twitter
• Blog
• del.icio.us
• Jaiku
• Tumblr
• Facebook
• Yelp

Then there's the ones I have accounts in but don't use all that much:

• 43Things
• BlipTV
• Google Video
• MySpace

I'm sure I'm forgetting a few too. Add the fact that in some of these services (Flickr, YouTube, blogging) I have access to multiple accounts, one personal, one work. (Blip.tv is only work right now. I don't have a personal account there.)

Here's the problem: when I find something interesting online or have something to say, how should I share it?

I've got four bookmarklets set up; BlogThis, TwitThis, TumblThis, and TwitThis, along with the Share+ button on the Facebook toolbar, which makes posting to those sites a simple process. But each one has a different audience (if any audience at all) with different levels of immediacy. (For example, if I post it to my blog, only my subscribers will read it but maybe not for a few hours or days. If I post it to Facebook, only my Facebook friends will see it albeit a bit quicker. If I put it out to Twitter, only my Twitter followers will see it but within minutes.) Additionally, Twitter posts need to be kept to 140 characters, my Tumblog can contain more but I usually don't, del.icio.us is for stuff I want to go back to later or share with my classes, and my blog is for more extensive writing even though I post short stuff there too.

Well I could, and do sometimes, post the same content, or various versions of the same content, to multiple services. For example, I put a link to my blog review of my new keyboard on Twitter. Why didn't I also share it on Facebook? I have no idea. It just didn't occur to me until I wrote the previous sentence.

I have a pseudo-solution and that's my Jaiku account. Jaiku allows me to pull in content from all of my other accounts that are outputting feeds. So, if you visit my Jaiku page or subscribe to my Jaiku feed, you'll get all of the content from almost every other service I post to. (There's no way to pull in Facebook info that I can find so there's one notable exception.) The trouble is, there's no one in my extended circle of friends using Jaiku with two notable exceptions (planetneutral and jessamyn) and they don't seem to be doing much with it anyway. So, is a "solution" really a solution if no one uses it? I don't think so.

So, how do you handle it? Do you just pick a favorite and stick to it? Do you clearly delineate in your own mind what goes where and not worry about who's at the receiving end? I'd really like to know.

Steampunk Star Trek

Wikis in Plain English

Another instructional video from the folks @ Common Craft.

Logitech diNovo Edge Keyboard

Last week I realized that there was a down side to how I'd hooked up my laptop to my HDTV. The laptop ended up connected to the TV and on top of my stereo cabinet, forcing me to stand at the computer to use it, or in my lap on my sofa, but not connected to the TV. So, I started poking around for wireless keyboards and mice. Thinking that a mouse wasn't going to work all that well, and that would just be one more "remote" in my livingroom, I shopped for a wireless keyboard with a built in trackpad. What I found was the Logitech diNovo Edge Keyboard.

At $149 this keyboard is a smidge on the pricey side but it's worth every penny. It's light, it's thin, it doesn't need AA or AAA batteries due to the built in Li-Ion batteries and charging station, and it's on board "touch disc". The batteries are quoted as being able to last a month or more on a single charge and based on other reviews I have no reason to doubt that. The "touch disc" is a round touchpad but with two special spots on the disc that allow for both vertical and horizontal scrolling once you get the hang of it.

Stylistically, this is a gorgeous piece of equipment. It's sleek and black, and had many backlit icons for special functions. (For example, the ring around the touch disc lights up when your using it and slowly fades out when you stop.) And, as other reviewers have said, it even looks great when sitting in the charging station.

The wireless connection runs on Bluetooth and this is where I ran into some problems. My Vista Ultimate laptop has built in Bluetooth but I'd not used it in the past as this is my first Bluetooth device for a computer. So, I went into the Bluetooth configuration settings and instructed the computer to find the device. I'd pressed all the right buttons and read all the instructions a dozen times but computer continually failed to find the keyboard. So, as a test, I plugged in the USB dongle for computers that didn't have Bluetooth and everything connected almost instantly. Therefore, the problem was with my computer, not the keyboard.

An hour later, having read many a support document, it seemed that Bluetooth was "running" (at least there was a Bluetooth icon in my system tray) but it was "turned off". Using the function keys to turn it on didn't work since, ultimately, the laptop was refusing to recognize the built in Bluetooth hardware. My guess is that something happened in the upgrade to Vista.

I found updated drivers from Gateway, downloaded them, and ran the install program. The install program informed me that I had to first uninstall the old version. Off to Add/Remove Programs to uninstall Bluetooth. Upon reboot, Vista found the hardware, reinstalled the (original) drivers, and before trying to install new drivers, I tried again. This time, the keyborad connected as it should.

(I don't blame the keyboard or Logitech for this at all. I mention it since others might have a similar problem.)

I then installed the Logitech software which seems to give me some additional options and customizations but I'm in no hurry to investigate those since so far I've been able to do everything I've needed to do.

The only other odd thing I've noticed is the keyboard's volume control. Using the keyboard to raise and lower the volume seems only to work within a small range, not silent-to-blearing like you'd expect. I'm sure this again has something to do with the OS' volume settings and not a problem with the keyboard itself. This is also something I'm not all that worried about as I'll probably use the TV remote's volume control more than anything else.

For those interested, a slideshow of the unpacking, Bluetooth installation(sans screenshots of the hour of troubleshooting) and Logitech software installation, can be found in my Flickr account.

Teasing your users

In surfing around various library Web sites this morning I found this:

Granted, I've not seen an "under construction" page in a while but this might as well be one. "email: pending"!? Either you have an e-mail address or not. If you don't (and just why doesn't the library have an e-mail address?) then don't bother listing the fact that you're working on getting one. Just leave it out, and when you do have an e-mail address, then list it on the site. Please, don't tease your users.

Blogger weirdness

I've noticed lately that when I publish a new post sometimes the publishing happens quickly, sometimes very slowly. The difference seemed to be in whether I included labels (categories) with the post. (For example, when creating a post with BlogThis! you can't add labels so posts are published quickly. When posting via Blogger, I add labels and things publish slowly.) Well, the image at the right (shrunk since it's huge,) "explains" the problem. Whenever you publish a new post with a label, whether one label or a dozen, Blogger republishes every page for every label you've ever used. So, in this example, I wrote a new post with one label, "blogosphere", yet several hundred files were created, and SFTP'd to my server. All that should have been published are the four files: the post's page, the main page, the archive page, and the page for the one label I used.

I'll be submitting this to Blogger and will follow up here with any response I receive.

Aren't we already aware of this?

The Amazon.com blog wants parents to "Get excited" because it's potty training awareness month. Really is potty training is something we need to be made aware of? (BTW, isn't Elmo a little overdressed in this photo?)

Change, Transparancy, and a blog suggestion

When I tell people that I currently have more than 400 feeds in my aggregator most stare at me a bit slack-jawed. How could I possibly read that much content. Well, to be honest, I read a lot of headlines and skim the rest. I look for patterns and that leads me to what I need to read in more depth. However, after today, I will be reading every word of every post Meredith Farkas ever writes. (Oh, and there's a copy of Social Software in Libraries on my desk that I'll be starting just as soon as I'm done with Everything is Miscellaneous.)

Two days ago, Meredith posted a lengthy, yet worth the time to read, commentary on change and transparency, and how change for change's sake isn't necessarily good and how transparency only works if you're actually responding to the comments you're receiving. Go now and read her post. Be sure to read all the comments too. I'm sure there'll be more by the time you get there.

When you're done, leave a response, the go back to her first paragraph and follow the link (or this one) to the Library Suggestion Blog from Virginia Commonwealth University’s library. For those looking for a way to use blogging to be more transparent and more human, there's a spectacular example that I'll be subscribing to and demoing in my future blogging workshops.

Thanks Meridith! I'm glad I know you and I'm glad the profession has you!

Collapsible fork

This came with my lunch today and I'm totally fascinated with it.

Another Blogging via Word 2007 test

Since someone just asked me "how clean is the code Office 2007 puts out" for blogging I figured I'd do another test. This post contains much more complicated formatting and an image pulled in from MS ClipArt.

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Here's some right-aligned text.

And some centered text in another font.

Come on people!

Time for another rant.

If you've ever stuck a CD into your computer and had your player program magically tell you the name of the album, the artist, and all the track information, then you're familiar with the Gracenote (formerly known as the CD Database, CDDB). This is a generally useful collection of data about CDs totally created by volunteers. How is the data gathered? Well, whenever you put a CD into your computer and the program fails to fill in the information, you can fill it in and then submit the data back up to the larger collective. Here's my beef: I'm sick and tired of the number of basic mistakes in the data. The number of mistakes I've run into recently leads me to believe there is no quality control at all. Here's my first example:

Incorrect:

In this case someone thought that the name of the album was "Chronicles (Disc 4)" which was "disc 1 of 1" in a set of one. Sorry folks, but the name of the Album is "Chronicles" and this happens to be disc 4 of a 6-disc set. Additionally, this is a book on CD. They don't have composers! (Nor, folks is the name of the person reading the book considered a composer. The number of times I've seen that.)

Correct:

My other example:

Incorrect:

In this case someone has decided that the author's name is "Cynthia Lennnon", the name of the album is "Lennon 1" and that this is a "Compilation CD". Well, I'd forgive the misspelling of her name (I'm hardly one to be able to complain about that,) but it carries through all nine CDs. They got the "disc 1 of 9" correct but still insisted on misnaming the album itself. And finally, compliation CD are albums with multiple artists, typically a different one for each track. Sorry, this is another book on CD, there is only one artist. (If it was an anthology by multiple authors then this option should be checked.)

Correct:

Just had to get that off my chest.

An Interesting Clock

Found @ http://blog.pixelbreaker.com/upload/polarclock/polarclock.html

And another thing...

Signs only work for those that read them.

What's the problem?

The problem isn't the Dewey Decimal System, the problem is us.

The Nebraska Sky

I've posted a lot of photos of the sky here in Nebraska. Despite having live in Colorado for almost 10 years, and having visited most of the rest of the country, I will say that the sky here in Nebraska is the most impressive I've ever seen. This past Friday I was driving home from Holdrege, NE and saw some mammatus clouds ans was able to snap off a few photos before they disappeared. Here's the best one:

There are a few others in my flickr account you can get to from the photo in this post. For some even better photos, check out these photos from 2004 taken in Hastings, NE (just down the road from Holredge) from the UNL High Plains Regional Climate Center. (I'd discovered these just last week. Had I not, I wouldn't have know what I was looking at.)

Musical compant shelving