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Archive for July, 2007

Email Dead… Again!

Monday, July 23rd, 2007

C|net has a story that highlights the demise of email among teens. It really is dead for people under 25. Texting, IM, MySpace, FaceBook, Twitter, Blogging, and the plethora of other social networking sites have replaced so much of regular communication that email is essentially dead. It’s still necessary for transactions and stuff involving money but it’s not a mode of communication between peers. I hope libraries see what’s coming and start offering all of their services via Text or IM or even better FaceBook apps soon. The Buddy List is ever important so let’s get on with becoming a “Buddy” and not and outsider.

“I only use e-mail for my business and to get sponsors,” Martina Butler, the host of the teen podcast Emo Girl Talk, said during a panel discussion here at the Mashup 2007 conference, which is focused on the technology generation. With friends, Bulter said she only sends notes via a social network.

From C|net – Kids say e-mail is, like, soooo dead
by Stefanie Olsen

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Morgan Hill Library Grand Opening

Sunday, July 22nd, 2007

Yesterday, a new Morgan Hill Library held its grand opening with fan fare, speeches, Taiko drummers, a costume contest, storytimes, a passport to the library program, and a ton of other fun events.

I was there for the first part of the day taking pictures of volunteers, staff, local politicians and all of the other folks who made the new library possible. My good friend Emily was there with her husband, both in costume.

There was a mad rush to get in and soon the place was swamped with patrons picking up their reserved copies of Harry Potter, checking out DVDs, using the internet. Good fun. Check out the photos on Flickr

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Questioning the economics of libraries

Tuesday, July 10th, 2007

Freakanomics blog has an interesting posting on the economics of books, publishers, and libraries. Stephen Dubner really poses the question that if public libraries didn’t exist today could one be started without publishers, authors, and media-in-general getting on your case. Dubner points a couple things that most librarians know, libraries foster learning to read and life-long reading. Dubner thinks that with current economic pressures, the “owners” would prevent such a free distribution of ideas but they fail to realize that regardless of what they tried to do, “consumers” would do what suited them best, maybe a black market, or more prevalent individual book sharing, like the system that flourished in the Soviet Union… which essentially would be a public library of sorts. Besides, publishers know that librarians and libraries are their best customers, with some of the most defined marketing channels for books that don’t have a major marketing blitz behind them. As an aside, the best seller lists in the NY Times or other places are mostly recursive functions of marketing and not indicative of the overall quality or quantity. Libraries still buy best sellers but publishers produce a lot more than these few hundred titles per year and need to sell them to someone.

Besides, libraries do exist.

http://www.freakonomics.com/blog/2007/07/10/if-public-libraries-didnt-exist-could-you-start-one-today/

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New app for eBooks

Monday, July 2nd, 2007

Information Today has an article that highlights Adobe’s new application for reading PDF & XHTML eBooks as well as managing a library of eBooks. Adobe Digital Editions has a slick interface very different from Acrobat. It also supports the Open Publication Standard which makes XHTML ebooks a lot more fluid and readable. I downloded the full version of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and it looked great even when I resized the window. Sony, HarperCollins, and a few other publishers have signed on and apparently approve of the DRM scheme. Sony will be incorporating it into it’s readers. And the publishers have made a few limited samples available.

The application downloaded and installed almost instantaneously on my Mac. PDF eBooks likewise were pretty quick to download and install. I’m on a fast (FIOS 6MB down) connection but launching Digital Editions was much faster than Acrobat Reader. It seems to have a very small footprint even with large downloads.

Will this format take off? Maybe we should encourage it. Will library customers be asking for this functionality? Libraries might as well offer it as one of their applications / plug-ins. Oh yeah, it needs Flash. Since it is not an exe it might work on most library computers without any fuss, but it can’t hurt to check.

[via Information Today]

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Friday’s iPhone media frenzy

Sunday, July 1st, 2007

Friday, I stopped by the Apple Store in Clarendon, a suburb of DC in Virginia assuming there would be a long line, lots of Apple devotees and opportunists. What I didn’t expect was all the media. Local and international reporters and camera operators were swarming over the place. It was a zoo. They opened the doors and I left. I wonder what the Harry Potter media frenzy will look like.