Technically Random

A lot of months ago (OK, maybe three, who knows) I signed up to be on the beta list for Twine.  I had no idea what it was at the time, the marketing hype made little sense to me so I pretty much just forgot about it.  Well, last week I got my invitation and I signed up.

So far, I’ve played and poked a little, I joined the Library 2.0 twine, I read some posts from people who are saying that it’s “addicting.”  Then I got the flu and couldn’t look at anything but the insides of my eyelids for a few days.

Now I’m back in, still looking around with this uneasy feeling that there’s some fundamental semantic web coolness about Twine that I’m just missing.  Is this the one social thingadoodle to bind them all?  Maybe I’m not getting it because I’m not, you know, social.  Maybe it’s because I’m one of those people who needs to see each line before I can see the whole picture.

Whatever the case, I’ll keep poking around and maybe, at some point, the picture will come into focus.  Until then, I’ve got some invites if you want to come and play.  Drop me an email or comment on this post if you want one of the invites.

- Corey

The latest in the Educause “7 Things You Should Know About …” series.

7 Things You Should Know About Ning

Ning is an online service that allows users to create their own social networks and join and participate in other networks. No technical skill is required to set up a social network, and there are no limits to the number of networks a user can join. Users of Ning social networks have access to functionality similar to that of more well-known social networks, such as Facebook and MySpace. Various features allow users to read news or learn about related events, join groups, read and comment on blog entries, view photos and videos, and other activities as set up by the network creator. RSS feeds let users subscribe to updates from specific parts of the social network.

I’ve played around on Ning a little and joined the Library2.0 Ning group/network.  Seems like it could be an effective way to set up micro-issue social networks or a single use network for a project.

- Corey

With Google’s announced release of an API for Google Books, it was only a matter of time before this functionality was integrated into WorldCat Local. The Google Books lookup was released as part of this month’s regular WCL maintenance. It appears that the ISBN is used as the lookup, so materials lacking an ISBN won’t include the preview button. So, no, it’s not perfect, but it is another big step in the right direction.

Here’s what it looks like for “The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy“.

This is a great feature and something that our users have requested and will definitely appreciate.

This probably falls under the “random” category, but Science Direct has upgraded their user interface (UI) with more changes to follow:

http://newsbreaks.infotoday.com/nbReader.asp?ArticleId=48792

The DLF ILS and Discovery Systems group is proposing

standard interfaces for integrating the data and services of the Integrated Library System (ILS) with new applications supporting user discovery. Such standard interfaces will allow libraries to deploy new discovery services to meet ever-growing user expectations in the Web 2.0 era, take full advantage of advanced ILS data management and services, and encourage a strong, innovative community and marketplace in next-generation library management and discovery applications.

This set of standards (nicknamed the “Berkeley Accord”) would support:

• Harvesting of data records for library collections, both in full and incrementally;
• Querying for real-time availability of an item;
• Stable linking to any item in an OPAC.

A number of ILS vendors have already signed on.  Our own, beloved, Innovative Interfaces being the exception.  See the full announcement on Peter Brantley’s blog here.

Copyright? That’s not technically random! Well, I may be stretching it with this–my first Technically Random post–but copyright has a huge impact on the extent to which I can use random technology to disseminate av media.

After close to 3 years of mulling over reports and testimony the  Section 108 Study Group released its recommendations on March 31: http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2008/08-063.html Why is section 108 relevant to us? It’s “the section of the Copyright Act that provides limited exceptions for libraries and archives so that they may make copies to replace copyrighted works in their collections when necessary, preserve them for the long term and make them available to users.”

Their recommendations include the following:

• Museums should be included for Section 108 eligibility, as they perform many of the same functions as libraries and archives.
• A new exception should be added to Section 108 to permit certain qualified libraries and archives to make preservation copies of at-risk published works prior to any damage or loss. Access to these “preservation-only” copies will be limited.
• A new exception should be added to Section 108 to permit libraries and archives to capture and reproduce publicly available Web sites and other online content for preservation purposes and to make those copies accessible to users for private study, research or scholarship. Rights holders would be able to opt out of this provision.
• Libraries and archives should be permitted to make a limited number of copies, as reasonably necessary, to create and maintain a single replacement or preservation copy. This alteration to the current three-copy limit would, among other things, enable libraries to more securely preserve digital materials, which often involves making copies.

At this point these are just recommendations. Congress, et al, needs to consult with the RIAA, MPAA, and hopefully others before signing this into law.

-John V

Thanks to Angie Rosette-Tavares for pointing this one out: 

Adobe recently released a slimmed down version of PhotoShop for the web, PhotoShop Express: http://www.photoshop.com/express/landing.html

While it likely isn’t something most of us will need on a daily basis, it’s yet another tool that might obviate the need for local software installations. 

So Word 2007 now lets you write and publish blog posts directly from Word. I’m trying this for the first time with this blog post. I like having the big edit window of the Word document and some of the autocorrect features are actually pretty handy, especially for quick and dirty posts. I don’t have any fancy formatting in this post, so we’ll have to test that out later. My only gripe so far is that I normally use CTRL-N to create a new document and by default it creates a new Word document. If I want to start a blog post I either have to move my hand all the way off the keyboard and use the mouse or do an ALT-F (to bring up the file menu) then select ‘N’ for a new file. This is nothing new, of course. This is what I have always had to do to create a new document using a template. A minor irritation, but one I’ve grown accustomed to.

So, here goes, I’m about to press the ‘Publish’ button.

Oh, wait… seriously, it will only let me select one category? Well now that’s really irritating.

-Corey