Maaashups!

Ok, I'm going to state first up I've never been into mashups, though I have heard in my time some interesting musical mashups many would refer to as hip hop, something I am ludicrously into at the moment. I also have contracted a rabid penchant for vinyl, the staple in any good DJs diet. Coincidence? Fate? Kismet!?

As for the technological age of the mashup, the amazing perforation of the boundaries of ownership brought and wrought over online sharing has enabled a plethora of visual and aural bending creative endeavours. So anyway, I decided to take a quick flick across the boards to see what the latest flavours were.

Twitter was mainly on about music mashups, and when I happened to click on this unfortunate video, I'm pretty sure its in my repressed memory bin, sheesh! Flickr was thankfully a bit more tasteful in its artistic expressions, more heart; something I should develop more of an interest in once I find some time.

This lack of involvement has meant that I've had very little experience with actually using any APIs to generate my own mashups. The simple fact that we now have so many tools at hand to craft with is great to get people interested and started. But not me, not this time; time to browse what they have done for mankind.

bkkeepr has one of those fine grating titles I love, but its actual use would not be so bad to see what library users were reading, provided they wanted to share what it is they were in fact reading. Good as a tool to see what is popular.

Booktour is fabulously blocked at my library, so no dice there.

Libworm looks innaresting, but it is primarily US centric, so not so much for me here. Still it is an intriguing idea that they are running with; the possibility of a one stop feed shop with both searching and browsing capabilities. It's like having food and drinks! Sate AND Slake! Reminds me of my idea of the one global library system to rule them all that I have feverish dreams about that leaves me in a delirious stupor.

Visual Headlines is innovative in its presentation, as well as its stress on the computer I was on. Like giving me too much music to listen to with no real time to absorb it. So I can understand the duress such quality products being thrust upon once capacity; to be incapacitated by overloaded capacitors and other overloaded circuit/synapse themed sentences. Anyway, seems it doesn't like the whole visual interaction thing.

Intrestingness I like, not for the word (I'm going to have to get used to mashed words soon) but for the inspiration I feel to go out and take arty photography. Reminds me of my trip to the Newcastle Museum to take some snaps but to find they were all out of focus by a long way. Which I still used for a Uni assignment. Which of course left my lecturer wondering what they were looking at. So in effect I achieved the art of interpretation in its worst form.

Flickr Memari is deemed to much fun to be allowed at work, so twice no dice.

Let me google that for you is not a sentence you will hear me utter anytime soon, nor a sight to see me visit. I mean really? is google that hard to use?

Crime Reports seems interesting...I wonder how Boltwood street would fare in my fair state's north. Dubbed 'boltdown street' for the dual reason of A) if it wasn't bolted down it was likely to be stolen and B) unless you bolted down the street in swift fashion you were likely to be set upon by vagrants. Classy.

Walkscore - now there's a website for any budding fan of self propelled transport! Whilst it states that is States centric, a quick flash over the keys produced my location, with a behemoth score of 51%! So it seems this is the reason for my lack of visitors, they have seen my paltry figures and have wilted and balked at the though of said walk!

Interesting that the site primarily focuses on amenity data from Google maps, rather than how pleasant 6 lanes of never ceasing traffic is to my walkability. Not to mention all those great gradients on show in the area to test those tender tendons on! Still, its better than my Mums House, I mean you gotta go to Woolgoolga if you want a decent drink, take THAT Toormina pub (which if fair, even I wouldn't even go there). Still, I like the site, may even use it when I think of moving closer to the city.

A quick perusal of the web yielded Mashup Awards, though sadly it only serves as an archive now. Still, a good source to see what went down 2007-2009.

I think, therefore IM.

Instant messaging, not so instant is it really? I mean, I still have to type, wait for my Internet connection, the program to display. Even with voice operated systems I still need to verbalise my thought. Wheres the ESP? now that would be useful for instant messaging! but as I have yet to achieve such cerebellum feats of communication, I will direct my focus this instant to this instance of Instant Messaging.

So far my interaction with messaging has come in many forms. From Blogging whenever I feel like it or in later response to something I've read (similar to thinking of the ultimate comeback to a debilitating and social life threatening insult), to using IM chat on MSN Messenger, Facebook, and MMORPG games (the equivalent to that lightning quick riposte to a verbal vapulation, a most satisfying feeling for all involved). Another other joy with instant messaging is you can actually tell when a conversation is getting a little one sided, with a textual onslaught bleeding across you little chat receptacle, or even to the point of chatting to an offline friend (at that stage its best to switch to email).

Anyhow, Whilst I've had limited usage of skype, I have utilised online voice software often used for games, Ventrillo being one. You could even use this for conference calling, or a cheap way for endless conversation (as long as your Internet holds out). Hell I've even used it to talk to my mum.

Webcams however are where I draw the line. My pixelated moving image does nothing for my online persona's self esteem, and would hate to see my attempts to give someone 'the look' turn into a digitised blasphemous expression due to video compression. Diminishing returns people! In essence though I like the majesty of the written word for long distance communique times, and there is always the dog and bone.

Twitter as always seems interesting to me in a way, but I have yet to be compelled to jump aboard. The hash tagging is interesting, but with only 140 words to dispose on a discussion, it invariable ends in links to be a means to and end. In essence I compare it to posting newspaper headlines with a link to the article. ANd I don't like newspaper headlines at the best of times.

Once again my two cents, rounded down.

Documenting google: style guide

Well I figure google docs does indeed have its own style, and the latest 2.1 installment is the guide, like a librarian in a digital stack. Possibly maybe, probably no. After trying to F5 my memory on how this little feature functions via some plain English, YouTube seems to have decided to be of no assistance, or perhaps telling me I do not need it, like Obi-Wan coercing Luke to 'use the force'. It seems YouTube will only take you so far. Time to use some of that intuition!

Now back in my 2.0 days I was quite impressed with the power of google docs, but remember having to shift my mind from the storing in private @ home versus the potential of online collaboration on the net. The fact that this was nigh on two years ago is still a little startling,.
realising for all my good intent I haven't used it at all. Promises and words it seems. First handy hint off the block was now I can upload and store fines into docs! quite impressed indeed, especially if downloading word or excel documents onto a computer without said programs.

The ability to see revisions is also handy for documents you have worked on or collaborated with people, not only to see added/omitted information, but the documents progress. Had a quick look at the 12 things about google docs, some not so useful but the power to make your browser via toolbar plug ins your word processor is a very handy tool indeed.

Had a play around with making a quick form, useful tool to make quick tests our questionnaires. Sadly my enquiry to the 100 tips on docs use was met with indiffernent server failure, once more a portent that I am best to rely on my own intuition, always.

igoogle: the latest tool for ivillains

Looking at the interface for igoogle got me thinking: it really does remind me of ye olde super-villains with their underground lairs, poor reading light, and masses of monitors and gadgets to endlessly scheme at new ways of being a menace to society. to think that rather than needing a device for every pot they wanted their finger in, it has all been condensed onto one screen! though if they were an uber new age villain I guess they would spread it across two 30" screens just to make sure they are the envy of the villain fraternity. And to think of all savings they will make on electricity and hardware! Still, this will no doubt be offset by their high download needs as well as masking their IP address. but I digress...

So whilst my world domination plans have been on the shelf of late, I figured I'd at least set up my online interface so can jump right in, like I'd never aspired to be a wild mannered librarian. email, favourite blogs of musical contemporaries, I could go on forever! All the most useful plug ins as well, I'm sure they even have links to your flickr...err I mean Picasa online photos of the family to be just like that old workstation at home, and thousands of the most useful gadgets/widgets I'm sure.

Was that a tone of trepidation at the installation of this intrepid destination to my 2.1 exploration? Yes. whilst handy as it is indeed, I still find it to be an over glorified favourites list. I will admit is is great to use as a glance and pick out what info that interests you, but often anything you want to view will take you to another site. Still, I can see with the right concoction of widgets it would be a most powerful tool.

Ping on the other hand is a wonderful way to get that old 'I have command of your airwave dreams mwahahaha' feeling that all villains aspire to for shock and awe tactics, a must to get your fingers into peoples ears, or pull theirs out of them per se. a definite advantage to any institute that wants to post info across platforms, but one must be wary of the different uses and audiences one encounters across these: posting everything to everyone may not be the wisest. Definitely worth libraries investing in.

43 Marks and allmyfaves look interesting, especially the logolicious output of the latter, sure to dazzle any marketing image fixated people. its also a good way for users to see what other services are on offer in your 2.0 field of choice. Whilst I will keep them in mind for my own use, I think they would prove to be a handy tool for library users, especially allmyfaves.

Age of Man is Meant to be an Event

So if said title is found to be true, then this 'age' of 'man' should no doubt have some kind of organisation, event management mayhap, by aged 'men'. Whilst this is how things were no doubt done thorought the tumultuous times of man as we know it, there is now another way! a 2.0 Way! Hooray!

had an oogle at doodle, fast, quick n easy to set up invites and send em away, but even when I was sending an email out via gmail, I noted I could add one automatically. less options, but you get the idea.

Google calendar looks intriguing, and the sheer amount of 2.0 tools they have is seriously making me consider changing my main email account from hotmail. An instance where I could see it being of use would be for the tech team here that runs computer courses. We are all fairly busy and have to slot appointments for training when we can, so if we all had a communal diary per se, the qualms over finding time to allocate would be simple! but it would also entail everyone keeping info as up to date as possible. I also realised it would be quite a humorous way for people to elect what shifts they wanted to work throughout the week at the library. No doubt a disasterous but valuable experience in event management.

Event brite I've encountered once or twice before and actually find it amazingly useful, especially if creating events on 2.0 technology, it would be like having the first 100 people to successfully use Event brite get to attend! I have in fact used it in the past to attend events at the State Library, and a quick search brought up the latest Seniors in focus being held there in April. Really easy to organise any event, printed tickets, sliding scale ticket prices, it has it all!

after a play around on eventful a search for gigs on in my area showed me the pixies were playing on the 15th of march, but then deferred me to a world ticket site selling them to me for 225 Euros? and its already sold out? more of an aggregator of events rather than an instigator.

Anyvite takes a different tack and offers you a way to do personalised invitations online in a neat cute package. I could even use it for my upcoming birthday! Though I may still do D&D with the old p&p.

the Rssa is gssa nu thang.

sooo...RSS we meet again. I always knew your wraps on the latest low down on the tech beat were something well beyond my hollow stringy skills. I've been keeping up with you via our mutual friend Bloglines, where you have gathered quite the entourage to keep me constantly engaged without getting to know the real you. So do you have more to offer me and my fellow homes?

The answer would appear to be yes. Feedrinse has the sound of a dishwashing detergent, but it does claim to have to have the power to blast away those skerricks of spam and leave behind only the mightiest germs (or gems) that are of interest. Sadly, Bloglines does not seem to be such a big fan of sharing its home RSS feeds, and besides, I do prefer my own filtering.

I seemed to get the ol' 404 on filtermyrss, seems it needs the ol' 101 on how to run a website, though I suspect its just for today. feedsifter is a simplified version of Feedrinse, but it simply makes me want to have the option in Bloglines to filter my own. I can filter from the web but not my own list? Silly.

As for RSS going places? some say 'over the hill' but with tools like spokentext its really a powerful tool, as you can listen to that lengthy proposal from mike on your ipod on the way home from work rather that read it. I hope it has a Vulcan accent available.

As for being more efficient with my RSS I'm still fail at 1500 wpm, which really would have increased my capacity to get through my feeds. However I'm sure my comprehension and love of reading would convert to fail on a said win. As for the caring of sharing...its likeness has been added to my own blog.

As for my RSS use, I regularly check it 1-2 times a week, alternating which blogs I read if I don't get through them all, and comment on them occasionally here. The feeds are organised according to the rules of chaos, much like my cd collection as I never know what turn my tastes will take. As for what tools I used and liked, take a trip back in time to the start of the post to find out!

Casting from couch to screen

Ahh screencasting, how I have waited for thee. Multidue is the time I have spent lending my voice, prompting my audience with handy navigational hints with my musings and mousing to traverse there way across the cathode lit screens to find the drive users of computers have been lacking to complete their purpose for coming to the library.



first port of access is to the address of slideshare. Seems to me to be filled with lots of presentations etc used for, well, presentations. from the wealth of information available it would be an alternate to acquainting yourself with an unfamiliar product or service, or learing about one from another perspective. Lots of how to's for social networking are available. I myself have assisted in creating a powerpoint presentation for social media at my Library (with a little help from the common craft lads)which would fit in to what is being presented here. Neato, but still lacking a little something...



Authorstream was the next viewing, and once again similar with plenty of linking features. Now to see some in action!



I really liked the Public Library presentation on talking books, something we here are looking at. Was good to see how it had evolved over time into what is available to the public now. But still, these are often used as aids to a presentation, they are lacking a voice (you can add one, but still, not quite the same effect). What intrigues me is online screencasting.

So behold! by Awful attempt at a screencast. I was so unhappy that captions could not cover up my shonky work

Free online screencasting tool