CIL2008 Twitter Icon Contest - Fine, there's a prize too.

It seems that many of you are asking me what the prize is for winning the CIL2008 Twitter Icon contest is. What, getting your icon used isn't enough? Ok. Fine. Winner gets a $10 Amazon.com electronic gift certificate.

Spring Speaking Schedule

March

• 11 - Rapid City Public Library, Rapid City, SD, Social Web Workshops
• 12 - South Dakota Library Association Spring Forum, Rapid City, SD, Keynote (Social Web) and closing (Observations from the day)
• 14 - South Dakota Library Association Spring Forum, Brookings, SD, Keynote (Social Web) and closing (Observations from the day)
• 19 - Library Camp Kansas, Manhattan, KS
• 20 - University of Nebraska Council of Libraries (UNCL) Staff Development Day, Lincoln, NE, Social Networking & Library 2.0

April

• 6 - Computers in Libraries 2008, Crystal City, VA, Gaming Preconference (attending)
• 7 - Computers in Libraries 2008, Crystal City, VA, Moderator for Track A
• 8 - Computers in Libraries 2008, Crystal City, VA, C202: Libraries a-Twitter & del.icio.us
• 9 - Computers in Libraries 2008, Crystal City, VA, eBooks & eInk Cybertour
• 10 - Computers in Libraries 2008, Crystal City, VA, RSS Postconference
• 17 - Nebraska Library Commission, Lincoln, NE, Get Your Game On! The How and Why of running a gaming tournament in your library
• 24 & 25 - 3rd International Conference on Information Warfare and Security (attending), Peter Kiewit Institute, University of Nebraska Omaha
• 25 - Lincoln City Libraries Staff Day (unconfirmed), Lincoln, NE, Library Signage

May

• 7 - Prarie Area Library System (PALS) Day, Starved Rock State Park, Il, Reference 2008
• 20-23 - NLC Workshops, Chadron State College, Chadron, NE, Topics TBA
• 28 - NLC Workshop, Lincoln, NE, XHTML
• 29 - NLC Workshop, Lincoln, NE, CSS

Map via Dopplr

How To Behave On An Internet Forum

Internet forums are either a brilliant community where you can meet and chat with new, interesting people, or full of scornful idiots who deserve to be banned from The Net in its entirety. This film explains some of the common mistakes people make in forums, which makes them the sort of loathsome fool no one wants to know.

How To Behave On An Internet Forum

CIL2008 Twitter Icon Contest

As I posted yesterday there's a Twitter feed for Computers in Libraries 2008. @stevelawson has suggested that I run a contest to create an icon for the account. So, ok, I will. Create an icon for the CIL08 Twitter account and send it to me. On March 17th I'll post all submissions on this blog. Vote by leaving a comment. The winner will be declared on March 21st. (In the case of a tie I'll decide.) The only real rules: Keep it clean and keep it within the technical specs required by Twitter (Maximum size of 700k. JPG, GIF, PNG.)

Unshelved, Creative Commons, and blog editing :: Update

I don't know if my previous post had anything to do with Bill's new post (though I get the feeling it did) in which he clarifies their current non-decision on giving Unshelved a CC license. I'll just follow with my continued encouragement for "Mr. Con" to give it a go. You're practically doing it anyway, why not make it official?

And the reason for the editing of the blog post. Let's just say it involved a skateboard and Jim Croce. Thanks guys!

CIL2008 Twitter feed

It's coming up on that time again. I've set up a Twitter account for the 2008 Computers in Libraries conference. If you're going to be at the conference and twittering, contact me and I'll tell the account to follow you. (You'll need to friend the account back if you're protected your updates.) Once the conference has started, or before if you'd like, use your RSS reader to subscribe to the CIL08 & Friends feed to get all the tweets from the conference.

Funniest copyright statement ever

I was saving this for my CC talk at CiL but it's too funny not to post.

All rights reserved under the International and Pan- American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced, replicated, reiterated, duplicated, conduplicated, retyped, transcribed by hand (manuscript or cursive), read aloud and recorded on audio tape, platter, or disk, lipsynched, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including genetic, chemical, mechanical, optical, xerographic, holographic, electronic, stereophonic, ceramic, acrylic, or telepathic (except for that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press who promise to read the book painstakingly all the way through before writing their reviews) without prior written permission from the Publisher.

Thinking of using Firefox in your library?

If not, you should be, IMHO. Anyway, here's two somewhat technical articles related to this topic.

• Hacking Firefox at my library: instructions & stuff
  Instructions on how to lock-down and tweak Firefox for public consumption. I don't necessarily agree with everything suggested but I don't have any problems big enough to complain about either.
  
• 40 Useful Firefox Add-Ons for Librarians
  There are a lot of Firefox add-ons out in the wild. Here's a list of 40 that are most useful for us librarians. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

The Top 50 Proprietary Programs that Drive You Crazy — and Their Open Source Alternatives

Yes folks, today is the day in which I clean out all those shortcuts on my desktop to things I've been meaning to blog about. This time it's Open Source alternatives to those programs you're using and drive you nuts. I'm not necessarily endorsing any of the programs on the list but it's definitely worth taking a look though to see what you might want to give a try.

The following fifty proprietary programs are listed in no particular order within broad categories along with their open source alternatives. In some cases you could probably write your own book on frustrations with the proprietary programs shown here. In other cases, you’ll discover that the open source alternative isn’t quite up to snuff yet. And, in other cases still, you’ll learn that some proprietary programs are real gems, but that the open source advocate can replace those gems with equally shiny objects from the open source repertoire.

The Top 50 Proprietary Programs that Drive You Crazy — and Their Open Source Alternatives | WHDb

The shiny guy, he always worries

Star Wars explained by a three year-old.

Unshelved, Creative Commons, and blog editing

I'm wondering about what's up with the guys over at Unshelved regarding Creative Commons. I wasn't going to blog about his until something happened. Here's the story:

Yesterday there was a post on the Unshelved blog in which Bill talked about giving permission to use Unshelved strips to promote your library. Great idea I thought. This morning I went to re-read that post and something seemed different. I though he'd listed some specific things you needed to do in order to use their comics which sounded a lot like a NC-BY-ND CC license and that they were aware of this so don't e-mail them about it. But today here's what I read:

..So here's our offer. We've got over two thousand strips about libraries and the things they go on there. Please use them to promote your library, school, or other reading-friendly cause. If you have questions about usage, or if you need a high-resolution version suitable for printing, just mail us.

Wait, where's the specifics? Where's the mention of Creative Commons? I did have a rough night's sleep last night. Did I dream it? Seems not. Here's what I found via the Google cache:

...So here's our offer. We've got over two thousand strips about libraries and the things they go on there. If you'd like to use some of them for noncommercial purposes, please do. Just use them intact, without alteration, attribute them to us, and show our URL and the correct copyright. If you have questions about usage, or if you need a high-resolution version, just mail us.

...P.S. To forestall a gazillion emails I will say that I am well aware of Creative Commons, and we are thinking (read: arguing) about it.

So, what's my point? There are two actually. First, guys, please make the plunge into the world of Creative Commons. My guess is that one of you likes the idea and the other doesn't. How about blogging about the pros and cons and get some outside opinions from the library world. Heck, many of us are reposting your strips on our blogs anyway. How about making it officially allowable and support the CC movement at the same time.

Second, as I warn my students in my blogging workshops, if you have second thoughts about something you wrote in a blog post, don't go back and remove it like it never happened. Write a follow-up post and clarify your position. Otherwise someone's going to notice and point it out since nothing on the Net ever actually gets deleted.

Open Office 2007 Documents in OpenOffice

I don't use OpenOffice much but it comes installed on the Cloudbook so I think I'm going to start. (Though I also plan on using Google Docs a lot more too.) Anyway, since most of my current files are in Office 2007 format I was concerned about moving between the two programs. Well, a solution is now available: the Open XML Translator.

Expand OpenOffice.org's document opening, saving, and conversion powers to Office 2007 documents with the Open XML Translator, a free plug-in intended for Ubuntu systems.

lifehacker also says that "conversion from Microsoft Office-authored files remains hit-and-miss, but it's a nice step forward for the free and open-source office suite." I'll have to give it a test when I get my Cloudbook.

(Oh, and I'm officially declaring this my blog post for Thing #7: Blog about anything dealing with technology.)

Cloudbook Update

Nope I don't have mine yet. Here's the full e-mail update from ZeReason:

Dear customers who have been waiting for the Cloudbook for far too long.

For the sake of clarity, here is what you need to know:

* Two days before the initial date the Cloudbook would be available for shipping, we opened for pre-orders. We were told the Cloudbooks were off the coast of CA and would be here in about 48 hrs.

* On shipping day, we found out that the Cloudbooks had been pulled for "minor tweaks" and it would be about a month until they were done.

* A month later, on Valentine's Day, we found out that due to the snowstorm in China which bumped up against the Chinese New Year, Everex had gotten only a portion of the systems built. We were given only part of our initial promised allotment. The Cloudbooks that should have gone to fulfil the rest of our preorders were sent on a truck to Walmart.

* We shipped out our portion of the initial allotment, fulfilling orders in chronological order so that people who had waited the longest got theirs first. We shipped the Cloudbooks on the first day they were available, no delay for transport since we are located near Everex headquarters. The rest of the Cloudbooks that sat on a Walmart truck took a little more than a week to get to their destination and are now available for purchase.

* Walmart is doing now what we did on Feb 15th, shipping out their initial batch of Cloudbooks.

To those of you still waiting from the initial batch (the later part of the initial batch), we apologize profusely. We are so deeply sorry that the deadlines have dragged on. The deadline was supposedly this Tuesday, 2-26 and has slipped to Friday, 2-29. We anticipate that it will not come as a surprise to anyone.

Our solution, as a solid, trustworthy little company is to:
1. be as transparent as possible
2. grant you a full refund for pre-orders, if you are even slightly unhappy, and
3. to refocus our company on our own ZaReason laptops that have an ultra low return rate of <1%, with shipping deadlines we can control and honor.

If you wish to wait for your Cloudbook as many others have done, we can reassure you that it is a great little machine for the price. For most users' needs it is sufficient and travels well. If you can wait a few more days, your Cloudbook will ship out from our shop in CA and you'll be using it soon.

*** Please note: All Cloudbook sales are final. Everex is not giving refunds for returned working CloudBooks. They will repair any faulty systems, but will not give a refund for a working system. If this worries you, we ask that you cancel your order before it is shipped. We cannot accept returns for working CloudBooks. This policy is only for CloudBooks. For any other ZaReason system, we have a generous return policy.

If you wish to cancel your order, feel free to simply email us at orders@zarason.com Your refund will be processed the same day it is received.

Whatever you decide, we wish you the best,

--Cathy Malmrose, CEO ZaReason, Inc.
www.zareason.com

I've got to admit that at first the revised return policy made me a but nervous but then I thought for a minute and realized that if it works but I just don't like it all that much, I probably wouldn't have returned it anyway. So, I'm sticking it out. I really want this computer for conferences so for another week I wait.

Thing #6: New Trading Card

New Trading Card
Originally uploaded by Travelin' Librarian

Thing #6 has us playing with flickr mashup tools. I created a trading card for myself way back when but I never really like the photo so I've taken this opportunity to create a new one. Hope y'all like it.

Thing #5 : Blogging from flickr

Miles Davis
Originally uploaded by jazz matrix

Thing #5 of our Learning 2.0 series involves playing with and optionally signing up for a flickr account. Well, got the account already (approaching 15,000 photos) and I'm pretty familiar with how it works. The last item was to blog a photo from flickr. So, I poked through my recent flickr favorites and figured I share this classic photo of Miles Davis. (I'm a big Miles fan!)

Neil DeGrasse Tyson: Death by Black Hole

I'm so buying his book this weekend!

Random House Audio abandons audiobook DRM

I posted earlier this week about DRM-free free eBooks. Now it looks like Random House is going through with DRM-free (though not $$$ free) digital audiobooks. It seems they've been doing this for a while through eMusic but will be extending it to all other online services (such as Audible and Overdrive I assume.) The most interesting part was this reason given for going through with the change:

[W]e have not yet found a single instance of the eMusic watermarked titles being distributed illegally. We did find many copies of audiobook files available for free, but they did not originate from the eMusic test, but rather from copied CDs or from files whose DRM was hacked.

In other words, people that legally purchased the music and could do what they wanted with it due to the lack of DRM felt no need to redistribute said content in legally questionable ways. Yep. Give us something we can actually use the way we want and we'll pay for it. Don't make us pay for something that locks us out of what we've paid for.

More at Boing Boing.

Learning 2.0, Thing #3

Well, it's NLCL2 time again folks and this is the first blog-based assignment. Thing #3 has us creating a blog and writing some posts. Well, I've got the blog already and I don't seem to have any problems coming up with topics lately. However, as part of the assignment we're supposed to blog about the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits and "which one might be easiest for you and hardest for you & why?"

This is a hard one for me. I just skimmed through the list again and honestly, I don't find any of them difficult. My guess is that this is because it's my job to constantly learn new things and that I'm a trainer so I'm constantly teaching others. This does put me in a unique situation compared to many others on our staff but I know I'm not totally alone.

As for what's easiest, habit 7.5 most definitely: play. In some ways though this makes separating my work life from my non-work life somewhat difficult. I'm allowed to play at the office and many things I play with outside of work have job-related outcomes. I'm not complaining, I just have to force myself to separate some times.

I've been BoingBoing'd

Honestly, after my conversation with Cory about the project I was hoping this would happen. There is now a BoingBoing.net post about the Creative Commons project I've been working on at the Commission. As a result the story has also been picked up by LISNews. (I'm now off to give a heads-up to our computer team about the potential spike in Web traffic.)

Lunar Eclipse

I braved 20 degree weather and a wind chill in the single digits last night to get some shots of last night's lunar eclipse. Here's the one that I think came out the best. A set of the best 15 can be found on flickr.

Still a bit bitter

But at least I know I was right...

Wilson also suggested that consumers would really have been better off with the HD format than with Blu-ray. [emphasis added]

"Storage capacity is the one area [where Blu-ray] can claim an advantage," he elaborated. But the outcome of the format war, which became official on Tuesday, "doesn't benefit anyone today and it comes at a cost. [Blu-ray] discs and players are both more expensive to manufacture. The DVD format was less expensive to implement and further along in its deployment. [Blu-ray] is twelve months behind in terms of its feature set."

Via BetaNews: Analysts: Studios will gain from HD DVD's exit, but consumers' won't

Another Hall of Shame entry

Yep, another Web site that won't accept my .info e-mail address. Disaapointingly, it's Lessig08.org (mentioned in my previous post). I'm still supporting him but he needs a better e-mail validation script.

Lawrence Lessig launches "Change Congress" and makes another announcement

You'll have to watch the video to find out.

Security: Unclear on the Concept

I recently accepted SallieMae's constant suggestions that I should switch to receiving all of their communications via e-mail instead of paper mail. (I was holding out for a small decrease in my outstanding debt since I'd be saving them a lot in postage over the next 15 years, but we never did see eye to eye on that one.) Anyway, today I received my first "official" e-communication from them. It was a simple e-mail telling me that my account had been updated and my new bill was available for viewing on their Web site. So far, so good.

Attached was a 48k PDF file. Using Outlook 2007 I clicked on the attachment to preview it. This failed for an unspecified reason. So, I double-clicked the attached file to open it in Adobe Reader. At this point I was prompted for a password. I drew a blank. But then something made me try my Social Security Number as the password and viola, the document opened. It was the exact same text that was in the body of the e-mail message but this one was on SallieMae letterhead.

WTF? Either send me something that deserves to be behind a password or don't. Don't send me text "protected" by a password that's also being sent in the clear in a standard unsecured e-mail message.

SallieMae, just what point are you trying to make here?

Ladies and Gentlemen...Will Ferrell and Dave Grohl

Contains some adult language

Creative Wikipedia solution to images of Muhammad controversy

Just edit some Wikipedia-specific CSS:

How can I hide the images using my personal Wikipedia settings?

See also: Wikipedia:How to set your browser to not see images

If you are offended by the images (and you have an account), you can change your personal settings so that you don't have to see them, without affecting other users. This is done by modifying your CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) page, which is individual to each user.

To do this:

• Click on this link to modify your monobook.css page
• If no page is there already, just go ahead and create a page
• Add the following line to your css page:

body.page-Muhammad img {display: none;}

This will permanently hide the images on the article for you as long as you are logged in.

From Talk:Muhammad/FAQ

Are publishers finally starting to understand

First there was Lawrence Lessig, then Cory Doctorow (or was it the other way around?) who offered the complete texts of their books online, for free. You could read them on the Web site, download them, read them on your computer in Word, put them on your phone, iPod and/or eBook. Finally, you could print your own copy. Many readers ended up buying the publisher-printed copy anyway. Those who didn't make the purchase probably wouldn't have regardless of the availability of the free version. Other authors have started to follow.

And all was good.

But where were the publishers in all of this?

Then came the Baen Free Library. Long-time publisher of science fiction and fantasy, Baen offers more than 100 complete titles in formats from HTML to Rocket eBook (there's a dead format) to RTF. Just read online or download it to go. 4.6 million visits later, they're periodically adding new titles.

Neil Gaiman's publisher, HarperCollins, has started offering complete book for free online. Neil recently asked his readers to pick which of his books would be offered up. Much to his surprise, his largest book, American Gods was chosen and will be made available in the near future. I was excited. I'm not any longer. The problem is that in order to read the book you must do so on their site, in their reader.  The books are not portable in any way, shape, or form. Sure, you can search the contents (nice) and you can embed the book into your site (a la YouTube) but how does that help me read it on my device, when I want, when I don't have a WiFi connection?

Close, but no soup for you!

Next on deck, TOR books. Publisher of Cory Doctorow and many, many other authors I love to read. (L.E. Modesitt, Jr., Brian Lumley, and Brian Herbert, just to name a few.) They're about to launch their new site "Watch the Skies" and if you sign up, they'll e-mail you the link to a free eBook every week. No word on the level of control that they'll give you over said books but with Cory Involved and the word "download" being bandied about, I have all sorts of hope.

So publisher's, who's next?

Toshiba Officially Drops HD DVD

Following several days of rumors, Toshiba has confirmed that it will no longer develop, manufacture and market HD DVD players and recorders, effectively ending the high-def format war.
Toshiba Officially Drops HD DVD | High-Def Digest

Yes folks, it's finally officially over. Can we all shut up about it now. (Of course, this means I picked the wrong side no matter how justified. Let the fire sales on the discs commence.)

Cloudbook delayed

Here's the e-mail I received yesterday from ZaReason:

Dear Cloudbook customers,
Today we shipped out the first Cloudbooks to hit the open market. If you received an email with your tracking number, then you are among the lucky early orders. If you did not receive a confirmation email, your Cloudbook will be the first ones to go out with the next batch that completes our original allotment of preorders. The best estimates we are getting now are that the next batch will be here in a week. We are not giving a firm date until we hear more details, but at least this gives you a time frame. If you did not receive a shipping confirmation today and want to cancel your order, we will gladly refund your order. We want *all* our customers to be happy and so far we have a great track record giving you the best solutions possible.
Thank you,
--Vincent in Shipping
www.zareason.com

Needless to say, I did not receive a confirmation e-mail so I'm SOL for another week or two. Here's the full story on the delay. I'm not upset at ZaReason at all. I'm disappointed but it sounds like they're doing their best. As for some of the early reviews of the Cloudbook (which haven't all been positive), I'm holding my judgement until I get my hands on one.

Warrantless wiretapping explained by Snuggle the Security Bear

Click the image to get the the video.
via BoingBoing

Tips for Conference Bloggers

I printed this out a while ago and just found it again in a pile on my desk. In preparation for the upcoming spring conferences I feel this is something that everyone planning on conference blogging should read. (Also, it's a great excuse to play with embedding documents via my Scribd account.)

E-books will never be our friends

Here's a great article from the Times Online about eBooks. Considering I gave a presentation on the Sony Reader and the Kindle earlier this week (video available on the NLC blog), I'm glad to hear that I'm not the only one who still thinks that they have their place, but won't ever replace printed books. Here's a sample:

None of this, however, spells doom to the physical book. A reader who falls in love with a book, even if first read in electronic form, will still want to own it. Books do more than furnish a room: they are our intellectual companions.

Some books are worth sacrificing a tree to make; others are not, and that is the distinction that the electronic book offers. Ruskin once observed that literature is “divisible into two classes, the books of the hour, and the books of all time”. The books of all time will remain on paper, but those of the hour will increasingly be digital: the airport novel, the reference book, the celebrity memoir. A personal library will no longer be the repository of unread paperbacks, but a genuine index to individuality, as it was in the days when books were rare and precious.

Keith Olbermann Special Comment ‘We will NOT fear George W. Bush!’

via RawReplay

Two great quotes

From We're All Journalists Now: The Transformation of the Press and Reshaping of the Law in the Internet Age by Scott Gant.

"The Web makes it possible for citizens to think in public together. That is not a fad. That is the underlying reality of the news industry for the next 30 to 50 years."
— Lew Friedland, University of Wisconsin-Madison's School of Journalism

"We must no longer accept uncritically the idea that professional journalists can be anointed with special perks and protections denied to others engaging in essentially the same activities"
— Scott Gant

Learning 2.0 in Salt Lake City

It looks like the folks over at the Salt Lake City Public Library are also currently in the midst of a Learning 2.0 program. According to Elizabeth's Endeavors they seem to be a few things ahead of us as she found this blog via Technorati. I will add that I've been to SLCPL many times and it is one of the most beautiful public libraries I've ever been in. (I also got out there several times during the construction. Unfortunately all of those photos I took before I started using flickr.)

Creative Commons @ MPOW

I don't usually cross-post between this personal blog and the office blog but a project I've been working on for about a month has just been implemented and I'm totally excited about it. Check out the details on the NLC blog.

Hey Monkeybrain!

The creators of Squidoo.com have just released HeyMonkeybrain.com a social way of arguing online. Want to check it out? I've started an argument titled "The Dewey Decimal System is not the problem". Got an opinion? Agree? Disagree? Log in an state your case.

Quite possibly the longest spam subject time ever

"Part-time job offer, Us part-time employement,Necessity in Us employees,European company requires Us employees,European company is looking for Us representatives, European company offers a part-time job, European company is seeking for Us employees"

Learning 2.0 starts today

I'm in my office this morning about an hour before everyone else start to appear. This in itself, isn't bloggable since that's my SOP. However, this morning I just put in the links to the first two of 23 things for the Commission's Learning 2.0 program. This week there's just some reading and thinking to do for the participants so there won't be too much excitement. Next week, they all start blogging. I'll be participating too so watch this space for my thoughts and comments on the learning exercises.

(If you're not an NLC staff member, which I'll assume you're not, you're welcome to participate in our program. Just follow along via the link above. Unfortunately, you won't be eligible for the prizes.)

The FBI wants to help me....

...get my money from Nigeria! Check this out:

Anti-Terrorist and Monitory Crimes Division.
Federal Bureau Of Investigation.
J. Edgar. Hoover Building Washington D.C
Tel: 1-206-666-6052 or 206-350-2807
Fax: Tel: 1-206-666-6052 or 206-350-2807

Attn: Beneficiary,

This is to Officially Inform you that it has come to our notice and we have thoroughly Investigated by the help of our Intelligence Monitoring Network System that you are having a Legal Transaction with one Rev John Irwin of the Federal Ministry Of Finance Nigeria. During our Investigation, it came to our notice that the reason why you have not received your payment is because you have not fulfill your Financial Obligation giving to you in respect of your Contract/Inheritance Payment.

Therefore, we have contacted the Federal Ministry Of Finance on your behalf and they have brought a solution to your problem by arranging your payment in total of US$800,000.00 in an ATM CARD which you will use to withdraw money in anywhere of the world. You now have the lawful right to claim your fund in the ATM CARD by contacting the ATM CARD CENTER.

Also, we have being informed by Rev. John Irwin that he gave you instructions on how to proceed and contact the ATM CARD CENTER for their requirements to procure your Approval Slip which contains details of your PERSONAL IDENTIFICATION NUMBER (PIN) which you would use in activating and operating your ATM CARD in any ATM Machine closer to you and note that to procure your Approval Slip it would cost you $550.00. Since the Federal Bureau of Investigation is involved in this transaction, all you did have to do is to be rest assured for this is 100% risk free so do contact the ATM CARD CENTRE so they could let you know on how to make payment for the procurement of your Approval Slip which is the only payment needed before the delivery of your ATM CARD is being effected.

Below are the contact details of the ATM CARD CENTRE which you are to proceed and contact them for their requirements to proceed and procure your Approval Slip after making payment of $550.00

CONTACT DETAILS

Name: Mr. Paul Smith

Email: pau.smithatmcard@yahoo.com

We do await your response so we can move on with our Investigation and make sure your ATM SWIFT CARD gets to you.

Thanks and hope to read from you soon.

FBI Director
Robert S. Mueller

Note: Do disregard any email you get from any imposter or office claiming to be in possesion of your ATM CARD, you are adviced only to be in contact with Mr. Paul Smith of the ATM CARD CENTRE who is the rightful person you are suppose to deal with in regards your ATM CARD PAYMENT and forward any email you get from imposters to this office so we could act upon and commence investigation.

How many five year olds could you take in a fight?

18

CC-licensed Firefly FanFic by serious SciFi Author

Established and popular science fiction author Steven Brust has written My Own Kind of Freedom: A Firefly Novel and released it under CreativeCommons on his Web site. (.doc & .pdf) I've also uploaded the PDF version to my Scribd account. I've not started reading it yet but I've got it loaded on my Sony Reader so I'll be getting to it soon.

I want my office walls totally covered in this!

Update: Turns out that you need to erase whatever you've written within 24 hours or it'll become permanent. Great for meeting rooms, poor for just leaving yourself notes in your office. (Thanks Allana)

First footage of the next Bond film

I'm gettin' me a Cloudbook

Yesterday I broke down and decided to use a small portion of my recent larger-than-expected royalty check and ordered a Cloudbook. This UMPC is only available online at ZaReason and, get this, WalMart. (Yes, you'll be able to purchase these off the shelf in WalMart. I ordered mine from ZaReason.) Here's what you get for just $399:

• 1.2 GHz
• VIA C7-M Processor ULV
• 512 MB DDR 533MHz
  (expandable to 1GB)
• SDRAM
• 30 GB Hard Disk Drive
• 7" WVGA TFT Display (800x480)
• VIA UniChrome Pro IGP Graphics
• VIA High-Definition Audio
• WiFi 802.11 b/g
• (1) 10/100 Ethernet Port
• (1) DVI-I Port
• (2) USB 2.0 Ports
• (1) 4-in-1 Media Card Reader
• (1) 1.3 Megapixel Webcam
  (commonly misreported as "0.3")
• (1) Headphone / Line-Out Port
• (1) Microphone / Line-In Port
• (1) Set of Stereo Speakers
• (1) Touchpad
• (1) 4-Cell Lithium-Ion Battery
• Software: gOS, Mozilla Firefox, gMail, Meebo, Skype, Wikipedia, GIMP, Blogger, YouTube, Xing Movie Player, RythemBox, Faqly, Facebook and OpenOffice.org 2.3 (includes WRITER, IMPRESS, DRAW, CALC, BASE)

Yes, I know that some of that "software" isn't software. The point is that there's one-click access to those services via the Mac-esque dock at the bottom of the screen.

I also considered an EeePC but decided that for the same price I'd rather have a 30GB hard drive rather than a 4GB solid state drive, a 5-hour battery instead of a 3-hour one and an adult-sized beyboard. I've been playing with the Ubuntu-based gOS and I've got to say I'm liking it so my intention is to keep it running Linux and soo how it goes. (It will run Vista should a user choose to install it.) Having no optical drive will be interesting but there are other ways to get movies onto it which then saves me from having to bring discs on a trip. (I could always plug in an external USB opti-drive if I get desperate.)

Oh, and they've already sold out. Of course, complete unboxing photos will be posted when it arrives sometime around the 18th. (It comes out on the 15th but I only paid for UPS ground shipping.) I will be bringing it with me to CiL so those there can corner me for a demo.

Well, I can name a few of my neighbors...

One Laptop Per Child: Laptops designed for learning

The One Laptop Per Child (http://laptop.org) project's goal is "To provide children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves." To that end, the XO laptop is a machine created explicitly for children and learning. Karin Dalziel will demo the XO laptop, give a tour of the operating system, called "Sugar," and explain how features of the laptop are custom made for education.
Presented at the Nebraska Library Commission on 1 February 2008.

Click To Play

The Librarian Song

I haz cheezburger can?

Yes folks, you can now buy a Cheeseburger in a can. (I'm only posting this because I'd not yet run into another site that used this obvious post title.)