Up up and away

I'm teaching a CSS workshop at the Commission today then flying to Denver. Tomorrow Mary and I are off to Montego Bay, Jamaica for the ACURIL Conference. I'll have a laptop with me but I don't know how much I'll be blogging. I do plan on calling in (via VOIP) to next week's Uncontrolled Vocabulary for a full report.

Clinton, you invoked a nightmare

Keith Olberman's latest special comment

Diana's Valedictory Speech

But you're *all* special

Lately a lot of articles and books about generational differences have come across my desk. Boomers, Gen X (me), Millennials. There are similarities, and not all the generalizations apply to everyone, but there are significant differences that you can't avoid. My problem with the Millennials is their innate sense of entitlement which, in most cases, I place the blame squarely on their boomer parents. This sense of "we're all special" and "we're all winners" is just not realistic. Case in point:

I've got a high school graduation to go to on Saturday morning. Turns out that there's going to be 11, yes eleven, valedictorians! ELEVEN!? I'm sorry, but doesn't the very definition of this word make it a singular? Let's check...

"the student usually having the highest rank in a graduating class who delivers the valedictory address at the commencement exercises"
Merriam-Webster.com

Yep, just what I thought. It's not a plural within a single school. So, how do eleven students give a single valedictory address? The don't. Er, well, they all do. In this case each of the eleven students is allowed to give a two minute speech. WTF? Yeah, a lot of wisdom from some very smart kids can be boiled down into what are in effect soundbytes. (As a co-worker described it: a Pecha Kucha graduation.) To make it worse, they were informed by the school that each talk had to be based around a movie and had to use quotes from the movie of choice to illustrate whatever they were trying to express. So much for trusting the smartest student in the class to make an appropriate or inappropriate speech as they see fit. Wouldn't want to give them that amount of trust.

Now, I don't know the exact reasons for having 11 valedictorians but I'm going to make an educated guess: we wouldn't want to disappoint any of the 4.0 students. They've all earned it. Sorry, but ONE student has earned it, not eleven. If you've actually got a tie (statistically improbable that it's an eleven-way tie, but not impossible) then use additional factors like attendance or extra curricular activities. Come on adults, show some backbone to your kids and pick a winner. The other ten will get over it.

Oh, and there's going to be just one salutatorian. Just proving that earning either of these honors isn't exclusive, just that you're a member of a grade range.

Further proof that filters don't work

Last week I was at the offices of Lincoln Public Schools to present on LibraryThing. During some free time in the lab I wanted to catch up with some online articles I'd been meaning to read. I fired up del.icio.us and started clicking on some recently bookmarked sites. One was titled 60 Photography Links You Can’t Live Without. Here's what I was presented with:

Turns out any site, in this case the blog "Camera Porn" is blocked as being porn. Check the link, it's not porn in the traditional vein. Good to know that these sites are vetted by real live people... Not! I'm guessing science students won't be allowed to look at Space Porn or Astronomy Porn either.

Small rural libraries and technology

Recently I was speaking with someone about a forthcoming open position which would be dealing with many small rural libraries. The person was saying that they had mentioned to a board member that would be hiring someone that they should be sure to look for someone more technology oriented/comfortable than the person leaving the position. The board member responded something to the effect of "sure, but we need someone who can focus on the needs of small rural libraries."

Do you see a disconnect here? This conversation to me implies that someone in the position of hiring the next library leader in that area believes that the "needs of small rural libraries" and technology are mutually exclusive. Well, they're not. How about this for an idea: look to hire someone that understands the needs of small rural libraries and has a basic yet solid grasp of technology. Better yet, someone who can understand how technology can help small rural libraries. Just an idea.

Religious test for office

According to Article VI of the US Constitution:

"...no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

That is, except in Tennessee I guess:

Article IX: Disqualifications
§ 2. Atheists holding office
No person who denies the being of God, or a future state of rewards and punishments, shall hold any office in the civil department of this State.

Hmmm... Well, they don't allow "Ministers of the Gospel" to hold state-level legislative seats either but that is to ensure that they are "not to be diverted from the great duties of their functions" (Article IX,§1).

Now here's a lawsuit that should be waiting to happen.

Another amusing copyright statement

"All rights reserved. All lefts gregarious. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photography, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission form the publisher, or special dispensation from the Archbishop of Cydonia Mensae." (Look it up ;-)

You Can't Picture This

More sad news about public photography. This time again from the UK.

The World of Chemistry

Bilingual blogging?

I receive this question from a reader last week and haven't found anyone who can help her out yet. If you can, please post a comment which she'll be checking periodically.

I'm wondering if in your research you'd seen any successful implementations of a bilingual blog as I'd be interested in talking with the writers about best practices/issues that arise. We're talking about blogs for our clients here in my department (4700 staff) but any communication (even within the library 20 people) that's on our intranet or internet site needs to be bilingual.

Some words on me:
I've never written a blog, though I've been reading them through my aggregator for years. I'm new to Libraries (although my MLIS is 10 years old) and new to my position here at Justice Canada. Previously I worked for the National Archives of Canada in a position far removed from public service.

Cheers,
Jennifer Svarckopf
Manager, Systems and Technical Serives | Gestionnaire, Systèmes et services techniques
Department of Justice Canada | Ministère de la Justice Canada
Departmental Library | Bibliothèque ministérielle

A Day in the Life of Technical Services

Via Tame The Web

Change from the inside

I recently saw this cartoon from Gapingvoid and it got me thinking.

I don't believe that I've mentioned this previously here but I'm running for vice-chair/chair elect of ITART, the Information Technology and Access Round Table of the Nebraska Library Commission Association. Basically, I'm putting my money (well, my time anyway) where my mouth is.

Folks here in NE have learned over the past year that I find it part of my mission in life, and also part of my job, to shoot my mouth off. I feel that I generally do this when appropriate and with plenty of thought behind what I'm saying but not everyone will agree with that. Since said shooting typically involves saying something along the lines of "why?" not everyone likes what I have to say.

I've said some things about the state association in general and about ITART in particular and as a result I'm getting involved. I believe things need to change and in this case they're best changed from within. (Issue #1: The ITART Web site.)

But, and here's where the above cartoon fits in, one must be careful not to blend in too much when attempting to create change. Just how much change can George possibly generate when he's indistinguishable from everyone else in the organization? This is not a problem I generally have, but am still wary of nonetheless.

I've met many next-gen librarians in this state and most of them have said the same thing to me in one form or another: I'm trying to change things but no one's listening. My advice, join with me and STAND OUT. Make some noise. (Just make sure you know what you're talking about when you do.) Stick to your guns. Join me to work from within. The change will happen eventually.

Linux projects updates

RE: The Cloudbook
Well, XP installed successfully but I can't find my product key. Even if I did, I'd still most likely have to call Microsoft for a new one as I'm installing it on completely different hardware. (It's the copy I got with my TabletPC which is now running Vista so I assume installing it on another computer is kosher.)

RE: Linux media server
This project is DOA. I got the new hard drive, WiFi card and another 2x128MB of RAM. Everything worked but 320MB RAM is not enough to run smooth video on a 233MHz processor. Oh well, it was a nice try.

Thanks and thanks again

Just a quick pair of thanks to the librarians at Love Library on the campus of University of Nebraska, Lincoln and to the attendees of the Southeast Library System (NE) 2008 Training Extravaganza, both of whom I spoke for last week. Both groups were fun and my hosts were a pleasure to work with. Below is a photo of some Wii Boxing fun which will link you through to my other photos from the SELS event. (My presentation was on LibraryThing and it was not recorded nor were there handouts.) Video, audio, and the slides from my UNL talk are available through the NLC blog.

Oh, and UNL librarians: Yes, Diana will be one of your students this fall. Got any work-study openings?

Just another day at the reference desk

Via Love the Liberry

Novelties: When Specialty Plates Go Hilariously Wrong

The genius that hides behind this vanity plate is beyond words.

Jury clears Galveston news photographer of interfering with police during arrest

Finally, some good news, though it's sad that the trial even happed at all.

A jury cleared a former Galveston County Daily News photographer Wednesday of a charge that he interfered with police during 2007’s Mardi Gras.

The case raised questions about whether police destroyed evidence, and prompted debate about the rights of journalists and ordinary citizens to monitor the actions of law enforcement.

Read the full story at KHOU.com.

The Gen-Y Guide to Web 2.0@Work

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Read the full article: Why Gen Y Is Going to Change the Web on ReadWriteWeb.

Understanding Anti-Piracy Enforcement

TorrentFreak has a great post explaining some of the most common misconceptions about anti-piracy enforcement today. They are:

1. There have been very few actual legal cases, as yet, that have involved torrents.
2. The majority of copyright cases are CIVIL, not criminal
3. What most people think of as being the law, often isn’t.
4. The RIAA and the MPAA never get involved in anti piracy evidence collection directly.
5. Most of the time, people are going from what someone they have met on a forum had read in an IRC channel.

Each of these are addresses in detail on TorrentFreak.

Our Transportation Facilities Are Being Watched

Yet another "photographers are considered terrorists by default" story. This time from the blog of the Spokane County Transportation Department.

I was out taking pictures this morning of sites of transportation projects to be completed over the next twenty years. One of those projects is to move of the weigh station near Stateline further east along I-90. I stopped at the pretty much deserted weigh station and took a couple pictures, then drove off. About 10 minutes later I received a call on my cell phone from Washington State Patrol asking why I had been taking pictures of the weigh station!

The blogger's final comment is the most interesting:

I guess it makes me feel a little better to know that someone is watching the people who are watching our infrastructure. On the other hand, it kind of scares me that they could track me down that fast.

Read the whole story on the SRTC Transportation Blog.

Think Like a Dandelion

In Cory Doctorow's latest Locus column he discusses the reproduction methodology of the dandelions (something I'm currently fighting in my own back year, literally,) and relates it to artists in the Internet world.

Dandelions and artists have a lot in common in the age of the Internet. This is, of course, the age of unlimited, zero-marginal-cost copying. If you blow your works into the net like a dandelion clock on the breeze, the net itself will take care of the copying costs. Your fans will paste-bomb your works into their mailing list, making 60,000 copies so fast and so cheaply that figuring out how much it cost in aggregate to make all those copies would be orders of magnitude more expensive than the copies themselves.

You can read the full article on Locus Online.

Billy O'Reilly meltdown dance mix video

Contains a lot of adult language.

Tonight's Keith Olberman Special Comment

Read the transcript at MSNBC.com.

More BS involving photography in public places

Wow, three stories in one day. The first from a professional photographer taking photos of the Port of Los Angeles. Seems the FBI paid him a visit.

So I inform them that I was under the impression that everything I was doing was legal. Security guards can't chase you off of public streets, and that I'm free to shoot whatever I want in public view. I inform them that my rationalization was that anything you can see from a public street isn't private (if they're trying to protect some secret, they shouldn't put it there), and if I really wanted to canvas the place, Google Maps' satellite view is a much better place to start. They confirm that yes, what I was doing was completely legal, but they're just doing their jobs, that it doesn't make sense, and that the "heightened security alert"... "will change soon". They informed me that most of their job lately has been following up with photographers who take photos in the port complex. They also informed me that they try their best to inform private security guards how to deal with confrontations with photographers, and that most of the guards have a bit of a skewed view on what's legal (oh my god this is true), and they're trying to correct that. They have had to correct guards who have insisted that photos be erased, or worse, have confiscated equipment in the name of homeland security. This doesn't help anybody, and makes their jobs harder.

Read the full story on the iStockPhoto forums.

Next from someone taking photos of the Red Line, amazingly enough, also in Los Angels.

Well last week here in Los Angeles, I was waiting to board the redline (subway) and snapped a picture with my cell phone camera. Not the best picture in the world, but I was just putzing around, waiting for the train, holding a quizno's to-go bag. Almost immediately, a vest wearing man with METRO emblazoned on his back who had been mopping the area nearby rushed up to me and the exchange went something like this:
Him: Hey! It's against the 9-11 Law to take pictures down hear man!
Me: You mean the Patriot Act?
Him: No pictures.
Me: Could you explain? What law do you mean?
Him: You are lawyer?
Me: No.
Him: No pictures. You could be a terrorist. Very strict!
Me: How about I take a picture of you?
Him: F**k you...(I couldn't believe it either)

Read the full story on Keith's MySpace blog.

Americans and World News

BBtv - Cory Doctorow: Show us your "Little Brother" HOWTO videos, and "Dumpster-Diving Philosopher."

Almost Arrested for Taking Photos at Union Station

Don't try to take hi-res photos at Union Station, even if you do work for NPR.

Then the security guard returned. She informed us that we would have to cease taking pictures immediately and leave. I asked what the problem was, and she said that this is a private space, and we didn't have permission from management to take pictures. I told her that we were testing equipment for potential use by NPR, showed them our press passes, and noted there were plenty of other people walking around with cameras. She seemed sympathetic to our position, but said she was relaying orders she'd received from someone higher up. I asked if we could speak with them, then twittered it:

Just got told by security to leave. Asked to speak with a supervisor to explain why we can't take pictures at union station.

Then it gets more bizarre.

Throughout the conversation, which I should point out was conducted in a cordial, but firm tone, we received mixed messages from the security guards. One told us the problem was that we were using a tripod, while another insisted it was because we had "that thing" on top of our tripod. They then changed the story again, and said that journalists couldn't take pictures without permission from management, and that Union Station is a private space run by a private company, not a public space. They never gave us an answer as to why we were first allowed to take photos in the first location, but could not do the same here.

Read the full story on Andy Carvin's Waste of Bandwidth.

Fences

A quote from the book I'm currently reading inspired me to create this mini-presentation. Eventually I'm sure I'll work it into one of my proper presentations.

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Star Wars: The Clone Wars theatrical trailer

Addictomatic: Inhale the Web

I'm not typically a fan of meta-search engines but Addictomatic (sent in my my coworker Cathy) looks interesting. In a very 2.0-ish way it presents to you results from sites such as flickr, live.com, Google blog search, Digg, technorati, YouTube, and many others. Each box containing search results can be repositioned on the screen via drag-and-drop. Here's a few screenshots to give you an idea before you try it out.

Millimeter Wave

Here's the next stage in airport security:

According to the TSA:

I venture to say, Mikhail Baryshnikov may have exposed more in his ballet costume than this robotic images portrays. Why did we decide to put there up now? Because you've asked for it...Hopefully the editors of Reader's Digest will consider these for their next cover.

Read more at the Evolution of Security blog.

Star Wars fans vs. Sports Fans

Linux trials and errors

So, I'm currently in the middle of two Linux-based projects. One is going well, the other, not so much.

Project #1:

Two weekends ago my Cloudbook offered to update itself to the new version of Ubuntu (which the included gOS is based on). I ran that update and after several hours I was told I needed to reboot to finish. It was at this point that the touchpad and keyboard were unresponsive. The power button was equally unresponsive. So, I pulled the battery and turned it back on. All I got was a memory test. Seems that reboot was needed to tell the computer that there was actually an OS on the drive.

Today I finally got my hands on an external CD/DVD drive and went to install Ubuntu 8.04 from scratch totally erasing gOS. (I'd been meaning to try that anyway.) Well, the install CD runs and gets just so far then I get the amazingly colored flickering screen. Seems it doesn't like the video driver or something. So, I'm now downloading the ISO of the original gOS install and going to try restoring to factory just to get it up and running. (Really, I'm not complaining, this is a learning experience now.) Anyone want to suggest a good Linux distro other than Ubuntu?

Project #2:

For about a year now I've kept my Vista laptop hooked up in the living room connected to my HDTV. This has been great for watching TV and Video podcasts but there are some down sides. First, I'm running the laptop in dual-screen mode so as to not have to watch something on both the TV and the laptop's monitor. Unfortunately, this causes some programs to run on the laptop screen and need to be dragged to the TV. From the sofa, this isn't always an easy thing to do. Second, the laptop's drive is quite full so I can't put much on it at one time. Third, networking between XP (my base machine in the basement running BitTorrent) and Vista (the laptop) isn't as reliable as I'd like so transferring from one machine to the other usually involved sneakernet. In the end, I've been meaning to buy a box just to hook to the TV. Last night, I hit on an idea.

I've got an old beige box from 2000. For years it ran Windows NT4 very reliably but I didn't hook it back up when I moved to Nebraska a little over a year ago. Hmm. I keep telling people that Linux will run well on old hardware, let me prove it. Install Ubuntu 8.04 I did. It runs, but a smidge slowly on this box. The specs? 233MHz, 96MB RAM, 10GB hard drive. Yep, top of the line eight years ago.

So, Ubuntu runs and Web surfing is fine but video's going to need a little more behind it. I've ordered a 200GB hard drive, another 256MB RAM (the motherboard will only handle 3x128 max) and a wireless card for the networking. Grand total, just under $100.

Once the parts arrive the plan is to install them, get it to talk to my Windows workgroup, and install the USB Bluetooth dongle for my wireless keyboard. Assuming all goes well, I should have a Linux-based media box in my living room within a week or two.

I'll keep you posted on both projects as events warrant.

Funny nonetheless

I've met both James Patterson and Nora Roberts which maybe made me laugh at this all the more.

Thanks PALS!

Sorry for not posting this yesterday but I'd like to officially thank my hosts and all the attendees of the Prairie Area Library System's PALS Day this past Wednesday. The weather was perfect (sunny on the day I got to hike through the woods, and rainy while we had to be inside for the presentations) and I wish I could steal your park and its facilities and transport them to about 10 miles outside of Lincoln, NE. Everyone was wonderful to me and made me feel welcome. Feel free to invite me back any time.

Parallel Parking w/ Mr. Car

Copyright and the World's Most Popular Song

Woah! It looks like Happy Birthday might not actually be under copyright.

"Happy Birthday to You" is the best-known and most frequently sung song in the world. Many - including Justice Breyer in his dissent in Eldred v. Ashcroft - have portrayed it as an unoriginal work that is hardly worthy of copyright protection, but nonetheless remains under copyright. Yet close historical scrutiny reveals both of those assumptions to be false. The song that became "Happy Birthday to You," originally written with different lyrics as "Good Morning to All," was the product of intense creative labor, undertaken with copyright protection in mind. However, it is almost certainly no longer under copyright, due to a lack of evidence about who wrote the words; defective copyright notice; and a failure to file a proper renewal application.

SSRN-Copyright and the World's Most Popular Song by Robert Brauneis

One bielyon dollars!

Ok, I exaggerate a little but this is getting a smidge ridiculous. The MPAA is demanding $15.4 million from The Pirate Bay to "cover the damages they suffered from 4 movies and 13 TV-episodes that were made available via the popular BitTorrent tracker". Sorry, but by that logic, never mind the insane math involved in coming up with that number, the MPAA should be suing Google too since I can find torrents of The Pink Panther via their search engine too.

Pirate Bay's response: “The worst thing is that I lost 100 kronor on a bet on the number they would come up with,” Sunde added. “And, it sucks that they didn’t claim more than for Napster and the other sites. It’s cooler to break the record.”

Meme: Passion Quilt

I haven't officially been tagged with this meme to my knowledge but I was inspired this morning by the combination of a quote from a book I'm reading and preparing for a Library 2.0 presentation next week. So, here's my entry:

Who am I tagging? Many I know have already done this but I'm sure I've missed a few so if you've already done this, my apologies:

1. laurak
2. mlibrarianus
3. rgarza
4. nirak
5. cjburns

3 Simple Meme Rules:

• Post a picture from a source like FlickrCC or Flickr Creative Commons or make/take your own that captures what YOU are most passionate about for kids to learn about...and give your picture a short title.
• Title your blog post "Meme: Passion Quilt" and link back to this blog entry.
• Include links to 5 folks in your professional learning network or whom you follow on Twitter/Pownce.

BBC removes Doctor Who fan’s knitting patterns from the Web

I'm not a knitter but I've been watching a lot of the photos on Flickr (especially the recent Face of Bo and Adipose creations) and wishing someone would love me enough to knit some of these for me. So when I read the story of the person who's received a cease and desist from the BBC for posting homebrew knitting patters online I felt just a little sick.

“We note that you are supplying DR WHO items, and using trade marks and copyright owned by BBC. You have not been given permission to use the DR WHO brand and we ask that you remove from your site any designs connected with DR WHO. Please reply acknowledging receipt of this email, and confirm that you will remove the DR WHO items as requested.”

Really, who is this hurting? No money is changing hands and the BBC isn't loosing any market share since they're offering no such thing officially. Hey Russell, what do you think about this?

Read more and link to the full story on the The Open Rights Group Blog.

Top 10 Jackie Chan Fight Scenes

(Contains some adult language)

Visa Officially Says Stores Cannot Deny Purchases If You Don't Show ID

According to The Consumerist, here's VISA's official policy on stores requiring ID for a credit card purchase.

Merchants may not refuse to honor a Visa card simply because the cardholder refuses a request for supplementary information. The only exception is when a Visa card is unsigned when presented. However, "See ID" is not considered a valid signature. In these situations, a merchant must obtain authorization, review additional identification, and require the cardholder to sign the card before completing a transaction.

To report any merchant practices that you feel are inappropriate, please notify the disputes area at the financial institution that issued your card account. Your card issuing bank has access to the appropriate Visa rules and regulations as well as to the Notification of Customer Complaint forms which should be used by your bank to document and file merchant complaints.

As an alternative, you may contact the Global Customer Care Services to report merchant practices that you feel are inappropriate. Please contact the Global Customer Care Services at 1-800-VISA-911 (1-800-847-2911). Please advise them that you were referred to file a complaint. The staff will be able to initiate a complaint form over the phone.

Flawed Bush logic on surge

Countdown, May 7: On Tuesday, Max Booth, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, insisted that the surge has worked and civilian deaths were down in Iraq. However, he wrote an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal the day before claiming the jump in American fatalities could be a sign of things getting worse before they get better.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/24511312#24511312

Moyers on Wright

Bill Moyers reflects on his interview with Reverend Jeremiah Wright. (Sorry, the video isn't readily embeddable.)

Little Brother » Download for Free

The CC-licensed free download is now available.

I did listen to the audio version over the weekend and I've got to say it's an amazing book that everyone should read. I got goosebumps a few times and started to tear once or twice too.

Pink Martini

Last Friday night I got to see Pink Martini with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra Pop. Here's a sample if you're not familiar with their music.