I love the idea of an ebook reader, but I have problems with Amazon’s Kindle, foremost being price and inability to load my own content on without sending it through Amazon. I’ve been playing with the Sony Reader the last week or so but I don’t love it either. Since I want to love ebook readers I’m on the look out for anything that might improve them. The Cooler is an interesting venture in the market. It’s sleeker and well, prettier, it comes in 8 colours including ruby red, vivid violet and hot pink, you can view jpg, pdf, txt, and mp3 files right to it yourself. Its not without its problems, only one navigation buttons and books in the cooler store are more expensive than Amazon Kindle Books, although the selection seemed good. Overall its compares to Sony’s version than Amazon’s. More Reviews: Cool-er eBook Reader Review Hands on: Cool-er eBook reader review Cool-er ebook reader: is this the iPod for books? Bookmark on Delicious Digg this post Share on FriendFeed Buzz it up Share on netvibes share via Reddit Share with Stumblers Tumblr it Buzz it up Subscribe to the comments on this post Print for later Tell
Monthly Archives: June 2009
The UNICEF Bee and the Digital Doorway
This video, The Future of the Library, has been making the rounds on library blogs and after watching it I visit the blog Everywhere is Here. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about the digital divide and the bubble I spend most of my time in so I was much more interested in this video. It is about the Digital Doorway and the UNICEF Bee, providing access to the internet for those in remote areas. The project was inspired by the Hole in the Wall experiment (perhaps more famous for inspiring the movie Slumdog Millionare) The information and access we take for granted, so for granted in fact that we we’re concerned about the future of libraries as they have been traditionally, is something a great many people don’t have. This video and the projects linked to are in Africa and India but the divide is real, right here in the United States. There are a great many people without access to the internet access or a computer or a smartphone. People, who, if they did have access wouldn’t know how to use them. Just something to think about. Bookmark on Delicious Digg this post Share on FriendFeed Buzz it
What Reading (Listening) Do You Recommend for a Leadership Program?
My library has a leadership program and we were asked to recommend books, journals articles blogs blogposts podcasts whatever with an annotation preferably, on any topic relevant to leadership, management, customers service or other topic we think would be helpful to participants. I went through my favorites of the last couple of years and came up with these: Predictably Irrational, The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions Outliers: The Story of Success Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations The Big Moo: Stop Trying to Be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable The Myth of Multitasking: How What do you recommend? Bookmark on Delicious Digg this post Share on FriendFeed Buzz it up Share on netvibes share via Reddit Share with Stumblers Tumblr it Buzz it up Subscribe to the comments on this post Print for later Tell a friend
Geek the Library
Monday OCLC kicked off their Geek the Library campaign with Iowa (my home state!) and Georgia (my current state!). What is Geek the Library? Its a community-based public awareness campaign. The idea is to increase public awareness of libraries and the important role they play and the funding we so desperately need. People can share what they are passionate about using geek as a verb Geek\Verb. To love, to enjoy, to celebrate, to have an intense passion for. To express interest in. To possess a large amount of knowledge in. To promote I love (or is that geek?) the potential of this campaign! When they get the gear up I’ll be first in line for a shirt and coffee cup! Right now they are testing the campaign in Georgia and Iowa, with plans to kick off nationwide in 2010. I’ll be interested to see how it plays out. The site looks slick and being a geek is cool in many circles now, I’m sure it will be a hit with librarian. Will it raise public awareness and more importantly funding for libraries? I hope so. For the public they have show your support page. I do with they had made
Does the average Joe really need to know what a browser is?
Jessamyn West shared this yesterday “A team from Google interviewed dozens of people in Times Square the other day, asking a simple question: What’s a browser? This was in an effort to understand and improve the customer experience of Google’s own browser, called Chrome. Turns out that over 90% of the people interviewed could not describe what a Web browser is.” Watch the video I don’t think any of my non-techie family or friends could answer this question. I’m not sure I could adequately if a microphone was put in my face while I was out shoe shopping (its hard to swtich from thinking about a stacked heel to properly defining browser) My parents use Firefox because I told them to, I don’t think they have any idea why. But does it matter? I know nothing about how my car works, I have no idea what’s actually involved in making it go, other than I turn a key, shift gears and apply the brake. Does the average Joe need to know what a browser is or just how to get online? I’m sure a car enthusiastic will tell you my Saturn is not so hot, but I don’t care it
Reading
