Librarian by Day » education

Top Ten Links Week 16

Bobbi Newman — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 15:05:39 +0000

My personally selected top 10 from the links I shared on Twitter from 4/16/2010 thru 4/22/2010

1. NYTimes: Out of the Loop in Silicon Valley – Sexism is still alive in Silicon Valley and pretty much everywhere else including libraries.

2. NYTimes: Web Coupons aKnow Lots About You, and They Tell – love coupons? Me too, but make sure you know what information you’re giving up when you get web coupons.

3. Two magazines, Newsweek and New York Teacher, offer competing views of what it will take to fix our schools via dmlcentral- the article the link goes to looks at two magazine covers but its worth actually reading the articles the covers are about.

4. Tim O’Reilly Explains the Internet of Things via mlx – be sure to read the article too

5. Are we surrendering our privacy too easily? Intriguing online conversation on MemeBurn via @dmlcentral – an absolute must read if you are thinking about privacy even a little.

6. Facebook’s move ain’t about changes in privacy norms - If you are looking for well thought out responses to claims that privacy is dead danah boyd is always dead on. Here is another great post from her about this issue comparing it to a face to face situation.

Public-ness has always been a privilege. For a long time, only a few chosen few got to be public figures. Now we’ve changed the equation and anyone can theoretically be public, can theoretically be seen by millions. So it mustn’t be a privilege anymore, eh? Not quite. There are still huge social costs to being public, social costs that geeks in Silicon Valley don’t have to account for. Not everyone gets to show up to work whenever they feel like it wearing whatever they’d like and expect a phatty paycheck. Not everyone has the opportunity to be whoever they want in public and demand that everyone else just cope.

7. Dear Non Library Followers: We’re looking 4 essays importance of libraries 4 savelibraries.org PLEASE WRITE 1 2day send lori at lorireed.com via baldgeekinmd

Savelibraries.org is the collaborative effort of my friends Heather Braum & Lori Reed. If believe in the value and importance of libraries please, please share your story.

8. Making Your Boss Look Good (Without Becoming a Sycophant) – great suggestions on ways to make your boss look good without looking like a, well you know

9. Study finds young do care about online privacy – Security- msnbc.com – well duh, but studies are always nice back up for those conversations with non believers

10. yes it does! RT @gcaserotti: RT @buffyjhamilton Does the term “digital natives” do kids a disservice? – yes absolutely! It does a disservice to those children without access to technology, it does a disservice to those who have it but don’t understand how to use everything or the ramifications of some of the aspects. They may be more comfortable with technology than some adults but they are still children.

CC image used courtesy of holeymoon on flickrSimilar Posts:

Voting is Open for the 2009 Edublog Awards – Go Vote!

Bobbi Newman — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 14:47:39 +0000

Voting ends Wednesday December 18th. Yes even you library people. You’ll find some great new blogs to read and trust me there are names in there you’ll recognize!

The Edublog Award Categories….

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My Nominations for the 2009 Edublog Awards

Bobbi Newman — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 15:48:06 +0000

My Nominations for The 2009 Edublog Awards are:

Best individual tweeter – Marianne Lenox and her blog
Best new blog - Emergent by Design by Venessa Miemis
Best resource sharing blog – Librarian in Black
Best librarian / library blog – The Unquiet Librarian by Buffy Hamilton

Deadlines for nominations is Tuesday 8 December! Then the voting begins, ending Wednesday 16 December! Award Ceremony: Friday 18. So make your nominations today! PS there are more categories than I listed.

Found out about the Awards on Information Wants to Be FreeSimilar Posts:

Commentary On the Digital Divide from the Chief Executives of Netflix & CommonSenseMedia

Bobbi Newman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:05:09 +0000

CC image courtesy of ap. on Flickr

If you’re thinking about transliteracy you almost have to be thinking about the digital divide. What does it mean? Is it real? How will we close the gap?

This New York Times piece Will the Digital Divide Close by Itself? From the Google’s Breakthrough Learning in a Digital Age provides a look at and arguments about the digital divide from two different perspectives.

From Jim Steyer, chief executive of CommonSense Media and co-sponsor of the event

“every kid needs to be digitally literate by the 8th grade” and called for a major public education campaign to make that happen. He argued that technology and learning are synonymous and that schools, parents, and kids must get up to speed in the next five years.

On the other hand:

Reed Hastings, the founder and chief executive of Netflix, contradicted him directly, saying it would take well more than five years to bridge the divide.

Mr. Hastings, an avid education philanthropist and proponent of school reforms, argued that at the advent of any new technology — television, cars, even rockets — people get riled up and wring their hands over a growing gap between the haves and have-nots.

He said that gaps narrow naturally as the market evolves and prices drop, enabling more people to bring new technology into the home and schools.

Most interestingly:

“We need to shift our expectations,” Mr. Hastings said. “This is a natural part of the evolution of technology.”

If I understand this correctly he is saying that the digital divide is part of an evolutionary process where technology and access to technology will be ubiquitous. I’m not sure I make the connection.

Most importantly:

Failed school reform might point to the need for more efforts outside of the classroom.

This is where libraries need to step in. We need to help students close the digital divide because what that means, what were talking about is the same thing as transliteracy. Becoming transliterate closes the digital divide. If schools can’t or wont, libraries need to step forward. We’ve done it for years with literacy, we need to do it now with transliteracy.

Knight Commission on the Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy Warns of “Second Class Citizens” in the Digital Age

Bobbi Newman — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 15:34:19 +0000

The Knight Foundation has released a new report Information Needs of Communities in a Democracy. A good deal of the content either is or could be applies to libraries. The entire report is 148 pages, you can also download a 2 page summary that includes recommendations like these

2: Increase support for public service media aimed at meeting community information needs. Read more …
6: Integrate digital and media literacy as critical elements of education at all levels through collaboration among federal, state, and local education officials. Read more …
7: Fund and support public libraries and other community institutions as centers of digital and media training, especially for adults. Read more …
10: Support the activities of information providers to reach local audiences with quality content through all appropriate media, such as mobile phones, radio, and public-access cable. Read more …
12: Engage young people in developing the digital information and communication capacities of local communities. Read more …
14: Emphasize community information flow in the design and enhancement of a local community’s public spaces.. Read more …
15: Ensure that every local community has at least one high-quality online hub. Read more …

The Foundation has also taken actions that affect libraries:

$3.3 million to improve free, public Internet access in libraries in 12 communities

$2.28 million in broadband access projects in underserved neighborhoods in three cities

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