Google Art Project: I Get to Be Thomas Crown

It's pronounced Van Gogh.

Using their Streetview cameras in accordance with their indexing and photo posting skillz, Google has created the Google Art Project.  I can only think of two reasons to do this:  educate the masses and plan elaborate art thefts.  I plan on getting Starry Night from the MOMA any day now, just as soon as I virtually find my way to New York on Streetview and then virtually romance some Internet hottie on Second Life.  My virtual self can do anything!  Whoops, the virtual cops!  The link was dead when I found it, I swear!  Pew, Pew! OMG, what have I done!  That's okay, with the Google Prison Project upcoming I can get in and out of anywhere!

Google blog
The Thomas Crown Affair

Apple to Sony eReader App: Kiss My Grits

The "Flo" of the computer world.

In a surprising turn of events in the land of ereader apps, Apple has rejected Sony's eReader app despite allowing both Kindle and Nook apps.  Some speculate that Apple is attempting to derail more eReaders from being used on its devices, either by cutting competition from its own eBookstore or just out of spite.  This article explains the situation in great detail. 

My personal opinion, formed after years of study in temples across the land, is that Apple don't want nobody up in their Kool-Aid.  They let Microsoft slide in a little, but Microsoft already had a mobile platform of their very own.  With little seen of the new PSP phone, Sony has only to grasp at the current race of smartphones.  With Apple shutting them out, they will have no option than to either keep selling their own reader or go all out kung fu style.  I hope for option #2.

Library Vending Machine

Ah, man.  I wanted a Snickers but got a Grisham...

In Polk County, Flordia, patrons are using an old piece of tech in a new and boring way: library vending machines.  The vending machines despense books and DVDs to patrons who want the satisfaction of self-checkout and the promise of never interacting with humans.  I find this an encouraging endevour, sefishly because I too do not wish to enteract with other humans.  Also, I hear books read better when they have been dropped often. 

There is a downside to this, however.  As one more step to the global robotic apolcalypse, these machines represent an awarness that literature and film is disposable as a candy bar.  Soon, carnivals nation wide will be littered with the tattered remains of Steinbeck and Twain as we quickly comsume fattening fiction to otherwise sate our non-existant lives.  I do not wish to rant, but I feel these machines will trivialize the most important calamity in our great nation:  fast fiction addiction.  Quickly pumping fiction from a machine instead of walking into the stacks and searching is the first step in allowing libraries to be nothing more than a wasteland, a laundrymat of convience where knowledge is not earned, it is purchased.  Nature will reclaim the stacks, wild animals running free in the reference section until one lone hunter stands tall in the computer lab, searching over the hunched backs of his bretherin to find himself wanting.  Where will it end?

This gibberish has been brought to you by the Society for Homogeneous Instant Teaching.  If you would like to know more about S.H.I.T., contact us, if you can find us.

Photo and original article here via CNN

It's a Shelver, It's a Cataloger, No! It's Super Librarian!

Batgirl, the O.G. Super Librarian

 Ever wanted to be a super hero?  How about a librarian super hero?  Gale, a company within Cengage Learning, has announced the "Are You a Librarian Superhero Contest" to unmask library superheroes.  A nominated librarian will be announced at this year's ALA conference and be published in a comic.

My thoughts on this?  Do not do this librarian superheroes!  Giving up your identity is the first mistake in superherodom!  Captain America fought and died to protect your identities (not that it did much good) and let us not even talk about how much of a steaming crap heap Spider-man's life and comics became after unmasking.  Just ask yourself, WWBGD?  What would Barbara Gordon (Batgirl) Do?  That lady took a bullet and kept on going!  Surely you can do the same library super heroes!

Does anyone else think "Gale" sounds like a supervillian's name?  What other library-centric things sound "superheroey"?  What would your superhero librarian name be?  What would be your powers?  Discuss.

Original press release and contest info here
Image from here

Kindle 'All Up On" Paperbacks

Amazon recently reported that ebooks on their site are outselling paperback books as the most popular format.  I am going to go out on a limb here and say, "Duh."  When your heavily promoted, electronic book market sells more electronic media than print media, that should probably be par for the course.  That would like the elderly lady at a used bookstore putting out a press release saying that her print books are kicking the shit out of ebooks in sales.  While the popularity of ebooks is notable, saying that users who already prefer an electronic media for shopping also really like buying electronic materials is kinda like saying people who like going to the pet store also really like hugging puppies.  This is a given announcement meant to encourage more ebook and ereader sales and excite an already excitable media.  I also find it funny that Amazon sells the Nook.

Prison Library Work: Not What You Would Expect

I bet you can't read 50 books in a row!

According to this post on the blog "Innocent Flower", working as a librarian in a prison is not as different as you would think.  A prison librarian, Emily, writes about how the library is important to the inmates as a source of information, entertainment, and income (there are several working there).  Both this article and Avi Steinberg's Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian are fascinating looks into this interesting librarian career choice.

This is normally the part of the post where I make some joke about the subject at hand, but I honestly think this is a stimulating look at our profession.  And I do not want released/escaped prisoners coming after me for "dissing" their favorite librarian.  Much love!

eBook News That's Fit to ePrint

3D is the new 2D.  Image from Copyblogger

 Amazon starting new service called Amazon Singles.  What is a single?  Think of that random dude you know who writes 20 page manifestos about how the world should be more like his favorite D&D campaign.  Now think of Kraft Singles.  Smoosh the two together and you get a processed yellow goo that might, might have a kernel of truth in it.

Google seems happy over ebook launch.  And why should they not be?  Ooooo, I am a giant software company that specializes in making people happy and stuff.  I can do anything with computer code.  Wwwwoooo.  Look at me program a double rainbow that farts leprechaun gold!

Yet another ebook Internet lending service.  Bookswim jumps on this months band wagon with a new service that rides the Kindle Lending service like a harpy from hell.  That's an unfair comparison, but hey, wasn't Danny Devito great as the penguin?