iPad App Makes Civil War Photos Pop in 3D

Just jumps right out at ya, am I right?

Matt Raymond, the Library of Congress's former communications director, used original Civil War negatives to create 3D images for an iPad app.  Twenty-four of the pictures will be with the first incarnation of the app with more possibly on the way.  The app will cost you $1.99 or you could just hop on over to the LoC where the 3D images have been donated.

This is cool and all, but I want some true to life 4D rocking my mobile, you know?  I want what Harry Potter has and I am not talking Ginny Weasley.  When my newspapers, books and magazines feature people dancing for my amusement without me having to click on a play button, I will be happy.  And do not try to tell me about GIFs either.  They do not count until they stop repeating themselves like a YouTube video with Tourrette's Syndrome.  Until then, my iPhone will keep doing the same things it always does:  playing Angry Birds, dropping calls, and taking blurry photos.

Daily Mail

Doctor Who Companion Elisabeth Sladen Passed Away

David Tennant (The Doctor) and Elisabeth Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith)

Elisabeth Sladen, 63, passed away after a battle with cancer.  The actress portrayed Sarah Jane Smith on the original show on and off from 1973 to the present.  While I admit I was late on the Doctor Who bandwagon, only coming in at the start of the new series, I have retroactively watched many of the Sarah Jane adventures with Tom Baker and John Pertwee as well as her appearances on the new and found her delightful.

The news has been confirmed by fellow Doctor Who alum Nicola Bryant in a tweet:

I'm so sorry to have to say I've just had a call to say Liz Sladen has died. It's too much to take in, but it's true. How tragically young.

And also by Gallifrey One, the annual Doctor Who convention:

We are absolutely devastated to note the passing today of the extraordinary Elisabeth Sladen. Our deepest sympathies to her family.

My heart goes out to her friends and family.

Update:  BBC news, Doctor Who news page, and Digital Spy also confirm.

P is for Phone

"You got a phone I can have?"
"We have a phone patrons can use for emergencies, but we do not have a public phone."
"Cool, can I use it?"

Have you ever had someone say "cool" in an emergency?  You would be amazed how calm and collected some people can be when the poop really hits the oscillating fan.  And to be able to hold together in a public forum, to stay on the phone with the other person and talk about Grandma's hip replacement when all hell is breaking loose, that takes moxie and spirit.

Check out the jump for a little more discussion on phones in the library.

Pay phones
A pay phone in a public library is like a prostitute in a bar: used, abused, and socially unacceptable.  Nobody wants to use it except the most desperate of people and often those are the folks staff will let use the library phone anyway.  Also, if you have it in a corner or out of the way area, it becomes creepyville where dudes wearing long coats and little else hang out.

Public phones
Public phones do exist in remote parts of the world where libraries still trust people to make sensible use of their time.  These places also lose their phone service when someone wishes to access the Internet because they are all on the same line.  The idea of trusting the public with an open phone connection is like trusting a bear with your child.  Sure everything might turn out fine, but there is always the chance for carnage and death.

Library phones
The library must have a land-line phone for the same reason old west towns had a telegraph office: it is the simplest form of communication today.  Think about that.  A hundred years ago, people would be blown away that business is more or less required to have a phone "just cause."  They would have called it witchcraft and burned it down or that "ducking stool" thing that was so popular with the kids those days.  While now everyone must have a website, there is still a majority of the population that is outraged when there is no phone number to connect them to someone to be outraged at.  

Cell phones
I... cell phones... little things in their ears... staff joined in... silent mode is an option...  I am sorry, I just can not coherently talk about this anymore.

O is for Original

Dictionary.com defines "original" as an adjective that is

1.  belonging or pertaining to the origin or beginning of something, or to a thing at its beginning: The book still has its original binding.

2.  new; fresh; inventive; novel: an original way of advertising.

3.  arising or proceeding independently of anything else: an original view of history.

4.  capable of or given to thinking or acting in an independent,creative, or individual manner: an original thinker.

5.  created, undertaken, or presented for the first time: to give the original performance of a string quartet.

6.  being something from which a copy, a translation, or the like is made: The original document is in Washington.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "Insist upon yourself.  Be original" while Benjamin Franklin said "Originality is the art of concealing your sources."

Herman Melville somberly stated, "it is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation” as Kahlil Gibran jested, “Should we all confess our sins to one another we would all laugh at one another for our lack of originality.”

In conclusion, the great M.C. Escher said "Originality is merely an illusion."

May your life and blogs be original.

pw0nd.com

What's Wrong with TV's "Joey"?

 

Joseph.  Joe.  Cup o' Joe.  Joe the Plumber.  Joey Bag O'Donuts.  That name is stitched across the American landscape in a big bad way.  I have a friend, however, that wishes that were not so.  At first, when Joe was still "little Joey" he got a kick out of all the people named after him on television.  Then, he noticed a pattern as he got older:  when a character named "Joey" came along on a TV show, he (or she) was often either an uber  man-child, a moron, or an annoying hippie.  Comic relief, basically.  Even in movies "Joey" was often put down, like in Back to the Future with Uncle "Jailbird" Joey or in the Peter Boyle movie Joe where Joe is kinda nuts.

Hit the link for some TV examples of Joey's gone wrong.

Show: My Two Dads
Actor: Greg Evigan
Profession: Artist
Homelife: Loft in New York with his possible daughter and her other possible father
Distinctive Joey-ness:  Wacky artist that makes his own furniture and clothes (or that was just the 80s)

Catch phrase:  "Paul Reiser sure is funny" followed by career slump

Show: Full House

Actor: Dave Coulier

Profession: Comedian

Homelife: Lives in best friend's house helping take care of best friends three daughters.  

Distinctive Joey-ness:  Fondness for impressions and improvisation

Catch phrase: "Cut-it-out", with hand motions

Show:  Blossom

Actor:  Joey Lawrence

Profession:  High School

Homelife:  Lives at home with his single dad, ex-drug addict brother, and sister whose name no one can remember

Distinctive Joey-ness:  Dumb as a brick

Catch phrase:  "Whoa" followed by audience applause

 

Show:  Friends

Actor:  Matt LeBlanc

Profession:  Actor

Homelife:  Lives with his best friend Chandler and hangs out with his other friends

Distinctive Joey-ness:  Dumb as a brick and smooth with the ladies

Catch phrase:  "How you doing?" followed by booty

Show:  Dawson's Creek

Actress:  Katie Holmes

Profession:  High School

Homelife:  Lives with her sister after her dad was arrested, also spends lots of time on boats in a creek

Distinctive Joey-ness:  Aloof artist with a thang for men

Catch phrase:  "Dawson, you're my two dimensional hero" followed by chaste one-dimensional kiss that lead to weirdly religious short people.

There's also a Joe, North Carolina.  That's about all I got.

N is for News

Often, I do top news stories from around the world of libraries, librarians, books, ebooks, electronics, and whatever else catches my eye.  These are some news stories that appeared this week and the reasons I rejected them or reasons I reject these stories in general.  Here we go!

Ebook sales triple!  Quite frankly, I am tired of hearing about eBooks.  Sure, fascinating reinvention of the way society blah, blah, blah. I am running out of jokes on this.

The Weird World of Straight to DVD Christian film.  This article did not need me throwing jokes at it to make it funny.

Man banned from library allegedly pushed guard through glass window.  While this may be "How to Get Banned From a Library" worthy, I honestly try not to do too much about crazy people going crazy in the library unless it is out of the norm.  If he had assaulted him with a 1st edition of Mark Twain or a red herring, I would have more to run with.

Endless stories about people retiring or changing jobs. I have nothing against celebrating a community leader's career, but I try to stay kinda national or global on this site.  So, unless you develop the cure for book cancer during your cataloging career, you will probably not show up on here unless I start a "Crazy Librarian of the Week" and even then, you would have to be crazy.

Bibliophiles, casual readers get fix at spring book sale Much like the above story, book sales are more of a local thing. Now, again, if there is something spectacular about the book sale, like Nicholas Cage's Superman comic showing up in it, boom, it goes up on this site.

Nicholas Cage's comic book is found, but the thief is still at large. I honestly did not give one poop about a rich guy getting his fancy prize found. Not enough to write about, anyway.

If you see a story you think I might find interesting, send me an email at evan@bannedlibrary.com or @bannedlibrary on Twitter.

M is for Marketing

Hot, sexy books on display

Did you know your library was trying to sell you something?  Oh, yeah, that friendly neighborhood library down the street is a hotbed of propaganda that serves to get you to check out more items and come to more functions. Honestly, their funding depends on it.  Let's look at a few ways your local library is trying to sell you on them.

Library Logo

The one thing the library system needs is logo.  Brand the library so as it creates all its library marketing projects it has a graphic to slap on everything.  And I mean EVERYTHING.  If the library had a chance in creating anything, it should have a that logo on it.  Think of it like NASCAR, the library want its logo distinct enough to show up anywhere and be recognized.

Book Jackets

Sure, the publishers are the ones that really do most of the work here, what with all the images and lettering and names and such.  Placement, however, is something the library uses the book jacket for.  Did you know that if you display a book jacket flat out on a shelf, it will check out more than if it is vertical on a shelf with a hundred other books?  This is a form of brand recognition and the tendency of people in general to be lazy.  People are less likely to hunt for their favorite authors, especially if the name is staring them in the face from the get go.

Displays

Right up there with the book jacket is the display.  Now, this can go from displaying a lot of books or just pictures that put the book or author in the person's mind so that when they are browsing and see that book or name they go for it.  Special subject displays, like "Mystery Month," get the idea in the patrons mind to go for the mystery books, kinda put them in the mood if you will.  

Posters and pamphlets

Get out your graphic design hats, folks, cause the library is going to start real advertising.  Whether it is a program, subject display, or service that the library is advertising a well designed poster can lead people to the library or to the place in the library it wants them to go.  Posters and pamphlets are something the patron can take with them, remind them that "Hey, the library has a polka dancing monkey on Saturday and the book about the monkey is in nonficiton!"  The best way to do this is by creating the pamphlet as a bookmark.

Social Networking

One of the best tools today in getting people interested in the library is social networking.  Web 2.0, Library 2.0, whatever goofy name you want to call it, getting a library a Facebook, Myspace and/or Friendster account is a great way to connect with the users.  Taking what the library learned above, displaying services and events on the library's Facerbook can reach out to its users in a whole new way.  My favorite way to use this is to post book jackets in a reader advisory type of way and link it to your online catalog record.  

Library Website

Fancy websites are all the rage now-a-days.  Make sure the library website has three things on its home page:  the logo, hours and contact info, and for god sakes, a catalog search.  The logo is so people know they got to a library's website. The contact information and search are because noone likes to look for those.  Think of all the calls a library receives in a day.  I bet you dollars to donut-holes that the two most popular questions libraries get are "When do you close?" and "Do you have random item?"  A library website should serve these two functions first.  Here's a test, go to your library's website and if you cannot clearly see a couple of phone numbers and a box to start typing, tell them to call their tech support immediately.

Library Merchandising