There is no regular Impress Your Professor this week - just a hearty shout of GOOD LUCK with all your finals, papers, and projects.
We'll see you all next semester.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
YouTube Tuesday: Finals Fun
Because Finals are upon us (Good Luck to all!) we're only posting two fun videos today. Cheers!
Friday, December 4, 2009
Impress Your Professor: Digitization Without Fear
Two new Wired Campus pieces on The Chronicle of Higher Education Web site highlight recent university efforts to make their print collections more accessible to more patrons through technology.
In the first, our Washingtonian neighbor George Washington University is experimenting with an automated digitization system to determine whether a specially designed robot is faster and more cost-efficient at digitizing rare books than human page-turners. Rare Middle Eastern texts from GWU and Georgetown libraries will be the first texts digitized this way, and GWU plans to share its findings with libraries that might be considering a similar system.
Visual reproduction isn't the only form of digitization in the news this week. Audio reproduction of texts got a rare mention. Librarians at California State University-Dominguez Hills realized that the text-to-audio feature of their Kurzweil 3000 software for the visually impaired could be used to allow all students to turn texts into mp3s. Now 17 machines have been set up on campus for this purpose.
There are surely copyright concerns that will arise from all this, but it's a step in the right direction. It's nice to see people writing and thinking about technology in libraries with optimism instead of fear.
In the first, our Washingtonian neighbor George Washington University is experimenting with an automated digitization system to determine whether a specially designed robot is faster and more cost-efficient at digitizing rare books than human page-turners. Rare Middle Eastern texts from GWU and Georgetown libraries will be the first texts digitized this way, and GWU plans to share its findings with libraries that might be considering a similar system.
Visual reproduction isn't the only form of digitization in the news this week. Audio reproduction of texts got a rare mention. Librarians at California State University-Dominguez Hills realized that the text-to-audio feature of their Kurzweil 3000 software for the visually impaired could be used to allow all students to turn texts into mp3s. Now 17 machines have been set up on campus for this purpose.
There are surely copyright concerns that will arise from all this, but it's a step in the right direction. It's nice to see people writing and thinking about technology in libraries with optimism instead of fear.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
YouTube Tuesday: Be Professional
Librarian 2.0
What does it mean to be the new librarian?
Now With Sidearms... of books!
A cops parody
What does it mean to be the new librarian?
Now With Sidearms... of books!
A cops parody
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
YouTube Tuesday: Open Sesame
The Internet as Right?
A case for open internet.
The Internet - In a box!
I can't embed this video, but follow the link for hilarity.
The IT Crowd - Series 3 (The Internet)
A case for open internet.
The Internet - In a box!
I can't embed this video, but follow the link for hilarity.
The IT Crowd - Series 3 (The Internet)
Friday, November 13, 2009
Impress Your Professor: Lose the Books
NPR has a rather interesting story posted on its website about how a school library is saying goodbye to its print collection. It seems to me like this yet another tipped domino in an increasing move towards digital collections and e-books.
NPR quotes the schools Academic Dean as stating, "Part of our desire to move in this direction is to meet the students where they are most comfortable... And it's our responsibility as well to help students understand the emerging technologies that they are going to be faced with."
But with great new power comes great responsibility. (Oh, Spiderman.) This week, NPR also posted a story about a Vision Group requesting that a school stop buying Kindles until Amazon comes up with better way to turn on the vocal reading option.
So, my question to everyone is, how do we continue to move forward with our digital and electronic tools without leaving people behind?
NPR quotes the schools Academic Dean as stating, "Part of our desire to move in this direction is to meet the students where they are most comfortable... And it's our responsibility as well to help students understand the emerging technologies that they are going to be faced with."
But with great new power comes great responsibility. (Oh, Spiderman.) This week, NPR also posted a story about a Vision Group requesting that a school stop buying Kindles until Amazon comes up with better way to turn on the vocal reading option.
So, my question to everyone is, how do we continue to move forward with our digital and electronic tools without leaving people behind?
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
