More Of The Same

For anyone interested, the story has been updated....no accompanying pictures, though. Sorry, Library Nerd!

P.S Whoops, changed it but didn't republish it. It should work now.

Lunchtime Sketches VI

Eco-Punk
Medium: Pencil
Very badly touched up in Photoshop to remove some messy smudgy bits. Credit goes to the ever-inspiring Fault for the name and seed of the idea (pun intended). I actually quite like this one...

Online Apps

Like, say, World of Warcraft. No? Damn.

Well then, on to Google Docs!

The availablilty of a free online Word clone is fantastic. Okay, okay, it doesn't have all the features but it'll type up your resume and covering letter without too many dramas- what more can you ask for? (Seriously, let them know and they'll probably include it in the next version.) I liked some of the features- being able to slap the text directly into your blog is nice, for a start, and the sharing worked more or less how I thought it would. The one thing I thought was missing was the ability to share it unreservedly- it would have been nice to just slap a document up there and let anyone mess with it.

Instead, I just put it up as a page. Want to see my google doc? Find it here. Want to add to it? Drop me a comment and I'll add you as a collaborator (I love that they used that particular term. It sounds like we're planning to overthrow the Nazis or something.)

Consider It Mashed

Ha HA! Bet you'd all thought I'd dropped off the face of the earth, huh? Well, fair enough, I had. But I'm back, for mashups-related goodness.

Mashups, I'd have to say, are one of the things that I've learned the most from in 23 Things: mostly because it goes directly against my idea that two types of information are difficult if not impossible to shove together properly. I mean, I can barely get two different versions of Outlook Express to talk to each other.

I had planned a simple (de)motivational poster, but then I couldn't find the pic I wanted. So I decided to draw it. And colour it. And make it one of a series....

I'm sure you can all see where this is going, so in the end I just decided to post what I had so far and run with it. It needs a lot more work, and I don't know if the other sketches will ever see the light of day- other scribbles are calling my name...

For any who are interested, the art is based off a pencil sketch, lined then coloured in photoshop. The motivational poster mashup over at Bighugelabs took care of the rest.

Lunchtime Sketches V

...And Now It's You
Medium: Pencil
Slightly touched up in Photoshop, too, to remove some of the nasty sketch lines. This one was a bit of fun. It's odd, though: you're staring at something as you're drawing it for an hour or so, and it's not until you are finished and uploading the sodding thing that you realise what you should have done differently. It's all a learning experience, and I still like his expression.

Answer Boards

Slamming the boards? Sounds uncharacteristically violent for librarians, doesn't it? (Although, the next time someone asks me what I do and then says 'oh, that's nice, you must read books all day'...)

One thing about the answer boards: as soon as I saw some of the questions, I had a sudden and enormous love for the reference interview. People often just aren't that good at framing their question well.

Or spelling it well.

Or at all.

Or spending two brain cells and the common sense given to the average chicken at perhaps having a stab at the answer themselves.

Ahem. Sorry. That whistling noise you may have heard was the vent. But seriously, I don't think of myself as a grammar nazi or anything, but when you see something like this, you're not supposed to take it as a challenge.

I think librarians participating in these answer boards is a fantastic idea, by the way. It's one of those activities that can be a little tricky because, while it's benefiting the profession as a whole, you're not likely to see statistically significant improvements in your immediate area as a result of it. I like to see an organisation be willing to take a bit risk on an activity or program for more than short-term payoffs. Much like 23 Things, really.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Portrait
Medium: Photoshop
I wasn't going to post this one, as I'm not too happy with it: but then that's true of practically everything, so why not? Unusual for a few reasons- it was drawn from a photo reference, whereas I normally just sketch without references, and it was done entirely in Photoshop. That's a little challenging, as I normally rough out a sketch and scan it in first, but I could really get used to the fluidity it give you, too.

Passwords Aplenty

So, how's everyone been going with this 23 things, eh? (Sorry, went a bit Canadian there). One of the little issues that has cropped up for me in doing this has been the sudden proliferation of passwords. I have a big pile of them anyway- just about every site or service that allows you to post content is going to want one, for a start. It soon adds up.

After a little messing around, I've settled on a rough system. Sites where I'm not posting much content or that interested in get my 'generic' username and password, and a link to my hotmail account if I need a password reset or anything. Sites like blogger, where I'm spending a bit of effort, get a unique password. (That, incidentally, is one of the reasons I like Google so much: Reader, G-mail, everything all with one login. Nice)

So what does everyone else do? Has anyone tried one of those 'password list' applications? I'm open to suggestions for a better way of organising this. Any ideas?

Lunchtime Sketches IV

Fury

Medium: Ballpoint pen

Another rough sketch in ballpoint. Tried to mess around with the perspective a little, but didn't come out quite as I planned. Done mostly because, well, you just have to have dragons, right?

Me, Robot

Machinemind
Medium: Mechanical pencil, Artliner, Photoshop
I thought it might be nice to show a more-or-less finished work. I don't often finish my sketches because it takes a little while, but colouring a lined drawing like this is much quicker for me than doing a fully rendered piece. And really, we can't do anything about technology with out least one robot, right?

Lunchtime Sketches III

Giant's Supplication

Medium: Ballpoint Pen

Another fine example of why not to forget your pencils when trying to do something a little more subtle. I may fix it up later, but more likely it will fall into the vast dark pit of forgotten sketches.

Ironically Del.icio.us

I like to think I'm a fairly bright person, you know? So why is it that I only really learn something when pain is involved?



I'd heard of del.icio.us but had never tried it. Too much bother, I thought. I can bookmark perfectly well in Firefox, I can't think of anyone who'd be interested in my bookmarks anyway...well, not unless I had an unusually shy stalker.



I figured out one reason to use it, though, when I stuffed up my computer trying to be clever. I managed to get back most of my information, and fortunately it was the stuff it would have been difficult or impossible to replace, like in-progress artwork. All my bookmarks, however, have gone to the great big information graveyard in the sky, along with why Astro Boy fired bullets from his bum and who ever thought Vanilla Ice was cool.



The day after the computer crashed, I went out and bought an external back-up drive. Now off to del.icio.us I trudge, to reconstruct more than a year of accumulated bookmarks. I may have had a little trouble absorbing the lesson but I've decided I'm only going to learn it once.

Tagged

But not in the bad, call-the-graffiti-removers way. Warning: possibly boring dribble ahead (of course, I hear you cry, it's your blog).



I found the wiki article on folksonomies pretty interesting. I have messed around with tagging things a little but hadn't previously thought much about the implications of folksonomies vs taxonomies. It seems pretty clear that both have things they do well: folksonomies have a practically non-existent entry cost, in terms of learning a system and how to apply it, and can be applied to rapidly changing concepts like....let me see...well, most of Web 2.0, without worrying about information hierarchies.



Taxonomies, on the other hand, have a much higher entry cost but have less duplication, more accurate targeting, all the stuff we as librarians like to make it easier to find information. Both have their uses and will continue into the future: I think what's really going to be interesting the interface between the two, and what role librarians are going to play in that. Who else better to understand and make sense of the way information can be organised and categorised?

Lunchtime sketches II

Masked
Medium: Ballpoint pen
I know, I know, it's another monstery thing. It's not indicative of anything deeper: drawing monsters just seems more fun. Plus they never get bored and start saying things like 'Can I move my legs now?' or 'Aren't you done yet?'.

Lunchtime Sketches

Glance
Medium: Mechanical pencil and graphite stick
Well, the subtitle of this blog was 'Random Links and Infrequent Sketches'. I've got the random bit down pat, but I thought I had best add a sketch before 'infrequent' slid gently into 'nonexistent'.

Temporarily Bewildered

For anyone who occasionally feels dazed and confused...

I typed out the name of my blog in the staff list. Four words, right? Under. The. Troll. Bridge. Simple, right?

I managed to make a make a mistake on every one. I misspelled bridge three times.

Apparently the Dyslexia Fairy has come early this year.

Half Way

We've hit the half-way mark here (but it's a bit like the half-way mark in a marathon, isn't it? The question lingers as to whether you've been running uphill and it will soon be a long, leisurely coast across the line, or whether you'll turn the corner and see the ascent to the finish. It all seems to be falling into place at the moment, but your mileage may vary). I'm up to the bit on streaming videos, so I thought a short break to savour the moment would be appropriate.



*ahhhhh*



Well, that seems long enough. Now on with the videos!




I chose this one because it illustrated one of the fantastic things about easily uploadable, easily acessible video: it can show you how to do stuff (stuff being the technical term, of course). To paraphrase Terry Pratchett, I am a great believer in the usefulness of knowledge as derived from books. Some things, though, need to be demonstrated and seen to be understood. Hence my love for things like this.

Life Lessons

The thing that always amazes me about life is that it keeps falling over itself to offer you lessons to learn. Sometimes we ignore it because we're too tired or cross or scared, but they're there all the same.

Today, for example, I learned a great deal. I'd have to say the most immediately applicable lesson was the difference between a properly tightened fuel filter on your car and an almost properly tightened one. It's one of those lessons that I think will stay with me.

Yeah.

Wikid II

I have to confess that Wikis challenge my sometimes, uh, less than fulsome belief in my fellow man. Anyone who has experienced any kind of online gaming environment will soon see that a public forum combined with effective anonymity creates, in a certain kind of person, the apparently irresistable desire to share their opinions. And by 'share', I mean 'shout'. And by 'opinions', I mean 'stupidity'. And by 'person', I mean...

Whoah there. Best keep this PG 13.

So it's always good to have a reminder that it's not you against the vocal idiots of the world, it's you and the rest of the world.

As one of my readers, of course, I am automatically discounting the possibility that you're one of the idiots, as you must be a person of taste, discretion and intellect.

Why are you looking at me like that?

Wikid

Geddit? Because it's about wikis but sounds kinda like 'wicked', so...aha hah ha....haaa *sigh*

Lame puns aside, I really liked the Book Lovers Wiki: we all know people love to get a recommendation before picking up a book. Doesn't matter who from, but we seem all seem to be far more inclined to give a book a go if we've gotten a thumbnail portrait of it from another. I'd really like to see something like that work in BCC libraries....actually, why limit it there? Why not an Aussie wiki of reviews? (It's at this point someone slaps their forehead and pens a comment pointing me to such a thing that already exists. Take that as a challenge if you will) I think it'd need a bit of staff contribution to get it up and running- people generally don't like being the first one to scrawl on the blank slate that is a brand-new wiki.

(But for some reason, you can't beat morons off with a stick when it comes to posting daft things like 'Whooo! 1st post!' in the comments fields of game websites. Sorry, where was I?)

Oh yeah, I also loved the Wookiepedia but candor compels me to admit I'd like it even if it was terribly designed. I just like Star Wars, okay? (Except for the three latest movies, but we'll pretend they don't exist and that Jar-Jar is just an extended bad dream we have yet to wake up from)

My Five Feeds

Okay, so the title sounds like some kind of sitcom about vampires or something, but I've carefully chosen (translation: randomly picked) 5 RSS feeds. It's been really good- I've always seen the little orange icon on sites and have heard people talking about how cool they are, but I've never bothered to chase it up. Now, I suspect, it'll turn into one of those things I never knew I wanted but will use. Possibly constantly. Like so many things in life, it's so simple once you know how.

For those who are interested, a demographic consisting I am sure of absolutely none of you, these are the feeds I've linked to...

The Powerhouse Museum
Librarian.net
LibraryJuice
Our own 23 Things blog, natch
And MightyGodKing...by turns funny, thoughtful and rude. Undoubtedly comes under the heading of 'Inappropriate use of the internet', but has some really good suggestions for graphic novels, too.

Warwind

1088114164_brom
Originally uploaded by adrian207

Hi guys,

I chose this as an image to share (whee! I found out how to link to blogs! Also: Yahoo is evil and Gmail is much, much nicer)

This was painted by the fantastic American artist Brom, who applies to fantasy and science fiction all the skill and dedication that a Renaissance painter might have applied to a portrait. I love practically all his work.

First Blood

Hi guys,

For my very-first-ever post, I've copped out with a link.

http://www.librarian.net/

A fantastic blog by Jessamyn West about all things library and Web 2.0, usually in conjunction.

-Troll