Sunday, September 9, 2007
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Week 9, Thing 23....DONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
well, I have officially completed 23 Things.
1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
Definitely Bloglines and LibraryThing. Most of the other exercises I'd had experience with, so they weren't very innovative to me. However, both Bloglines and LibraryThing are services that I continue to use now, even though I am done those exercises.
2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
I plan on being a lifelong learner for sure. Even though I am a part of the new "tech generation," there were still services involved in 23 Things that I had never used before, such as Rollyo and Blonglines. I think it was a good learning experience.
3. Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
I know I will continue to use some of the services used in the 23 Things program. But there weren't any unexpected outcomes; I came to learn about technology and so I did.
4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?
Not much. The exercises were pretty loose so you could learn without strict formulas (like "click here, then click here, then click here," that would be boring).
5. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you again chose to participate?
I would probably participate, unless it was something that I was already familiar with. The advantage of 23 Things is that I learned a lot. If that were possible in future discovery programs, then I would participate.
6. How would you describe your learning experience in a few words or a few sentences, so we can share our successes and promote this program?
23 Things introduced me to different services that, even as a young person, I had never heard of or used before. It was a great discovery exercise for beginners and veterans of internet services alike.
1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
Definitely Bloglines and LibraryThing. Most of the other exercises I'd had experience with, so they weren't very innovative to me. However, both Bloglines and LibraryThing are services that I continue to use now, even though I am done those exercises.
2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
I plan on being a lifelong learner for sure. Even though I am a part of the new "tech generation," there were still services involved in 23 Things that I had never used before, such as Rollyo and Blonglines. I think it was a good learning experience.
3. Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
I know I will continue to use some of the services used in the 23 Things program. But there weren't any unexpected outcomes; I came to learn about technology and so I did.
4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?
Not much. The exercises were pretty loose so you could learn without strict formulas (like "click here, then click here, then click here," that would be boring).
5. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you again chose to participate?
I would probably participate, unless it was something that I was already familiar with. The advantage of 23 Things is that I learned a lot. If that were possible in future discovery programs, then I would participate.
6. How would you describe your learning experience in a few words or a few sentences, so we can share our successes and promote this program?
23 Things introduced me to different services that, even as a young person, I had never heard of or used before. It was a great discovery exercise for beginners and veterans of internet services alike.
Week 9, Things 21 and 22
Thing 21: Search tools for podcasts.
I am not very familiar with podcasts and I don't know anyone who listens to them. Podcasts, by my understanding, are basically recordings of radio shows, books, etc that can be played back on an iPod, mp3 player, or other device. Podcasts are basically TiVo for your iPod.
I first went to podcast.net and searched for "film," it came up with a number of podcasts so I picked an interesting one, Indie Film Nation, and added it to my RSS feed. I also searched for "spanish" and ended up finding quite a few podcasts that were in Spanish, aside from the usual ones that will teach you the language.
I went to podcastalley.com next, and clicked on the "Arts" category. I ended up with a Harry Potter fanfiction podcast, which was interesting. I can see what podcasts have to offer, but I myself am not buying into the hype; podcasts just don't interest me.
Thing 22: Overdrive/Project Gutenberg.
I was very disappointed with Project Gutenberg. I typed in 4 different authors who are pretty well-known and ended up with nothing each time. I am skeptical as to the reach of their collection if these authors were not available. Overdrive was a bit of a confusing site, as was NetLibrary. I felt kind of like they were trying to make it as hard as possible for me to locate books, especially NetLibrary. But since I would rather read a book than listen to it, this exercise was interesting but not really my kind of thing.
I am not very familiar with podcasts and I don't know anyone who listens to them. Podcasts, by my understanding, are basically recordings of radio shows, books, etc that can be played back on an iPod, mp3 player, or other device. Podcasts are basically TiVo for your iPod.
I first went to podcast.net and searched for "film," it came up with a number of podcasts so I picked an interesting one, Indie Film Nation, and added it to my RSS feed. I also searched for "spanish" and ended up finding quite a few podcasts that were in Spanish, aside from the usual ones that will teach you the language.
I went to podcastalley.com next, and clicked on the "Arts" category. I ended up with a Harry Potter fanfiction podcast, which was interesting. I can see what podcasts have to offer, but I myself am not buying into the hype; podcasts just don't interest me.
Thing 22: Overdrive/Project Gutenberg.
I was very disappointed with Project Gutenberg. I typed in 4 different authors who are pretty well-known and ended up with nothing each time. I am skeptical as to the reach of their collection if these authors were not available. Overdrive was a bit of a confusing site, as was NetLibrary. I felt kind of like they were trying to make it as hard as possible for me to locate books, especially NetLibrary. But since I would rather read a book than listen to it, this exercise was interesting but not really my kind of thing.
Week 9, Thing 20
YOUTUUUUUUUUUUBE!
I am a big big big fan of YouTube. Not only can you find almost any music video you are looking for (including things I haven't heard since middle school, favorite bands, the most popular new
songs, etc), you can watch them all absolutely free. YouTube also allows you to discover independent film and support their efforts. The only irritating thing that I absolutey cannot stand about YouTube is that people use it as their own personal soundbox. I don't really care for others' opinions, even if they agree with my own. Not to mention that the amount of stupid people who just sit there babbling. Despite these factors, however, I still like YouTube for the fact that you no longer have to download an application (Limewire, Napster, etc) in order to watch videos; you can just go to YouTube and see them without all the spyware and viruses associated with downloadable programs. In the end, no matter what you're looking for, YouTube probably has it, and that makes it entertaining and sometimes invaluable.
I attempted to embed a video from one of my favorite bands in this post, but Blogger won't allow that type of HTML. BOOO BLOGGER!
I am a big big big fan of YouTube. Not only can you find almost any music video you are looking for (including things I haven't heard since middle school, favorite bands, the most popular new
songs, etc), you can watch them all absolutely free. YouTube also allows you to discover independent film and support their efforts. The only irritating thing that I absolutey cannot stand about YouTube is that people use it as their own personal soundbox. I don't really care for others' opinions, even if they agree with my own. Not to mention that the amount of stupid people who just sit there babbling. Despite these factors, however, I still like YouTube for the fact that you no longer have to download an application (Limewire, Napster, etc) in order to watch videos; you can just go to YouTube and see them without all the spyware and viruses associated with downloadable programs. In the end, no matter what you're looking for, YouTube probably has it, and that makes it entertaining and sometimes invaluable.
I attempted to embed a video from one of my favorite bands in this post, but Blogger won't allow that type of HTML. BOOO BLOGGER!
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Week 8, Things 18 & 19
For things 18 and 19, I went to Zoho Writer. I don't particularly see the point in online word processors. I mean, come on, how lazy are you that you can't just convert the files between word processors (which all word processors do automatically anyway). The question of plagiarism also struck me, because it would be so simple to hack someone's account and then have access to all their documents. A lot simpler than trying to break into their house and boot up their PC. I can't say that I enjoyed Zoho, and Google Docs was no different.
For thing 19, I visited the Web 2.0 awards site and found some very cool sites. My favorite, however, was One Sentence.org. On this site, you tell a story in one sentence. I thought the idea of limiting a story like that was very interesting and a good way to force people to become creative. I added a story of my own. That would have to be my favorite site.
For thing 19, I visited the Web 2.0 awards site and found some very cool sites. My favorite, however, was One Sentence.org. On this site, you tell a story in one sentence. I thought the idea of limiting a story like that was very interesting and a good way to force people to become creative. I added a story of my own. That would have to be my favorite site.
Week 7, Things 16 & 17
So this week I discovered wikis, and also that my font changes a lot. I like that.
Wikis, I discovered, are interesting but not particularly useful unless complete credibility can be achieved. There's a reason they won't let us use Wikipedia and other wiki sites when writing papers; information can be tampered with too easily through the wiki system. By having an system of open editing, wikis are subject to vandalism and false information. For example, recently someone sabotaged the Wikipedia page of a 90s television actor, claiming that he had died. The page went unchecked for days before someone noticed, and by then, flowers and sympathy cards had been sent to the actor's home.
With that being said, the Wikis that I checked out (including Book Lover's Wiki and Library 2.0 in 15 Minutes a Day) were reputable and fun. It was interesting to see all the book reviews, and the Library 2.0 had some good information about different types of browsers (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox), as well as web tools like blogs, social networking, and other things we have learned about so far in 23 Things.
I also went to the Sandbox wiki and read through a few entries before adding one to the Favorite Fun Memories entry. I thought that it was cute and a great way to share thoughts (another one of my favorites being Random Thoughts).
All in all I think Wikis are useful for entertainment and not so much information unless they are kept in check, like Library 2.0.
Wikis, I discovered, are interesting but not particularly useful unless complete credibility can be achieved. There's a reason they won't let us use Wikipedia and other wiki sites when writing papers; information can be tampered with too easily through the wiki system. By having an system of open editing, wikis are subject to vandalism and false information. For example, recently someone sabotaged the Wikipedia page of a 90s television actor, claiming that he had died. The page went unchecked for days before someone noticed, and by then, flowers and sympathy cards had been sent to the actor's home.
With that being said, the Wikis that I checked out (including Book Lover's Wiki and Library 2.0 in 15 Minutes a Day) were reputable and fun. It was interesting to see all the book reviews, and the Library 2.0 had some good information about different types of browsers (Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox), as well as web tools like blogs, social networking, and other things we have learned about so far in 23 Things.
I also went to the Sandbox wiki and read through a few entries before adding one to the Favorite Fun Memories entry. I thought that it was cute and a great way to share thoughts (another one of my favorites being Random Thoughts).
All in all I think Wikis are useful for entertainment and not so much information unless they are kept in check, like Library 2.0.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
8 Little Known Things About Me
I got a tag awhile back so here is the response...
8 Little Known Things About Me:
1. I am deathly afraid of bees.
2. My first and only job has been with BCPL.
3. I am a huge gaming/book/movie geek.
4. My favorite color is blue.
5. Both cars I've had have been Volkswagens.
6. I secretly enjoy reading dumb celebrity gossip.
7. I love thunderstorms
8. Halloween is my favorite holiday.
I'll get around to tagging some blogs later, but in the meantime, it's back to work... and of course to Harry Potter ;)
8 Little Known Things About Me:
1. I am deathly afraid of bees.
2. My first and only job has been with BCPL.
3. I am a huge gaming/book/movie geek.
4. My favorite color is blue.
5. Both cars I've had have been Volkswagens.
6. I secretly enjoy reading dumb celebrity gossip.
7. I love thunderstorms
8. Halloween is my favorite holiday.
I'll get around to tagging some blogs later, but in the meantime, it's back to work... and of course to Harry Potter ;)
Week 6, Things 13, 14, & 15
I started off this week as suggested, by exploring del.icio.us. I can't say I was too impressed with the site. I think that it is practical - a good way of sharing links that don't contain misleading information. There is a lot of unreliable and even downright wrong information to be found on the vast WWW, so I think in that respect, del.icio.us is a good tool for those looking for reliability in their web searching.
The blog-linking site Tehnorati confused me at first. I tried searching for Library 2.0 without quotations, and just ending up getting repeat blogs about pocketbikes and how much they were going for. It was a little strange to say the least. Then I put quotes around it: "library 2.0" and ended up getting what I was looking for. There were 3,442 blogs about Library 2.0 already.
Next I read an article entitled "Into a New World of Librarianship," in which the writer discussed the future of a more technologically sound library and in what ways librarians will have to adapt to these updates. He brought up an interesting story in one of the sections: the argument that the principles of Library 2.0 are not new. I must say I agree with him, however, the ways in which we go about becoming better libraries are different. The same principles of being able to attend to the needs of the public, especially being able to inform them, are the same. But I doubt that libraries in the past have always used computers, or programs such as Library 2.0, in order to better their technological knowledge. As I have said, I grew up with computers, so this is not that hard for me, but for someone with limited computer experience, I think that Library 2.0 is useful.
Lastly, I got tagged awhile back so I figured I would respond to that in the next entry.
The blog-linking site Tehnorati confused me at first. I tried searching for Library 2.0 without quotations, and just ending up getting repeat blogs about pocketbikes and how much they were going for. It was a little strange to say the least. Then I put quotes around it: "library 2.0" and ended up getting what I was looking for. There were 3,442 blogs about Library 2.0 already.
Next I read an article entitled "Into a New World of Librarianship," in which the writer discussed the future of a more technologically sound library and in what ways librarians will have to adapt to these updates. He brought up an interesting story in one of the sections: the argument that the principles of Library 2.0 are not new. I must say I agree with him, however, the ways in which we go about becoming better libraries are different. The same principles of being able to attend to the needs of the public, especially being able to inform them, are the same. But I doubt that libraries in the past have always used computers, or programs such as Library 2.0, in order to better their technological knowledge. As I have said, I grew up with computers, so this is not that hard for me, but for someone with limited computer experience, I think that Library 2.0 is useful.
Lastly, I got tagged awhile back so I figured I would respond to that in the next entry.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Week 5, Things 10, 11, and 12
SO I have just finished with this week's activities. But before I could continue on this priceless journey of learning and frustration, I first had to reset my password because I forgot it. YAY!!! So in the process, I discovered a new word: erstical. Go ahead, look it up, it doesn't exist yet but it will soon because I'm going to give it meaning. So watch out.
I decided to get on Yahoo! and create my own avatar. Since Yahoo! is such a huge media conglomerate, it's truly a surprise that they could not get anyone to better animate these atrocities otherwise known as avatars. My own avatar looked nothing like me, with eyes that took up half her face and tight blue jeans. Speaking of clothes,the start page gave me a choice of a sparkly white halter top or a "Kiss Me, I'm Irish!" shirt. Since I am neither a club-hopping socialite nor Irish, I sadly could not use either option. In the end, avatars can only take you so far. And they really, really don't look like you at all.
Thing 11: LibraryThing. Here's my LibraryThing account: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/librosplox
While I appreciate the fact that LibraryThing let me catalog my favorite books, I suspect some subliminal messaging/sneaky advertising on the part of Amazon.com, whose name popped up quite frequently while I was just attempting to share my love of books with the world. I don't want to buy the books, Amazon. I work in a library, okay? Anyway, LibraryThing definitely interested me mainly because it was cool to see how many people like the same books that I like (unexpectedly, a book I thought only I liked actually happened to be known by more than 100 people).
Things 12: Rollyo. SO USELESS!! The internet and all its inventions are making people lazier and lazier. Instead of actually going on a search through the internet for what you want, you can now have it delivered right to you. I am not a big fan of this technique. I prefer to go looking for my own sources, mainly because I tend to find other interesting facts along the way. I figure, there is no harm in searching each site individually. The only thing stopping someone is laziness. Not to mention the fact that if you are trying to save time looking through all those search engines, you should START THE PROJECT EARLIER, PROCRASTINATOR! (And trust me, as a student, I know everything about procrastinating and marathon paper writing.) Also, something like this has definitely been invented before, with a much more amusing name: check out www.dogpile.com
I can't get over that name! HEEHEE.
That's all for this week's adventure into cyberspace. PEACE OUTTT.
I decided to get on Yahoo! and create my own avatar. Since Yahoo! is such a huge media conglomerate, it's truly a surprise that they could not get anyone to better animate these atrocities otherwise known as avatars. My own avatar looked nothing like me, with eyes that took up half her face and tight blue jeans. Speaking of clothes,the start page gave me a choice of a sparkly white halter top or a "Kiss Me, I'm Irish!" shirt. Since I am neither a club-hopping socialite nor Irish, I sadly could not use either option. In the end, avatars can only take you so far. And they really, really don't look like you at all.
Thing 11: LibraryThing. Here's my LibraryThing account: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/librosplox
While I appreciate the fact that LibraryThing let me catalog my favorite books, I suspect some subliminal messaging/sneaky advertising on the part of Amazon.com, whose name popped up quite frequently while I was just attempting to share my love of books with the world. I don't want to buy the books, Amazon. I work in a library, okay? Anyway, LibraryThing definitely interested me mainly because it was cool to see how many people like the same books that I like (unexpectedly, a book I thought only I liked actually happened to be known by more than 100 people).
Things 12: Rollyo. SO USELESS!! The internet and all its inventions are making people lazier and lazier. Instead of actually going on a search through the internet for what you want, you can now have it delivered right to you. I am not a big fan of this technique. I prefer to go looking for my own sources, mainly because I tend to find other interesting facts along the way. I figure, there is no harm in searching each site individually. The only thing stopping someone is laziness. Not to mention the fact that if you are trying to save time looking through all those search engines, you should START THE PROJECT EARLIER, PROCRASTINATOR! (And trust me, as a student, I know everything about procrastinating and marathon paper writing.) Also, something like this has definitely been invented before, with a much more amusing name: check out www.dogpile.com
I can't get over that name! HEEHEE.
That's all for this week's adventure into cyberspace. PEACE OUTTT.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Week 4, Things 8 & 9
As I sit here in good old Perry Hall Library on a Thursday night, Laserface in the basement (http://www.laserface.net) and about an hour until close, I find myself compelled to complete this week's activity.
Bloglines is one of the best sites I have ever been to, and definitely one that I will use long after the 23 Things program is complete. As soon as I confirmed my email address, I was ready to explore the different feeds. I liked how Bloglines gave you two options: to look at feeds by category (a list on the left) or to pick from specific, popular feeds (on the right). This made it easier to find what I was looking for, instead of having to go off all on my own in search of blogs that interest me. I picked several feeds from each list, including Alternative Energy Blog, EnviroLink News Service, National Geographic News: Animals & Nature, and TreeHugger from the Environmentalist list. From the sites recommended by 23 Things, I picked Information Wants To Be Free, It's all good, and Unshelved. Picking out feeds that interested me was easy, so I subscribed to 1Up, a video gaming blog, and PostSecret (many PostSecret books can be found on the shelves of our libraries). All in all, I think Bloglines is such a good idea. Instead of sifting through all the news on sites such as msn.com or CNN, I get directly to what I want to read, about topics I'm very interested in.
I moved on to MERLIN. As I already know quite a bit about technology, MERLIN wasn't as useful to me as it may be for others. However, for the beginning internet explorer (bad pun. I know. sorry.) it is useful. I did check out some things about Wikis in preparation for later.
Closing tiiiiime...
Bloglines is one of the best sites I have ever been to, and definitely one that I will use long after the 23 Things program is complete. As soon as I confirmed my email address, I was ready to explore the different feeds. I liked how Bloglines gave you two options: to look at feeds by category (a list on the left) or to pick from specific, popular feeds (on the right). This made it easier to find what I was looking for, instead of having to go off all on my own in search of blogs that interest me. I picked several feeds from each list, including Alternative Energy Blog, EnviroLink News Service, National Geographic News: Animals & Nature, and TreeHugger from the Environmentalist list. From the sites recommended by 23 Things, I picked Information Wants To Be Free, It's all good, and Unshelved. Picking out feeds that interested me was easy, so I subscribed to 1Up, a video gaming blog, and PostSecret (many PostSecret books can be found on the shelves of our libraries). All in all, I think Bloglines is such a good idea. Instead of sifting through all the news on sites such as msn.com or CNN, I get directly to what I want to read, about topics I'm very interested in.
I moved on to MERLIN. As I already know quite a bit about technology, MERLIN wasn't as useful to me as it may be for others. However, for the beginning internet explorer (bad pun. I know. sorry.) it is useful. I did check out some things about Wikis in preparation for later.
Closing tiiiiime...
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Week 3, Things 5, 6, & 7
I have changed my font size as I am quite aware that I may be causing eye strain with the tiny print. Sorry about that.
Anyway, I've embarked on this, the second week of the Maryland 23 Things. I visited Flickr, created an account, learned that mashups have nothing to do with potatoes, and even researched the iPhone in order to blog about technology. I wasn't even this productive when I was in school, but then again, my school never offered me a Wii.
As far as Flickr goes, ennnnghhh. I have used another photo hosting site, Photobucket (http://www.photobucket.com), which, in my opinion, is vastly superior to Flickr.
First of all, Flickr is complicated. On the top of the page are several drop-down menus comprised of even more options. There is "Home." Simple enough. But then they start calling me out: the next one is labeled "You." Uh oh. ME? Your Photos. Your Sets. Your Archives. Your Tags. Your Maps (I make maps now?) Your Favorites. And then: Recent Activity. Thanks for monitoring me, Flickr. creeps. The menu then goes on to tell me to Organize, Contact, Group, and Explore.
Photobucket does no such thing. After the brain melt that is Flickr, I feel like calling up Photobucket just to tell them how much I love them. I have a lot of experience with computers, being young and growing up with one in the house, and in my opinion, Flickr is a pretty complicated interface for people who don't have that same amount of experience. I think Photobucket is a much simpler site.
That being said, Flickr won't let me upload pictures from their site to an outside blog, instead insisting that I create my own Flickr blog. I call bull. If anyone knows if it's possible to use Flickr to post onto blogs, please tell me. I could not locate the URL of any of my images or even get them to let me blog on a site other than their own (greeeeeedy.)
I now present one of the pictures that are currently hanging out on my Flickr account:
Moving on to mashups aka Thing 6. I don't use mashups or believe that I will have any use for them. I don't like to play around with my pictures, so mashups don't interest me. Mappr is the best one out of the three mentioned (the other two, Montagr and Flickr Colr Pickr were okay). I think Mappr has the most potential to make me waste an entire afternoon playing around with pictures. But what alarms me about these mashups is that they keep in with the misspelling of Flickr. It's no surprise that spelling in this country today is in a deplorable state (or that I once got asked by a patron how many letters there are in the alphabet).
And last but not least, Thing 7: Anything technology related. I will therefore commence my critique of the iPhone.
Look, Steve Jobs, I realize you hit it big with the iPod, the iHome, the iBook, and whatever else you have cooking in your cerebral iCortex. But the fact of the matter is, the iPhone is iUseless. If anyone wanted the internet, email, instant messaging, games, a picture of a clownfish, a built-in camera, touch screen, and the perpetual time of 9:41, then they could really get any one of the similar gadgets that came before. (Blackberry, Blackjack from Cingular, etc etc). I know this is a big step in media convergence, but it just doesn't seem practical to have everything in one place. What if you drop your iPhone in the iToilet? That's the end of all your personal data. Not to mention it's $599 retail price, which is bordering on insanity. AND you have to pay for service.
Verdict: Not worth it. The iPhone is complicated (can you tell I don't like complication?) and expensive.
That's all until Week 4, with RSS feeds. hooray!
Anyway, I've embarked on this, the second week of the Maryland 23 Things. I visited Flickr, created an account, learned that mashups have nothing to do with potatoes, and even researched the iPhone in order to blog about technology. I wasn't even this productive when I was in school, but then again, my school never offered me a Wii.
As far as Flickr goes, ennnnghhh. I have used another photo hosting site, Photobucket (http://www.photobucket.com), which, in my opinion, is vastly superior to Flickr.
First of all, Flickr is complicated. On the top of the page are several drop-down menus comprised of even more options. There is "Home." Simple enough. But then they start calling me out: the next one is labeled "You." Uh oh. ME? Your Photos. Your Sets. Your Archives. Your Tags. Your Maps (I make maps now?) Your Favorites. And then: Recent Activity. Thanks for monitoring me, Flickr. creeps. The menu then goes on to tell me to Organize, Contact, Group, and Explore.
Photobucket does no such thing. After the brain melt that is Flickr, I feel like calling up Photobucket just to tell them how much I love them. I have a lot of experience with computers, being young and growing up with one in the house, and in my opinion, Flickr is a pretty complicated interface for people who don't have that same amount of experience. I think Photobucket is a much simpler site.
That being said, Flickr won't let me upload pictures from their site to an outside blog, instead insisting that I create my own Flickr blog. I call bull. If anyone knows if it's possible to use Flickr to post onto blogs, please tell me. I could not locate the URL of any of my images or even get them to let me blog on a site other than their own (greeeeeedy.)
I now present one of the pictures that are currently hanging out on my Flickr account:
Moving on to mashups aka Thing 6. I don't use mashups or believe that I will have any use for them. I don't like to play around with my pictures, so mashups don't interest me. Mappr is the best one out of the three mentioned (the other two, Montagr and Flickr Colr Pickr were okay). I think Mappr has the most potential to make me waste an entire afternoon playing around with pictures. But what alarms me about these mashups is that they keep in with the misspelling of Flickr. It's no surprise that spelling in this country today is in a deplorable state (or that I once got asked by a patron how many letters there are in the alphabet).
And last but not least, Thing 7: Anything technology related. I will therefore commence my critique of the iPhone.
Look, Steve Jobs, I realize you hit it big with the iPod, the iHome, the iBook, and whatever else you have cooking in your cerebral iCortex. But the fact of the matter is, the iPhone is iUseless. If anyone wanted the internet, email, instant messaging, games, a picture of a clownfish, a built-in camera, touch screen, and the perpetual time of 9:41, then they could really get any one of the similar gadgets that came before. (Blackberry, Blackjack from Cingular, etc etc). I know this is a big step in media convergence, but it just doesn't seem practical to have everything in one place. What if you drop your iPhone in the iToilet? That's the end of all your personal data. Not to mention it's $599 retail price, which is bordering on insanity. AND you have to pay for service.
Verdict: Not worth it. The iPhone is complicated (can you tell I don't like complication?) and expensive.
That's all until Week 4, with RSS feeds. hooray!
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
really, it's all about the WII.
Now that the formalities are out of the way, let's get to the real reason behind this blogging: The almighty Wii. Now, as I figure it, they have been out of stock since coming out in November. The only way people seem to be getting them is through friends who work at game stores and unfairly hide them in the back and then call you when everyone has left. (Not that I'd know anything about people who do that. Nope. Nothing at all.) How did BCPL get their hands on a Wii? Is there a friend of BCPL hiding in some GameStop? The black market? I don't know where that Wii is coming from. But I want it. Heck, I'll even settle for the Zune.
just starting out
I'm very excited about starting out on the Maryland 23 Things program. Thankfully I am computer-literate enough to not have trouble registering this blog. I look forward to continuing the program in the coming weeks.
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