Posts tagged ‘Uncategorized’
I am Napster’s B*tch
I feel like such a chump. I feel like I just went back into an unhealthy relationship and, despite my hopes that things will be better this time around, I know it will all be the same.
I went back to Napster. I’m giving them a second chance…
I know, I know what you are going to say to me. You left Napster eight months ago because of the way it treated you! They’re going to treat me the same as before. Napster is still going to put those programs into my computer and mp3 player. It is still going to pseudo-forbid me from using players b/c it likes to be controlling. It’s still going to make me link to it once a week, because Napster always wants to know what I am doing (it is jealous of me using other programs).
But, can’t you see that Napster was good to me price-wise?!And I’ve tried to break the habit. I’ve used other music programs and, although friendly at first, all they really wanted to do was get deeper into my pockets. I even tried buying individual albums, but that only made me realize how much money I was spending and how much I was still missing out.
I’m sorry, but I had to go back for something that was going to offer me better financial stability. If not for me, for the children… Birthdays are coming up for crying out loud. Do you want me to get them nothing!?
So, okay Napster, you got me back. I hope you are happy. You will see me linking my mp3 player to you and letting watch who I’m listening to, but that doesn’t mean I love you!
Bill & Ted Had It Right!
When I first decided to return to school to become a librarian, I had a pretty narrow view of what a librarian was:
A librarian was the lady (yes, in my head and in my experience, they were all women) who helped me navigate the stacks and find books I would like to read. She answered every question I had and seemed to know everything, or be able to find out anything she did not know very fast.
I wanted to be that woman-a kind, helpful, friendly person who knows everything! While I knew intellectually that there was more to the profession, what appealed to me about the job was working with the public. Librarians had made a huge impact on my life and I wanted to do the same. In fact, I had always wanted to be a librarian, but graduate school wasn’t a possibility earlier in my life. Stuck in a corporate job that I didn’t find challenging, I craved human contact and returned to school to become a librarian.
Peter’s post about customer service brought this memory back to me. I, and many of my fellow MLIS students, want to be librarians because we want to help. We want to provide answers. We want to make a difference. Customer service is a regular topic of conversation which often sounds something like this:
“if ‘they’ dislike working with the public so much, why are they in this profession? Why are they here? If ‘they’ left, maybe then those of us who actually want to help people could get a job”.
I am the first person to admit, these goals and the desire to ‘help’ may be naïve and our conclusions about job availability could be disputed. However, the reality is, many library science majors feel this way. In fact, many college students feel this way. On several occasions while working reference, I have been explicitly thanked for providing help and instruction and told about how the ‘other librarian’ was so ‘mean’ (in the defense of the other librarian, no one who has complained has ever been able to attach a name to the complaint).
With my business background, I know that customer service is the only way for a business with limited resources to survive and compete against organizations with relatively unlimited resources. Google, Yahoo, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc.-compared to most libraries, are competition with virtually unlimited resources. Libraries and Librarians need to remember that no matter what kind of day we are having, no matter how difficult the patron, it is in our own self interest to treat the patrons well. If we library science students want to have jobs available when we graduate, there needs to be thriving libraries in our communities.
With this in mind, as I start my career of library work, I pledge the following:
- No matter what is happening in my personal life, while at work, I will smile at every person I come in contact with.
- When a patron apologizes for bothering me (as is often the case), I will assure them that it is no bother-I am here to help them and happy to do it.
- I will remember that the person asking me for assistance has chosen the library over many other resources. I will do everything I can to make them happy about making that choice.
- When I am not at work, I will promote libraries every chance I get. If anyone tells me of a bad experience, I will encourage them to try again-most librarians are in the business because they want to help, they want to make a difference, they like people.
I encourage all library staff-regardless of title or time in-to make a similar pledge. I encourage library science students to speak openly with professors, co-workers, and one another about customer service. Finally, I encourage everyone to follow the advice of ‘Bill & Ted’: Be Excellent to Everyone!
David Lee King’s new video kills!
YAY!!
David Lee King has offered up a new song/video Social Digital Revolution. I love this tune! The poppiness. The playfulness. The great lyrics.
Enough of my blabbering, just go watch it: http://blip.tv/file/441515
Jim Trelease to speak in Princeton
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Save the date and plan to attend this event that will be of interest to school librarians, youth services librarians, teachers, parents, grandparents… well, almost anyone! Jim Trelease will be retiring from the speaking circuit after January 2008 and this presentation will mark his final public speaking appearance in a NJ venue. As he announces on his site:
“January 2008 will be Jim Trelease’s last month of public seminars. After that his only programs will be for teachers through the Bureau of Educationand Research (BER) and a few isolated librarian conferences. Why retirement? Four grandchildren and a wife who has waited 23 years for him to “come in off the road” to travel with her. (Jim suspects there is an oxymoron in there somewhere.)”
The library has teamed up with several PTOs and the local school board to make this event happen. Trego-Biancosino Hall at Princeton High School seats 770, but arrive early as this free event is sure to draw a crowd.
More details can be found on PPL’s site:
http://www.princeton.lib.nj.us/children/
2007 Summer Reading Program… in Review
This time of year is always a happy and sad time for me. I’m sad because the summer is so close to ending, and I have an annual tradition of regretting not doing more outside. But then again, I am happy because the frantic pace of our Summer Reading Program is over… and that means I can actually take a moment to relax a little, perhaps breathe a bit as well.
All in all, it was a great summer for me. This was the first time that I had full reign of our teens’ Summer Reading Program. I packed it with programs, volunteers, last-second planning, fix-ups, movies and an occasional-running-with-scissors moment… if you know what I mean.
But how did it all go? What worked and what didn’t? Let’s review it in a hot/not fashion.
Hot– The average number of books read by teens who signed up for the Summer Reading Program was 18!
Not– Actual number of participants in the Reading Program was down.
Hot– The “You Never Know What You Can Do With Duct Tape” program. We made wallets, cell phone holders, a couple flowers and even attempted sandals. It was probably my most attended program on a week to week basis. By the way, if you try the sandals, make sure you don’t accidentally expose the duct tape adhesive to the hair on your toes… Yowwww!
Not– The whole “YNK” theme. Maybe it’s just me, but it seemed silly. People may have used the theme but few actually used it as “YNK” (and not without having to clarify what YNK stood for).
Hot– The End of Summer lock-in. It was the first after hours party we had at our library. The teens ate about 8-feet worth of subs, partied heartily and every single one of them was actually picked up on time!
Not– The one single teen at the party who decided to push the boundaries and threw her piece of cake into the face of another person.
Hot– The Shoprite Deli. Originally, the store lost our sub order for the party. So, Dan, the Deli-guy, made good by not just making 10 subs but only charged us half-price because of the mix up.
Not– Shoprite in general. I’m sorry, it’s a Marrazzo’s thing.
Hot– My teen-volunteer coordinator’s ability to have all but 5 of our teens complete the required number of hours and set a record for most volunteers sign-up and completed.
Not– The teen volunteers constantly referring to me as “Hey Mister!”
Hot– The song “Hey Delilah” by the Plain White Ts being constantly played.
Not– Fergie’s “Big Girls Don’t Cry” being constantly overplayed.
And finally….
Hot– Our brand new Teen furniture finally came in!
Not– Gaylord messed up the color of the furniture and has yet to fix it. But they did offer to let us keep the furniture they sent us in lieu of having to send the right ones.
So, how do I rank the summer on a whole? I’ll go with an 8/10. Better than average but let’s leave some room for improvement.
The Bottom Line: Libraries Boost the Economy!
I love it when I come across articles that quantitatively prove the value of public libraries, and it seems like I have read several lately. The one I just finished reading is too good not to share!
Study: Libraries offer big returns.
In specific, it is facts such as the one quoted below that we all need to be able to call upon when our budgets are challenged:
The bottom-line conclusion: Pennsylvania public libraries provide a “return on investment” of $5.50 for every $1 of taxpayer funding.
If every state had a study where we could prove our worth in such a manner to the voting public it would be a wonderful world.
BookLovers Wiki: We hardly Knew Ye!
Summer Reading Clubs are well under way at public libraries across the country, including MPOW. I have had several emails and even some phone calls inquiring about the BookLovers Wiki and why we have not updated it. I finally had time to update today, but my update was merely to announce that the BookLovers Wiki is on a hiatus for this summer. I hope we can bring it back again next summer, but that will depend on a variety of factors (some of which are out of my control).
We fully intended to revive the wiki for this summers edition of the adult reading club. In fact, we had hopes of moving it to MediaWiki so that we could fully realize our original plan of creating cross indexes to the reviews (much like the TabWiki). We wanted to categorize the reviews by genre, author, title, reviewer, etc. this year. Even if we didn’t have time to migrate to MediaWiki, we were really excited to see if the addition of WYSIWYG editing to PBwiki would boost the number of reviews submitted by the public. Last year we had a few brave individuals who learned to submit reviews directly, but most (in the end) were still emailed to us and then entered by teen volunteers or staff — many of our bibioliphiles just couldn’t seem to grasp wiki code well enough to enter reviews on their own.
The BookLovers Wiki was a success in many ways, even if it had some shortcomings. We devised our plan to use a wiki for summer reading on a fairly short time frame, but it served its purpose amazingly well. It certainly raised awareness in the community about wikis in general and what they are (many atteneded classes about wikis, so even if they didn’t feel comfortable with the code at least they understood how they worked). It was an experiment, and (as far as experiments go) it was a good one.
So, why no wiki this summer? The wiki’s furlough status was made at the same time the decision was made to upgrade our III catalog to include ratings and reviews. Essentially, we want to get our community involved with adding reviews and ratings to our online catalog and, since we went live with the upgrade on June 1st, the summer reading club was the perfect vehicle to raise awareness about our catalogs newest features.
Also, we had been doing the BookLovers theme for a few years and we wanted a change of pace for the club. This year we have gone with a theme of “Read Around the World: Your Passport to Summer Reading” and it has been a hit. We have integrated our summer programming to the theme, have generated many interesting reading lists which we are now putting on our web site and will be having a Book Brunch at the end of the summer for participants.
I really do encourage other libraries to get involved with wiki projects for their communities, whether it is for book reviews or another program/project. The staff and patrons at PPL both learned much more than we anticipated from running the BookLovers Wiki and I am sure other communities would have a similar experience. I am always willing to talk about the project with those considering a wiki, so please do not hesitate to drop me a line or give me a call.
Friday Fun: Your Road Trip Mix Tape
There are songs which help keep highway hypnosis at bay. The energy, the fun, the sing-along potential make them great for those long hours in the car, particularly if you are stuck in the chaos of Friday vacation traffic. Sometimes, in order to keep your sanity, it is important to have a collection of songs that will make the time fun, or at the very least, tolerable.
Here is my top 10 selection, go ahead and add your own.
On the Road Again by Willie Nelson– Mandatory, probably for any mix tape but especially this one.
The Way by Fastball– You wouldn’t think a song about packing your bags, leaving the kids behind and all responsibility behind could be so fun. 😉
Mr. E’s Beautiful Blues by Eels– It’s not the best lyrics that you’ll ever hear but it’s nearly impossible not to chime in when they sing “God damn right it’s a beautiful day!”
Crash by The Primitives– “Here you go, way too fast. Don’t look out you’re gonna craaaash.” Quite possibly the most energetic song to have sha-na-na in the lyrics.
Scar Tissue by the Red Hot Chilipeppers– You need a downtime song on the mix tape… and I gotta go with this one.
Into the Great Wide Open by Tom Petty– Is there are song about bigger possibilities!?
I Wanna Rock ‘N’ Roll All Night by Kiss– This is the last resort song. If this one can’t wake you up, pull over and get some sleep.
Song 2 by Blur– Whoohoo! ‘Nuff said
Basket Case by Green Day– “Do you have the time to listen to me whine…” Hey, I’ve got as long as this trip is gonna take.
Heart Shaped Box by Nirvana– I haven’t a clue what Cobain was saying but it doesn’t stop me from screaming “Hey… wait!”
Singshot.com- Karaoke Singers Unite!
To me, Karaoke will always be known as the revolution that brought amateur singers out of their showers and into the limelight.
I’m not saying whether that was a good or bad thing… but local drinking establishments did clean up on it!
Singshot brings the karaoke movement for the glitz and glamour of your local dive-bar and onto the electrified waves of the Internet. No more smoke, no more booze, no more people to appreciate your erm… lovely voice which has yet to bring you fame or fortune. At the very least, perhaps a highlight real on American Idol’s audition episodes.
Singshot is an online community for singers who are looking for feedback from other singers. There are also groups and contests available to any member choosing to participate. The collection itself is not the best but there are literally thousands of songs to choose from and you will be able to find something in your range.
For the fun of it, I joined and tried the recording system. It was okay but could run into some serious lag issues as well; I mean, I know I wasn’t perfect, but I definitely wasn’t a whole measure out either. Once the lag was fixed though, I did post the song and got immediate feedback from people.
Uhhhh, let’s not talk about the feedback.
One of the better features on singshot is the webcam option, which has produced some rather funny vidoes. There really isn’t anything like watching the moment of a person trying to look their coolest and achieve rock-stardom… yet, completely failing to capture it.
Marie’s 8 Things
In the interest of being a member of the LG team, here goes my 8 revelations. Warning to all, the below is (almost) totally unrelated to librarianship. Abandon hope all ye who enter here!
1. If you have ever heard me speak, you may be surprised to learn that I had a bad lisp as a kid. My speech therapist advised me to take up public speaking to help overcome the lisp. Now I have a passion for public speaking and have had a career in teaching/librarianship (from Kindergarten through Doctoral courses and every grade level in between) and can’t get enough of either.
2. Following from the above, I admit that the famous YA advocate Mary K. Chelton, of Queens College, has (affectionately I hope!) dubbed me a “great big ham.” It fits.
3. After the lisp removal, I wore braces for 4 years in HS. Yuck! Today kids wear trendy colored braces in JH which are a status symbol of sorts. Not so then, when I endured being called “tin grin,” “can opener mouth,” (and worse unpleasantries that shall remain nameless). I must say, however, that this horrific experience made me a better person, especially later, when I was a school librarian with zero tolerance for vicious name calling or bullying.
4. Acting again on the advice of my speech therapist, I got involved in radio and had my own late night show for 4 years on the College of NJ (then Trenton State College) radio station, WTSR. My air name was “Me” and I played blues and rock n’ roll.
5. At WTSR (still WTSR 91.3 FM to this very day) I recollect that I once had a mad crush on another DJ whose show followed mine. I later found out he was gay (sigh). I should have known better, as his air name was “Peter Pan.” You can’t make this stuff up.
6. I am totally untalented when it comes to athletics, but I’ve been: an assistant cheerleading coach (to purge my intense dislike of cheerleaders, acquired in HS, see #3 above), a girl’s softball umpire, a scouting assistant to a HS football coach, and a choreographer for a HS production of Oklahoma.
7. I have never had the urge to do the following: ski, sky-dive, skateboard, bungee jump, or surf. But I have parasailed in Acapulco, ridden a motorcycle, refinished loads of antiques, and driven from NJ to Houston to cheer the Rutgers football team to its 1st bowl victory ever in the Texas Bowl last December.
8. I have had drinks with Umberto Eco at Erica Jong’s apartment. Read more about this story from my husband Gary’s point of view at his website (note the photo credit for the picture of Gary with Umberto!)
Library Garden 