Personal blog: All opinions are only my own, unless you want to borrow them. (he/him)
Last week, this article was tearing through the rounds of the library community:
The Wrong War Over eBooks: Publishers Vs. Libraries by David Vinjamuri
This is an important read. It raises some really good points, challenges some often unquestioned perspectives, and his proposed “pay-per-circ” model appears to have some real potential.
Still, though, I can’t get behind him on this issue. I feel that he misses the whole point. Continue reading “The Right War Over Ebooks”
With all of the changes taking place over at Apple, people are wondering how it will affect the design of their future products – both the external look and the software interface. As a result, skeuomorphism is very much on the minds of systems and UX designers.
Skeuomorphism gets a pretty bad rap among many tech-savy computer folks. It’s kitschy, it’s gimmicky, it’s corny. Some feel that it dumbs down the essential nature of digital technology. By over-emphasizing analog equivalents (equivalencies that are, arguably, false in their foundation) skeuomorphism runs the risk of obscuring many of the things digital technology can do that analog can’t – the aspects of the digital tool for which there is no analog equivalent.
Mashable has a delightfully snarky gallery of some of Apple’s more infamous uses of it:
Say Farewell: Apple’s Skeumorphism Hall of Shame
Many of these criticisms are largely correct. So why am I still a fan of skeuomorphism?
Continue reading “Speaking of Skeuomorphism”
When I was in school to get my MLIS, I had an assignment in my Reference class to observe reference librarians in real-world situations. I sat in at the reference desk at my local branch of the Chicago Public Library over the course of several days. I noticed something odd about the way the reference librarians dressed at this branch: sometimes they dressed in more formal professional attire – long-sleeved, button-up shirts and ties for the men; blouses and skirts, or dresses for the women – but at other times they dressed very casually; sometimes the same librarian would be dressed professionally one day, and the next day casually. I saw no rhyme or reason to this.
Continue reading “Conveying Authority”
On Friday, I saw this article on Techdirt:
House Republicans: Copyright Law Destroys Markets; It’s Time For Real Reform
And it gave me such hope that our elected leaders might finally openly acknowledge and own up to everything they’ve done wrong with copyright over the past couple of decades! This passage, in particular, echoes everything I’ve been arguing about copyright for years:
Continue reading “The Continuing Saga of Copyright Reform”
This is why I’m proud to be a librarian! 😀
Library in a Disaster Zone (via Boing Boing)
My library has been researching the SirsiDynix® Social Library app for Facebook. While there appears to be incredible potential in such social media-based library apps (friend recommendations, reviews, wish-lists, in-platform catalog interactions), for me it raises some serious concerns about patron data and privacy.
And it’s not just my innate antipathy to the thought of sharing any of our patron information with Facebook – an organization that sets the standard of notoriety for selling users’ personal info to any advertiser that wants it…
Continue reading “Library-Based Social Book Apps: A Question of Ethics”
Yesterday, the Kansas City Public Library held the first ever Kansas City SirsiDynix Users Group Conference at our Plaza Branch. Representatives from several KC-area library systems and from SirsiDynix met and discussed what the future could hold for ILS systems and library technology.
Web-based services, cloud services, APIs, fully integrated discovery layers, social media integration, the role of mobile apps, patron-driven acquisitions, one-click downloads, the relationship of the library OPAC to the library website…
We’re brainstorming the nature and structure of libraries in the Digital Age.
I came out of the conference with three major take-aways:
Continue reading “Everything, Anywhere, All the Time”
Homo sapiens is unique on this planet in that we’re the only genus with only one species. It’s not normal to be the only species within a genus! All other animals exist in a world in which there are others very like themselves, but not them.
Humans, by contrast, take it for granted that there are no other species in the world like us.
It didn’t used to be that way, though. We used to share this planet with other people who weren’t us.
Continue reading “The True Scope of History, Part II”
The Internet Librarian International 2012 conference wrapped up yesterday. Perhaps the most widely circulated tweet from the conference came from Airport Librarian (@airprtlibrarian):
We have libraries because people need a place to dream. The collection is not the main goal. #ili2012
— Airport librarian(@airprtlibrarian) October 30, 2012
“People need a place to dream.” Yes!
[Edit: At the request of Airport Librarian, I’d like to credit David Lankes as the original source of the quote, from his keynote speech.]
The human ability to dream and to imagine is one that has fascinated me from a very early age. The scientist in me wonders: Why do we dream? What necessary function is served by our imagination?
Why do people need a place to dream?
I had an experience during my freshman year of college that informed my understanding of the purpose of imagination more than any other…
Continue reading “The Purpose of Human Imagination”
The Kansas City Public Library just posted a new position: User Centered Design Specialist
I love that we’re doing this! I know that it’s become something of a cliché to talk about UX, but the simple fact of the matter is that user experience and interaction design are only going to become more important as we proceed in our Digital Information Age.
The landscape of information access is undergoing radical evolution. We have a wider variety of information accessing technology than ever before: desktop computers, laptops, tablets, smart phones, gaming systems – with different operating systems and coding platforms for each. More importantly, these technologies have created a near-infinite variety in points of access – wherever we can carry our devices (and still have signal) we can access information at will.
Continue reading “User Centered Design: The New Card Catalog for the Digital Information Age”
John the Librarian 