PVLD Director's Blog

Too much noise!

Lately my life feels all-too-much like Smigly's, so I'm looking forward to a weekend of ocean walks, bike rides, and just chilling out.  Happy Friday and Happy weekend everyone! 

(Hint - double click on the video to see the full width, or click here if that doesn't work for you)

 

(Thanks to Michael at The Travelling Librarian for sharing!)

 

The Future of Screen Technology (and it's almost here!)

Interesting video via the Eclecticity blog -  Note that this is a projection for 2014...just around the corner.  I can just see the cool stretchable screen in the first vignette being used as an amazing e-reader.  (You might want to double click on the video to go right to YouTube to see the full screen view)

Changing technology

This has been a big week for me in terms of technology.  Last Friday morning I picked up my new Iphone 4 (love it!), and on Friday evening PVLD made the switch from Microsoft Outlook to a the corporate version of Gmail and Google Apps for our email and calendar systems.  Even for a wannabe geek like me that is a lot of technological change to absorb!

The Iphone upgrade was pretty easy - the new phone is faster, and has some cool features like a video camera and flash, but none of the basic functions or my apps changed.  It's been fun playing with the new features, and also fun showing my husband how to use all of the apps on my old Iphone, which he inherited. 

The switch to Gmail is another story.  I've been an Outlook user for nearly 20 years, and relied heavily on its Tasks functionality to organize my life and make sure everything on my plate got done, so the switch to a system with a very different model for handling tasks has been a challenge. In the end I decided to use a 3rd party application, Toodledo, to manage my task list.

I've also had to learn new ways to manage my inbox and calendars, and spent a fair amount of time cleaning up data after the migration.

After a week, however, I have to say that overall the combination of becoming a two-Iphone couple and the switch to Gmail has been a big step forward in terms of managing and integrating my work and personal lives:

• I love that Gmail is a web-based application, so it functions exactly the same whether I am using my work computer, my home computer, or some other computer with Internet access.  As much as I liked the desktop version of Outlook, the web version was really clunky.

• With the Gmail calendars Don and I can share access to a "family" calendar so we both can add and view events and activities that affect us both, and we can view this shared calendar either on its own or consolidated with other calendars we might use to get a comprehensive view of our schedules.  This means we can each keep a personal calendar with the details of our daily appointments and commitments, and at the same time view all of the activities on our shared calendar so we don't double-schedule ourselves.  Better yet we can easily manage our calendars from any computer with Internet access or from our Iphones.
• The "Toodledo" task  application allows me to manage my task list both on my computer and my Iphone.  With Outlook I could manage tasks on my computer, but not my Iphone.  I used to print out my Outlook task list nearly every day and carry it around with me and I had to remember to transfer my scribbled reminders from meetings and conversations into Outlook when I got back to my computer.  Now I can enter tasks from either my computer or phone, and the list is always up to date . I can also convert emails directly into tasks by forwarding them to Toodledo, and show the tasks on my Gmail calendar if I want. 
  
  Going to an entirely screen-based process for managing my tasks is taking a little getting used to, but it will be more efficient in the long-run and save some trees, too.
• Gmail has some very cool ways to manage, label, and filter emails.  I'm still learning how to use them, but I think they will make keeping my inbox to a reasonable size much easier.
• As if all of this weren't enough, today our Network Administrator figured out how to set up our PVLD voicemail system so new voicemails appear in our Gmail inboxes as new emails with "Wave" files attached. This means that not only will I be able to see at a glance when I have a new voicemail on my work phone whether I am in the office or not, I will also be able to listen to those voicemails right from the email instead of having to call into work.  Nice!

The advantages for PVLD are pretty big, too.  Employees who have a need to work from home from time to time will be able to easily access their emails, voicemails, and documents via the Internet.  We will avoid having to invest in new computer server capacity to house and store our emails, as they will be securely stored in Google's "cloud" with good archiving capabilities.  This also means our server room operations will be significantly streamlined, freeing our IT staff to work on expansion of our technology capabilities and to support our growing fleet of public computers.  Last but not least, our annual software license costs will be reduced by several thousand dollars.

There is a learning curve for sure, but both PVLD and took a step forward this week!

The world we live in

I think I published an earlier version of this a year or more ago....it's been updated and I still find it a fascinating snapshot, so I thought I'd pass it  along.  There are definitely plenty of things for PVLD to think about as we evolve our services and work to improve how we communicate with and engage our community....

Whatever happened to the book?

A couple of weeks ago I gave a talk to the Southwest Manuscripters about the future of books and reading.  I only wish I had come across this video of Mark Pesce from his The Human Network blog before I prepared my remarks.

In it he talks about how the act of reading is changing in the digital age, and asks the question "What is electronic about the electronic book?"  His answers fascinated and intrigued me...and scared me a bit too! 

If you are interested in books and reading, watching the entire video is a worthy investment of 35 minutes.  I suggest grabbing a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and a notepad and a pen, setting the video to "full screen" (just click on the little symbo with arrows radiating out to the edges of a square at the bottom right of the video screen), and then settling in for a real intellectual journey!

Now...tell me what you think!

Computers and Internet - A Core Library Service

According to Opportunity For All, a study of the use of public access computers in libraries published by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation last month,

"Over the past year, 45 percent of the 169 million visitors to public libraries connected to the Internet using a library computer or wireless network during their visit, even though more than threequarters of these people had Internet access at home, work, or elsewhere. The widespread use of these services by people of varying age, income, and experience is an indication of the unique role that public libraries play in the evolving digital landscape. Public libraries stand out as one of the few community institutions that can address the computing and information needs of all kinds of users, from seniors who have never touched a keyboard to young entrepreneurs launching a new eBusinesses strategy."

This certainly reflects our experience at PVLD, where despite the relative affluence of the community we serve and the assumption that many residents have computers and Internet access at home we are struggling to keep up with the demand for computer access (and the associated Internet bandwidth) at our libraries.    This fiscal year we will host approximately 110,000 Internet sessions on our public access computers, and this doesn't include the many people who use our free wireless Internet service to access the Web using their own computers.  The Gates study offers an explanation -

Users turned to computers at the public library for a wide range of reasons, whether it was because they did not have access elsewhere, needed faster Internet speed, wanted technical help from a librarian, competed for access to a computer at home, or simply wanted to work somewhere more peaceful and inviting than a crowded coffee shop or a hectic unemployment office."

As the economy has weakened libraries including PVLD have seen even greater demand for access to computers, and for technical support from staff, as the newly unemployed face a job market where nearly every employer demands an online job application; people who have been out of the workforce for sometime now need to improve their computer skills so they can try to re-enter the job market; and faced with budget pressures people are cutting back on their home Internet services.

Add to that technological and social forces that mean that people are relying on the Internet for access to information, for connecting with family and friends via email and online social networking, for entertainment (games, movies, etc.) and it is no wonder that our library computers are well-used and our computer classes are full.  I haven't had time to digest yesterday's Superior Court decision about Internet Service Providers ability to charge more for customers/uses that consume more bandwidth, but I can't help think that the resulting changes in cost structure will drive even more people to the public library's Internet service.

In recent years there have been studies such as this one from 2005 showing that in the public's mind libraries are still mainly about books and reading, and that too has been born out in focus groups and market research we have done here at PVLD.  The Gates study shows that whatever the perception, the reality is that for many of our library users computers and Internet access are perhaps as important, if not more important, than our books.

Interesting data to consider as we look at how to allocate our limited resources to best meet the short- and long-term needs of our community!

Unplugging

For the past year or so I've been trying to stay away from communications technology (phone, cell phone, email, Facebook) for at least a few hours each Sunday with variable success.  I generally manage to spend at least a few hours walking the beach, working in the yard, or just taking a siesta untethered from modern communications, but I rarely make it through a full day.

I know that I am not alone in my addiction to my Iphone, or in my quest for some unconnected time, but I didn't realize it was a national movement until several of the blogs I follow had posts about a National Day of Unplugging being promoted by a very cool online movement called The Sabbath Manifesto.  Essentially they are encouraging everyone to "Put down the cell phone, stop the status updates on Facebook, shut down Twitter, sign out of e-mail and relax" for 24 hours starting at sundown tonight.

My plans for tomorrow will make it difficult for me to participate, so I intend to defer my participation by 24 hours and give it a go on Sunday.  Who knows, maybe this will kick-start me into a weekly day of unplugging...and maybe some of you will join me.

In that spirit I offer two quotes to inspire all of us  -

The first, from Annie Dillard via the Blisstree blog -

    “Spend the afternoon. You can’t take it with you.”

And from Nicholas Bate via the Execupundit blog -

Sometimes it is remarkably productive to NOT "be productive."

Here's to an unproductive weekend for all!

Going digital - the world is changing

Going through some saved posts from other blogs I came across a some interesting data about the proliferation of digital technology.  All are courtesy of Stephen Abram at Stephen's Lighthouse -

First, from Forbes Magazine  The Decade in Data by Oliver Chiang:

–Percentage of U.S. households with a broadband connection in 2000: 6.3%
–Percentage of U.S. households with a broadband connection in 2008: 63%
–Number of e-mails sent per day in 2000: 12 billion
–Number of e-mails sent per day in 2009: 247 billion
–Revenues from mobile data services in the first half of 2000: $105 million
–Revenues from mobile data services in the first half of 2009: $19.5 billion
–Number of text messages sent in the U.S. per day in June 2000: 400,000
–Number of text messages sent in the U.S. per day in June 2009: 4.5 billion
–Percentage of U.S. households with at least one digital camera in 2000: 10%
–Percentage of U.S. households with at least one digital camera in 2008: 68.4%
–Percentage of U.S. households with at least one MP3 player in 2000: less than 2%
–Percentage of U.S. households with at least one MP3 player in 2008: almost 43%
–Number of pages indexed by Google in 2000: 1 billion
–Number of pages indexed by Google in 2008: 1 trillion
–Number of Google searches per day in 2001: 10 million
–Number of Google searches in 2009: 300 million, estimated
–Number of total Wikipedia entries in 2001: 20,000
–Number of Wikipedia entries in English in 2009: 3.1 million
–Number of blogs in 2000: less than 100,000
–Number of blogs 2008: 133 million
–Minimum free hard-disk space needed to install Windows 2000: 650 megabytes
–Minimum available hard-disk space needed to install Windows 7: 16,000 megabytes (16 gb)
–Amount of hard-disk space $300 could buy in 2000: 20 to 30 gigabytes
–Amount of hard-disk space $300 could buy in 2009: 2,000 gigabytes (2 terabytes)

And some videos that make the point that the world truly is changing -
 

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from JESS3 on Vimeo.

And last but not least, a tongue in cheek look at one of the effects! (I can't seem to get the cartoon to size properly, so click here for the original)

Have a great weekend!

"Stuff" Happens

This weekend PVLD experienced a major problem with our website and our web-based SOPAC online library catalog.  The website was down from Friday evening through noon today (Tuesday), and the SOPAC catalog is still down.

We don't know (and may never know) the cause...a piece of code gone haywire or a hacker attack are the most likely explanations. 

The bad news is that our website hosting service (the company we pay to maintain our website and SOPAC on their computer servers) had never backed up our systems despite billing us for backups with every monthly invoice.  This meant the loss of several months worth of enhancements.  Yikes!  Needless to say we will be acting to recover our payments from them.

The good news is that our Digital Services Team of David Campbell and Erik Adams did an amazing job of keeping their cool under very trying circumstances.  All employees were alerted to the problem in an email that David sent out in the wee small hours of Saturday morning, and by the time the library opened on Saturday a rudimentary web page with access to our library catalog and basic functions like the ability to place holds was up and running.  By Saturday afternoon that rudimentary site also had tabs for access to our online databases/resources and calendar of events. 

By Sunday the website had been transferred from the non-performing hosting company to servers owned by the company that does our web development and was available in the library (at least in its October 2009 configuration which means minus some recent enhancements), complete with access to our pre-SOPAC online catalog, and by noon today a fully functioning website and online catalog were available to remote users.

David and Erik are now working to restore the website enhancements that were lost and to get SOPAC back up and running as quickly as practical.

In my career I have had many occasions to learn that "stuff" does indeed happen, and to come to the view that the important thing is not the fact that it happened but how you react.  Do I wish that this weekend's challenges had never occurred?  Sure.  Am I proud of how our PVLD team responded?  Absolutely.   I know David and Erik were thrown for a loop, and somewhat embarassed even though this was not their fault, but they just quietly went about fixing the problems in a way that kept the most important needs of our library customers in mind. 

Great job, guys!

Broadband - a right or a luxury?

Just after I wrote my last post trying to explain braodband and why it is important, I came across this post from the Publicola blog (thanks to Stephen Abram for sharing it) comparing broadband Internet access to access to electrical power in the early part of the 20th century. 

In the U.S. and around the world electricity quickly became seen as an essential prerequisite to "modern" life, enabling everything from industrial development to the spread of public education.  In the first half of the 20th century governments, including our own, invested huge amounts in electrification projects like those of the Tennessee Valley Authority and today developing nations like China continue to invest in rural electrification through projects like the "Three Gorges" project.

It's hard for me to see how the same will not be true of broadband Internet access.   In a world where the Interent is the primarly repository for up-to-date information on everything from crop prices to the weather to the latest scientific and technical news; an increasingly important telecommunications medium; and a means of delivering education and medical services access to the Internet is already dividing the "haves" and "have nots" much as access to electricity has done for the past one hundred years.

Advanced nations in Asia and Europe are already making huge investments in broadband, and the U.S. is beginning to lag far behind.  Delivering affordable high capacity broadband to every household in the nation may not be practical or affordable, but surely we should be making sure every community has access to broadband Internet...and what better place than at the public library?

In my view access to broadband is not only a right, it is vital to the future of our nation...but what do you think?