Google Street view

I have probably blogged about this at least once already, but it still blows my mind everytime I encounter a reference to it. If you haven't done this yet, you need to try it--if only to see how easy it is for information-literate-trained stalkers to find you. Many streets in U.S. cities have now been photographed. Looks like pictures of my house were done sometime last winter.

Go to Google; choose Maps; enter your address/zipcode. When you get the map, click on Street view in the box that pops up. Now you can navigate by clicking on the arrow in the middle of the street or rotating the picture using the carets (sp?) in the top corner of the view.

Should you ever see a car driving your street with a set of cameras mounted on the roof, be sure to wave and say hello to the world!

Tic Your TOC

I love electronic databases, especially those with full-text articles. But, alas, I miss the serendipitous finding of articles I wasn't looking for, but really like or need or explode my mind. Just got notice of a utility from the UK that allows us to specify (tic) a list of our favourite[sic] journals, save the list, and then cruise the Table of Contents (TOC) of our choices whenever we wish. And the name is. . . . ticTOCs!
http://www.tictocs.ac.uk/index.php?action=home

"Welcome to ticTOCs - where researchers keep up-to-date

* ticTOCs is easy to use, and it's free.
* Find 11,393 scholarly journal Table of Contents (TOCs) from 414 publishers.
* View the latest TOC for each journal.
* Link to the full text of 291,071 articles (where institutional or personal subscription allows).
* Export TOC feeds to popular feedreaders.
* Select and save journal titles to view future TOCs (Register to ensure your MyTOCs are permanently saved).
* And more!"

Library Elf

Sounds like a Christmas story; it's not. Ellen Wilson, our ingenious technology librarian, alerted me to this utility several months ago, and every month I'm really glad she did.

Sign up for an account. Enter your Mobile Public Library card number and password and Library Elf will connect with your account. You can set it up to let you know which books you have checked out and send you an email alert before they are due.

It works for MPL and Hancock County library for both me and my husband. You can check and see if any other libraries are included. There are a couple of academic libraries, but not this one, though I will look into it. Library Elf may not work with our system.

It has saved me from fines several times and I love just being able to see what I have, what I've put a hold on, and when everything is due. Perfect if you have kids that use the public library. So easy.
http://libraryelf.com/

The Top Ten of Everything of 2008

Finished exams? No brains needed for these lists.

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2008/top10

Addictionary

I think it was the Washington Post that used to have a contest every year for the best made-up word. This website is based on the same concept. The Word of the Day is:

inlawgestion
noun, The anxiety and stress stemming from having the in-laws over for dinner over the holidays.

So many words that ought to exist!
http://www.addictionary.org/

Thanks to http://marylaine.com/neatnew.html
Marylaine Block

Just for Fun--Sleeveface

Now that exams are going on, I think it's too late for anything but some stress relief. Heard about this website on NPR the other day. Too cool! This is something anybody can do with an old album cover and a friend with a digital camera. Submit your photo to the website.
http://www.sleeveface.com/

The Mechanics of Finding an Article in the Library

I just finished updating a web page that, I hope, elucidates the steps you need to take to find a full text article through the USA University Library Homepage in a couple of general databases. I wish it were easy, but it's not. Here are seven steps that take you through the mechanics of the process. The actual search strategy is a whole 'nother ballgame. Maybe I can talk Ellen Wilson into doing a Captivate demo on constructing a search strategy--after the Holidays, of course.
http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/sauer/articles/finding.html

World AIDS Day

How much do you know about how AIDs? Take the test.(Give it a few moments to load.)

American Social History

Appropriate for this most social of holidays is this primary document website described by the Scout Report today.

The Digital Library Federation's website, Aquifer American Social History Online, is a site that brings together 175 collections that catalog American social history. Some of the types of materials included on the site are photographs, maps, oral histories, data sets, sheet music, posters, books and journal articles. On the right side of the homepage you can browse by "Times", "Subjects", and "Places". The items included here date back as far as the 1600s, covering the 50 states plus Puerto Rico and subjects ranging from African-Americans to World War II.

http://www.dlfaquifer.org/home

Great Websites for Kids

For these holidays from the American Library Association:
http://www.ala.org/greatsites

"The most valuable journalism is the kind that explains."

Too much information; too little knowledge.
http://www.prwatch.org/node/7978

Website Parodies

Sometime along the way, I gathered this set of parody websites. They were probably originally meant to illustrate the need to evaluate public web pages. Some of them are very carefully done--by someone who had a lot of extra time. Some of them are just silly. I thought maybe they would provide a little humor-break from research-paper writing. And always remember there is The Onion.
http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/sauer/parodies.html

Civic Literacy Quiz

According to an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education citing a newly released report on civic literacy:

. . . earning a college degree does not necessarily guarantee an increase in knowledge of American history, government, or economics.

The report, "Our Fading Heritage: Americans Fail a Basic Test on Their History and Institutions," is based on a survey that quizzed more than 2,500 randomly selected Americans, including college graduates and elected officials, to test their "civic literacy." Of those who took the 33-question multiple-choice test, nearly 1,800, or roughly 71 percent, failed.

According to the report, college graduates whose highest educational-attainment level was a bachelor's degree answered 57 percent of the questions correctly. That was 13 percentage points higher than the score for Americans whose formal education ended with a high-school diploma.

Only one age bracket of college graduates, baby boomers, did not fail the test over all but came close with an average score of 61 percent. A score below 60 percent was considered failure.

I didn't fail, but am embarrassed that I actually missed 3 questions. But I'm one of those baby boomers that actually studied "civics" as a class in grade school and high school.

See how you do. Take the 33 question multiple choice test.

Life on Google

For years, when doing a library tour, I've stopped at our shelves of Life magazines. Our bound volumes on the third floor outside of the classroom start in 1936 and go through about 1983. Students are amazed at the history these represent--the articles, the advertisements and the photos. Google has gotten the Life photo collection from 1750s and made it available on their Images search. All those famous shots of presidents' inaugurations, presidents'funerals, war, wars' ends, fashion icons and the poor unfashionables.

To browse the collection go to Google, choose "Images" search and use these words: source:life.

To search it just add another word, for example: source:life vietnam.

http://images.google.com/

Full Frontal Scrutiny

Americans for American Energy
Center for Consumer Freedom
American Clean Skies Foundation
Coalition for a Democratic Workplace
Alliance for Abundant Food and Energy
Consumers Rights League

"Alliance," "foundation," "league," "coalition," Wow, such great names. They sound like activist, grassroots organizations working for the betterment of our world and our lives. Sorry to say these are all backed by those for whom transparency is the foe. Hmmm, what might that be? Here is a watchdog website that follows the money to unearth the agenda of these groups.

http://www.frontgroups.org/

"This joint project between Consumer Reports Web Watch and the Center for Media and Democracy aims to examine advocacy groups with misleadingly green-sounding names that are actually funded by corporate interests." Thanks to: Neat New Stuff I Found This Week http://marylaine.com/neatnew.html

Hoaxed Again!

Have you heard the news that Sarah Palin didn't know that Africa was a continent and not a country? And did you believe it? All the news stations and blogs reported it, so it must be true, right?

Read this: http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/11/13/arts/13hoax.php

Even me, a librarian skeptical of all news sources, fell for it. After all everyone was saying it. Just hope that no one decides to do this to you on the web, on facebook, twitter, wherever. It is viral and can be deadly.

National Survey of Student Engagement 2008

Though this report should be of interest to university administrators, students should take note of the summary below. Whatever college and university you attend, there will be differences in the quality of the education. It is up to you to find the best courses and the best teachers--not just the easiest and those that fit your schedule.

Promoting Engagement for All Students: The Imperative to Look Within
Source: National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)
From press release (PDF; 226 KB)

Findings from a national survey released today show that the quality of undergraduate education varies far more within colleges and universities than between them. As a result, rankings can be highly misleading predictors of educational quality. Analyses of key “Benchmarks of Effective Educational Practice” reveal that in almost every case, more than 90 percent of the variation in undergraduate education quality occurs within institutions, not between them. A related conclusion is that even institutions with high benchmark scores have an appreciable share of students whose undergraduate experience is average at best.

The 2008 report from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) is based on information from nearly 380,000 randomly selected first-year and senior students at 722 four-year colleges and universities in the U.S. The report, Promoting Engagement for All Students: The Imperative to Look Within, provides an overview of survey findings and points to accomplishments as well as areas where improvement is needed.

10 Most Annoying Phrases

Oxford Researchers List Top 10 Most Annoying Phrases
By John Scott Lewinski
Wired.com, 7 Nov 2008

The great hierarchy of verbal fatigue includes:

1 - At the end of the day
2 - Fairly unique
3 - I personally
4 - At this moment in time
5 - With all due respect
6 - Absolutely
7 - It's a nightmare
8 - Shouldn't of
9 - 24/7
10 - It's not rocket science

The list appears in a new book, Damp Squid: The English Language Laid Bare, by Jeremy Butterfield.

Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition

The 11th Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, coincidentally published in 1911, is known (by librarians and historians mostly) for the depth of its articles and the scholarly authority of the authors of these articles. I just ran across an online version of this 44 million word reference source and after a little more research have found more than one website hosting it. Needless to say, it is of no value for most 20th century topics, but for students and academics in most fields it is a historiography of great value.

Wikipedia offers these characterizations by noted authorities. I can't think of better advertisements for trying it than these

In 1917, under his pseudonym of S. S. Van Dine, the US art critic and author Willard Huntington Wright published Misinforming a Nation, a 200+ page criticism of inaccuracies and biases found in the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition. Wright claimed that Britannica was "characterized by misstatement, inexcusable omissions, rabid and patriotic prejudices, personal animosities, blatant errors of fact, scholastic ignorance, gross neglect of non-British culture, an astounding egotism, and an undisguised contempt for American progress.

"Sir Kenneth Clark, in Another Part of the Wood (1974), wrote of the eleventh edition, "One leaps from one subject to another, fascinated as much by the play of mind and the idiosyncrasies of their authors as by the facts and dates. It must be the last encyclopaedia in the tradition of Diderot which assumes that information can be made memorable only when it is slightly coloured by prejudice. When T. S. Eliot wrote 'Soul curled up on the window seat reading the Encyclopædia Britannica,' he was certainly thinking of the eleventh edition." (Clark refers to Eliot's 1929 poem Animula.)"

Check it out at:
http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/

Molecular Movies--Cool Animations for the Biologist and the Curious

This website just came via Scout Report. This is their review:
. . . . The Molecular Movies site presents an organized directory of various animations, along with original tutorials for life science professionals who are learning 3D visualization techniques. These materials are divided into the following sections: "Showcase", "Learning", "Toolkit", and "News". The "Showcase" area contains animations listed by scientific area or individual animator or design studio. Currently, there are well over fifty animations offered here which demonstrate everything from cell invasions to DNA replication. Next up are the visualization tutorials (located in the "Learning" area), which allow users to learn about the techniques used in making such lovely animations. Visitors can browse these tutorials by skill level, software type, or topic area. Before leaving the site, visitors should also check out the site weblog for further updates and links to other related works. [KMG]
http://www.molecularmovies.com/showcase/index.html

Copyright Internet Scout, 1994-2008. Internet Scout
(http://scout.wisc.edu/),