U2 and Pandora

Unfortunately my technology thoughts this week have nothing to do with libraries or class but they are important to me :)

If you know me you will know I am a huge u2 fan. In fact the last time I saw them I had general admission tickets so I had to get to the concert hours and hours before so I can get in line to get a good spot on the floor. Well it paid off because I got pictures of bono and edge and my ticket signed.

Bono super close, couldn't manage to say anything but thank you, but shrieked right after it happened
My ticket

Sorry I try to throw this in whenever I get the chance :)

Anyway on Saturday I saw U23D at Navy Pier in Chicago. It was an Imax movie. I have never seen an Imax movie before and was really worried because it seemed everyone I had talked to did not like them and would get sick watching them. It was the greatest thing ever. Not only was Bono and U2 way tall but I could see every minuscule detail on them from birth marks to five o'clock shadows. Plus they were 3d so all I wanted to do was reach out and touch them. Needless to say I love Imax technology and think it's the greatest thing ever. I had never understood why people have to see movies in Imax but now I do and I think I may be seeing Batman there when it comes out this summer.

A few months ago someone sent me a link to a website called Pandora. It is a FREE music website where you type in a band, artist or song you enjoy and the site sets up a station by that band, artist or song you chose. That station plays music by whatever you typed in but also other bands that sound like them. It is not all popular music but bands that may not necessarily be that famous. I have found a lot of new people that I enjoy but have never heard of before. The site links the songs to amazon or itunes so you can purchase them if you like them. It also talks about the artist and the song and why they chose this song for you station. You can give the song a thumbs up or down-- thumbs up plays the song again thumbs down you will never hear it again. You can also choose not to hear the song for a month if it repeats over and over again. I just love the website because its FREE. I would recommend everyone check it out!

Forgot to mention...

There is an article in the Dec. 15 issue of Library Journal about blogs and libraries.

Farkas, Meredith. The bloggers among us. Library Journal; 12/15/2007, Vol. 132 Issue 20, p40-43.

I don't think I could post the actual link here of the article, but look in ebsco host for it.

Wikipedia and hooked on technology

I really don't like wikipedia. I guess it is a good easy information website, but it bugs me when people want to use it for research papers. My brother, who is a sophomore in high school, had to do a speech on David Bowie last week. He kept telling me it was no big deal he'll just look up information on Wikipedia because the teacher did not require citing sources. I told him it shouldn't even matter that it is not a big research paper, you should not even get used to just going to wikipedia. I showed him 4 books at the library and the biographic database on inspire. Anything he needs to look up online, he automatically goes to wikipedia. I don't know if this is normal for teens his age and if schools tell students not to use it but I hate that he wants to use it at all for any project relating to school.

I don't consider myself a big technology and computer person and don't consider myself addicted to it at all-that is until I lost my internet. A few weeks ago my internet went out. I thought it was because of a bad wind storm we had. But a few days later internet still did not work. A call to ATT and an hour on the phone, I found out I had a defective modem. I went a week without the internet, only checking my email two of those days at work. I hated that I could not look up the pointless websites I do everyday or even not being able to email.

The internet makes things so much easier, when I didn't have it my boyfriend and me were trying to figure out the name of the actor in a movie. Usually all I would have to do is go on Imdb.com and look it up, few minutes top. Since I didn't have the internet, it took us forever to think of the name I had to pull out the movie (vhs even so I could not even skip chapters!!) and we fast forwarded it to the part where he was in to see who he was.

S554 First Blog Posting

Hello-

I created this blog last spring for my 401 class so I deleted the other posts and made a 554 blog now. Although the blog for 401 was only 3 posts and just a week's worth of lessons I learned alot from it. I did not realize how many blogs were out there about libraries and librarians. I know a lot of people have personal blogs (I have had one for a few years, but hardly update it now), many of my friends have personal ones which is really nice because a lot of them live far away and I don't get to talk to them as much, but I can always check their blog. Anyway, I learned in 401 about many different library blogs and the book confirmed that. Chapter three shows many library blogs to look at.

I think this class will be very useful for me because although I have had an account on blogger for some time. I don't really think I am that technological savvy. Although I have a fancy blogger background, I just copied it from the internet (so if anyone does not like the blogger backgrounds just google 'blogger backgrounds' and you should be able to add a new one). There is no way I could do HTML tags. I don't really know about RSS and wiki's, so I'm looking forward to learning about them.

I have only taken one class using VIC and I didn’t have a problem with it. I have taken many classes strictly online and enjoy those because you get to work at your own pace and work ahead. I did have some problems with Oncourse last semester, it seemed to only let me on when it wanted to so I hope it is better this semester.

After reading the book, I was extremely curious about what the author wrote on page 6 about people 'Google Bombing.' I had to look up the two phrases to see what search results I got. Typing 'miserable failure' just came up with news results talking about the incident.