14 Weird things I’ve learned this week

  1. Queen Bees are expensive
  2. It’s damned difficult to find a cat-sitter in Ithaca
  3. Johnathan Lethem’s You Don’t Love me Yet is, so far, an absolutely perfect book
  4. Tom Phillips is an artist who did a really great book painting featuring fictional books with titles stolen from Shakespeare
  5. Roccapulco is a salsa club in San Francisco. I’m going next week with my friend Jake
  6. The Lunch Meeting is the gold standard for interviews at eBay
  7. Oldschool Metadata

  8. You can randomly teleport somewhere in Second Life and end up getting juggled by a large pink elephant
  9. Hotels in San Francisco are way cheaper than hotels in NYC. Jobs in San Francisco pay way better than jobs in NYC.
  10. All it took for me to get my finances in shape was to get some software with a decent interface
  11. The only cure for pregnancy-induced hypertension is childbirth (hi clay!)
  12. My friend Josh has taken over things digital at the NYPL
  13. Adobe CS3 will steal your soul with its compelling beauty
  14. Google Analytics has a new interface that will steal whatever bit of your soul is leftover after Adobe gets done with you
  15. Half of you people are still using Internet Explorer. I’m saddened. Please, for the love of all things holy: Use

SXSW Interactive – Saturday

Lists. Lists are the secret to blogging during a panel while still paying attention. Watch.

Best things about SXSW Interactive so far:

  • The BlogHer meetup is described during the opening panel as “the biggest taco-fest in Austin”
  • Vendetta, 1999 – a more modern version of the humanist Jenson typeface
  • Consumating.com
  • Seeing people from last year and feeling like they are old friends
  • Analog Tagging
  • Carrie Bickner at the NYPL gets it. Librarians don’t own metadata. Metadata, like all information, belongs to the people.
  • NYPL Labs
  • Breakfast tacos

Librarian meetup in Austin this weekend

Good morning, all. I’ve been death-on-a-stick for a week, thanks to accidentally ingesting some sort of peanut bi-product last weekend. The Epipen plays hell with my immune system. The good news is, I’ve gotten a lot of very important America’s Next Top Model watched. So, that’s done.

I am heading to Austin, Texas tomorrow for the annual South by Southwest Interactive conference. Jenny’s putting together a Libraryworker meetup in Austin on Sunday if you are in town.

I love the word “libraryworker”. It’s like sexworker, but you know, wholesome.

Librarain videos

These kids today and their wacky video freeculture.

libraryninja.jpgThey say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Well, after minutes of painstaking research, I have determined that librarians reign supreme on YouTube.

Steve Reed, kickass Library Media Specialist at Wilmington High School sent us a link to an excellent video some of his students made, featuring a library ninja.

As you know, one library ninja video leads to another, and another. Once I finished with the library ninjas and ninja librarians, I was naturally drawn to the librarian superheros.

Troubling indeed, were the librarian villains, librarian vampires, and librarian nazis. But worst of all, are the schlumpy “librarians” who shelve books all day.

Enjoy!