Steve Garwood's Website: Blog - That's What I'm Talking About

Surprise them with Politeness

Steve — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 05:52:36 PST

I've been trying my own little "social experiment" lately...when I go through a fast food drive through or a checkout lane at a store I've been saying two words:

"thank you"

What I find odd is that often people don't know how to react...sometimes I get a "your welcome", sometimes I get silence, sometimes I get indignation that I "stole" their line (not that it was what they wanted to say, but that they were suppose to say it).

I don't understand, maybe it was the 12yrs of Catholic School, maybe it was being raised by people who believed in basic courtesy, maybe it was the 10yrs that I worked in the service industry...when did we get to the point that "Thank You" and "Your Welcome" had to become scripted phrases...

Books for the Families of the Troops?

Steve — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 12:29:38 PST

Taking this blog off hiatus for a quick post...

Are any libraries out there sponsoring programs to give books to the families of the troops? or sending books/magazines/DVDs/CDs to the troops?

I don't know if the USO or the military has a program that already does this, but it seems like it would be a great idea to take some of the great materials that are going to a library book sale and sending them to the troops or troops families...I know the military probably has libraries as well, but I'll bet they're underfunded...

Blog on Hiatus

Steve — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 07:59:26 PDT

OMG am I bz.

For a little while I'm not going to maintain this blog (of course I'm fickle so I'm sure I'll be back).

Instead I'll be focusing on my blog on the SCILS website:
http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/directory/sgarwood/index.html

I post a regular S(C)ite of the week there with new and interesting things that grab my interest...sorry no rss there yet (10.15.07) but hopefully soon.

New Blog at SCILS

Steve — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 11:16:33 PDT

As part of the School of Communication, Information and Library Studies website redesign, all Faculty members now have blogs. One of the areas I'll be posting on mine is a "Site of the Week" to give people more of an insight into who I am, what I do, what I like, etc.

The Blog is available from my SCILS Profile:
http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/directory/sgarwood/index.html

Sorry, no rss yet :-(

Bad things can be Good

Steve — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 11:03:11 PDT

So I got totally taken by the stupid Quechup service - http://tinyurl.com/3dxj38

After the stupid service sent out email to all those in my address book w/out permission, I sent email out to all those in my address book apologizing that that happened...

At first I felt like an idiot, I'm a damned computer instructor...don't I know to read the fine print? Duh, of course I do...but do I read it? Nah, who's got time.

Two really good things came out of this though:
1. I'm about to go into the class I teach on malware, etc. It actually feels good having a little "practical" experience after successfully avoiding this stuff for awhile

2. In response to the apology I sent, lots of folks that I haven't written to in awhile have written back. I spend too much damn time with my machine and not with the people that this machine helps me to connect to...funny how a bad thing turned out to be really good.

New Product in the Store

Steve — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 12:05:31 PDT

Thank You to my former students for the idea, the lowercasenospace shop is here.

http://www.cafepress.com/librarysteve/3501923

Now make sure those file and folder names are:
lower case & no space

Back to School

Steve — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 05:58:32 PDT

Wow, I didn't think I could ever dislike these words more than when I was a student. Trust me they're far more horrible as a teacher :-)

Don't get me wrong, I like teaching, I love being in front of the room, I enjoy seeing those students who push to learn as much as they can (I will admit I teach some pretty cool things), and I love that they keep me on my toes...but, WOW the time commitment necessary to teach is a bear.

Is there a point here? I don't know, but I do know that I've learned one thing in the last 3 years of teaching...teaching is hard!

It has (almost) ended

Steve — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 13:18:10 PDT

Well...10 classes later and I know I'm feeling a hell of a lot more Social Software Literate.

http://russl.pbwiki.com is looking messy though pretty well complete.

Will I use everything that we went through in this class? Doesn't matter. I know I can and when I should.

It has begun

Steve — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 10:47:26 PDT

July 11...One day in to my Summer Class: Social Software Literacy at Rutgers. Should be a fun class as it gets developed over the next month with LOTS of student involvement.

Want to see it as it grows: http://russl.pbwiki.com (affectionately pronounced as russel). Last night was Introductions and Instant Messaging, Thursday we move to Blogging...go go go :-)

Well back to meebo, I've got IMs to handle...

"I don't wannas"

Steve — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 08:54:29 PDT

Ok perhaps this should be "I don't want to(s)", but I just don't wanna...What do I not "wanna" do? EVERYTHING...jeez louise this grind of teaching in the summer and working on prep for the Fall stinks. I'm pooped and I just want to lie down in the park and read a book that will give me absolutely no intellectual stimulation as well.

Thinking of a new "class": How to Avoid All Social Networks, While Still Living in a Place Where I can get Cable and Pizza Delivered. But I guess even teaching the class would lead to yet another social network :-)

For this post I just want to share one of my personal favorite blogs:
http://www.lifehack.org/

Whenever I want to "unplug" from the library and technology worlds, this blog always seems to have something I'm interested in...best yet, usually the articles are short, sweet, and to the point.

I want to be that happy

Steve — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 05:13:32 PDT

Yesterday I took my dog, Teddy, to the groomer. Plenty of $$ and pampering later he came home...pretty and smelling good.

This morning I took him to a big field that I like to take him to so he can walk off leash for awhile and enjoy trotting around. As I was walking he got behind me...when I turned around all I saw was four paws in the air and sheer dog bliss as the big guy rolled around in the tall grass...When I yelled to him to catch up, he looked up at me with the biggest happiest face I think I've ever seen.

Now don't get me wrong...I'm a fairly happy guy, but I don't know if I've ever had that face.

We walked a little more and again I turned around to see him rolling around in the grass...let me just tell ya...unplug for a bit and give it a try :-)

Just a little video test

Steve — Sun, 15 Jul 2007 06:49:07 PDT

Click To Play

Don't mind me, I'm just working on adding a video file to this blog. I love screencasting and have been using TechSmith's Camtasia for a couple of years now...maybe one day I'll get to be good at it. I enjoy making vids but those file sizes are a bear...usually my content goes on a streaming server that I don't control, but I want to explore a bit with things.

The above is a screencast of a PowerPoint presentation, I opened PowerPoint and used Camtasia 4 to record the screen as I spoke. After recording I produced the video as several diferent types of files, the one above is a .flv from a .wmv. From there I uploaded the video to blip.tv and took the code that site generated and pasted into blogger...that's it.

A nice tutorial on how to do this is located on the freevlog site...very easy to follow screencasts for PC and Mac.

C(S)ites:
Camtasia - techsmith.com
blip.tv - blip.tv
blogger - blogger.com
Freevlog - freevlog.org

Enjoy, Steve

Information Literacy Games?

Steve — Wed, 09 May 2007 17:55:47 PDT

I've been reading a lot about how the Millenials/Digital Age folks like and use gaming, both for fun and to learn...it's got me wondering why I haven't seen more cool interactive information literacy games...why not learn how to find, evaluate and use information as part of a game model? There's got to be a good way to do this...

If technology is suppose to...

Steve — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 05:32:36 PDT

....make my life easier why do I never have time to update this blog?

Ok...maybe it's not technology, maybe it's me...do I have nothing to say...do I just hate writing so much that I don't want to post anything here...maybe it not that I have nothing to say...maybe it's just that I don't want to post it so that anyone can hold me to it later...maybe my reasons for blogging just aren't good enough (I teach blogging, though I don't seem to have another purpose for it)

Whew...ok that's a post :-)

Yes, We've Arrrived

Steve — Wed, 09 May 2007 18:20:18 PDT

http://tinyurl.com/2etnss

"Public Library Geeks Take Web 2.0 to the Stacks". Nice little article about Charlotte & Mecklenburg County's Learning 2.0 site: http://plcmclearning.blogspot.com/

An Open Call...

Steve — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 11:49:12 PDT

To Google and the Library World. Google has a lot of talent and a lot of resources; Libraries have a lot of talent and a lot of resources...One thing that libraries could really use...a GOOD Integrated Library System (ILS)(book catalog, patron system, borrowing management...)...our vendors suck...and when they don't suck they want to charge an arm and a leg for every new feature.

Google seems like they want to attract the legitimacy that can be gained by having Librarians say that we use and promote Google...why else have Librarian Central (http://librariancentral.blogspot.com/)??

If that's the case, and I think it is...one thing I'd love to see from Google is a Great ILS with continual support/updating that's Open Source enough that smart systems Librarians can create all sorts of awesome tools for it.

Now of course what could Google get from this? I wouldn't mind it if they were able to figure out what the most popular books were in a certain area (geographic or subject), I wouldn't mind adding the ability to add web search results to a book catalog search (or even better a portal that could do books, ebooks, journals, ejournals, image and audiosources, etc.), and lastly, if they make my job easier and better and help the library world stay up to date (our vendors sure as hell don't), then I wouldn't mind saying that "yes indeed I love Google"...and this from someone who doesn't even use Google to Search....

Bill of Right? How about Bill of Responsibilities?

Steve — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 06:41:14 PDT

Ok, I agree, companies should be responsible for actions they take (or don't take) that inconvenience their customers...BUT...I'm a little tired of hearing of everyone's rights when it seems that no one acknowledges their responsibilities. Maybe I'm a little jaded from working with the public for too long, but if a company doesn't say that it's mission is to serve *only* you then how about realizing that it's NOT all about you. Also, let's not forget that there are other people in the world...if you can't hear on your cell phone, go somewhere else...don't talk louder; if you've decided not to parent your children, don't bring them out of the house; if you want your music louder get some headphones...

Think about someone else...that's all I'm asking, companies are doing it with their "Customer's Bill of Rights", but how about we all acknowledge that with rights come responsibilities and that maybe we should acknowledge that others have rights as well...

Microsoft: How do I love thee?

Steve — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 11:11:21 PST

I'm conflicted...do I hate Microsoft for making my life a mess every few years by making me recreate my training materials or do I love them as they keep making me money and keeping me around as a necessary part of society?

Vista, Office 2007, Internet Explorer 7.0...thank you Redmond...throw my whole life into update mode why don't you? As an general IT guy, applications trainer and web and multimedia designer, Microsoft has screwed up my world BIG TIME...couldn't have spaced it out a bit, huh?

Oh well, you know this actually makes my job kind of fun (or at least never dull) and I will say given the "weirdness" of Microsoft applications training opportunities will always be around...time for a new round of business cards.

"What are you talking about?" is what you might be thinking...IE7 doesn't look that much different, Vista is still the same idea, and even though Office 2007 looks quite different it all acts the same...

Well here the "gig".

IE7 fixed a bunch of bugs which means that web design training is going to be different...also means some $$ making opportunity fixing those pages that needed to be hacked to work, which now have problems because of the hacks...

Vista looks different...in training if one person has something red on the screen and another has something blue..all hell breaks loose...the differences between vista and xp (or god forbid, something earlier) more significant than red/blue

Lastly, Office 2007...well I used to have great screen shots and screencast training materials...I teach online...25 students: 2 have Office 2007, 15 have O'2003, 10 have 2000. Next semester more 2007 users...time to warm up my Camtasia. Yep, FUN.

So, my personal jury is still out, but just typing this to give you another idea of how software upgrades affect the world (well at least mine)

Utilize? how about Customize, Maximize, Personalize

Steve — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 10:02:20 PST

I've been to several Web2.0/Library2.0 workshops lately where I've heard the following phrase: "You don't even have to learn html"

Well, ok, I understand the idea that learning html can be a barrier to posting things to the web and blogs, wikis, etc. allow you to post content without that learning curve.

But here's the rub...isn't web2.0/library2.0 also a bit about customization and personalization? If so, there are only so many templates that you can choose from. But here's the thing, most of these templates are changeable IF you know some html(xhtml) and css, yes, yes I know some are WYSIWYG, but a bunch aren't...so...go take a class and have what you want, rather than being stuck with what you get.

Yes...thank you Walmart

Steve — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 14:33:29 PST

A student in my Web Design class, sent me an excellent story...but a little background 1st. In class I always stress that a design has to "work" in various browsers, at various speeds, on various platforms, etc. If people can't "view" (let's not forget screen readers) your site...it just doesn't exist.

Apparently Walmart decided to launch a beta of their video download service last week.
Check it out in IE, FF and/or Safari: http://mediadownloads.walmart.com/mmce/jsp/storeHome.jsp

Looks pretty nice in IE..too bad for the rest of us. When they put it out at first this is what it looked like in FF: Walmart VideoDownload Site

Nice, thank you to Walmart for making my point