"Oh, Marjorie, this is positively de-lish!!!"

I found del.icio.us to be an interesting site. Often, I don't mind community sites that share your information and preferences with other users--like pathetic.org, fictionpress.net, Facebook, or even livejournal--but something about this site, like bloglines, doesn't sit well with me. Usually when I choose to bookmark a site, it's because it's the result of a complex Internet search that would be difficult to repeat. For example, the fifth result on the 17th page of an 11/26/05 Google search for "dominican friars" might be hard for me to find again unless I bookmarked it. And typically, I don't like other people knowing what sites I visit or enjoy; the sites that I don't mind sharing, everyone already knows about.

Even though I don't think it's my cup of tea, I can see benefits to a social tagging site. If I did a search on del.icio.us for "richardiii," I might find resources that other users only associated with the Yorkist king but wouldn't necessarily turn up during a Google search, thereby expanding my search results. Also, I use a lot of baby name websites when I'm writing, and it could be helpful for me to group them together in one category on del.icio.us instead of having them spread out in my Favorites folder depending on when I accessed them. (But, of course, I could just put them in a folder in my Favorites folder...) The cross-referencing possibilities also have their appeal. I reckon than a site about hentai could be tagged with things relating to Japan, comics, and homoerotica, and so could be useful when searching for any of those subjects. The portability of del.icio.us is also appealing, as was that of bloglines; no matter what computer you use, you can always access your favorite sites and streams.

The major pitfall I can see would be idiots doing the tagging--and, let's face it, idiots populate most of the world. Heck, at least 10% of the world would consider me an idiot of they met me! I've seen tags on YouTube with this problem: people think of tags like labels or captions instead of single-word search terms, or their tags are far too esoteric for anyone else to be able to use them. (I believe I referenced a problem with YouTube tagging back in my YouTube post.) And then, of course, there's the privacy issue... because everyone would be able to see which sites I had tagged and how I thought of them when I accessed them.

I explored del.icio.us a little bit and saw the comments left by other users on some of the tagged sites. The comments were helpful--some were reviews of the site, and some helped explain more fully what a site's purpose was. That could be useful when trying to search for something based on the tags of others.

Yo, roll! Roll, I say!

Well, I made a searchroll. I also added it to my blog. You'll see it on the right. To search within my parameters, select "TV and Film Resource" from the drop-down menu.

This was sort of fun. I didn't know about Rollyo before. When I first created the searchroll, I included amazon.com among the sites to search, but then I discovered that there were too many results coming back from the one site, so I took it out. After that, I started getting a wider variety of results. I also really like that once you've searched, you can narrow your results by site, just by clicking on the listing to the left.

I guess this tool can be useful if you're looking for very specific results, or for searching sites that don't have very good search features themselves. I particularly like the idea of being able to execute a genuine search without having to put up with results from wikipedia, for instance.

I come from the online image generation, folks.

Clearly, I had a good time with the online image generators. Having grown up with livejournal, I have a long history with all kinds of online generators/memes. In fact, my MySpace profile picture is something I created with a ticket image generator, which I found through the classic Church Sign Generator site. I had an especially good time exploring the Generator Blog, which introduced me to a lot of new sites. In addition to the ones suggested by the 20 Things blog, I highly recommend checking out RedKid.

As you can see, I focused most of my energy on creating images Pamunkey could use to promote itself:

And if you like Magic Eye illusions, I'm quite fond of this image I made for the 20 Things project! (I felt it was too big to post here.)

I thought the Soviet states gained independence fifteen years ago. Anyone? No? Guess I'm alone in that belief. (In other words, revisiting RSS...)

I used Bloglines' search tool, Technorati, Syndic8, and Topix to locate feeds. Bloglines and the two "t"s were the easiest to use, by leaps and bounds. I still don't understand what I was looking at in Syndic8's search results, and the main page was clunky and looked like its HTML had been written by a fourth-grader. I liked the range and organization of Technorati's results, and I appreciated the thoroughness of Topix. The Bloglines search tool allowed me to locate some interesting blogs, including The "M" Word - Marketing Libraries and Tame the Web: Libraries and Technology. I also found the New York Times Book section through a Bloglines search.

I would like to note that I did not add any of these to my Bloglines newsreader account because of my strong anti-newsreader leanings, which I mentioned earlier. But I suppose that's all right; it was not part of the explicit assignment for us to add them to our accounts, only to explore them.

new fascinations

Another film starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Dano? I'm seriously hoping this could this be a new trend...

No. 8 of the library things: LibraryThing

Doing this from the hotel in Pennsylvania...

Went to LibraryThing and created an account. Added five books to my "library" (just a few favorites, notably Bandits by Elmore Leonard and the Rebecca Miller's screenplay of The Ballad of Jack & Rose). Unless something is wrong with the site (as it was while I was signing up), this should be my public shelf.

LibraryThing was interesting. It reminds me of the Shelfari and the Visual Bookshelf applications on Facebook. My Visual Bookshelf keeps track of books I've read, books I'd like to read, and books I'm reading now. It operates by the same principle as LibraryThing, pulling most of its data from Amazon.com. I can write reviews, recommend books to friends, and even buy books directly from Amazon through the Facebook application. My Visual Bookshelf currently contains 104 books, but I add to that whenever my friends add books to theirs. = )

Something about "RSS" feels vaguely communist, doesn't it? Anyone? No? Guess I'm alone in that feeling.

I have discovered something through this exercise! I don't like Bloglines. In fact, I think my feelings might even be slightly stronger than that. On my laptop, I have one subscription to the one feed I really care about--and the only one on a site which is difficult to navigate when trying to find the updated material--and I check and maintain that through IE, and it works really well for me. In almost all other circumstances, I prefer to visit sites myself. You know, when it comes down to it, I'm a pretty simple kid, and I don't feel like I need some external site metamanaging my interests for me. The truth is, if I need information, I'll seek it out, and if I don't feel like wading through the business/capitalist aspect of the site to find what I need, then I probably haven't needed it badly enough. I feel like Bloglines is a remote control for the Internet--you don't have to get up and change the channel anymore, and neither do you have to navigate away from one site! It's kind of ridiculous. Plus, Bloglines is ridiculously user-unfriendly. And I hate that the feeds show up on the left. What's up with that? I feel like I'm going to get a cramp when I look at the page. So far, I haven't discovered a way to change the layout.

So, despite every fiber of my being screaming for me to stop, I created my very own Bloglines account, and I added five feeds, including two of the recommended ones (I chose BBC [despite not having any need for or interest in BBC news] and a co-worker [my mother]). I'm hoping that means I'm done with Numero Siete.

Facebook vs. MySpace

My favorite of the online social networking sites is, by far, Facebook. I find it much easier to search for people and interests there than on MySpace. For instance, I've never actually been able to search for anyone on MySpace with my last name. Even the three people on there who I know have my last name (my cousins) don't turn up after such a search, whereas they do on Facebook.

As for "famous" people, Kevin Pollack, Jon Lovitz, John McCain, Regina Spektor, and Jill Sobule are all my "friends" on MySpace, although I don't really know them. I have several bands as friends, too, some of which I know personally and some of which I don't. Brian Huskey is one of my MySpace friends, and while he is marginally "famous," I also know him in real life. (Incidentally, more and more "famous" people and bands are branching out to Facebook; Carbon Leaf signed on in February, and with the new Entertainment application available on Facebook, a lot of filmmakers, musicians, and writers can make fan pages to create buzz for their new work.)

As for fan pages, some of my "friends" are actually plays, novels, and literary reviews written by or edited by my friends. The MySpace pages serve as promotional tools for them. A friend of mine had a play in the New York International Fringe Festival, so he created a MySpace page for it. He has a book coming out next June, so he just created another page for that. Both Another Day on Willow Street and Band Fags! are now my "friends."

I am not a member of any groups on MySpace. I don't like the MySpace groups. I much prefer Facebook groups. On Facebook, I am the creator of the groups "The Villagers" (a network group for Bard students, and a group which I have since left...), "The Laurie Duncan Fan Club" (a global group for friends of my awesome friend Laurie), " 'Old School' Isn't Just a Hyphenated Adjective" (a global group created as a gathering place for alumni of GSGIS), and "I still won't say 'Bloody Mary' in dark rooms with mirrors in them" (another global group, created just for fun, and playing off an old superstition which many of us still have). I am also a member of groups such as "You Know You're from Richmond When...," "Barats and Bereta," "1,000,000 Strong for Stephen T Colbert," "El Azteca is the Shit," and "KD Cash Control n tha people who luv them!!!" Some of these are common interest groups, and some of them are fan-club-like groups.

I also prefer the photo album feature on Facebook to the one on MySpace. Recently, I took a hiking trip in the Blue Ridge and posted photos on Facebook. I was then able to send a link to the album to my friends and family, even those who didn't have Facebook accounts.

To sum up, I prefer Facebook, although I preferred it longer ago, before people could sign up without joining a network--this would be before people could sign up in a regional network, and even before people could sign up from high school networks.

What I think is most interesting is how quickly certain Internet sites have become part of the American vernacular--turning with Shakespearean ease into verbs and adjectives. I think we all know what it means "to 'google' something," for instance, and I have said to many a new acquaintance or long lost friend, "Yeah, just facebook me, and we'll get together." I've even told people I would "friend" them on MySpace (a phrase which I think actually comes from the practically defunct Friendster site). Such terms, I think, are becoming as commonplace as Kleenex and Band-Aid, White-Out and Crescent wrench. And so, with all of that said, if any of you reading this are interested, please feel free to facebook me... but good luck trying to find me on MySpace.

The Fifth was Flickr

When your first view of a campus is something like this, is it any wonder at all that you would choose to attend that college? I spent many nights in the garden at Blithewood and have so many memories of the place and its rocks that lit up when they were cracked together... And I think "Halcyon Heather" had the right idea when she let us read Arcadia aloud in the garden, back in August 2001, when everything really was idyllic, before the world fell apart.

"hudson ethereal" by iluvrhinestones

Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson NY

questions about 2.0

Is Pamunkey trying to be part of the "Web 2.0" movement? Or are they trying to highlight aspects of it? Because if they're trying to do the latter, why are we spending time with certain sites? I feel like if a site were really worth our exploring, we could find it here. Am I wrong? Am I just naïve? At least 20% of what we're being encouraged to do is not yet listed in the directory, though the sites/communities/programs have been around for ages. I have to wonder why.

What? Ewe Tube?

Of course, since I'm a kid, I've been visiting YouTube for several years now. I've even got a YouTube profile, even though I've never uploaded anything, and the user who impresses me the most is Argentinian computer artist Nico Di Mattia, whose "speed paintings" of Scarlett Johansson and others are absolutely incredible.

I use YouTube fairly regularly. My new favorite band, The Wiyos, just put out their third album with my favorite song on it--and before the CD came out (and before the lead singer/washboardist kindly gave me a copy), the only way I could hear my favorite song (without being at a show) was by playing a video of one of their performances on YouTube. And here it is, The Wiyos performing "Dyin' Crapshooter's Blues" originally recorded by Blind Willie McTell:

As for other video hosting sites, I really like Ebaum's World, which is unfortunately blocked by the library's content filters. In the past, Ebaum's World has hosted videos from my college's sketch comedy troupe, Olde English. Ebaum's World was also the place where I first found the video of "Pinky, the Pet of the Day." (And evidently, whoever posted this version of it to YouTube also found it on Ebaum's World...)

Even though I know some about YouTube and have a profile myself, I decided to explore one of the library's recommended videos (by "recommended," I mean one of the ones linked in the "20 Things" blog), so I chose the time-lapse drive down the Richmond-Henrico Turnpike. It started playing and something about it reminded me of a guy I know who works with my friend Joel at the VCU/MCV Tompkins-McCaw Library. His name is Andrew, and he's got a cute little Mazda RX-8, which one day had a camcorder taped to its roof. Turns out, he had decided to record trips that he made around town, and was starting to post them on the Internet. Well! I looked to see who had posted the video, and it was none other than Andrew himself! Isn't that funny! What are the odds?!


Anyway, I kind of like YouTube because it offers videos of things that I haven't seen in years--Joel, for instance, just told me about finding clips from "Noozles" on YouTube--or it lets me introduce my friends to new things. In fact, I used YouTube to introduce my coworker Josh to "The Vicar of Dibley," which he found hysterically funny, even though he doesn't typically like British humor. (And I've used it to promote The Wiyos on my Facebook page, and I've shown The Wiyos' videos to my friends to entice them to come to shows with me.)

One of the weaknesses of YouTube, I think, is its search system. If someone hasn't tagged their video very well, or if you don't know the exact search terms, it could take a very long time to track down the video you want. For instance, if I were looking for clips from "Noozles" but I couldn't remember the title of the show or any of the characters' names (which I didn't until Joel reminded me of them), I would probably search for something like "koalas" and "animation" or maybe "koalas" and "tv show," and videos for "Noozles" would never appear. (One "Noozles" video appears in a search for "koalas" and "cartoon.")

I'm not sure I understand the question about features of the site being applied to library web sites. Are we talking about videos? Are we talking about video hosting? Are we talking about the channels and categories? Are we talking about the "community" aspect of YouTube? It would be cool if Pamunkey started some sort of community where patrons and staff could go to share book reviews and things like that--but that's not an idea inspired by YouTube...


And finally, just because I love this dude, I want to share one last favorite video:

Sweet, huh? In case you don't know anything about anything, that's the "Inspector Gadget" theme song. And yeah, that's right, he's beatboxing into his flute.

Reflections on 7 1/2 Habits

For me, the easiest "habit of lifelong learning" is, by far, playing. When I was in high school and taking American Sign Language as my 2-year language, we would often play a head-to-head team game to practice our vocabulary. We would break into two teams and line up in front of our teacher, who stood at the front of the room. She would sign the word or concept to the two people immediately in front of her, and whichever team's player said the answer first got a point. I loved the game.

To indicate that you want to play a game, you sign PLAY + GAME. "Play" is signed by shaking both hands in the "Y" shape at about chest level. "Game" is signed by making thumbs-up signs with both hands and knocking your fists together at the knuckles.

We had a very informal class--and we were only allowed to sign--so whenever our teacher paused from her lesson and looked as though she was trying to think of what to do at that moment, I would wave my hand for her attention and signed PLAY + GAME. Seriously, I did it all the time. In fact, that was how I finally got my "name sign." My name sign is a "D" (for Devon), shaken at chest height--inspired directly by PLAY. Whenever I introduced myself, I'd include the explanation: MY + NAME + "Devon." WHY(t) + ME + LIKE + PLAY + GAME(nod). "Devon" + PLAY. One could say that, as far as learning Sign Language went, "Devon" was synonymous with "play," and so I don't think it's at all surprising that I think the easiest thing of the 7 1/2 habits is remembering to play. I play all the time. For me, things aren't worth doing if they're not fun, and I tend to make fun for myself, even in boring situations.

The second easiest thing for me (I imagine I ought to have a second, since "playing" was really only half a habit...) is #2, accepting responsibility for my own learning. In college, I don't think I ever skipped a class because I just didn't want to go. I missed a couple of classes freshman year when I was sick with H. flu and strep agalactiae, and then I missed one junior year when I had my first case of heartburn (from a medication given to me by the psychos in health services) and literally thought I was dying, and I missed one or two of the classes I was auditing senior year--but I never just skipped for the hell of it. Furthermore, I went back to Bard after the fiasco of my sophomore year!!! I've said it before, and I'll say it again--I hated the students and I hated the administration, but I loved my professors and I loved my classes; I wasn't in school to socialize or to rub elbows with the administratii, I was there to learn, and I couldn't imagine a better place to get an education. I knew what it would take to return, and I'd be damned if I didn't take it into my own hands and do it. I'm very self-reliant as it is (because, after all, you can't really trust anyone but yourself, can you?), and so recognizing that education and learning is my own responsibility just comes naturally to me.

Now, the hardest thing for me among the habits is probably #4, having confidence in myself. With self-reliance comes a great deal of self-doubt. I literally am my own worst critic. When I began high school, I suffered a terrible spell of feelings of inadequacy, and I think I have finally plateaued at an uncomfortable level of sheer adequacy. I no longer feel stupider than others, but I also no longer have the confidence that I once had that I could master anything in enough time. I'm just not a masterer. I'm one of those people who knows a little about a lot, but I know that I'll never be the best at anything. It's kind of discouraging, disheartening. Therefore, it's very difficult for me to have confidence in myself as a competent lifelong learner. Furthermore, I was trying to teach myself Greek a year ago, and I couldn't even figure out how to pronounce "gamma"!!! I asked for the Rosetta Stone language materials for Christmas, but I haven't even opened them yet. (The truth is, I want to make sure that I use them on a computer with enough memory to support the software, and I think my parents have done terrible things to our home desktop, and my laptop is so old that its hard drive is probably going to crash in the next six months, so I don't want to risk installing anything of such gravity as Rosetta Stone on it right now. But still--haven't done it.) The point is, instead of going on to practice the rest of the alphabet, I stopped at gamma because I didn't think I had it in me to learn anything else if I couldn't even get past the third letter of the alphabet.

At any rate, I think I am a lifelong learner. I'm always trying new things out, and even though my memory isn't so great, I love whenever I can pick up a new skill. In considering graduate schools, I've been looking not only at programs that will enhance what I already know but also at programs that will fill in the gaps where there are still things I want to know.

And here's something I guess I'm curious to know... why did Fran refer to the video as "the second thing" and not the third? Also, why do we have to watch these videos, when there's nothing special about the video format that we couldn't have picked up with simple voiceover? I feel awkward trying to watch these "videos."

Muzeum Szymborski

Muzeum

Wisława Szymborska

Są talerze, ale nie ma apetytu.
Są obrączki, ale nie ma wzajemności
od co najmniej trzystu lat.

Jest wachlarz - gdzie rumieńce?
Są miecze - gdzie gniew?
I lutnia ani brzęknie o szarej godzinie.

Z braku wieczności zgromadzono
dziesięć tysięcy starych rzeczy.
Omszały woźny drzemie słodko
zwiesiwszy wąsy nad gablotką.

Metale, glina, piórko ptasie
cichutko tryumfują w czasie.
Chichocze tylko szpilka po śmieszce z Egiptu.

Korona przeczekała głowę.
Przegrała dłoń do rękawicy.
Zwyciężył prawy but nad nogą.

Co do mnie, żyję, proszę wierzyć.
Mój wyścig z suknią nadal trwa.
A jaki ona upór ma!
A jak by ona chciała przeżyć!

There are the plates, but gone is the appetite.
There are the wedding rings, but gone is the love
these three hundred years.

There is the fan - where is the blush behind it?
There are the swords - where is the anger to use them?
And the lute won’t even twang at dusk.

For lack of eternity
ten thousand old things are gathered.
A mossy, old guard dozes sweetly,
his moustache draped over a display case.

Metal, clay, birds’ feathers
quietly triumph in time.
Only an Egyptian girl’s hairpin giggles.

The crown outlasted the head.
The hand lost out to the glove.
The right shoe conquered the foot.

As for me, I still live, you know.
The fight with my dress goes on.
Oh, how stubborn my dress is!

And how it would love to survive me!

trans. Devon E. Mattys

my favorite poem

Dwie Małpy Bruegla

Wisława Szymborska

Tak wygląda mój wielki maturalny sen:
siedzą w oknie dwie małpy przykute łańcuchem,
za oknem fruwa niebo
i kąpie się morze.

Zdaję z historii ludzi.
Jąkam się i brnę.

Małpa, wpatrzona we mnie, ironicznie słucha,
druga niby to drzemie -
a kiedy po pytaniu nastaje milczenie,
podpowiada mi
cichym brząkaniem łańcucha.

the first of, presumably, about 20

First, I feel like I need to make a confession: I hate blogs. I hate blogging, I hate when people call themselves "bloggers," I hate reading blogs, and I even hate the word. It sounds like vomit. But here I am.

I had a livejournal in high school that I kept until my senior year of college. My friends and I used lj to stay in touch, even though we were hundreds (and in one case thousands) of miles apart. And I used it for more personal things, too, and there was some comfort in the relative anonymity of the Internet. We, my friends and I, found ourselves saying things to one another that we wouldn't have dared confess in person. And while it drew us inevitably closer during those early years of separation, it made our later reunions all the more awkward. In the silence of those gatherings, unspoken conversations: Did I really say that to you? It didn't mean anything. No, I never felt that way. I can't believe you still remember when I told you that. Wow, I was a bit dramatic back then, wasn't I? No, of course I thought I meant it. Please, that was two years ago. Are you sure I said that? I was drunk. So many apologies should have been made, but too many things were left unsaid because the sins had been committed online where they were real but unreal at the same time. Can there be absolution for things you don't have proof happened? If I'm not looking you in the face when I tell you something, have I really told you it? The early days of blogging killed some of my relationships. I guess blogging is a symptom of technological progress, progress is a battle against the past, and every war will boast its casualties.

But, as I said, here I am. Not yet sure what I'm doing this for, but here I am. Superficially, of course, this is to fulfill the Pamunkey Library's "Web 2.0: 20 Things" program participation requirements. And now I guess I can check off Numbers One and Two on the list. Congratulations to me.

(Chej, łat gód yz sakryfajsyn jur prynsypls yf jó dont rełord jyrself?)