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Friday, June 26, 2009

King of Pop Passes on...



The iconic King of Pop Michael Jackson passed away yesterday June 25. He was a phenomenal and influential figure in my early years as an ardent listener of pop music. I sang along with all the songs in the mega album Thriller and stayed glued to my television set whenever one of his music videos aired. I would like to express my condolences to the Jackson family. May his music and legacy live on ...

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Three new search engines on the horizon






WolframAlpha - described as a computational knowledge engine. Enter your question or calculation,and WolframAlpha uses its built-in algorithms and a growing collection of data to compute the answer.

Google Squared is an experimental search tool that collects facts from the web and presents them in an organized collection, similar to a spreadsheet. If you search for [roller coasters], Google Squared builds a square with rows for each of several specific roller coasters and columns for corresponding facts, such as image, height and maximum speed.

Microsoft Bing - Bing makes an extra effort to help searchers with some targeted topics such as shopping, travel, local business and information, and health-related research which have been identified as areas in which people wanted more assistance from a search engine in making key decisions.

Saturday, June 6, 2009

ACURIL 2009



I attended the ACURIL (Association of Caribbean University Research and Institutional Libraries) annual Conference which was held June 1-5 in Guadeloupe. This provided an excellent opportunity to network with my colleagues from the English, Dutch, French and Spanish-speaking Caribbean islands.

They were very receptive to my ideas outlined in my presentation Web 2.0, Library 2.0, Librarian 2.0 - Innovative Services for Sustainable Caribbean Libraries.

Click here for the Powerpoint presentation

Click here for the Conference paper which includes examples of Libraries using Web 2.0 technologies and a list of free Web 2.0 resources on the Internet

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Podcast interview with Sarah Long on the book Caribbean Libraries in the 21st Century



My colleague Shamin Renwick and I talked to Sarah Long (Director of the North Suburban Library System) about our book Caribbean Libraries in the 21st Century: Changes, Challenges, and Choices. Sarah's podcast, "Longshots,explores the world of libraries through interviews with key library figures and commentary on issues that matter to libraries.

Click here to listen to the podcast