Second Life Library 2.0

We've Moved

2006-10-12T10:33:00.000-07:00

The Second Life Library blog is now located at our website, InfoIsland.org. We've imported all the entries and comments, and the old blog will no longer be updated.

The new feed address is http://infoisland.org/feed/. You can add it to your feed-reader directly if you visit the site.

Apologies for any inconvenience.

Rik Riel's Skating Tour of Info Island

2006-10-10T22:00:00.000-07:00

Rik Riel of The Click Heard Round the World blog created the greatest video of a skating tour around Info Island. For those of you who have not tried Second Life yet, hopefully this will give you a feel for some of the things there. It is only 3 minutes long, gives a great overview and has some fantastic upbeat music.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTQkzfz5osQ

Great program on Info Island by Jeff Barr, Amazon Technology Evangelist

2006-10-10T19:36:00.000-07:00

Over 50 people attended a great program on Info Island tonight presented by Jeff Barr, Amazon Technology Evangelist. He talked about web services offered by Amazon and their activities in Second Life.

Fantastic art show opening by Bucky Barkley on Info Island

2006-10-08T17:15:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to photographer Bucky Barkley on a fantastic art show on Info Island on Saturday, October 7! Almost 80 people attended the elegant event held from 6-8 pm sl at the Library Gallery. The show was called "Blurred Realities" and featured photographs by Bucky Barkley. This has been the most well-attended event at Info island and was a terrific kickoff for our grand opening week. Bucky's artwork was the first to be displayed on Info Island. For more information on Info Island art shows, contact Abbey Zenith.

New Library Search HUD by Damek Tretiak

2006-10-06T07:05:00.000-07:00

Damek Tretiak in SL and Patrick Ward in RL has created a special search HUD(heads-up display) which can also reside on the user's screen for Second Life Library. Library users can ask a question via Question Point via chat or via email, search world-cat, wikipedia, google, view a map of the library, Amazon, Findarticles.com, and Second Life itself. According to Damek, this is only the beginning. Currently in Second Life, the only ways we are aware of to search the web is through other search mechanisms created by Hugo Dalgleigh and a 411 search engine. When finished searching, the user can minimize the small search screen on their Second Life screen. Users can get one of these free of charge in front of the library in the Second Life Library kiosk. If you have further suggestions for the HUD, contact Damek Tretiak or Lorelei Junot. The search engine is powered by slquery.com.

In real life, Damek is the CTO for a small, international company called TransWorld. He works with several European auto makers managing port operations and other activities related to the United States market. He also has several associated companies such as a marketing group and a new restaurant management group. Damek has been in the software industry for around 10 years now, building everything from real-time inventory management systems to e-commerce sites on the Internet. He joined Second Life mainly because he was curious about what the fuss was about, but quickly realized its potential. His mission soon became to find new ways to be creative with the information we have available in RL, and of course have a little fun! Again, the Search HUD is just the beginning. The library is thankful to Damek for creating such a wonderful tool which should help library users.

PLCMC partners with Alliance Library system to open cultural/creative space in virtual world

2006-10-06T06:57:00.000-07:00

PLCMC partners with Alliance Library system to open cultural/creative space in virtual world

Charlotte, NC - Oct. 6, 2006 - The Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County (PLCMC) and the Alliance Library System are pleased to announce a partnership to collaborate on the "Eye4You Alliance," an island in Teen Second Life that will offer virtual library services to teens.

Teen Second Life is a 3-D, international gathering place on the Internet where teens 13-17 can make friends, play, learn and create. Teens create a digital version of themselves, called an avatar, that they use to travel around the "virtual world," meet new people and participate in a variety of activities.

The goal of "Eye4You Alliance" is to create an interactive and informative space for young adults within the Teen Second Life virtual world and to collaborate with other educators who serve youth and are already present in Teen Second Life and in real life.

"At a time when many libraries are offering collaborative spaces through social tools, a 3-D immersive environment is the next logical step to libraries remaining relevant to teenagers," said Helene Blowers, director of Information Technology at PLCMC. "This project is an opportunity to engage teens in services and activities that will excite them in a place they already are."

The project hopes to build teen developmental assets, encourage collaboration and promote active learning that will prepare teens for future learning. PLCMC and Alliance Library System leaders believe this environment has significant learning potential by being a Web interface that can challenge teen users to figure things out for themselves.

"We see this as an important service our libraries can collaborate on, and we are proud to team up with the library in Charlotte," said Kitty Pope, executive director of the Alliance Library System in Peoria, Ill. "We are excited to be offering new outreach programs, events and services to teens who might not otherwise come to the library."

Both library systems will provide the leadership and expertise in extending their outstanding real-life programs and services to the virtual world.

Founded in 1903 as a Carnegie Free Library, PLCMC has become one of the premiere libraries in the country with 24 locations, 1.6 million volumes, and 28,000 videos, DVDs and CDs. The library sponsors a variety of community-based programs - from computer- and Internet-education workshops to the award-winning Novello Festival of Reading, a celebration that accentuates the fun of reading and learning. As a public library, we are dedicated to our mission of expanding minds, empowering individuals and enriching our community.

Alliance Library System is one of the most innovative regional library systems in North America and is the lead agency on the Second Life Library project on Info Island in the adult version of Second Life. It is located in East Peoria, Illinois with 253 library members of all types. Alliance offers continuing education, consulting, resource sharing, and delivery service to members

For more information, contact Teen Second Life Project
Leaders Matt Gullett, mgullett@plcmc.org or Kelly Czarnecki,
kczarnecki@plcmc.org

Upcoming Programs for Info island and NMC Library

2006-10-05T14:46:00.000-07:00

*On Tuesday, October 10, Jeff Barr (Jeff Batra in Second Life), Web Services Evangelist at Amazon.com, will discuss the
full line of Amazon's web services from a technical and business
perspective on Tuesday October 11 at 5 pm s. The presentation will
include a review of developer activity within Second Life and there
will be ample time for discussion and Q&A. Open air auditorium, Info island, 141,
81, 33

NMC library programs
i *On Wednesday,October 11 at 5 pm sl, Henry VIII will visit the NMC library to talk about his life and how biographers have villified him. Come and heckle Henry during his one hour program.

*On Monday, October 16 at 7 pm SLT/PST, Lorelei Junot and Maxito Ricardo will host an informal discussion in the NMC library on “Digital Media and how it is Affecting Libraries.” There are now downloadable audio books, ebooks, and video. Libraries are stretching their budgets on new media to keep students engaged. Lorelei and Maxito will discuss current trends and open up the topic for discussion. The program will last approximately one hour and will be held at the NMC library.

*On Saturday October 21 at 12 noon sl, Troy McLuham, from the International Space and Flight Museum will present a program on “Life on Mars?” at the NMC library which begins with a 14-slide presentation, including prepared notes (chat text). He encourages interruptions for questions, comments, and discussion… that’s what makes it fun and interesting! It’s a historical overview of humanity’s knowledge about life existing on Mars, now or in the past. he usually allow san hour for it… the exact duration depends on the size of the audience and how much discussion arises. Come and catch a surprise!

Blog moving to http://www.infoisland.org

2006-10-04T09:44:00.000-07:00

As of October 11, this blog is moving to the Info Island website at http://www.infoisland.org. (The new RSS feed is at http://infoisland.org/feed/) Check it out. Between now and then posts will be made at both sites.

You're Invited! Grand Opening of Second Life Library/Info Island

2006-10-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

Alliance Library System and Second Life Library/Info Island Pleased to Announce Official Opening

The Alliance Library System and the Second Life Library/Info Island collaborative group of librarians are pleased to announce the grand opening and a host of activities planned for Second Life residents scheduled October 12-14, 2006. All events will be held in Second Life and are free to residents.

“We have been working on this project with partners from around the world for six months,” stated Kitty Pope, Executive Director of the Alliance Library System. “We are grateful to all the librarians and others who have put in huge amounts of time to make this happen and we are pleased with the reception the library has received in Second Life.”

Gonzo Mandelbrot, Coordinator of Grand Opening Activities said, “We have a variety of activities, events and tours that people can pick and choose from or they may attend everything. The goal is to highlight all the different aspects of the library and Info Island and all that is available there.”

A detailed schedule of events is provided below. If attendees have questions about specific locations, come to Info Island. We will have tour guides there who can show people to the event location.

Thursday, October 12 – Virtual Worlds and Education: The Cutting Edge – 4 pm sl – 6 pm sl – Speakers: Pathfinder Linden, Kitty Paul, Puglet Dancer, Professor Beliveau, Lorelei Junot and Maxito Ricardo – Puglet Dancer and Kitty Paul will cut the ribbon to begin grand opening ceremonies at Info Island open air auditorium (Info Island 143, 82, 34)
Friday, October 13 - Virtual Worlds and Alternate Realities – Where Do Libraries Fit In? – 7:30 a.m. sl – 1:30 pm. sl – A variety of wonderful speakers with keynote by Pathfinder Linden - Info Island open air auditorium(Info Island 143, 82, 34)
Friday, October 13 – 5:00-6:00 p.m. sl – Scary Movies at Second Life Pantheon Picture House (Info Island II, 98,71,24)
6:00-8:00 p.m. sl – Costume Ball at Info Island Mystery Manor – prizes for best costumes! (Info Island, 214, 163,33)
Saturday October 14 – 8:00 a.m. sl – Opening of Caledon Branch – 19th century library (Caledon Tamrannoch (211,31,22)
9:30 a.m. sl – Grand Opening of Second Life Library Medical Library – special events (Info Island 165, 204, 33) – Bioterrorism demonstration
Speakers: Moriz Gupta and Sojourner Truth
12:00 p.m. sl – Second Ribbon Cutting and special speaker – Info island Open Air Auditorium (Info Island 143, 82, 34) – Katt Kongo, editor, Metaverse Messenger
3:00 p.m. sl – Talis SciFi & Fantasy Portal Opening – special events (Info Island 29, 62, 33)
5:00 – 8:00 p.m. sl – TX950 Beach party and celebration – dancing refreshments, fun (Info Island 85, 33, 23)
Throughout the day – Tours, scavenger hunts, information kiosks – come and have fun!

For further information, please contact Gonzo Mandelbrot or Lorelei Junot.

Book Making

2006-10-02T13:49:00.000-07:00

Today I taught the first class I wrote specifically for the Second Life Library. It met with great success, as the participants learned both about prim editing but also the features of notecards. I am glad that the class went well, and none of the students became lost, all though I did at times :). I will repeat this class again, and develop new ones. In the mean time we all prepare for the great events happening in October. I hope to see you at the library.

Reuters health trial at medical library

2006-10-01T19:37:00.000-07:00

The Second Life Medical Library now offers a three months trial access to Reuters Health News Services. Anybody with an SL account can get access! Details are available at the Reuters health display in the SL Medical Library and at the New Consumer Health Library

Reuters Health offers Health E-line, health related news for the general public interested in wellness, healthcare and the latest treatments for medical conditions. Health eLine offers accurate, readable and informative news reports every day. Reuters Health eLine is available in English, Spanish and Portuguese.

Reuters Medical News for health professionals
With content selected for relevance and newsworthiness, the daily Medical News is a convenient way for physicians, researchers and other medical professionals to stay informed of developments in their field. This service is available in English and Spanish.

Reuters Health Industry Briefing
Offering up-to-the-minute news on the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, Industry Briefing delivers a fast, accurate business information service for the healthcare community.

Come and have a look! Things are moving faster and faster. More breaking news soon about the Second Life Medical Library

Info Island This week: Halloween Haven of Horror to Science Center

2006-09-29T20:10:00.000-07:00

The Library Gallery opens with "Blurred Realities" October 7th!

A new gallery opens on Info Island on October 7th! The
initial show is entitled "Blurred Realities", which explores
the zoom blur photography technique of Bucky Barkley. Bucky
explains: "A Zoom Blur is a bit like an impressionistic painting,
done completely in-camera in a half second. It's also a wonderful
way to wear out a lens!". Come see the photos, the 3 story space,
see old friends, and make new ones. Opening event is on
Saturday, October 7th - 6-8 pm SL time. The gallery is located
at Info Island (24, 125, 33).

A meeting for planning the new Science Center headed up by Hayduke Ebisu was held on Info Island II Thursday night and attended by 8 people. If you would like to participate and join the Science Center group, contact Hayduke Ebisu.

Info Island I will be decorating the libraries for Halloween during the next few weeks. One of the exhibits is Halloween Haven of Horror: Stephen Kind Reads Here." If you are looking for good scary horror books, this is the place to go - to our mausoleum of good scary reads.

Stop by Info island to play a game of giant checkers created by Librarian Eiseldora Reisman.

Chris Reitveld has build a Victorian bookshop which is on Info Island II for Halloween and Christmas.

Activities this week at Info island - "the Early Years of Elizabeth I"

2006-09-25T00:27:00.000-07:00

Info Island/Second Life Library is pleased to be working in collaboration with the New Media Consortium on library services and resources for their beautiful library. Watch this column and the NMC Campus Observer for updates. The libraries will work together to provide a variety of services, events, training and resources for students and residents of Second Life.

Approximately 20 people attended an excellent program given by author Greyfox Book (Jon Klements in real life) about his writings on superheroes.

"The Early Years of Elizabeth I" will be presented at the Second Life Library open air auditorium on Wednesday September 27 at 5 pm sl. The young Elizabeth I herself will visit Info Island to share the story of her early years before taking the throne of England at age 25, Elizabeth I is thought to be one of the greatest monarchs of English history. Come and hear her story and ask her questions.

Reference librarians on Info island are staffing the welcome/reference desk several hours per day to help visitors and answer reference questions. Terminals have benn placed around the island so visitors can ask questions via email or text chat with a librarian via Question Point software. Soon, we hope to place these in other educational locations. If you have informational questions, visit Info island for help from librarians.

There is a new exhibits building built by Shadow Fugazi on Info Island II. It currently displays the Library of Congress Declaration of Independence and will feature new displays from Library of Congress and other places every few months.

Info Island II has a new movie theater and events area called the SL Pantheon Picture House. The building was constructed by Nubian Bliss. Old movies and other types of entertainment will be offered here. Watch the Second Life events calendar! The building was purchased with funds from the second prize in the Talis Library Mashup contest.

Hayduke Ebisu is Founder of a Science Center which is being built on Info Island II. If you are interested in science, and would like to become involved, please contact Hayduke Ebisu.

Experience the magic and mystery of Xibalba inside and outside. Usu Ventura has just finished building the first stage of Xibalba, an evocation of the Maya Otherworld. It features a Second Life version of
the Temple of the Inscriptions in Palenque, Mexico. Inside the temple
is a gallery of Maya art and architecture. Donations will benefit the
Hospitalito in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala, which is rebuilding after
a mudslide destroyed it in 2005. You can visit at Info island II
41,217, 24. For more information, contact Usu Ventura.

October is Charles Dickens month at the Caledon branch library. On October 19, there will be a discussion of Dicken's novel "Hard Times" and on Halloween, Dickens' ghost stores will be shared. For more information on the Caledon branch, contact JJ Drinkwater, Head of the Caledon branch.

The grand opening for the Alliance Second Life Library/Info Island is scheduled for October 13 and 14. On Friday, the 13th, Mystery Manor will show horror films at the new theater and host a costume ball with prizes for the best costumes. On October 14, a variety of fun activities and tours of the library will be available. More details will be provided closer to that time. Put the date on your calendars!

If you have ideas for programs, training , or materials you would like to see offered by Second Life Library, please contact Lorelei Junot or Abbey Zenith. If you have a class or a group that would like a tour, do not hesitate to contact us.

This week at Info island: a glimpse of Info Island II

2006-09-24T03:21:00.000-07:00

Author Greyfox Book, Jon Klements in real life, gave a program on his writing on superheroes at the Second Life Library. Approximately 25 people attended.

Reference librarians on Info island are staffing the welcome/reference desk several hours per day to help visitors and answer reference questions. Terminals like these have benn placed around the island so visitors can also ask questions via email or text chat with a librarian via Question Point software. Soon, we hope to place these in other educational locations.

This is new new exhibits building built by Shadow Fugazi on Info Island II. It currently displays the Library of Congress Declaration of Independence and will feature new displays from Library of Congress and other places every few months.

This is the new SL Pantheon Picture House built with funds from Talis Mashing the Library Compeititon prize money. This theater, managed by Thea Donovan will regularly show old time movies and will host other events too. This beautiful building was built by Nubian Bliss. Opening soon. Watch the SL events calendar for events coming up. The last picture is an interior of the lobby of the theater decorated by Abbey Zenith.

Come to the exquisite pyramid of XIBALBA. Drop inside and see the treasures awaiting you built by Usu Venura.

What else is coming for Info Island II?

We are currently working on a Science Center, headed by Hayduke Ebisu. He has assembled a great team of people to bring science information to Second Life.

Our grand opening is October 13-14; more information and a schedule out this week on that. It will be fun.

We hope to have some announcements of some other exciting developments we are working on too to improve library services. If you want to become involved, please contact me- lbell927@gmail.com.

MAYA Avatars in the Underworld - XIBALBA

2006-09-17T19:21:00.000-07:00

MAYA AVATARS IN THE UNDERWORLD – XIBALBA

First SL Maya Museum opens on Info Island II

Usu Ventura has just finished building the first stage of Xibalba, an
evocation of the Maya Otherworld. It features a Second Life version of
the Temple of the Inscriptions in Palenque, Mexico. Inside the temple
is a gallery of Maya art and architecture. Donations will benefit the
Hospitalito in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala, which is rebuilding after
a mudslide destroyed it in 2005. You can visit at Info island II
41,217, 24

"After years of visiting the Maya region and working with
archaeologists, I wanted to convey some of the mystery and beauty of
the ancient Maya civilization" Usu says. "And the themes in the
artwork, showing avatars of mythic characters battling and tricking
the gods of the Otherworld, certainly have resonance here in Second
Life."

The exhibit will also offer information on the living Maya, who
maintain their traditional culture, art, and languages in Mexico,
Guatemala, Belize, and Honduras. In addition it will support a
campaign to protect the Usumacinta River, the watershed at the heart
of the Maya civilization, from a planned hydroelectric dam.

In real life, Usu (Dave Pentecost) is a freelance TV and web video
producer, and technical director of the Lower Eastside Girls Club, a
non-profit in New York City. This summer, with help from Techsoup, he
started using Second Life in science, math, and design programs with
the girls. Usu quickly found an ally in Rain Noonan, of Second Life
Library and Info Island II. Rain also encouraged him to begin
developing the Maya museum.

"We are very excited to have this wonderful exhibit on Info Island
II," said Rain Noonan of the Second Life Library.

Usu notes that the museum is a collaboration with FAMSI, the
Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc.
(famsi.org). FAMSI supports archaeological research and maintains a
large archive of study materials. In particular, Xibalba's exhibits
will feature the photography of Justin Kerr, and the drawings of Linda
Schele, who sparked a revolution in Maya studies – the breaking of the
Maya code.

"Palenque was ground zero for the deciphering of the Maya glyphs" says
Usu. "I'd like to show both the work done by scholars over the last 30
years and by the Maya over 1000 years ago. The immersive environment
of SL should inspire people to visit the Maya sites in real life."

The exhibit is open now but is still evolving. Future plans include
scuba diving from dugout canoes in the nearby lake, to retrieve
artifacts for the museum.

The real launch will happen on Day of the Dead, November 1, 2006, with
the opening of the first show, "Maya Avatars in the Otherworld."

IM Usu Ventura for more information.

Author Jon Klement to Speak on Superhero Writings

Author Greyfox Book (Jon Klement) in real life will present a program
at the Info island open auditorium at 6 pm sl on Thursday September
21.
"Rush and the Grey Fox" is a series of super-hero novels published by Coscom
Entertainment. Volume One was released in November 2005 and Volume Two is
scheduled to release January 2007. Come and meet the author. Jon Klement is a
high school science educator and is passionately interested in encouraging
young people to read and reach their potential as well as crafting highly
entertaining super-hero/sci-fi stories for ALL ages.
For more information about Rush and the Grey Fox, visit
http://www.rushandthegreyfox.com

Book Discussion on Wednesday
Join the Second Life Library book discussion group on Wednesday at 7
pm sl in the main meeting room of the library for a discussion of
"Rusty Nail" lead by Maxito Ricardo.

Rock-A-Hula at Library Beach Club on Friday
Who said Elvis was dead? Join us at the TX950 Library Beach Club from
6-8 pm sl for fun in the surf and sand, dancing, music, and Elvis of
course. Librarians are a fun bunch and we want to meet you. (Info
Island 94, 49,22)

Info Island Orientation
There will be a tour of Info Island on Thursday September 21 at 5 pm
sl for 45 minutes.

For more information please contact Lorelei Junot.

Info island this week

2006-09-17T08:48:00.000-07:00

Monday 9/18 at 9 a.m. sl - Info Island orientation - meet at main library
Wed. 9/20 at 9 pm. sl - Book discussion of Rusty Nail at main library meeting room
Thursday 9/21 at 8 pm sl - Author Greyfox Book (Jon Clements in rl) at open air auditorium
Friday 9/22 at 8 pm sl - Rock a Hula Beach party at TX950 Beach Club - Prizes for best costumes
Sunday 9/24 at 7 pm sl - Info Island Orientation meets at main library
Sunday 9/24 at 8 pm sl - All staff meeting at main library meeting room

September 11 program draws 30 people

2006-09-12T13:21:00.000-07:00

The September 11 commemorative program drew about 30 people who shared their experiences of that day and how it affected their lives. Everyone held candles and people continued to talk after the program ended. Several added their artwork to the September 11 display on Info Island. This display will be available into mid-October if you have not had a chance to see it.

Talis announces winners of International Mashing the Library Up 2006: Alliance Second Life Library Project Wins Second Place!

2006-09-11T02:01:00.000-07:00

This information taken from theTalis website:

Talis is delighted to announce the winners of the first competition intended to openly encourage innovation in the display, use, and reuse of data from and about libraries - Mashing Up The Library 2006.

First Prize

The First prize of £1,000 was awarded to John Blyberg of Ann Arbor District Library in Ann Arbor, MI. His entry, Go-Go-Google-Gadget, shows how simply library information can be integrated into the personalised home page offered by Google, and is described by competition sponsor and member of the judging panel, Talis’ Paul Miller, as “an excellent example of taking information previously locked inside the library catalogue and making it available to patrons in other contexts where they may spend more time than they do in their catalogue.” Available information includes new and the most popular material in the library, and patron-specific information on checked-out and requested items. ‘Superpatron’ Ed Vielmetti applauded the simplicity of this entry, remarking in a clear invitation for others to follow John’s lead that “the visible source code is very tiny and easily hackable.” Vanderbilt University’s Marshall Breeding concluded, “I like this entry’s spirit of opening up information in the library system and putting it under the control of the user."

In recognition of the current exchange rate, the sum of $2,000 has been paid to John.

Second Prize

The Second prize of £500 was awarded to the Alliance Library System in East Peoria, IL, and their global partners in the Second Life Library. Their entry, the Alliance Second Life Library 2.0, was described by Talis’ Miller as “both a testament to international co-operation amongst libraries and a compelling demonstration of the ways in which traditional library functions can be extended into cyberspace, reaching new audiences in ways exciting and relevant to them as they live their lives.”

In recognition of the current exchange rate, the sum of $1,000 has been paid to the Alliance Library System, and they intend to use the funds to extend their work within Second Life.

For all those users of libraries who have ever wished they could bring information from their library to life outside the virtual walls of its web site, this competition presented an ideal opportunity to see some of what the future might hold.

From Jon Udell's early work with LibraryLookup to the current fashion for Greasemonkey plug-ins and the more structured exposure of Web Services by Talis, Amazon, Google and others, there are significant advances being made in the ways in which libraries offer their services to the outside world. At least as important is the revolution occurring outside the library, as those beyond the walls take and manipulate library data on their own.

Modern approaches to thinking about provision of library data and services online create opportunities for numerous applications beyond the traditionally defined library management system. By adhering to standards from the wider Web community, by considering the library system as an interlocking set of functional components rather than a monolithic black box, and by taking a bold new approach to defining the ways in which information from and about libraries are ‘owned’ and exposed to others, we make it straightforward for information from the library to find its way to other places online.

Rather than being locked inside the library system, your data can add value to the experience of your users wherever they are, whether it’s Google, Amazon, the institutional portal, or one of the social networking sites such as MySpace or Facebook. By unlocking data and the services that make use of it, the possibilities are literally endless, and it is here that efforts such as those around the Talis Library Platform become important.

One very early example of combining library data with other sources in order to add value to both is the whole area of the ‘Mashup’. Mashups are not only found in the library world, but are proving increasingly prevalent in association with a whole host of Web 2.0 companies and ideas. Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, defines a Mashup as;

“... a website or web application that uses content from more than one source to create a completely new service.”

This competition was for anyone in the community that had harbored a yearning to see information from or about libraries put to best use and displayed to best effect alongside information or services from other sources. The Mashing Up The Library competition was open to all, and carried a first prize of £1,000 for the best entry.

This competition is intended to celebrate and showcase all that is best in these efforts to push library information out to existing audiences in new ways, or to reach totally new audiences with compelling and captivating applications. The 2006 competition marks a beginning, and we look forward to watching the sector grow in coming years.

Announcement of the Mashing Up The Library competition in June generated great enthusiasm amongst diverse groups across the world. Tim Spalding of LibraryThing commented “LibraryThing draws on libraries for its data, so I'm well aware how rich this is, and how relatively unexploited by programmers in general. I'm looking forward to seeing what creative mashers do”.

Helene Blowers, Public Service Technology Director, Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County Charlotte, North Carolina commented, “I think it's exciting to see a major library automation company like Talis take the lead in encouraging and rewarding library innovation from the user community. What really sets this competition apart in my mind is that Talis has defined the user community as anybody, not just their customer base. And to raise the innovation bar even higher, potential developers or contest participants don't even have to use or interface with Talis' products to create an entry. That speaks volumes in my book! I'm looking forward to see the entries - and winner too! Thanks again for taking the lead here. It truly is exciting”.

Darlene Fichter, Data Library Co-ordinator for the University of Saskatchewan encouraged, “Love books? Love libraries? Love programming? Here's your chance to dive in and make a mashup with library stuff. It's sure to kick start the creation of several mashups using library data which will benefit everyone”.

At Talis, we recently announced the first set of our Talis Platform Web Services, and we fully expect to see growing awareness of their capabilities leading to a veritable explosion in the ways in which library information can be ‘mashed up’, and a significant lowering of the current barriers to participation and sharing by ordinary libraries around the world. This year’s competition marks a beginning. Improved tools, improved access to data from and about libraries, and increased awareness mean that libraries are in for an exciting and challenging journey.

What’s Next?

The Mashing Up The Library competition marks an important step forward in encouraging open and inclusive innovation from libraries around the world, regardless of their consortial memberships or vendor allegiance. As we move forward and traditional library groupings become less appropriate and sustainable in today’s rapidly changing environment, it becomes increasingly important to encourage open approaches such as these. Talis is committed to helping libraries to reach out to existing and new markets for their capabilities, and the ongoing support of this competition is one aspect of that strategy.

Rather than re-run the same competition again next year, we wish to encourage innovative work on an ongoing basis. As such, the competition web site reopens today, and will accept new entries. We will periodically assemble a team of judges to select the best submissions since the last time entries were judged. In addition, we will seek to reward particularly innovative or compelling examples on an ad hoc basis, outside the normal cycle of judging.

We welcome approaches from library systems vendors and other interested parties willing and able to join us in celebrating and rewarding all that is best in innovating around the display, delivery and use of library information, today and into the future.

The Entries

A total of eighteen entries were received for the competition, spanning everything from very simple enhancements to existing library functions right through to a collaborative effort to provide library services inside the Second Life 3D online digital world. Entries came in from public and academic libraries, as well as from the commercial sector. As is the trend with Mashups more generally, map-based Mashups proved common.

All eighteen entries are described in detail at www.talis.com/tdn/forum/84, and comprise;

Alliance Second Life Library 2.0, submitted by the Alliance Library System in East Peoria, Illinois, on behalf of the gobal staff of the Second Life Library;
Amazon2OU Library Pivot Browsing, submitted by Tony Hirst of the Open University;
BiblioPage.com, submitted by Aaron Huber of the Broward County Library System in Broward County, Florida;
Book Cover Browser, submitted by Mike Cunningham of Cambridge Libraries in Cambridge, Ontario, Canada;
Book Trackr, submitted by Jim Robertson of the New Jersey Institute of Technology;
Consuming Library New Book Feeds, submitted by Tony Hirst of the Open University;
Danish contribution, submitted by Jens Hofman Hansen of the State and University Library, Aarhus, Denmark, on behalf of the summa development team;
Feed Based Library Interface, submitted by Tony Hirst of the Open University;
Go-Go-Google-Gadget, submitted by John F. Blyberg of the Ann Arbor District Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan;
Lib 2.0 library toolbar, submitted by Casey Durfee of the Seattle Public Library, Washington;
The Library Catalogue in Google Desktop, submitted by Art Rhyno of the University of Windsor and Ross Singer of Georgia Tech Library;
LibMap, submitted by Tim Hodson of Herefordshire Libraries;
Library Map Mashup, submitted by Michael McDonnell on behalf of ‘the Bruncherati’, members of a library interest group in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada;
Library Patrons Who Borrow Create, submitted by Michael L. Johnson;
Lillian - A Virtual Librarian, submitted by David Burden of DADEN Ltd in Birmingham, UK;
Maps of Place of Publication, submitted by ‘MMcM’;
OU Traveller, submitted by Tony Hirst of the Open University;
NJIT catalog, submitted by Jim Robertson of the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

The Judging Panel

For this first competition, we assembled a team of judges who offered many valuable insights during the judging process. These judges were:

Jeff Barr, Web Services Evangelist for Amazon.com;
Marshall Breeding, Director for Innovative Technologies & Research at Vanderbilt University;
Jenny Levine, well established library blogger as The Shifted Librarian and newly of the American Library Association (ALA);
Paul Miller, Talis;
Andrew Pace, Head of Information Technology at North Carolina State University Libraries;
Chris Pirillo, Lockergnome;
Gary Price, Director of Online Information Resources at Ask.com and Publisher of ResourceShelf.com;
Tim Spalding, founder of LibraryThing;
Jon Udell, InfoWorld;
Ed Vielmetti, Superpatron.com.
We certainly owe all of them our thanks for their hard work throughout the competition.

The TDN

The competition Web site is hosted as part of the TDN; a Talis-supported initiative to support those developing and working with library systems. Like the competition, the TDN is open to anyone, anywhere, regardless of the library system with which they work.

Areas of the TDN support discussion between developers, the sharing of scripts and knowledge, and the provision of access to web services from Talis and others.

Membership of the TDN is free of charge, and more information is available from the TDN site.

Supporting Images

An archive file containing supporting imagery is available for download. This archive comprises;

Portrait of John F. Blyberg of Ann Arbor District Library (AADL), winner of the competition’s first prize;
An image, by John Blyberg, of his winning entry. This image was taken from Flickr, where other versions are also available at www.flickr.com/photos/jblyberg/218459782/ ;
A logo for the Second Life Library 2.0, winner of the competition’s second prize;
A screenshot from Second Life (www.secondlife.com/) depicting the outside of the Second Life Library 2.0, and the ‘avatars’ of Talis’ Paul Miller and library technology consultant, Phil Bradley;
Talis logo;
Mashing up the Library competition logo;
Portrait of Dr Paul Miller of Talis, competition organiser and sponsor, and member of the judging panel.

Talis

Talis is an established provider of library and information management software to public and academic libraries and has a long history as a technology innovator, a pioneer for open standards, and as a partner for its customers. Working closely with world standards bodies such as World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, and NISO, ongoing research activities include Web Services, Services Oriented Architectures, RDF based metadata and RSS.

Talis has recently announced a new Talis Library Platform which is an open, extensible, Web 2.0 based software platform which will be the foundation upon which next generation applications will be developed. The Talis Platform incorporates semantic content management, a global collections directory, with a Service Oriented Architecture that enables low cost institutional integration.

Through the Talis Developer Network, Talis welcomes developers to join its development community and build the next generation of applications and services on a shared platform.

For more information, visit www.talis.com, where you can find detailed information, read our blogs, join our discussion forums, and listen to our industry podcasts.

Further Details

For further details, please contact:

Ceri McCall, Senior Manager, Corporate Marketing. ceri.mccall@talis.com, +44 (0)870 400 5029

Paul Miller, Technology Evangelist; paul.miller@talis.com, +44 (0)776 974 0083

New SciFi Fantasy Center; Science Center; more orientations

2006-09-10T19:42:00.000-07:00

Info Island now has a new scifi/fantasy center built by Vincent Parvenu. It has three floors and will offer a variety of information, exhibits and programs on science fiction and fantasy literature. Leaders on this project are Michael Maitland and Floria Hand.

Hayduke Ebisu is beginning a Science Center on Info Island II. He is looking for people who would like to get involved in the Science Center to make science easier to understand and to create displays and exhibits on the history of science. Contact Hayduke Ebisu if this interests you.

Info Island will offer two orientations this week, one on Tuesday, September 12 a 4 pm sl and one on Thursday September 14 at 4 pm sl. Everyone is welcome. Contact Abbey Zenith or Lorelei Junot for a tour for your group.

Tour for CMSU Writing Students; Library Beach Club

2006-09-10T05:05:00.000-07:00

Maxito Ricardo and Lorelei Juno gave tours of Info Island and the CMSU resource center to approximately 20 students in Dr. Bryan Carter's writing class on Friday. Working with CMSU, Second Life Library will provide library support and assistance to these students whose class meets in Second Life.

Friday night, Second Life Library sponsored a Good-Bye to Summer party at the new beach club to help new librarians and educators get to meet one another. Approximately 25-30 people attended. A fun time was had by all. The library will continue to sponsor social events for librarians, educators, and residents.

Upcoming Info Island Orientations for Librarians and Others

2006-09-07T08:55:00.000-07:00

We continue to get new librarians exploring the island, so welcome. I
have set up some Info Island orientation times open to librarians and
others. These are in the immediate future and I will continue to set
them up. If others would like to do some, let me know. We will meet in
front of the library and these last about one hour.
Friday, 9/8 at 8 a.m sl, 10 a.m central, 11 a.m. eastern
Sunday, 9/10 at 4 pm sl, 6 pm central, 7 pm eastern
Sunday, 9/10 at 5 pm sl, 7 pm central, 8 pm eastern

September 11 - Libraries Remember Display and Program

2006-09-05T10:24:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos of the September 11 - Libraries Remember display on Info Island. Stop by to see a replica of the twin towers, a photo montage, and books you can read about what happened that day. Brackish Ludwig designed and built the towers and Lorelei Junot designed the photo montage. Join us on Info Island in the main library meeting room on Monday September 11 at 6 pm sl for an open discussion for attendees to share what happened to them that day and how it affected their lives, and the lives of everyone around the world.

Brack Ludwig, Designer and Bulder of Twin Towers

September11 - Libraries Remember

2006-09-03T22:54:00.000-07:00

The Second Life Library will honor September 11 through a national library program which has existed for four years started by the Bensenville Public Library - September 11 - Libraries Remember. There may be nothing more antithetical to terrorism, hatred, bigotry, and fanaticism than the American Public Library. Libraries all over the world are commemorating September 11 by staying open 24 hours and sponsoring special programs. To pay tribute to September 11, the library will have a display designed by Brackish Ludwig with a photo montage and replicas of the twin towers before and after September 11, 2001. The display will be open later this week. Most people can remember what they were doing on Pearl Harbor Day and on September 11, 2001. On Monday night, September 11, at 6 pm sl, the library will have a program where anyone who wishes to come can share their memories of September 11 and how it has affected life around the world. The program will be open mic and everyone is welcome to share.

The Second Life Library on Info Island is pleased to welcome a new non-profit partner: The Lower Eastside Girls Club. The Lower Eastside Girls Club of New York has built a kiosk on Info Island to give SL residents a look at the programs and the future ofthe club. In the fall of 2006 they will begin establishing a presence
on the Teen Grid and will be using Second Life in their science, math
and technology programs. They also plan to extend their current RL
fashion and design classes into Second Life, designing and selling
clothes for SL residents.

The Girls Club was founded ten years ago to address the lack of girls
clubs in the East Village of New York. That neighborhood was the only
place in the country where Boys Clubs of America did not merge with
Girls Clubs, choosing to maintain boys only facilities. Several
mothers decided to establish a girls club, and worked toward building
a full facility and community center on Avenue D, across from the
housing projects. In spring of 2007 they will break ground on their
building, with help from public and private donations.

Their programs include digital photography, video, blogging and
podcasting; farmers market, nutrition and environmental projects;
entrepreneurship training and commercial bakery; and social activism.
A book of photographs documenting an exchange with Maya women
photographers of Chiapas, Mexico, was published in the spring of 2006.
The kiosk in Second Life will present a featured video or animation
produced by the girls, as well as photos and Girls Club links on a
notecard. The small kiosk will be expanded in the next few months to
show more work by girls.

With help from Info Island and Teen Island, the Girls Club will create
homes in both real life and Second Life. Please stop by the kiosk at
Info Island (19, 158, 33) for more information, or IM LESGC technology
director Usu Ventura in-world.

On Friday, September 8, library staff will give Bryan Mnemonic's English class from Central Missouri State University a tour of Info Island and resources available. If you would like a tour for your class or group, please contact Lorelei Junot or Abbey Zenith.

Aura Lily and Ancient Egypt in Second Life

2006-09-03T12:12:00.000-07:00

Aura Lily has built a wonderful display on Info Island and has built an
immersive environment of Egyptian artifacts in Second Life. On Monday,
September 4 at 8 pm sl time the libary will sponsor a program beginning
at her exhibit on Info Island and progressing to a tour of her
wonderful work. as an example of an immersive environment experience. We will
meet at the main library, visit her exhibit on Info Island and then
tour her place.

Program on Academic Library Collaboration in Second Life

2006-09-02T06:30:00.000-07:00

Collaboration Opportunities for Academic Libraries in Second Life

Join Lori Bell, Tom Peters, and other librarians for a roundtable discussion of the opportunities for worthwhile collaboration among academic libraries in Second Life, a 3-dimensional virtual reality environment.

This fall over 50 institutions of higher education are offering (or preparing to offer) courses in Second Life. Learn what libraries of all types involved in the Alliance Second Life Library 2.0 project are doing to meet the teaching, learning and research needs of these courses being held in Second Life. Explore how academic libraries can collaborate while still providing access to local resources and services, and thus avoid re-inventing the wheel. Second Life Library is also collaborating with tne New Media Consortium (NMC) to provide library services in Second Life.

Tuesday, September 19, 2006 beginning at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, 1:00 Central, Noon Mountain, 11:00 a.m. Pacific, and 6:00 p.m. GMT

Sponsor: Alliance Library System.
Location: OPAL Auditorium.

URL to enter the online meeting room:

http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=67955673&p=0

Libary of Congress American Memory Exhibit at Second Life Library Parvenu Towers; Anne Boleyn-Beloved and Beheaded

2006-08-26T05:42:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the Second Life Library's American Memory Exhibit at Info Island Parvenu Towers, second floor. Please visit and enjoy audio, documents, and graphics of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This display will be up through the end of September and was compiled by Second Life Librarian Shadow Fugazi.

The Library of Congress' American Memory division provides free and
open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound
recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps and sheet music that
document the American experience. It is a digital record of American
History and creativity. These materials, from the collections of the
Library of Congress and other institutions, chronicle historic events,
people, places and ideas that continue to shape America, serving the
public as a resource for education and lifelong learning.

Our exhibit focuses on documents from the Continental Congress and the
Constitutional Convention, highlighting the Declaration of
Independence.

The Library of Congress' Continental Congress and Constitutional
Convention Broadside Collection contains 277 documents relating to the
work of Congress and the drafting and ratification of the
Constitution. Items include extracts of the journals of Congress,
resolutions, proclamations, committee reports, treaties, and early
printed versions of the United States Constitution and the Declaration
of Independence.

This exhibit displays only a few items from the collection. We have
made available full texts to documents such as the Declaration of
Independence, a 12-part timeline of "America During the Age of
Revolution, 1964-1789", as well as links to audio materials that can
be downloaded and listened to at the user's leisure.

We hope that you enjoy this exhibit. To visit the American Memory web
site, go to http://memory.loc.gov/ammem

Activities this week
Sunday, August 27, 5 pm sl - Info island orientation for new librarians - meet at main library
Sunday, August 28, 6 pm sl - Library staff meeting
Tuesday, August 30, 6 pm sl - SL VR practice session with Maxito Ricardo
If you need to practice chat this week contact Maxito or Lorelei Junot. Our chat form should be up this weekend.
Thursday, August 31, 5 pm sl - "Anne Boleyn: Beloved and Beheaded" - Participate in an interactive conversation with Anne Boleyn, the controversial second wife of Henry VIII of England, She will talk about her journey to the throne and the price she had to pay to obtain it. This will be held in the Info Island open air auditorium.

New Egyptian Exhibit by Aura Lily; This week at Info Island

2006-08-20T23:42:00.000-07:00

Visit Info Island to see a new exhibit by Aura Lily, a build similar to the Kiosk of Trajan. Info Island 24, 42, 33)

This is a build similar to the Kiosk of Trajan found on the Island of Philae. The Kiosk was also known as the "Pharoah's Bed". The Kiosk was one of the landings for people visiting the island.

The Emperor Trajan lived around 100 AD

Below is a pictrure of the Kiosk as it stands today on the Island of Agilkia northwest of Philae Island in Upper Egypt.

Aura Lily has a much more extensive collection of her work at her villa at
Amazon Land, Themiskyra, Themiskyra (52, 241, 36), her treausre room of Egyptian artifacts at Eros (123, 185, 146).

Go and visit her immersirve Egyptian exhibit. Many thanks to Aura for her beautiful display. If you have questions you can IM Aura on second life.

Search Central is now here. Next to Parvenu Towers, you can search World Cat with holdings for books all over the world and google from within Second Life. You can also do with from within the main library. Next to the weclcome area, visitors can search Amazon and get stock prices. These are developed by Hugo Dalgleish and Tabataha Hegel, owner of Life2Life Bookstore.

Other Activites at Second Life Library this week
Monday 9 a.m sl , 11 a.m . central - Tour for Informaion Commons group

Monday 2 pm al, 4 p.m. central - Tour
6 pm sl - 8 pm central - SLL VR meeting in main room of central library

Tuesday - 4 pm sl - Meeting of SL Business communicators group at open air auditorium - Abbey Zenith and Lori Bell will provide a tour of business resources
Tuesday - 6 pm sl - Meeting of the Kuurian Expedition group - contact Poinky Malaprop for more information
Wed - 7 pm sl - Program by Troy McLuhan of the Internatianal Space and Science Museum followed by a tour

Watch this blog and the events calendar for more events. Eiseldora Reisman is back and will be providing a variety of events and activities on Info Island.

Medical Librarian Namro Orman has just returned from holiday and is moving into his new medical library quarters. If you want to help out hwere, contact Namro.

Abbey Zenith and Kari Meadowbrook continue to work on the science and technology area on fifth floor of Parvenu Towers and Lorelei Junot is working on humanities and social sciences. If any of these areas interest you,please contact us.

Education in Second Life in Boston Phoenix

2006-08-18T07:32:00.000-07:00

A great article on education in Second Life appeared in today's Boston Phoenix.

Here is the link:

http://thephoenix.com/article_ektid20561.aspx

I have had trouble getting in. If you would like a copy of the full story let me know and I will send it. There was some great coverage of the library I will put here:

"Expanding in-world resources
In-world, there are offerings that are open to the public, from lectures with NASA engineers to presentations hosted by The Inﬁnite Mind public-radio show, which was the ﬁrst live-broadcast program to have a presence in SL. There is also Info Island, home to the Second Life Library 2.0, a collaboration between the Alliance Library System and Online Programming for All Libraries (OPAL).

"More and more educators see Second Life as a way to engage students," says ALS director of innovation Lori Bell. "We wanted to see what role a library could play."

A group of about 35 librarians have volunteered their time to build structures and stock the collection, which includes searchable indexes, audio and video clips, and books, many of which are public domain and available to own. "I see this as a great way to promote reading," says Bell. The library also offers live help at certain hours of the day, for the typical real-life reference questions that inevitably come up, and it will hold live events like authors' chats and tours.

The library is also exploring ways to offer learning experiences that simply would not be possible in real life. It is working with the Library of Congress to build a Declaration of Independence room, where a larger-than-life-size copy of the document will be on display along with additional readings, audio ﬁles, and period furniture. There's also a library in the works on Caledon, the exclusively 19th-century island where avatars wear period dress. "

Search Central, Henry VIII, and Librarian's Night Out

2006-08-12T20:31:00.000-07:00

Next week Second Life Library will introduce "Search Central" developed by Hugo Dalgleish. There will be a Search Central near Parvenu Towers and one in the main library. Visitors will be able to search within Second Life by speaking their search for google, wikipedia, or OCLC Open World Cat where they can see where books are located all over the world. More on this exciting development soon.

On Friday night, August 11, about twenty people attended a program at the open air auditorium by Henry VIII who talked about his life and wives. Although he died in 1547, noted by many, he is now excited to have a Second Life. The picture shows pictures of Henry and his six wives. Several wanted him to return again to talk about his political achievements.

Librarians have been working hard all summer on Info island. Librarian Abbey Zenith planned a Librarian's Night out at the Alquimia Club where everyone danced and had a great time. Abbey won the prize for Best Dressed Female, Percival Ogg won for best dressed male, and Lorelei Junot won a prize for Wildest librarian.

Two Exciting Upcoming Mixed Reality Events: Virtual Worlds, Education and Libraries

2006-08-07T14:04:00.000-07:00

Alliance Library System is pleased to announce Innovation Days: 2006 - "Virtual Worlds and Alternate Realities: Where Do Education and Libraries Fit In?"

There are two events, both which will be held at Alliance in East Peoria in person, on OPAL via audiocast, and at the Second Life Library Open Auditorium using OPAL for Audio.

Thursday, October 12- Virtual Worlds and Education - The Cutting Edge
In-person - $10 per person for dinner, register on CLEO on ALS Website
OPAL and Second Life - email me at lbell927@gmail.com to indicate you are coming so I can send audio link- no fee
Welcome and Introdcutions - Kitty Pope, Executive Director, Alliance Library System
4:00 pm sl, 6:00 p.m. central - Overview of Higher Education Activities in Second Life - John Lester, Community Manager, Linden Labs - Librarians bring your interested teachers and administrators! Learn about exciting learning activities and projects universities are undertaking in Second Life.
4:45 p.m. sl, 6:45 p.m. central - What Bradley University is Doing in Second Life for Education and Libraries - Edward Lee Lamoureux, Ph.D, Associate Professor, Multimedia Program and Department of Communication, Co-Director, New Media Center and Barbara Galik, Director - Cullom Davis Library, Bradley University
5:15 pm sl; 7:15 p.m. central - Education Activities at Alliance Library System in Second Life - Tom Peters, CEO TAP Information Services, and Lori Bell, Alliance Library System
5:45 pm sl; 7:45 pm central - Questions

Friday, October 13 - Virtual Worlds and Alternate Realities - Where do Libraries Fit in?
In person - $10 per person for lunch, register on CLEO on ALS Website
OPAL and Second Life - email me at lbell927@gmail.com to indicate you are coming so I can send audio link - no fee
7:30 am sl, 9:30 central - Welcome and Introductions, Kitty Pope, Executive Director Alliane Library System
7:45 a.m. sl and 9:45 a.m. central - Introduction to Virtual Worlds and Educational Activities in Second Life - John Lester, Pathfinder Linden, Community Education manager, Second Life
Never been in a virtual world? Can't imagine what they are? This is your opportunity to hear about exciting, creative, and interactive educational, medical, and other applications in Second Life. There are immersrive ancient Egyptian worlds; a nineteenth century setting where everyone dresses in Victorian clothes, the buildings are period, and we have a library; and International Space and Flight Museum; and campuses where universities are teaching classes in new and exciting ways.
8:45 a.m. sl and 10:45 a.m. central - The Alliance Second Life Project and How to Get Involved- Kitty Pope, Lori Bell, and Mary-Carol Lindbloom, Alliance
Want to get involved and offer these services to your patrons? We will show you what we are doing and how you can get involved
10:00 a.m., 12 noon central - not on OPAL or Second Life - Technology Leadership in Real Life, Lori Johnson, CIO, Pearl Technologies
The rest offered in real time, OPAL and Second Life - some presentations from Second Life
11:30 a.m. sl and 1:30 pm central - The Teen Second Life Project and How to Get Involved - Kelly Czarnecki, Teen Services Librarian, and Matt Gullett, Technology Education Librarian, Imaginon, Public Library of Chalotte and Mecklenburg County
Want to offer interactive library services where they are on the Internet? Learn about this exciting new service for teens your libraries can offer.
12 noon sl time and 2:00 pm central - Perspective of the Millenial Librarian on Libraries in Virtual Worlds- Jami Schwarzwalder, Library and Information Sciences Graduate Student, Indiana University
12:30 pm sl, 2:30 pm central - Thoughts About What We've Learned About Libraries and Virthual Worlds Over The Last Six Months - Tom Peters, Second Life Project Evaluator, TAP Information Services
Tom Peters will talk about what we have learned and the future of libraries in virtual worlds during the six months of the Alliance Second Life Library proejct.

Email Lori Bell at lbell927@gmail.com for more information

This week at Info Island: Amazon in world Search and Henry VIII

2006-08-01T05:25:00.000-07:00

Info Island is open now with services, events, and materials we hope
you will enjoy. Please stop by and visit. Our grand opening event
will be October 14 when we will have a day full of tours, orientations
and special events to celebrate. Gonzo Mandelbrot is in charge of
this. As we have more information, we will share it.

Tabatha Hegel, who owns the Life2Life bookstore in Second Life and Hugo
Dalgleish have created an in-world ability to search the Amazon.com website
for books. They have generously put this wonderful search tool on Info Island
and readers can search the U.S., Canadian, UK, and Japanese Amazon site with
a key word typed into the text chat with a /1keyword. The search will bring up 5 search results and with your movie screen control, you can view the cover of the book. This is the one of the first integration of web into Second Life initiatives and is very exciting. We are still working on the display, but the site is completely functional now. Thanks to Tabatha and Hugo. We are hoping to have search engines and other functionality if possible.

Henry VIII will visit the Second Life Library open auditorium Thursday August 3
at 5 pm sl, 7 pm central, and 8 pm eastern. He will share his story and answer questions about his life during the sixteenth century in England.

Parvenu Tower is the latest addition to Info Island. Built by Vince
Parvenu, the building will have a theater which will seat up to 50 and
nine other floors with a beautiful view of the ocean. Staff are
working on a display with materials from the Library of Congress on
the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Shadow Fugazi is
leading this group the the display will be open in a few weeks! The
third floor will hold business and government documents resources and
we are working on the other floors to add additional resources and
services.

Logannn8 Lombardi, an architectural student, is building a new medical
library. It should be finished in three weeks and we will have an
open house so that you can view our medical resources and services.
Namro Orman is our medical librarian.

In the central library, Robin Chamberlin has created an anime/manga
area where visitors can view materials and relax. In the future we
will have some programs on this topic. In the meantime, stop by and
visit this fun and imaginative area.

We are adding titles on display in the central library - many created
in Second Life. Some of the free copies of public domain books you
can take were created by Naru SLibrary located in Naru. Stop by and
see their neighborhood library. Contact Slinky Stiglitz for more
information. This new sim also has a community theater.

The library branch in Caledon is taking shape. We will be adding
books and audio books there in addition to some special nineteenth
century magazines and resources. Contact JJ Drinkwater or Lorelei
Junot for more information and suggestions.

Info Island is also home to the wonderful ICT Library which has a
number of free tools, scripts, and materials for edcuators. Stop in
and make use of these wonderful resources. Info Island also is proud
to host TechSoup and World Bridges.

If you would like to know of any specific services or would like a
tour for your group, please contact Lorelei Junot and we will be happy
to schedule a tour designed specifically for your group.

Programs and Tours at Info Island

2006-07-26T21:05:00.000-07:00

On Saturday night author Lopayza Moonlight talked about her work, creating fiction into virtual reality in Second Life and took the 15 attendees on a tour of her creation in Apoda.

On Wednesday night, Lorelei Junot and Eiseldora Reisman talked to SLED - the Second Life Graduate Education group, and gave them a tour of Info Island including the Main Library and the ICT library. Approximately 20 attended. Some are gearing up for fall classes and will use the library to supplement their courses.

What A Week at Info Island!

2006-07-21T20:33:00.000-07:00

The week started well with Maxito Ricardo, Caroline Keats, and I giving a tour of the island and introduction to medical resources on the Internet to Sojourner's stroke victim group.

Tech Soup had a wonderful mixed reality event to show their new directory of non-profits in Second Life, and various speakers, including a library representative talked on their organizations to a crowd of nearly 60. The event was wonderful. Glitter and her group did a tremendous job and it was exciting to have so many people on the island.

Then, a digital tsunami as Milo put it. Most of the things on the island disappeared. Within a day, Second Life had us back up and running again. After the upgrade, disappearance again. That same night, Second Life had us up and running again. I hope we never experience that again.

Milo Czervic, one of our partners on Info Island who runs the ICT library has a beautiful brand new library designed and built by AngryBeth Shortbread.

Jenna Darrow and Max Batra have a new Mystery Manor full of posters and information on mysteries and mystery authors. What fun we will have at Halloween.

The World of E! Spiral Mandelbrot posted to the list an idea to offer something on Info Island to celebrate the World Ebook Fair. There is a new high tech display on the lawn with information on the World Ebook Fair and links to e-books, e-movies, and e-audio. We are planning programs on Info Island on ebooks in real life and ebooks in Second Life. More on that once we have complete plans.

The Early Illinois Women's Exhibit on the lawn at Info Island has moved to our nineteenth century library in Caledon. CoyoteAngel Dimsum has donated the land and the building. It is exciting to get started with this special library.

Second Life Grid Down!

2006-07-19T17:45:00.001-07:00

With today's update, the SL grid went down - as of 4:20 PM (Pacific) Linden Labs was still trying to resolve the problem, and estimate SL back online around 7:30 PM (Pacific).

For updates on the issue, check http://secondlife.com/community/

Second Life Library Program: Making Fiction Into Virtual Reality

2006-07-16T06:47:00.000-07:00

Join us in the open air auditorium on Info Island on Saturday July 22 at 6 pm sl time for a fascinating program with Loypayza Moonlight, creator of Lopayzanilaya, which is designed to replicate a portion of the Celestial Court from the Aizvarya novels. She has built it exactly as the books describe — and she should know; she is the author of the original books. She will talk about her work, her creation and offer a tour of her creation. Lopayzanilaya is the state of the Fox Spirit. The entire area is designed to replicate a portion of the Celestial Court from the Aizvarya novels. Moonlight's avatar is an extension of this theme. She designed it to be a "Fox Maiden" from the stories, a being that would be a caretaker for the shrine. For more information on this fascinating prpoject, check the July 11 Metavsere Messenger. What can we as librarians do to create virtual reality of literature works to engage our readers?

Tech Soup to offer mixed reality event in person and in second life

2006-07-10T11:46:00.000-07:00

Net Tuesday Mixed Reality Event: SecondLife for Nonprofits

Tuesday, July 18, 2006 (6:00 PM - 8:00 PM)

Real World Location:

Net2 HQ
322 Ritch St. 2nd Floor
San Francisco, CA
415-633-9446
San Francisco, California

Virtual Location:
>From Second Life, click on the blue map button at the bottom of the screen. In the Find Region field, type "TechSoup.org" (without quotations) and include mature regions, click Show Location and then Teleport to go there.
Registration is free to create your avatar, but you will need to
provide your mobile phone number or credit card (which will not be
charged).

Here is the SLurl to TechSoup's virtual location:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/InfoIsland/52/171/33/

You need to be logged into SL to open this SLurl, and then once you
click, open your map and click teleport. You will be teleported to
TechSoup.

----------------------------------------------------------

Every month, Web innovators and those who promote social change
congregate in a shared effort to bring the social Web to nonprofits and
NGOs all over the world. These meetings are referred to as Net Tuesday
events.

July's Net Tuesday will feature a presentation about how nonprofits can
use Second Life, a multiplayer community on the Web. In Second Life,
users create their own characters (called avatars) and help build a
virtual 3D world that's created entirely by its inhabitants and limited
only by the imagination.

Second Life boasts a successful marketplace, social interactions, and
civic activities; it's a virtual community rather than a game, and
nonprofits can benefit from this community in a number of ways. The Net
Tuesday event, which will occur on July 18th, will be held at
TechSoup's satellite office in Second Life.

Susan Tenby, Online Community Manager of TechSoup.org, and Jeska
Dzwigalski, Community Manager at Linden Lab, (the company that created
and runs Second Life), will present a tour of this online community,
including TechSoup's satellite office. The presenters will also demo a
directory of nonprofit organizations in the Second Life world. Finally,
the event will feature a number of guest speakers from organizations
who are actively working in the Second Life community to better achieve
their organization's missions.

The event will simultaneously occur both virtually, in Second Life and
in the physical world. We will be displaying audio/video footage of
both environments to show participants in both locations what is
happening at that time.

To ensure smooth operation of the virtual event, we will restrict the
TechSoup space to those on the guest list, which operates on a
first-come-first-serve basis and will be capped at about 50
registrants.

For more newbie and How-To information, check out the Second Life wiki:
http://secondlife.com/tiki/tiki-index.php?page=How-Tos

Here is a great intro piece on how SL can be used for serious purposes:
http://futuretag.net/index.php/Slgp1
--------------

This Net Tuesday will take place on the 3rd Tuesday of the month rather
than the 2nd, on July 18th.

Library webcast; Authors Woodward and Witt Discuss Dobbit Do

2006-07-09T20:51:00.000-07:00

Meno Rich and World Bridges did a webcast tour of the library this evening.

Authors Woodward and Witt discussed their new book "Dobbit Do" in the outdoor auditorium which about 25 people attended.

New Special Collections from Illinois State Digital Archives, OCLC provides database trials

2006-07-07T07:57:00.000-07:00

WWII Posters

During World War II the United States government issued posters on topics such as national security, rationing and conservation, investing in war bonds, military recruitment, civil defense, and industrial production. These posters were part of an aggressive propaganda campaign designed to encourage and mobilize the home front war effort. Artists such as James Montgomery Flagg, Otto Fischer, Ben Shahn, and Norman Rockwell contributed their talents to create some of these posters.

This collection, from the Illinois State Library, contains posters issued by various United States government agencies from the beginning of the war through 1945.

Vachel Lindsay

Vachel Lindsay

The Vachel Lindsay Collection is comprised largely of materials containing the published prose and poetry of Vachel Lindsay in formats such as posters, newspaper and magazine articles, booklets, pamphlets, magazines and books. Other items include newspaper and magazine articles that contain biographical information on Lindsay and his family, critiques of his work and memorials and tributes to Lindsay. A small collection of photographs include Lindsay, his family, Elizabeth Graham, the Lindsay Verse Speaking Choir, 1940 and his tombstone. Phonograph recordings of Lindsay reading his works and his son, Nicholas Cave Lindsay, reading his father's poems make up another part of the collection.
Two scrapbook albums put together by Frances "Fannie" Hamilton, the younger sister of Vachel's mother contain materials about Lindsay from 1914 to about 1930. The albums include poems, drawings, private publications, clippings about and by Lindsay, a lock of his hair and some photographs. Bound volumes of his work include The Tramp's Excuse, The Village Magazine first edition, The Village Magazine third and fourth editions, Vision Magazine, A Letter About My Four Programmes and a notebook kept by Joy Lindsay Blair, Vachel's younger sister.

These digital images, made available by the Sangamon Valley Collection at the Lincoln Library (Springfield), are of photographs from this collection

OCLC provides trial access to databases for Second Life residents

Computer terminals with access and directions to these databases have been set up in the main library and the high rise library. Training will be planned soon.

Reference group to meet Thursday July 6

2006-07-04T14:49:00.000-07:00

The reference group under the leadership of Michael Maitland will meet in the main library meeting room at 6 sl on Thursday July 6.

Lots of things going on at Info Island

2006-07-02T19:56:00.000-07:00

Science fiction author Bud Sparhawk talked to an audience of about 30 at the Info Island new open air theater donated by the International Space and Flight Museum in Second Life.

Soon Club Lib will open for information seekers on the island to have fun and relax by dancing.

Last week we had several excellent Ebsco consumer health training sessions by Maxito Ricardo. Instructions are out on posters with computers that visitors can use to try the database to find consumer health information.

Crowd for Bud Sparhawk

The new library highrise has a reference area, a media viewing area, a conference room area, government documents, an academic area, and we are working on more.

Our new main library designed and built by builder Vincent Parvenu is now complete. We have a main meeting room which groups are able to use; and we are building special collections such as World War II posters, a nineteenth century author room, an anime/manga collection or more.

We have a number of presentations coming up for academic libraries. We think this may be one of the primary ways academic libraries serve patrons in the future. Please contact Lorelei Junot in world or Lori Bell at lbell927@gmail.com if you would like a tour or like to become involved.

ALS featured in Serious Games Source

2006-06-30T21:18:00.000-07:00

Enjoying Your First Life? Why Not Add a Second? Developing Library Services in Second Life
by Lori Bell, Tom Peters, and Kitty Pope, Serious Games Source 6/30/06
"...we have been waiting and looking for the right opportunity to get our libraries involved in gaming and virtual worlds – to make library collections and services available where the users already are."

Dobbit Do program at Second Life Library

2006-06-29T08:17:00.000-07:00

On Sunday July 9 at the Second Life Open air theater you will have the opportunity to hear authors Woodward and Witt talk about their writing and recently released book "Dobbit Do."

Woodward and Witt began their writing career quite by accident when Pamela Woodward became ill. The couple (who are married) began to tell the story of "Sharon" back and forth to keep Pamela's mind active. The illness progressed until Pamela actually passed away, only to come back in a minute or so, but the experience drove the pair to bring together the simple notes that Wilbur Witt had been keeping and the manuscript for Sharon was brought to be. Sharon has never been edited. In a dream Witt saw a vision that told him that the book would bring joy to millions but would never be financially successful, however because of it other books would be written that would reward the couple. They passed free copies around to friends until it became difficult to keep up with the demand and then they went to a publisher to help. Sharon is a unique blend of Judea,Christian, Islamic culture that each reader finds a slightly different meaning underlying it's story (which has absolutely NOTHING todo with Pamela's illness!)

The next novel was CigarBox which began to relieve the grief caused by the death of a daughter in law on Christmas day. What began as a form of therapy quickly led to a novel with two rewrites. This current version (Copyright 2003) is the one offered here, however a new version is in the works. June Montgomery still lives in the Avatar Emerald Pixie whom you can meet on any Saturday night at the parthenon. June's son, Micheal helps operate the image and keeps his mother's image alive in this small way.

Dobbit Do was the first book written by the duo after realizing that they just may have a talent for weaving a story. Dobbit was a fun book for the couple even though it was a horror, sci-fi book. Pamela bought a doll for Wilbur and perched it above his computer until he consented to write the book. The doll (affectionately named "Dobbit Do") stayed there until the last line, and a description of him appears in the jail scene in the novel.

Woodward and Witt are mystical writers, working together, burning incense and meditating to expand their minds and plots. You will enjoy wandering in their world. Their storys touch the mind and soul, and are not "children's" tales. Real people inhabit real worlds in their books, and you will cry in Sharon, flinch with June dies, and very definately think twice before taking your next IM after reading about Dobbit Do.

Enjoy! Real Woodward and Witt with a bottle of wine, and someone you love!

Upcoming Event/Experiment

2006-06-23T21:34:00.000-07:00

Kelly Czarnecki and I are facilitating the YALSA Teen Gaming Interest Discussion Group meeting at ALA annual conference in New Orleans, LA on Sunday June 25 at 1:30 PM SL/Central time in New Orleans. As an experiement we are going to podcast the session and run the discussion simultaneously in RL and SL!

The purpose of this discussion is to discuss issues relating to teens and gaming and to develop and disseminate best practices in collections, programming, and related topics in the field of gaming (including video, computer, internet, handheld, mobile, board, card, and miniatures) for young adults ages 12-18. We've invited librarians to bring a program to share, a game recommendation, or questions about starter collections or successful gaming events. Teens are VERY welcome to attend - we could really use their opinions, experience, and expertise to add to the discussion.

Want to participate virtually? You'll need Skype, which you can download free at http://www.skype.com. Set up and install, and the day of the event, log into Skype
and go to https://skypecasts.skype.com/skypecasts/skypecast/detailed.html?id_talk=12754
and join the discussion!

In Second Life, a free download at http://www.secondlife.com
(register and select a username), go to Info Island (128, 128) and meet on the roof of the Second Life Library 2.0. Kelly's avatar is named Blue Wings Hayek and Beth's is named Cerulean Vesperia. If anyone has advice about running audio with SL, I'm all ears!

Games Learning and Society

2006-06-16T11:37:00.000-07:00

I am a great conference in Madison Wisconsin. Academic and education researchers have gathered to talk about this topic, and share research.

There are a large portion of individuals here looking into Second Life as a place to hold educational simulations, and instruction.

I am happy to say that I have met many educators and librarians who are excited by what we are doing at our library.

I hope that after ALA we can begin to do more to be a resource for the established and interested educators in Second Life.

Michael Stephens on OPAL and Second Life Library

2006-06-16T05:53:00.000-07:00

Over 50 people in OPAL and 10 at Second Life Library enjoyed outstanding presentations yesterday by Michael Stephens on Library 2.0. We are doing it again today - a marathon of 4 marvelous sessions between 8:30 a.m. central and 2:00 p.m. central. Thanks, Michael for inspiration to try these in our libraries.

Upcoming events at Second Life Library

2006-06-16T05:46:00.000-07:00

"Murder at Mystery Manor"

Second Life Library recently opened up Mystery Manor, a castle with a Gothic theme where programs on mystery and horror genres will be offered. On Thursday June 28 at 6 pm sl time, Lorelei Junot will offer a program on hard-core mystery authors. She will introduce you and host discussion on a variety of these types of authors. The program will last about one hour.

Science Fiction Author Series: Bud Starhawk

Science fiction Author Bud Starhawk will give a talk on his writing at the Second Life Library Open Air Theater on Sunday July 2 at 7 p.m. sl time. Bud began writing science fiction stories in 1975 and,
affter two sales to Analog in 1976 and 1977, he
stopped writing for thirteen years. Since he again
took up the pen his stories have appeared frequently
in ANALOG, Asimov’s, and other SF magazines. His
stories have been selected for both Dozois’ and
Hartwell’s Years Best anthologies. His articles have
appeared in several magazines, writing collections,
and even in the Second Life Herald. He has two short
story collections appearing in print and digital form.

Bud was a three-time finalist in the Nebula’s Novella
category in 1998, 2001, and 2005. He has frequently
appeared in Analog's Readers Choice Awards lists.

Sparhawk is a Baltimore native and lives in Annapolis.
He has a degree in Mathematics from the University of
Maryland and an MBA in Finance from Oklahoma City
University. He is currently the Vice President,
Technology for Macfadden, a Federal Government
contractor.

Bud spends his spare time writing, sailing on
Chesapeake Bay in SPARROW, which has been a constant
place of refuge and the source of much inspiration,
and square dancing. More information may be found at:
http://sff.net/people/bud_sparhawk.

Informal Learning

2006-06-15T22:19:00.000-07:00

Informal Learning
Originally uploaded by cambodia4kidsorg.

One More Fan

Upcoming events at Second Life Library

2006-06-11T18:35:00.000-07:00

Come visit Info Island and meet our partners and experience our programs.
Upcoming programs at Info Island from the Second Life Library and Medical Library include:

Each program will be offered at the Second Life Library at 1:00 p.m. sl time and 7:00 p.m. sl time. Health information is one of the leading uses of the Internet by adults. Second Life Library and Medical Library are offering some programs to help you find credible information. The programs are free. If you would like to attend, please send an IM to Lorelei Junot so we will know if we have enough participants to have a program.

June 21: Finding and Evaluating Health Information on the Internet – Maxito Ricardo will show attendees how to look for health information on the internet and how to evaluate it.
June 28: EBSCO Consumer Health – The Library has received a new trial for access to Ebsco Consumer Health, a database with articles on a variety of health topics.

Thursday, June 15, 2006: Alliance Library System Online Innovation Institute Library 2.0 Extravaganza!
Speaker: Michael Stephens, Writer/Trainer/Teacher/Creator of the Tame the Web Blog

This special event is sponsored by the Alliance Online Innovation Institute. You can attend at Info Island. Audio will be offered at: http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=32ed326d&p=0
Type your name and click enter to go into the room. A small software applet will download to your computer as you enter the audio room.

Please Note: Each of the four sessions in this one-day institute will last approximately one hour. The entire institute will be repeated on Friday, June 16, 2006. You may participate either in the OPAL room of the Alliance Innovation Institute or in the Alliance Second Life Library 2.0 through the virtual reality site Second Life.
· 9:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, 8:30 a.m. Central, 7:30 a.m. Mountain, 6:30 a.m. Pacific and Second Life, and 1:30 p.m. GMT:
WEBLOGS & LIBRARIES: An in-depth look at the Biblioblogosphere -- all things blogs, libraries and librarians. We'll discuss best practices and lessons learned to make your library blog the most dynamic area of your web site!
· 11:00 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, 10:00 a.m. Central, 9:00 a.m. Mountain, 8:00 a.m. Pacific and Second Life, and 3:00 p.m. GMT:
INSTANT MESSAGING: DO YOU IM? How are libraries and librarians using Instant Messaging? This session explores a grass roots effort by many libraries to meet users where they interact online. We'll explore best practices and implementation strategies.
· 12:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, 11:30 a.m. Central, 10:30 a.m. Mountain, 9:30 a.m. Pacific and Second Life, and 4:30 p.m. GMT:
SOCIAL SOFTWARE: A SURVEY OF WEB 2.0. Librarians are finding their users are interacting online is social spaces and sites: creating content, collaborating, and building communities? What are some of the thriving social sites? How can we participate in sites like MySpace and Facebook?
· 2:00 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, 1:00 p.m. Central, noon Mountain, 11:00 a.m. Pacific and Second Life, and 6:00 p.m. GMT:
CREATING STAFF BUY IN FOR NEW TECHNOLOGIES: No matter what Web 2.0 technology you start with, a key element is staff buy in. We'll present Ten Tips for Staff Buy in and offer takeaways to get the ball rolling.

Speaker Biography: Holding an MLS from Indiana University, Michael Stephens has spent the last fifteen years in public libraries working as a reference librarian, technology trainer and manager of Networked Resources and Training at the St. Joseph County Public Library in South Bend, IN. His most recent position in the public library setting was as Special Projects Librarian, focusing on technology, policy and planning. Beginning in the fall of 2006, Michael will be joining the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at Dominican University in River Forest, IL as an Instructor.

Magic of Mysteries – The Second Life Library is building a “Mystery Manor,” castle decorated in Gothic style. Inside the Mystery Manor will be pictures of mystery authors. We will have a “Magic of Mysteries” discussion group at the Mystery Manor lead by Lorelei Junot on Thursday, June 29 at 6 p.m. sl time at the Mystery Manor.
Brackish Ludwig has built a maze of authors coming soon. You can still try the maze. We also have a new rock pond garden you can come and relax at.
More programs and services are being planned. Beginning this week from 6-8 sl time, we will have staff members on the island to greet people and show them Info Island. If you would like to schedule a tour, contact Lorelei Junot.

Next week we will feature some of Info Island’s partners including the ICT library and TechSoup.org.

If you have questions or suggestions, please contact Lorelei Junot or Rain Noonan.

Miller and Lee a Hit! SciFi in the Sky

2006-06-04T19:43:00.000-07:00

Approximately 25 people attended tonight's "Entangled in Cyberspace Program" with science fiction authors Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. The authors spoke about their experiences with cyberspace over the last 20 years and their writing. The program was excellent.

In honor of the program, Second Life Library has built a "SciFi in the Sky" area. This is a skypod with futuristic works of art, a screen which will show sci fi movies, and a place for those interested in science fiction to meet, have book discussions etc. We are hoping to put up a display of different authors each month and have authors and others as guest speakers.

Second Life Library Presents: Entangled in Cyperspace with Science Fiction Authors Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

2006-06-02T04:37:00.000-07:00

Entangled in Cyberspace:

Fresh from their Guest of Honor appearance at the joint Linux-Science Fiction convention Pengicon 4.0, award-winning authors Sharon Lee and Steve Miller discuss their careers, collaborating as writers, and how the expanding virtual world helped entangle them with the world-wide science fiction community. The program will be held on Sunday, June 4, at 6 pm sl time at the Second Life Library open air theater.

Sharon Lee & Steve Miller
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller are co-authors of the best-selling Liaden Universe? series and have been writing together since the "Kinzel" stories hit Fantasy Book in the early 80s. They began work on the first Liaden story in 1984 and have published a dozen novels and several dozen short works in that series alone. They count Meisha Merlin, Ace Books, Buzzy Multimedia, and Embiid among their English language publishers and have several foreign language publishers as well.

Their short fiction, written both jointly and singly, has appeared in Absolute Magnitude, Catfantastic, Dreams of Decadence, Fantasy Book, Such a Pretty Face, 3SF, and several incarnations of Amazing.

Their work has enjoyed a number of award nominations, with "Scout's Progress" being selected for the Prism Award for Best Futuristic Romance of 2001 and "Local Custom" finishing second for the same award. "Local Custom" was published by Buzzy Multimedia as an audio book read by Michael Shanks -- StarGate's Daniel.
"Balance of Trade," appeared in hardcover in February 2004 and hit Amazon.com genre bestseller lists before going on to win the Hal Clement Award as Best YA Science fiction for the year. Their most recent Liaden novels are "Crystal Soldier" and "Crystal Dragon" -- and as usual they have a book due out next spring.
Their backgrounds -- Steve was Vice Chair of the Baltimore in 80 Worldcon bid as well as Founding Curator of Science Fiction for the University of Maryland's SF Research Collection, while Sharon has been Executive Director, Vice President, and President of the Science Fiction Writers of America -- give them a unique perspective on the science fiction field.

History Gallery Garden

2006-05-30T10:44:00.000-07:00

Alliance Second Life Library is pleased to announce the addition of a History Gallery Garden. Visitors may wander through a garden of lifesized photographs of historical photographs and listen to audio descriptions about the photos. This month, Emma Abbott, a nineteenth century opera singer from Peoria, Illinois and Dr. Melissa Germann, an early Quincy physician are featured. Each month, new topics will be featured in the garden. This month's features are from the "Illinois Alive! Early Heroes and Heroines" website at http://www.illinoisalive.info. The Illinois Alive grant was funded with an LSTA grant from the Illinois State Library, a division of the Office of the Secretary of State.

Update on Second Life Library

2006-05-26T17:27:00.000-07:00

There is a lot happening this week at the Second Life Library.

We are building Info Island. CK Designs is putting up our new beautiful library building. It should be ready in two weeks.

Our partners World Bridges, and ICT Library have moved in. TechSoup hopes to be up by Monday. The Writing and Performance center had its first event which went well.

On Sunday at 2 eastern, 1 central, 11 a.m. sl time, DJ Under will do a training on broadcasting on the Info Island Radio station. Training at the open air theater.

On Monday at 9 eastern, 8 central, and 6 sl time, the collections group will meet at the open air theater. Cypress Barrett is head of that group.

On Tuesday at 9 eastern, 8 central and 6 sl time, there will be a meeting in the open air theater to plan for the new library space.

On Wednesday at 9 eastern, 8 central and 6 sl time, there will be a meeting in the open air theater of the Citizens Advisory Committee moderated by Patrick Witherspoon. Agenda items include discussion of the second draft of the business plan and projects which will bring visibility to the library.

EdTechTalk visits the library

2006-05-18T18:44:00.000-07:00

I've had the pleasure of participating in a few SkypeCasts with some folks associated with Worldbridges, which is something of a homespun webcasting group. They are very much interested in educational efforts within Second Life and the library fits right in. So I was delighted to see the library featured in the most recent EdTechTalk, a Worldbridges feature program. During the show, they visited various education-related sites in SL and made a visit to the library. You can see an entertaining video of them traipsing about the library by clicking here.

Big News: An Island and Two New Partners!

2006-05-17T18:47:00.000-07:00

Big news! An anonymous donor has purchased an island for us which will give us much more room to grow. It should be ready in the next week or so. At that time, we will begin moving the current library as quickly as possible and then continue to plan for expansion.

We acquired two new excellent partners today who will move to the island with us which will help us make the island a place to go to do a lot of different things.

One of our new partners is TechSoup, which is just building a presence in Second Life.
From the Tech Soup website: "Powered by CompuMentor, one of the nation's oldest and largest nonprofit technology assistance agencies, TechSoup.org offers nonprofits a one-stop resource for technology needs by providing free information, resources, and support. In addition to online information and resources, we offer a product philanthropy service called TechSoup Stock. Here, nonprofits can access donated and discounted technology products, generously provided by corporate and nonprofit technology partners.

We believe that technology can enhance nonprofit work, making us more efficient and better able to serve our communities. We never lose sight of that goal.

Whom we serve
TechSoup is a trusted technology resource that offers a variety of information and services for the benefit of the nonprofit sector.

TechSoup provides instructional articles and worksheets for nonprofit staff members who utilize information technologies, as well as technology planning information for executives and other decision makers. Our introductory articles and message board support are aimed at those who do not have much experience using technology, but we also provide more advanced information.

Our product philanthropy service, TechSoup Stock, is open to all qualified 501c3 nonprofit organizations. "

The other new partner is the ICT Library, or
Information and Communication Technology Library. It
is so named to be more global. "ICT" is a term our
friends in Europe, Africa, Asia, & the Middle East
readily recognize as refering to "educational
technology" and "instructional design."

From the ICT information card:
"Overview of the ICT LIbrary
--------------------------------
The ICT Library is a not-for-profit endeavor formed to reach out to members of the educational community working within Second Life. Funds received from sponsors will be used to expand the knowledge of SL members who are interested in using this virtual environment as a way to mediate classes or training.

It is based on a premise of taking information that exists on websites (ex., www.simteach.com, www.secondlife.com/education, various blogs, etc.) and putting it in SL for display and demonstration. The library hopefull will help solve the difficulty many new educators have in finding useful tools and ideas (rather than leave it to serendipity). Central to the Library's goals is the tenet that outreach to educators is essential in helping expand understanding and knowlege of media tools. Specifically, the ICT Library will:

- serve as a repository of tools and scripts that would be useful for instruction (both commercial and "free" tools)
- give hints and tips about how to best use the virtual environment to promote higher levels of thinking and constructivist approaches to learning
- provide case studies of how educators are using tools
- show pictures/descriptions of innovative educational projects
- offer small grants to spur innovation in educational implementation

--------------------------------
SL ICT Library History
--------------------------------
The ICT Library was founded in spring 2006 on the initiative of SL member, Milosun Czervik. In RL, "Milo" is a research associate and instructional technologist in Virginia Tech's School of Education (Blacksburg, VA, USA). Special thanks goes to SL members Jeremy Kapumbo, Mari Asturias, Pathfinder Linden, and Adiatha Bishop for their continued encouragement, ideas, and assistance. A blog about this project (and other thoughts) can be found at: http://www.rpfolio.com/cblog/"

New Library Writing and Performance Centre

2006-05-14T18:02:00.000-07:00

The Second Life Library is pleased to announce the opening of the Writing and Performance Centre managed by Deidru Valentine. In honour of this event are launching a poetry competition. The prize is L$500.

Rules of the competition:

1) The deadline is 1pm SL time 20th May, 2006

2) The poem may be on any subject and in any form however must not exceed 20 lines.

How to enter.

1) From your inventory menu (Create) choose new note.

2) Right click on the new note and choose rename - type Poetry Competition 05.20.06. On the note enter your name (please note that your name will be deleted prior to being passed for judging and replaced with a code number relating to your name).

3) Type your poem on the note card remembering to ensure you do not exceed 20 lines.

4) Check that the poem is as you wish it to be for spelling, line breaks and punctuation.

5) Find Deidru Valentine in the Find People tab and drop the inventory item on her card.

6) IM Deidru to say that you've submitted for the competition.

Results will be announced by the 25th May. The winning entry and the top ten best poems will be displayed in the Writing and Performance Centre and will be published by the Second Life library.

Anyone wishing to join the Writing & Performance Centre should contact Deidru Valentine for an invite.

A moment for Solitude

2006-05-13T21:31:00.000-07:00

Another exciting time for me in Second Life these past 24 hours or so. It started last night, when I jumped into a Skypecast which was being web-simulcast via Worldbridges. A small group of residents were able to chat while touring around Second Life. The participants were interested in education within Second Life and were naturally interested in the library, so I gave them the grand tour on air! I spent hours talking and exploring Second Life with this group and we ended up in the Podcasting News Network tower, where I was able to talk about the library project with a few recognizable names in podcasting. They all wanted landmarks (location markers that allow you to teleport to a location in-world) by the end of the chat. Earlier today, I jumped in-world to find that my Worldbridges friends had returned to the library without my prompting. A pleasant surprise indeed.

This afternoon was the first meeting of the library's Citizen Advisory Committee, which I could not attend. I hope that we can provide a report of that meeting shortly. But we followed that meeting with a discussion of our first big fundraising/grand opening event. A number of good ideas were proposed and a few volunteers identified to look at some of the options. Looks like we will be shooting for sometime in late June to make this event happen, so stay tuned for more details.

But this post is really about a wonderful gesture from an SL artist that took place just a short while ago. The library became the recipient of a lovely sculpture called Solitude, given to us by its artist, Sleepy Rambler.

This picture does it no justice, as the inner parts move and spin around to brilliant effect (they can also be stopped for an altogether different effect). This connection with Sleepy Rambler was made possible by our own Eiseldora Reisman, who is developing quite a fan club of her own.

If you've been to the Alliance Second Life Library 2.0 before, but it's been awhile, come back and check us out. The pace of development is breathtaking, as is the landscape.

Introduction to Alliance Second Life Library 2.0

2006-05-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

Alliance Library System/OPAL will provide an introduction to the Alliance Second Life Library 2.0 in the OPAL auditorium on Wednesday, May 31, at 2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Speakers will include Greg Schwartz, Tom Peters, Lori Bell, Kelly Czarnecki, Jami Lynn Schwarzwalder, and other librarians involved in the project. They will explain what they are doing, show you what is happening and answer questions about the project. Book discussions, training sessions, and other programs are currently being offered to current virtual residents. The goal of the project is to promote the real library and online library services to adults who might not otherwise use the library.

What is Second Life? Second Life is a 3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents. Since opening to the public in 2003, it has grown explosively and today is inhabited by nearly 200,000 people from around the globe. There are shopping malls, events, homes, lands of different types, and best of all, participants can contribute content, buildings, and other digital creations. The group is also working on a library for the Teen Second Life Library to open in the fall.

No registration is necessary. If you are interested in attending, please come to the OPAL online auditorium at http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=67955673&p=0
Type your name, click enter to go into the room. A small software applet will download to your computer as you enter the room. You may want to check the software before the program to make sure it works on your computer. All you need to participate is a computer with Internet connection, sound card, and speakers.

If you have any problems with the software, please contact Tom Peters, OPAL Coordinator, at tapinformation@yahoo.com or Lori Bell at lbell@alliancelibrarysystem.com.

Google moves into virtual worlds

2006-05-11T16:52:00.000-07:00

Just think - by doing what we are doing now, we will be able to help our communities move into the virtual world!

Google moves into virtual worlds
By combining satellite maps and 3-D software, Google Earth is turning into a virtual online playground.
By Chris Taylor, Business 2.0 Magazine senior editor
May 11, 2006: 11:47 AM EDT
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SAN FRANCISCO (Business 2.0 Magazine) - It's Google's world. We just live in it.

Online virtual worlds are a hot topic, as gamers spend more and more time playing online and virtual real estate turns into a real market. Now Google (Research) is getting into the business -- and if its plans come to fruition, the virtual world will never be the same. In fact, it may look more like the world we know than futurists ever imagined.

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Google already has Google Earth, a 3-D mockup of the planet generated from satellite photos. But Google wants you to do more than just zoom through its virtual Earth. The company wants you to add on to it, too.

At the end of April the company released, for free, a popular 3-D modeling program it bought called SketchUp. Google is encouraging developers to use SketchUp to build 3-D layers on top of Google Earth. There's even a website Google provides called 3-D Warehouse, where you can demonstrate what you've built in Sketch Up.

Enter the metaverse
The notion that you can create objects and buildings and place them in a virtual world makes Google Earth sounds less like a mapping tool and more like a metaverse. What's a metaverse? Science fiction writer Neal Stephenson introduced the term in his seminal 1992 novel, Snow Crash. The metaverse was Stephenson's name for a virtual world where his characters play and do business. It was a black ball 1.6 times the size of Earth, with a giant street running around its equator.

In Stephenson's novel, millions of users uploaded customized "avatars," or virtual personalities, and strolled the street, entering shops and exclusive nightclubs, conversing and trading with the metaverse's other denizens. It was, in effect, a 3-D version of the web.

Online worlds like Second Life and There.com – not to mention online games like World of Warcraft, Lineage, and EverQuest -- are direct descendants of the metaverse vision. Entrepreneurs like Second Life creator Anshe Chung have demonstrated how to run very profitable businesses trading online real estate, avatars, and other virtual goods -- businesses that have no physical presence in the real world.

But as popular as they are, virtual worlds like these are hardly mainstream. They're a little hard to navigate, and a little too videogame-like for the average user. It's hard to imagine your mom running around in Second Life, let alone World of Warcraft.

Googling the planet
It is, however, pretty easy to imagine your mom downloading and using Google Earth (indeed, perhaps she already is).

You can already download user-generated layers that sit on top of Google's 3-D Earth and show you, for example, the location of celebrity houses or hiking trails or famous landmarks. One dating service has even started showing people looking for partners as a Google Earth layer.

Real estate companies have started showing off virtual versions of their buildings (for sale in the real world) on Google Earth. SketchUp allows them to build entire models of their apartments, right down to the microwave oven.

Where will it end? Google Earth general manager John Hanke has said that Google Earth was partly inspired by Snow Crash's metaverse. At a recent Google press event, he described it as a "3-D virtual world."

A virtual Earth
The result could be that we'll soon populate a virtual version of planet Earth instead of the made-from-scratch metaverses like online games or Second Life. The main element Google Earth is missing today is avatars, but at least one observer believes those to be added soon.

"I would expect to see someone using Google Earth as a virtual social space by the end of the year," says Jerry Paffendorf, research director of the Acceleration Studies Foundation, a futurist organization.

Paffendorf isn't just sitting around waiting for the metaverse to happen, either. Last weekend he helped arrange something called the Metaverse Roadmap Summit, a gathering of programmers of virtual worlds.

The idea of the summit was to outline how we're going to get from here to the metaverse in ten years. There were major disagreements between the attendees, most notably between those who believe the Web should stay as a 2-D environment with 3-D components, and those who want the Web to become a 3-D metaverse-like environment where your avatar can call up 2-D screens if and when they need to – say, for a word-processing program.

Those in the latter camp believe, like Paffendorf, that Google Earth is the most likely candidate to become a metaverse. Just add avatars, they say, and the possibilities are endless.

Consumers could fly into the virtual New York, go shopping in a virtual Times Square, get past the velvet rope at a virtual Studio 54 and chat with an avatar dressed as Andy Warhol. They could plan their next trip to the real New York in meticulous detail, become a detective in a Gotham noir, browse an apartment for sale, or jump into a taxi and play a driving game.

There are, in short, many more opportunities in a virtual version of the real world than in an entirely fantastical world like Second Life -- or indeed Stephenson's original vision of the metaverse.

It's early days yet, but if Google Earth continues to develop as it has since its release a mere year ago, and if developers continue to build 3-D content and businesses continue to explore using layers, then the possibilities are as boundless as the planet.

By 2016, Google Earth should be a very crowded place indeed.

____________________________________________

Exciting updates

2006-05-09T08:52:00.000-07:00

Many updates....
1) The first citizen advisory meeting will be held at the library education center at 3 sl time Saturday. The chair of the committee, Patrick Witherspoon, will moderate the meeting via audio so if you want to attend and hear the audio, go to the Second Life audio room at
http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=37f95349&p=0
Minimize that window. The meeting will be held in Second Life. You can respond and discuss via text chat in Second Life - but he will moderate via audio.

2) The programming group wll meet at the education center at 4 sl time Saturday to discuss a fundraising/opening event. Greg Schwartz has a lot of great ideas.

3) Namro is doing a great job with the medical library. To highlight this part of Second Life Library 2.0, Ebsco Consumer Health is giving Second Life Library and its patrons a trial during June and July. During this time, Maxito Ricardo will do workshops for patrons on how to use Ebsco Consumer Health and how to find consumer health information on the Internet. We can also discuss other health oriented programs for this promotion at the meeting Saturday.

4) We will have an OPAL program on the Second Life Library 2.0 at 2:00 p.m. central, 3 p.m. Eastern, and noon Pacific on May 31. Greg Schwartz has agreed to speak. Eiseldora, Zach, Maxito, Namro, BlueWings and Ray, or anyone else willing to speak on the great efforts you have made on behalf of this project? Please let me know as I will soon put out publicity on this program.

5) We have a jukebox radio in the library. Several commented that they would like music.

Teen SL Library - Meeting Minutes, 5/7/06, Crossposted

2006-05-08T20:54:00.000-07:00

Virtual Teen Library Services Meeting
Sunday, May 07, 2006 5:00 PM
Medical Library building, 2nd floor

AGENDA

Purpose of meeting
Where we are with SL teen services
Teen/Adult grid
Teen SL Campus in fall
Island for library
Updates/News

School Library Journal

YPulse

M2-Metaverse Messenger column

Focus of project-Teen driven

How we can reach them in the game (M2 and in RL)

Build partnerships with people/organizations in RL and in SL

MySpace account

Educators mailing list

Private island owner to work with other educators

People’s interests

Communication (different google group, forum?, etc.)

Committees?

MINUTES

In Attendance:
BlueWings Hayek (Kelly), teen librarian
Ray Lightworker (Matt), youth/teens and technology in RL
Klutzy Marx Teen librarian in RL
Cerulean Vesperia (Beth), Library trainer/consultant
Lorelei Junot (Lori), Alliance Library System
Eiseldora Reisman (Jami), LIS student and gamer
Jenna Darrow (Jenna), middle school/high school librarian
Brackish Ludwig (Sebastian) works w/ computers and admin
Rex Riel (Rex), Head Buyer/Technician for a small IT company, library lover, scrounger and info nut
Planetneutral Fackler (Greg), supervisor at a public library
AXEl Foley
Robin Chamberlin, (Robin) YA Librarian & Simmons online CE instructor

Before the meeting officially started, we learned that Eiseldora is training as an instructor through TeaZers, and has added the following classes to next week's schedule: Making a HulaHoop, Virtual Reference, and Basic Decorating. Her rotating chair in the Medical LIbrary won an award at the Wednesday design contest. Congrats Eiseldora!

After a round of introductions, Blue Wings updated us on the progress of the Teen Library on the Teen Grid concept. On Adults are not allowed on the teen grid, and teens are not allowed on the adult grid. For more details, see the message from Pathfinder Linden forwarded from Planetneutral Fackler at http://virtualteenlibrary.blogspot.com/2006/04/explanation-of-sl-teen-grid.html.

We could wait for a Teen Campus (in development) to be completed this fall, or purchase an island outside the teen grid that teens could go to. The benefit is that there would be support for us to be a part of it as a teen services library.

The current procedure is adults must buy an island off the Teen Grid that teens can go to. Islands cost $1200 plus $150 a month for maintenance (20% educator discount). One option would be to share an island with other educators by renting plots, or creating a content creation space for teens. Islands can't be split between the Teen/Adult grids at present.

Initial funding sources could include Libraries Matter / Alliance Library System for the initial purchase. Grant sources, and corporate funding could fund the $150 a month fee. Corporate sponsors to approach might include OCLC and Overdrive, or businesses within SL. Lorelei, Ray, BlueWings and Cerulean offered to work on a grant.

Joining the educators mailing list was mentioned again. The Education Community page suggests emailing pathfinder AT lindenlab DOT com to join the Educator's listserv.

Ray suggested putting together a small group to investigate the island building options; Brackish has some experience. BlueWings Hayek expressed interest, and the issue was tabled.

News and Updates
Rex Riel and Namro installed visitor detectors in the main and medical buildings. Current traffic is around 40/day. Use the command “say list” to view visitors.

A signboard has been added in front of the current building.

A new open classroom has been added next to the SL library, and at the conclusion of the meeting, most of the group went to check out the space. It’s located at Minoa 220, 43 and includes a "Welcome to Second Life" script with notecards from classes and information on how to get started in SL. The space can be reserved through Google calendar or by contacting Rain to schedule.

Publicity
School Library Journal (BlueWings Hayek) -mention appearing in June issue
YALSA blog (Eiseldora Reisman) - Eiseldora has been doing lots of posting!
YPulse (Katt Kongo & Daughter) - interested in doing a story and getting teen perspective
M2 Teen Metaverse Messenger (BlueWings Hayek)

A discussion on how to reach out to teens in RL followed. There is already a mySpace profile set up at http://www.myspace.com/73899784. Other suggestions included setting up an OPAL room and getting Alliance Libraries involved in recruiting teens.

At present, we don’t have figures for how many teens are playing. Brackish said he thought the teen rate of joining SL is very good at this point, and Eiseldora reported that the teens she's talked to don't know about it, so it's not cool yet, or past cool. The teen grid is not as developed as the Adult grid. Episode 7 of Secondcast interviewed a teen player, Mercury Metropolitan, said there are about 10,000 users, not all are active. Download this episode at:
http://www.secondcast.com/podcasts/secondcast-ep07.mp3.

The issue of cost of getting teens involved came up – Lorelei reported that it is possible for institutions to set up educational accounts with logins/passwords. A basic account is free, but not all teens have credit cards. Cell phones with text messaging capabilities are a no-credit card option.

Action Plan

Continue learning about building and scripting (Eiseldora)
Set up a separate Google Group (Ray)
Set up a Teen Forum and take advantage of the polls options
Conduct a meeting for those interested in funding options (BlueWings)
Continue with mySpace profile
Develop programming (Lorelei)
Create in-world orientation workshops for librarians this summer (Klutzy Marx
Jenna Darrow)
Promote the project in RL workshops and trainings (BlueWings, Cerulean)
Create a Teen SL library Flickr group (Eiseldora)
Publish meeting notes to:

SL blog (Cerulean)
Teen SL blog (Cerulean)
YALSA Gaming Dicussion Group (Cerulean)
YALSA blog (Eiseldora)
YALSA listserv (BlueWings)
LM_Net listervs (BlueWings)
Teen SL Google Group (Ray)

Lorelei gave meeting attendees a Free Culture package, and the meeting concluded with an evaluation to determine if we covered everything we needed to, and a tour of the new open air training center.

Resources
Some resources from Planetneutral Fackler – Teen insights to adult presence on the Teen Grid
http://www.audioblogger.com/media/105581/319102.mp3
http://www.secondcast.com/modules/news/

The Brackeis Education Center

2006-05-07T19:06:00.000-07:00

An exciting new space has been added to the library grounds. Now introducing the Brackeis Education Center:

This space will be a venue for classes, programs, fairs and anything else that the growing number of creative librarians can conceptualize. As you can see, it's pretty much an empty canvas.

Lots of great stuff happening all around. More to come regarding the teen meeting earlier tonight.

Great program, great speaker, great crowd!

2006-05-06T19:54:00.000-07:00

Tonight, we had a great program by Katt Kongo, publisher of the
Metaverse Messenger about starting and running a business in Second Life. About 30 different people attended, most of them not librarians. There was a lot of great discussion, so the Library is going to form a Second Life small business support group with speakers each month from different types of businesses in Second Life. There are actually some people who work full-time with their businesses in Second Life for their primary income! Now, wouldn't that be fun!

We are also forming a citizen's advisory group to meet monthly to provide feedback and input on our evolving library.

Class tomorrow

2006-05-06T10:03:00.000-07:00

I'll be teaching a session of my Intro to Library Research class tomorrow (Sunday May 7) at 1pm SLT.

Kiosk for Real Life Education Events in Second Life and other News

2006-05-02T14:28:00.000-07:00

Pathfinder Linden, who works with educators in Second Life, has provided the Second Life Library with a kiosk we have placed right outside the library with information on other education groups and their activities and locations. The library is included!

We will have a weekly column in the newspaper of Second Life, the "Metaverse Messenger."

Thanks to BlueWings and Eiseldora, we will have a small story and photo in the June issue of School Library Journal about Second Life 2.0 and the plans for the teen library.

Namro is heading up efforts for a medical information service.

Second Life at Internet Librarian

2006-05-02T13:40:00.000-07:00

In a last-minute squeak-through I, Lori Bell, and Tom Peters will be presenting on the Second Life Library 2.0 project at Internet Librarian 2006. Probably in the last session of the "Digital Strategies" track on Tuesday. Here is the draft session description. (As soon as a final one is release I'll be sure to post it.)

The Second Life Library 2.0: Going to where the users are
Lori Bell, Director of Innovation, Alliance Library System
Tom Peters, CEO, TAP Information Services
Michael Sauers, Internet Trainer, BCR
In April 2006, the Alliance Library System put out a call for librarians interested in participating in a project to set up a library presence in the virtual reality world of Second Life. By the end of the month more than two dozen librarians from around the world were meeting at a brand new virtual library to staff the reference desk, and discussing collection development, online programming, and library services. Since then the response has only grown and Second Life citizens are taking advantage of all the library has to offer. This session will present an overview of Second Life itself, the creation of the Second Life Library, and the services that it is now offering in this completely virtual environment.

My day in pictures.

2006-05-01T15:56:00.000-07:00

I went out today to get pictures of the museums in Second Life for one of my finals. I had an lovely day. I posted the highlights.

Introduction to SL for newbie librarians

2006-04-30T07:22:00.000-07:00

Intro Workshop_037
Originally uploaded by travelinlibrarian.

Last evening Katt Kongo of the Mettaverse Messenger (pictured right) gave a presentation on the roof of the library for us librarians that are still getting our feet wet when it comes to SL. Topics such as basic object manipulation, teleporting, dancing, chat & IM, friends, gestures, and the camera view were covered in this 1.75-hour session. (Snapshots of most of her slides can be found int he flickr photo pool.) All of the attendees enjoyed the presentation and didn't seem to mind that the session, scheduled for one hour, went as long as it did.

One side comment: I don't know what the official etiquette is but please, if you're attending a workshop, and you want to have a conversation with someone that has nothing to do with the topic at hand, please use IM instead of chat. The rest of us don't need the distraction.

Second Life Guides

2006-04-28T09:00:00.000-07:00

Today I had another Reference question: How do I create CDs in Second Life. I personally had no idea, so I first pointed the user to the Wiki, and continued searching myself. I googled the site, the wiki, and the internet to find nothing particularly helpful, so I looked for a person to contact. I know that New Citizens has many great programs so I looked up their group, and one officer was on. She was extremely helpful and informative. She invited me to join the group (New Citizens Inc.), and told me that we can ask questions on the group chat at any time and someone will answer. I also invited her to use our library as a place to hold some of the classes. She took a landmark, and hopefully will come check the place out.

How to create CDs in Second Life:
you have to upload songs in 10 second clips so to create a CD you have to write or copy a script that will buffer the music and make is play smoothly. You may be able to find the script in freebie lots, but New Citizens is has a class Tuesdays at 5pm SL time about basic scripting.

The development wiki should be helpful for these types of questions as well. It is separate from the general wiki.

I was also visited by a Class of School Media Specialists. I only had enough time to say hi, but their guide showed them around our library. (He was here yesterday at the desk with me)

New Developments

2006-04-28T08:33:00.000-07:00

We now have a garden at Alliance Second Life Library 2.0 with a gazebo, lots of flowers, trees, and a water fountain. We have also built a smaller building for librarians to practice building and decorating in. Namro is developing a great new service I will let you tell him about. Let us know what you think of the gardens.

Upcoming Programs at Alliance Second Life Library 2.0

2006-04-27T20:52:00.000-07:00

A Guide to Second Life for Newbie Librarians
Date: Saturday, April 29, 2006
Time: 5:00PM - 6:00PM (60 minutes)
Location: Minoa (205,85)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Education
Cover Charge? No

Event description: Katt Kongo, Publisher of the Metaverse Messenger will provide a brief introduction to Second Life Librarians who are new - and tips and tricks for living a Second Life. She will also take questions.The training session will be on the roof of the library.

How to Start and Run a Business in Second Life
Date: Saturday, May 6, 2006
Time: 5:00PM - 6:00PM (60 minutes)
Location: Minoa (205,85)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Education
Cover Charge? No

Event description: If you are interested in finding out how to run a business in Second Life, how it works, and ideas for starting one, come to this program on the roof at Alliance Second Life Library 2.0. The presenter is Katt Kongo, Publisher of the Metaverse Messenger. Everyone is welcome.

Librarian stereotypes

2006-04-27T20:10:00.000-07:00

Someone pointed me to SLBoutique.com earlier today so I went to see what free stuff I could pick up. Just for fun I searched their inventory for "librarian" and actually found two items. The first, Sensual Librarian Shades. The second, a hairstyle named ~**The Librarian** ~REMIXED. Yep, you too can wear narrow glasses and have your hair in a bun. For females only of course.

Why the kilt had to die.

2006-04-27T19:13:00.000-07:00

Why the kilt had to die.
Originally uploaded by travelinlibrarian.

I was waiting to take the textures class when I decided to play with the camera pov and looked at myself sitting down. Turns out I wouldn't have looked very professional while sitting at the reference desk and that's putting it mildly.

Clothing 101

2006-04-27T18:35:00.000-07:00

Clothing class_010
Originally uploaded by travelinlibrarian.

Earlier this evening I attended the weekly Clothing 101 class in New Citizen Plaza. It was very basic so I didn't actually learn anything new, just confirmed what I already figured out on my own. Pictured is the class itself during which we each stood on a "blue mat" so the instructor, Brace Coral, could see each of us following her instrucitons and modify our clothing.

I was able to ask the instructor about my kilt "problem" and a solution was offered but I couldn't implement it properly so that idea was abandoned. I've since edited my kilt's texture and mostly solved the problem. (Just made black, non-tartan stripe at the top and it mostly blends into the jacket.)

Multi-tasking

2006-04-27T11:35:00.000-07:00

I am working on my Finals while I have SL open, and today I was joined by a passerby that saw me in the window and wanted to come in. I welcome him to come in and look around. He walked behind the desk, and I thinking he was a librarian offered a seat.

He was very happy to sit down and talk with me, but also wanted to know why we were sitting behind a desk. I explained about what we are doing at the library and we watched movie trailers and Magical Trevor on the Monitor. I explained how to add the library as a bookmark and teleport at his request. As he left I welcomed him back and he said he most certainly will come back.

I also drew in some more patrons while watching Magical Trevor, because I couldn't resist the urge to dance. I know its unprofessional, but it drew attention, and I got more people in the doors for services. I had many questions about what you do in SL, especially if you don't have a paid account. I think this would be an excellent idea to share with visitors. Another thing for the Ready Ref List.

Vandals

2006-04-26T11:04:00.000-07:00

Today I logged in to check on the ref desk and ask for volunteers to staff tonight. I found a cow!
At some point last night or the this morning someone had come into the library and left boxes of clothes, and other items. The good news is that they left remnants of using the Library Project Portal.
The bad news is that while deleting the items Rain accidentally deleted part of the house. She had to spend the afternoon fixing it.

First Organizational Meeting a Success

2006-04-26T08:27:00.000-07:00

SL Library Org Meeting_018
Originally uploaded by travelinlibrarian.

Last night was the first official orgizational meeting of folks willing to participate in this amazing project. More than 20 people showed up including a few non-librarians and Pathfinder Linden from Linden Labs. Pathfinder gave us a few ideas and praised our efforts. Conversation (all via txt) was brisk and very few people just lurked. The 1.5 hour meeting saw the formation of several committees (programming, services, promotion) formed and a basic governmental structure established.

A Google calendar has been set up for scheduling the reference desk and a MySpace account is in process. One other committee was formed to plan and organize a "Grand Opening" for the library. (No date at this point.)

Most all of the participants were positive in their ideas and comments. Only at the end did one person seem to imply unhappiness at our forming a "traditional library" in SecondLife but did not stick around to explain his comments.

I took several snapshots during the meeting which can be accessed through the picture accompanying this post.

All in all I was very happy with how the meeting went and even volunteered to participate on the programming committee and to staff the reference desk when I could. I'm looking forward to continuing to work on this amazing project.

Update: I forgot to mention that a Wiki will also be set up for participants.

Front page news!

2006-04-25T21:43:00.000-07:00

It is quite an honor to grace the front cover of the latest Metaverse Messenger, one of Second Life's premier news sources. And we're front page news!

Many thanks are due to Katt Kongo for her interest in highlighting our project. My hope is that we will do enough to encourage ongoing coverage.

A very lovely day

2006-04-25T14:51:00.000-07:00

Today was a nice day. I don't work Tuesdays, so I spent the day in SL. I logged on and was quickly greeted by some librarians that had stopped by. I chatted for most of the afternoon with passerbys and librarians. There was pretty much at least one other person in the library at all times. I don't know if I would call this busy or slow :).
For a little part of the afternoon, I decided to go try to attend a class at New Haven. I wasn't able to find a class, but I was shocked to be recognized. Many people commented that that there was that librarian. I invited them to come to the library anytime, and gave information about our blog, our location, and our flickr group.
This morning I talked with Namro Orman from the Netherlands. He is a blogger and librarian too. He was intrigued by our set-up. Later he returned when Rain was there, so thankfully she was able to answer his questions much better than I could.

The best thing that happened today was that, while joined with Rex Riel at the Reference Desk, the same two people from last night returned to the library. One of them had attended Zack's presentation, while the other was just tagging along. After looking around the building, she came inside and asked for a specific book. I was able to use World Cat to find where the book was located in her state. I do not know how helpful it really was, but she left very happy. ~~I posted the entire conversation below, so you can see what I did wrong, and what virtual reference looks like.~~ Update: Removed in consideration of confidentiality.

Great quote from today. in response to how he became a librarian Rex Riel said "me? Well, i love libraries, and all the good hitman jobs were taken so...."

SLL2 blog mentions

2006-04-25T13:34:00.001-07:00

We have garnered some blogospheric attention:

DigiCMB thinks we're a bit weird.

New World Notes includes us in Events of the Week.

Late Night

2006-04-25T00:19:00.000-07:00

We had some late night visitors from Zack's program. I was surprised that I had a couple of people stop by at night (I logged in at 9:30 SL time) all looking for books. There were quite happy with the bookcase and while I was at the library I created a table of contents for the bookcase witch made it easier for people to access and not clutter their inventory with notecards. I also was able to create a little shape that would tell users when I'm online. Anyone who is going to be a SL Reference Librarian may want to do this. I did confuse many people by being on the Second Floor.
I also wanted to add that it helped me to automate gestures for working at the desk. Everytime I though someone was near I could press F2 to greet them while continuing a conversation. Zack mention something similar he used during his presentation.

Reference Desk

2006-04-24T17:20:00.000-07:00

Hi this is Eiseldora, ER for short.

Today I spent my time making the lovely Ref Desk in the image to the right. This is no ordinary desk. Inside I have notecards with information about our library, events, and librarians.

Curious (seated next to me) wrote a script that allows the user to just touch the desk and receive the information.

I also was able to put a terminal for Project Library in the "stacks area" Since it can be confusing to access the information I wrote instructions that can be found above the terminal.

Lastly I placed a sign board next to the teleport, with information about current events and an invitation to come inside.

If you couldn't tell I like to modify things and decorate. I also have acquired many free items to use for decorating. IM me in game if you want to know where to find something, or want a specific item.

Hope to see you in SL

First library instruction session

2006-04-24T14:45:00.000-07:00

Today I had the honor of teaching SLL2.0's first library instruction session. This was also my first class of any kind in SL.

I teach basic library skills sessions to college freshmen in my RL job, so I was curious to see what I could apply to an SL setting.

Fortunately I had an engaging crowd to try the class out on, including some of the SLL2 crowd and a little-girl avatar from England who was terribly excited about libraries. Wile E. Coyote dropped by at the end.

I'm used to teaching to an audience of students from our university, so I usually have specifically applicable examples and know what resources they'll be using. I tried to universalize it a bit more for this presentation. I used the NYPL catalog and the Academic Search Premier database as my examples.

It has a HUD attachment allowing control of the slides, and I used a combination of powerpoint-created slides and screenshots. PF and Lorelei also have copies of the slideshow object if anyone wants one. The slideshow gadget is by eSheep and worked great despite being labeled "version 0.1". The fourth photo shows the slideshow control panel at the top of my screen.

I prepared a script, which I had in a notecard and copied and pasted as I went. This freed me up to field questions and reply to comments and worked out pretty well. Hopefully no one could tell where one left off and the other began.

I planned 45 minutes for the session, which worked out about right. During the discussion I learned that some of my assumptions about non-US libraries were incorrect, and which I'll make allowance for next time. I hope to teach this again periodically (ha!) and add some other classes. I'll probably try for a weekend day next time. (I just happened to have Monday off this week.)

Coincidentally, right after I left the Library I ran into Garnet Psaltery, whom we can thank for the new plot of land. I told her how well the swap had worked out for us and hoped it had for her as well.

Edited to add: It occurred to me the day after that another significant challenge was not having a browser to work with. I'm used to teaching with a live catalog/database on the screen to demonstrate examples, and I felt a bit hobbled having to make do with screenshots. If HTML-on-a-prim ever sees the light of day, that will make a significant difference in what we can teach via SL.

Organizational meeting Tuesday April 25

2006-04-24T11:55:00.000-07:00

Here is a draft agenda and instructions for tomorrow night's Second Life Library 2.0 meeting at 6 p.m. Pacific and SL, 8 p.m. central, and 9 p.m. Eastern. Remember there is also a book discussion of the book "Norwood" at 5 p.m. Pacific, 7 central, and 8 Eastern. If you have additional items or suggestions for the agenda, please let me know and I will add them. Please let me know if you plan to attend so we know how many to expect. We will take good minutes so those who cannot attend will know what happened.

The meeting will be facilitated by Maxito Ricardo.

Agenda for Second Life Library 2.0 Meeting
Facilitated by Maxito Ricardo

Current Status and Programs
Lorelei Junot

Current building status
Rain Noonan

Desired Programs and Ideas discussion
Everyone

Desired Services discussion
Everyone

Desired hours open discussion
Everyone

Desired Collection discussion
Everyone

Publicity
Blog – Planetneutral Fackler
Article in Metaverse Messenger – Lorelei Junot
Other publicity needed

Who wants to work on what?
Everyone

9. Governance
Everyone

For voice over IP, go to the following url

http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=37f95349&p=0

type your name in and click enter. A small software applet will download to your computer as you enter the room. Minimize this screen. To talk, press the control key.

We will meet in the Second Life Library.

If you need assistance with teleporting, please IM Lorelei Junot or Rain Noonan.

Thanks, Lori

Instruction session today by Zack Mortal

2006-04-24T04:45:00.000-07:00

Introduction to Library Research
Date: Monday, April 24, 2006
Time: 1:00PM - 1:45PM (45 minutes)
Location: Minoa (251,118)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Education
Cover Charge? No

Event description: This class covers the fundamentals of using real-life online library resources. We'll cover how to use library catalogs, subject headings to improve your searches; using research databases to locate articles and more. IM instructor Zack Mortal for a teleport to the Second Life Library 2.0

Presentation, Discussion, and Bookcases

2006-04-23T22:00:00.000-07:00

Today I did a lot of work adding furniture and plants to the library. In the smaller building the roof seemed too good of a place to have presentations, so I created a space there. I learned many things from that experience, and now I have created a space I like even better than the old one. The idea is that a presenter can stand behind the podium on the middle part of the roof and people can sit where they want, moving cameras to see. At any time we can copy chairs and add more if needed, but I tried to balance prim with need.

After I had my fun with the roof I took all the chairs I had that didn't fit well into the roof layout and created a discussion room. I tried to make it all a comfortable color, but I have the feeling the roof and the room are a bit on the girly side, instead of neutral.

After decorated the rooms I decided to try my hand an making carpet, which I am thrilled to say turned out very well.

My last voyage of the evening took me to a new place I hadn't been before that had copies of book and a 1 prim bookcase. I played with the privileges and tried to allow the bookcase to contain notecard books. I am still working on the functionality, and possibly security. If nothing else we could fill the bookcase with classics and allow patrons to take what they want for free. I have a feeling that people won't go to the trouble of making the books available on the free lot when they are already free at the library. It would seem like more trouble than its worth.

Relocation

2006-04-23T20:43:00.001-07:00

In a not-altogether-unanticipated move, Rain Noonan has traded our 2800 meter plot for a shiny new 4200 meter expanse. This gave us more room to install the larger version of the last building in use in Juanita (our old haunt). Getting the building in place was no easy task. On installation, it was facing the wrong way.

But with Rain Noonan and the unflagging assistance of Brackish Ludwig, the building was rotated into place. These shots show the process.

Of course, a building is just a building. Much credit must be given to Eiseldora Reisman, who spent much of the day decorating. Here she is showing off the rooftop picnic area.

And just a few other shots to give you some flavor (but sadly not much sense of the space as a whole).

And here's a shot of the exterior as it now appears, landscaped accordingly.

It's amazing how much dedication is being poured into this project. And we're only just beginning, so please join the fun. Go on, ask me how.

There's certainly been a great deal of interest from within the Second Life community. Visitors are already stopping by with curiosity, questions and offers of assistance. And I've heard rumors of some media coverage within the next week. Phenomenal.

On a side note, if you are not familiar with Second Life, teens have a separate "grid" or virtual world that they can (actually, they must) interact on. An effort has been initiated (thanks to Kelly Czarnecki) to provide library services within that unique space. Toward that end, Kelly has started a blog worth reading.

Another day in the (Second) Life

2006-04-23T06:12:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to learn something about how to do all the various content creation tasks that are possible in Second Life. So yesterday I attended a morning class about creating jewelry. In the end, I came home with a shiny diamond ring. I took a few more classes including an intro to snapshots and an intro to scripting, both of which were very helpful. I highly recommend taking advantage of all of the freely available educational opportunities that await you in Second Life.

So anyway, after the morning jewelry class, it was time for my usual jaunt to the library. To my surprise, our modern-style building was gone and had been replaced by a Roman villa.

It wasn't long before the villa had become a castle.

By the end of the day, this charming building emerged as the winner.

Much work was done getting things set up, including a lovely rooftop set-up (picture by childlit2004, apologies for the darkness).

But even at that point, we were discussing a larger version of the same building, so I know that we will continue tinkering. Expect more exciting developments on both the property and building fronts soon.

Programming begins

2006-04-21T21:10:00.000-07:00

Today was perhaps the first banner day for the Second Life Library 2.0, as we held our first in-world program. About 12 residents gathered in what has become the main meeting area to hear David King talk about bridging the gap between techies and non-techies. I was particularly excited that some of the residents in attendance were non-librarians who had seen the event listed in the Second Life events list and were curious enough to stop by. I think that alone demonstrates the potential reach that this effort can have.

Overall, the program went smoothly, as all OPAL programs do. It was enjoyable (if a little distracting) to have ongoing interaction with other avatars throughout the program. We had to explain to the non-librarians how to access the VoIP in the OPAL Auditorium. It will be interesting to see if we can bring that audio stream in-world using some of the available technologies. Same goes for the slides, although I imagine that this will be trickier.

So the activity did not stop when the program ended. There was some discussion immediately thereafter, but RL (real life) called me away. Later in the evening, the discussion was focused on the acquisiton of land and alternate concepts for our facility. We were joined by Katt Kongo of the Metaverse Messenger, who contributed some great ideas and supportive suggestions.

After so much talking and thinking, it was time to let loose, which meant a trip to The Blarney Stone in the Dublin sim, which is apparently a re-creation of the real thing. Here's a snap of three librarians on the dance floor.

A long day, but inspiring and rewarding. Much, much more to come.

Media coverage

2006-04-21T16:53:00.000-07:00

Helene points out that BusinessWeek is featuring Second Life in its cover story. Along with the main article, there's a slideshow featuring a selection of SL residents, some with the real life pictures juxtaposed with their corresponding avatar. I'd actually read the piece earlier today and found it entertaining enough. What I didn't realize at that time is that there is also an accompanying podcast.

Pitchfork Media published an article about the live music scene in Second Life. Although not mentioned in the article, it seems a fitting prelude to tomorrow's grand opening of Menorca, a sim dedicated to live music and promoting SL musicians. Tomorrow's opening features a lengthy live concert featuring some of the biggest names in SL music. Should be a good time. The venue looks nice at least:

Image by zenigma

Virtual attendance

2006-04-21T12:31:00.000-07:00

OPAL - Getting Along with IT Staff (36)
Originally uploaded by travelinlibrarian.

About twelve people assembled at the Second Life Library 2.0 this morning during David King's OPAL session. My snapshots can be found in my Second Life flickr set.

Reminder - Friday program!

2006-04-20T21:14:00.000-07:00

This is just a reminder that the first ever Second Life Library 2.0 program will be taking place this Friday morning at 8 AM Pacific. Please join us in-world for this groundbreaking event.

Getting Along with IT staff for Librarians and Educators
Date: Friday, April 21, 2006
Time: 8:00AM - 9:00AM (60 minutes) Pacific time, 10:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. central time
Location: Juanita (217,241)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Education
Cover Charge? No

Event description: Getting Along with IT Staff
David King, Acting ITS Director, Kansas City Public Library will be the presenter. Ever noticed that your co-workers' eyes start glazing over when you describe that custom XML app? Or, ever notice your network administrator's face start to turn red as you ask yet again for a "simple" explanation of why the Internet stopped working? This session covers the basics of how to jump communication hurdles between techies and non-technical staff. The problem is defined along with the steps to take, including what to do with jargon, how to handle training sessions, how to simplify describing a solution to non-technical staff, and how to describe technical problems and projects clearly. Gain some understanding of how techies and non-techies think and some strategies to improve communication in your work environment. This program is part of the Librarian's Continuing Education Seminar Series, sponsored by the Johnson County Library.

For voip, go to http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=67955673&p=0
type your name and click enter. Minimize window. If you do not have a microphone, you can ask questions via text chat.

Secondcast live taping tonight!

2006-04-19T17:14:00.000-07:00

If you're curious what a Second Life in-world program might look like, there is an opportunity tonight as Secondcast, a podcast dedicated to Second Life, will be recorded live in Pooley Auditorium at Pooley (253, 1, 50). Scheduled time is 7 PM Pacific (Secondcast site says PST, but I assume that's actually PDT). For those new to the environment, official SL time is set to Pacific (Linden Lab, the company responsible for SL, is based in San Francisco), so most events seem to revolve around that.

News courtesy of The Second Life Herald.

Update: Here's what that looked like, from a distance:

Welcome to Your Second Life

2006-04-18T17:24:00.000-07:00

Hi there. Name's Planetneutral Fackler. PF, for short. I'm all of four days old, but learning fast. Although I like to switch my style up often, here's a picture of me for your reference:

It's been an interesting first week of existence on "the grid," as the Second Life universe is generally referred. Although I signed on to satisfy my own curiosity, it did not take me long to seek out some purpose, a reason to stay in-world (another one of those terms used by "residents" to contrast with RL, or real life). And thankfully, the Second Life Library 2.0 was waiting for me.

The building itself was just about empty on my arrival, but the potential was obvious. I'd heard of some of the other programs that had taken place in-world, including an episode of Open Source with Chris Lydon. Placing the OPAL programming within that context seemed logical enough. Other possibilties are just beginning to be discussed. If you are interested in joining the discussion, please consider joining the Google group and then joining us via participation in Second Life itself. Lori will be posting details of an upcoming meeting, so stay tuned. And as she has already posted, there are a couple of programs already planned.

But even at this early stage, interesting things are already happening. I hope this blog can serve as a way to document said developments. Tonight's big success was the successful configuration of the media player. Here's a screenshot of four intelligent avatars trying to make it work (and one avatar relaxing):

Here's what the media player looks like in working form (showing the trailer for Syriana), although the full-screen option hadn't been set yet. It looks better than the screen capture suggests:

And every evening there seems to be a group of librarians turning up to socialize and find out what's new. Here's a snapshot of tonight's group:

I hope that this project will compel some new people to give Second Life a try. Toward that end, I'd like to offer my services to anyone who is entering Second Life for the first time and could use some guidance. I'm a relative newbie myself, so I can only offer a limited amount of mentoring, but a helping hand is a helping hand. So drop me a line or IM me (AIM, Yahoo) with the username planetneutral and I'll meet you there. Or find me in-world. Planetneutral Fackler's the name. But you can call me PF.

Update: Originally enormous image files have been replaced by convenient jpgs from Flickr.

Feed change

2006-04-18T17:05:00.000-07:00

On the odd chance that you've already subscribed to the feed for this blog, please be advised that I've redirected the feed to Feedburner. Please subscribe to the new feed at http://feeds.feedburner.com/secondlifelibrary. Thanks.

Programs at Second Life Library 2.0

2006-04-17T11:50:00.000-07:00

Getting Along with IT staff for Librarians and Educators
Date: Friday, April 21, 2006
Time: 8:00AM - 9:00AM (60 minutes) Pacific time, 10:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. central time
Location: Juanita (217,241)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Education
Cover Charge? No

Event description: Getting Along with IT Staff
David King, Acting ITS Director, Kansas City Public Library will be the presenter. Ever noticed that your co-workers' eyes start glazing over when you describe that custom XML app? Or, ever notice your network administrator's face start to turn red as you ask yet again for a "simple" explanation of why the Internet stopped working? This session covers the basics of how to jump communication hurdles between techies and non-technical staff. The problem is defined along with the steps to take, including what to do with jargon, how to handle training sessions, how to simplify describing a solution to non-technical staff, and how to describe technical problems and projects clearly. Gain some understanding of how techies and non-techies think and some strategies to improve communication in your work environment. This program is part of the Librarian's Continuing Education Seminar Series, sponsored by the Johnson County Library.

For voip, go to http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=67955673&p=0
type your name and click enter. Minimize window. If you do not have a microphone, you can ask questions via text chat.

Second Life Library 2.0 Book Discussion
Book Discussion
Date: Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Time: 5:00PM - 6:00PM (60 minutes) Pacific time, 7:00-8:00 p.m. central time
Location: Juanita (217,241)
Host: Rain Noonan
Category: Arts and Culture
Cover Charge? No

Event description: Book Discussion of "Norwood" by Charles Portis

Join us at the Second Life Library 2.0 for a book discussion led by Maxito Ricardo.

We will have this with audio. You need to log into the Second Life audio room at
http://67.19.231.218/v4/login.asp?r=37f95349&p=0
Type your name and click enter. Minimize this window. If you do not have a microphone, you can participate via chat in the Second Life Room. You will need to be in this room the same time you are in the Second Life Library to hear the audio.

And so it begins

2006-04-17T10:49:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the ~~unofficial~~ official(!) blog of the Second Life Library 2.0 Project. Much more to come...

Second Life Library 2.0

We've Moved

Rik Riel's Skating Tour of Info Island

Great program on Info Island by Jeff Barr, Amazon Technology Evangelist

Fantastic art show opening by Bucky Barkley on Info Island

New Library Search HUD by Damek Tretiak

PLCMC partners with Alliance Library system to open cultural/creative space in virtual world

Upcoming Programs for Info island and NMC Library

Blog moving to http://www.infoisland.org

You're Invited! Grand Opening of Second Life Library/Info Island

Book Making

Reuters health trial at medical library

Info Island This week: Halloween Haven of Horror to Science Center

Activities this week at Info island - "the Early Years of Elizabeth I"

This week at Info island: a glimpse of Info Island II

MAYA Avatars in the Underworld - XIBALBA

Info island this week

September 11 program draws 30 people

Talis announces winners of International Mashing the Library Up 2006: Alliance Second Life Library Project Wins Second Place!

New SciFi Fantasy Center; Science Center; more orientations

Tour for CMSU Writing Students; Library Beach Club

Upcoming Info Island Orientations for Librarians and Others

September 11 - Libraries Remember Display and Program

September11 - Libraries Remember

Aura Lily and Ancient Egypt in Second Life

Program on Academic Library Collaboration in Second Life

Libary of Congress American Memory Exhibit at Second Life Library Parvenu Towers; Anne Boleyn-Beloved and Beheaded

New Egyptian Exhibit by Aura Lily; This week at Info Island

Education in Second Life in Boston Phoenix

Search Central, Henry VIII, and Librarian's Night Out

Two Exciting Upcoming Mixed Reality Events: Virtual Worlds, Education and Libraries

This week at Info Island: Amazon in world Search and Henry VIII

Programs and Tours at Info Island

What A Week at Info Island!

Second Life Grid Down!

Second Life Library Program: Making Fiction Into Virtual Reality

Tech Soup to offer mixed reality event in person and in second life

Library webcast; Authors Woodward and Witt Discuss Dobbit Do

New Special Collections from Illinois State Digital Archives, OCLC provides database trials

Reference group to meet Thursday July 6

Lots of things going on at Info Island

ALS featured in Serious Games Source

Dobbit Do program at Second Life Library

Upcoming Event/Experiment

Games Learning and Society

Michael Stephens on OPAL and Second Life Library

Upcoming events at Second Life Library

Informal Learning

Upcoming events at Second Life Library

Miller and Lee a Hit! SciFi in the Sky

Second Life Library Presents: Entangled in Cyperspace with Science Fiction Authors Sharon Lee and Steve Miller

History Gallery Garden

Update on Second Life Library

EdTechTalk visits the library

Big News: An Island and Two New Partners!

New Library Writing and Performance Centre

A moment for Solitude

Introduction to Alliance Second Life Library 2.0

Google moves into virtual worlds

Exciting updates

Teen SL Library - Meeting Minutes, 5/7/06, Crossposted

The Brackeis Education Center

Great program, great speaker, great crowd!

Class tomorrow

Kiosk for Real Life Education Events in Second Life and other News

Second Life at Internet Librarian

My day in pictures.

Introduction to SL for newbie librarians

Second Life Guides

New Developments

Upcoming Programs at Alliance Second Life Library 2.0

Librarian stereotypes

Why the kilt had to die.

Clothing 101

Multi-tasking

See Also: Second Life on the brain

Vandals

First Organizational Meeting a Success

Front page news!

A very lovely day