Hmm, I didn't go so well with this exercise. I am not really an 'audio' person. I don't listen to the radio and would much rather watch something than listen to it (ie I'd rather read a book than have someone read it to me).
I did a search of Podcast Alley for Liechtenstein and came up with a 'school' in Liechtenstein that supposedly does them. I am a tad confused as to what the school is though because, after watching the podcasts (which all turned out to be videos), it looks like it is a school for Jonny Knoxville wannabees. Ah well.
The search engine sucks, I tried finding a podcast on Dana International (an Israeli singer) and ended up with all the podcasts with the word Dana OR the word International in it. I couldn't figure out how to get only the ones with both.
I then just randomly clicked on one of the podcasts on the front page (some Harry Potter one called MuggleCast) and the first entire minute and a half was taken up with ads...one for something called GoDaddy.com with some lecherous sounding man...ugh.
Just a note...the size of some of the podcasts is HUGE. The one I started listening to was 24meg for 44 minutes. I guess that's not too much really...not compared to video files.
If I see podcasts of things I'm interested in then I might listen to them, otherwise I don't really see myself doing this on any regular basis.
For a library, I think it would be good to podcast interviews with local residents for a local history project, or even podcasts of speakers that come to the library (if you can get the permission of the speaker that is). I've seen some libraries do podcasts about their libraries...'the reserve collection is kept on the second floor of the Dumbledoor Library'...that kind of thing (yes, I'm still listening to the H.Potter podcast). I'm not sure about this, I guess for people who are more audio-based it would be a good idea.
Showing posts with label Liechtenstein. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Liechtenstein. Show all posts
Friday, October 5, 2007
#14 Getting not-so-technical with Technorati
Today's post comes courtesy of my friend's laptop and is made using Windows Vista. An interesting experience which involves lots of pretty (but useless) things that slow down my 'computer experience'.
Anyways, today I looked at Technorati. Oddly enough, a search for Learning 2.0 (in the blogs tab) does NOT bring Helene Blowers blog up first. Luckily it's on the first page, but LibraryBytes is down the bottom of the first page when I performed my search. She's lower down because she has less 'Authority' (click on the word to read Technorati's definition).
Because Library 2.0 is kind of boring to search for (I think I've had enough of it for this week), I searched for Liechtenstein (bet you didn't see that coming!). As of today (October 5, 2007), there were 3663 blog posts about Liechtenstein (the first was a Runescape guide of all things), 33 blogs about Liechtenstein (including one called the Liechtenstein National Blog which wasn't in any of the languages spoken in Liechtenstein) and some videos and photos of Liechtenstein which were mostly crap. For some reason, a lot of sites on Liechtenstein are in Japanese...I'm wondering if it's a popular Japanese tourist destination...then again, one of the sites was on getting an internship in Liechtenstein so maybe Japanese bankers want to work there due to the lack of tax.
With the search results, they seem to be chronologically ordered for blog posts and popularly ordered for blogs. Great for blogs I guess, bad for posts. The Runescape thing only mentioned Liechtenstein because Runescape now has more players than Liechtenstein has residents (34,247 residents of Liechtenstein according to the CIA World Factbook entry.
All in all, I think Technorati is probably the best blog search engine of them all (even if it's not the most comprehensive, it was very easy to use) and I've signed up and all so that other people can read the boringness that is my life.
Speaking of my life, hi to all the CCLC readers out there!!!
Anyways, today I looked at Technorati. Oddly enough, a search for Learning 2.0 (in the blogs tab) does NOT bring Helene Blowers blog up first. Luckily it's on the first page, but LibraryBytes is down the bottom of the first page when I performed my search. She's lower down because she has less 'Authority' (click on the word to read Technorati's definition).
Because Library 2.0 is kind of boring to search for (I think I've had enough of it for this week), I searched for Liechtenstein (bet you didn't see that coming!). As of today (October 5, 2007), there were 3663 blog posts about Liechtenstein (the first was a Runescape guide of all things), 33 blogs about Liechtenstein (including one called the Liechtenstein National Blog which wasn't in any of the languages spoken in Liechtenstein) and some videos and photos of Liechtenstein which were mostly crap. For some reason, a lot of sites on Liechtenstein are in Japanese...I'm wondering if it's a popular Japanese tourist destination...then again, one of the sites was on getting an internship in Liechtenstein so maybe Japanese bankers want to work there due to the lack of tax.
With the search results, they seem to be chronologically ordered for blog posts and popularly ordered for blogs. Great for blogs I guess, bad for posts. The Runescape thing only mentioned Liechtenstein because Runescape now has more players than Liechtenstein has residents (34,247 residents of Liechtenstein according to the CIA World Factbook entry.
All in all, I think Technorati is probably the best blog search engine of them all (even if it's not the most comprehensive, it was very easy to use) and I've signed up and all so that other people can read the boringness that is my life.
Speaking of my life, hi to all the CCLC readers out there!!!
Friday, September 28, 2007
#12 Roll your own search engine with Rollyo
Firstly, let me just say thankyou to Jewinda of Library Shenanigans for her idea to add StatCounter to my blog. S/he doesn't know about me at all but I liked the idea after reading her blog (I'll be able to see where in the world people are coming from!). Her blog is very amusing, I LOVE the review of The Post-Birthday World (The characters were self-indulgent, boring twats...bland, bland, bland).
On to today's activity...Rollyo. Rollyo allows you to create a customised search engine. I had a search using the Public Domain E-Books search engine for Alice in Wonderland...the results weren't anything special and the paid ads that are popped in the middle of my results are hard to distinguish from the actual results.
I registered and, when I went to create my search roll, I found no way to use a generic *.xxx type thing (ie a search roll that would search all Victorian government sites would be *.vic.gov.au). I looked for the non-existant help files for a while...naughty naughty naughty! Help is always good. Finding the search-roll after I'd created it wasn't too easy either.
AHA! If I type in .li as the website, it finds anything in Liechtenstein. Although I just found out that it ONLY searches top level domains, so if you find a subdirectory you want to allow your search engine to search through...tough (ie a wikipedia article or the cia's Factbook).
Rollyo is a good idea but I'm not too keen on the limitations.
PS I do love how I can make the widget search my blog though!
On to today's activity...Rollyo. Rollyo allows you to create a customised search engine. I had a search using the Public Domain E-Books search engine for Alice in Wonderland...the results weren't anything special and the paid ads that are popped in the middle of my results are hard to distinguish from the actual results.
I registered and, when I went to create my search roll, I found no way to use a generic *.xxx type thing (ie a search roll that would search all Victorian government sites would be *.vic.gov.au). I looked for the non-existant help files for a while...naughty naughty naughty! Help is always good. Finding the search-roll after I'd created it wasn't too easy either.
AHA! If I type in .li as the website, it finds anything in Liechtenstein. Although I just found out that it ONLY searches top level domains, so if you find a subdirectory you want to allow your search engine to search through...tough (ie a wikipedia article or the cia's Factbook).
Rollyo is a good idea but I'm not too keen on the limitations.
PS I do love how I can make the widget search my blog though!
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
#9 Finding Feeds
Hmm, this didn't go so well either (probably because it is to do with rss which stands for either Really Stupid Stuff or Randomly Stuffed Scribble...I can't remember which).
I started by picking websites I sometimes go to. None of them had rss things on them...not that I could find them even if I wanted to as the symbols are always tiny!
I then tried searching Google Blogs thing. It searched the contents of blogs (great for if I wanted to find a post) but not the general topic...all I wanted was a blog on Liechtenstein (maybe just a news blog...I couldn't find an rss feed on the Liechtensteiner Vaterland which just goes to prove that I am destined to be rss-less).
Next step...Feedster. Same problem as Google Blog Search.
Topix on the other hand...I searched for Liechtenstein. Not only did it do the above but it also recommended that I look at the Liechtenstein News page which was just what I wanted. Down the bottom in tiny little letters was the rss area. Did you know that Prince Hans-Adam II von and zu Liechtenstein is worth US$4.5 billion and is the 6th richest royal in the world? Lucky bugger.
With Technorati I did like the tabs that let me filter my search from blogs/videos/etc (even if all the photos were holiday snaps of people I didn't know).
With the database search, I found an orange button and clicked it (which turned out to be an rss button luckily). What I am sent daily is a list of articles relating to my search term. I can click on a button to access the full text (which hopefully means I won't need to log in...I will have to try from home).
I started by picking websites I sometimes go to. None of them had rss things on them...not that I could find them even if I wanted to as the symbols are always tiny!
I then tried searching Google Blogs thing. It searched the contents of blogs (great for if I wanted to find a post) but not the general topic...all I wanted was a blog on Liechtenstein (maybe just a news blog...I couldn't find an rss feed on the Liechtensteiner Vaterland which just goes to prove that I am destined to be rss-less).
Next step...Feedster. Same problem as Google Blog Search.
Topix on the other hand...I searched for Liechtenstein. Not only did it do the above but it also recommended that I look at the Liechtenstein News page which was just what I wanted. Down the bottom in tiny little letters was the rss area. Did you know that Prince Hans-Adam II von and zu Liechtenstein is worth US$4.5 billion and is the 6th richest royal in the world? Lucky bugger.
With Technorati I did like the tabs that let me filter my search from blogs/videos/etc (even if all the photos were holiday snaps of people I didn't know).
With the database search, I found an orange button and clicked it (which turned out to be an rss button luckily). What I am sent daily is a list of articles relating to my search term. I can click on a button to access the full text (which hopefully means I won't need to log in...I will have to try from home).
Sunday, September 16, 2007
My ideal place
http://www.landesbibliothek.li/ *drool* A library...in Liechtenstein. I want to work there.
