Task 9....summerise my thoughts...

Summerise my thoughts on this program hey....

Can I be honest? It is not anything new for me, but then I am a tragic computer geek, so I would hope it's nothing new. But it is good to see everyone jumping on board and becoming better educated about the opportunities this technology involves. It can only be a good thing. And I think the added level of connectedness and communication it can offer, can only do better things for human relations.

Maybe it can help reduce some of the human disconnectedness we have dealt with while using the Internet. It has always been a double edged sword. More communication, but I'm not sure that it offered more human quality to that communication. So now that is slowly starting to change.

Task 8....online Apps

Google maps.....

Can it get much better really?

This site allowed me to not only plot out and record my entire trip to Queensland, but thanks to the level of detail in many places allowed me to get a feel for the roads I was going to be riding down in some locations and have some idea of the kinds of conditions I was going to be encountering.

And now with google street view, as much as I am worried about the general privacy issues, it enables me to have a snoop around the streets of the location I am trying to get to, and pick out some of the land marks ahead of time. So when I am riding and I don't really have the freedom to consult a map on the go like you would do in a car, I can often navigate to my destination with just the visual landmarks I have memorised in google street view, even if I have never been there before.

On top of that, there is now the option for things like GPS tagged photos to be added to the maps as well, so that even if the overhead satalite maps are getting a bit long in the tooth, a local could throw up a few recent photographs tagged to a particular location, showing what it is like now?

Want to know what sunset off a particular pier looks like, there you go!

So it is this ability to mash together coherantly all these different sorts of data to give people a broader picture that is one of the best features of Web 2.0 and it's associated technologies. It gives context to the data, instead of just making it a pile of facts. Much like the work we librarians do really. So we could see it as a bit of a kindred spirit I guess.

Task number 6......

Hmmm,

Blog about my views on Web 2.0 and the future of libraries......

There is really only one response to this.....WORLD DOMINATION!!!!

Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah....... Bwuhahahahahah.......

Ahh hem...yes, did I say that out aloud?

Yes....we don't need to be the gatekeepers of the information any more.....but you watch that information overload and watch them come running back to us to make sense of it all :)

Library Thing....

See....I can do cataloguing I can.....



Sort of :)



http://www.librarything.com/catalog/Garou

Activity 3!!!!!

Well it's only 5 months.....thats not long is it??

I have been busy....off being piratical and all that sort of thing....yeah, that'll do.....being piratical!!

So I finally getting some time to work on some of the activities and we are up to supposed to put up a posting about something technological that Interests us......but in true anti social form I'm going to throw out the rulebook on this post and do something more interesting...

(Sorry, I work with technology every day, a pirate can only bear so much geeking....well that kind of geeking anyway).

So instead I'm going to give you a whole new form of geeking to roll your eyes at and get bored with very quickly, I'm going to post a couple of pictures from a favourite website of mine that displays magnificant paintjobs for Warhammer miniatures.

The website is called Cool mini or not and some of these guys are just true artists, if a bit geeky for most social circles. So here are just a couple of my favourites.....

Now bear in mind, these may not appear to be major works of art at first blush..... but these models are only approximately 25mm tall. This kind of detail is not for the weekend fence painter like me!!

This is the kind of detail i would like to be able to put on a gaming table one day though. So lots of practice ahead of me.

Oh, and if you still want a technology angle....the figuring is called a Big Mek....as in Mekanic so there!

'Er we go 'er we go 'er we go....

Ok, so this is the beginning of a new blog, dedicated to one of those uber little geek art forms, otherwise known as wargaming. In this particular case my game of choice being Warhammer 40,000. A nice little Sci-fi game which involves collecting, painting and playing with little plastic and metal miniatures, some standing only about 2.5cm tall.

If your not familiar with wargamming, then why not head over to this article at Wikipedia that can tell you all about it.

Usually I play in fits and starts, because I don't really have the time and patience to devote to painting and modelling all those figures, however there is a tournament coming up for all of us little wannabe Hitlers next year in January called Arcanacon, and I'm hoping not to disgrace myself there.

The theme for Arcanacon in '09 is going to be Steampunk, which is a kind of Jules Verne'sk Victorian Science Fiction, once again Wikipedia to the rescue. My little band of toy soldiers is going to need to be designed for that theme. So now it's just a matter of figuring out what sort of Army I want to have. There are quite a few races to choose from in Warhammer, so I will have to do some reading of the books from the game, and see who fits the theme.

So enough writing for now, it's off to do some research....