Watson Library Wiki - Recently Updated Pages

Google Notebook

watsonlibrary — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 11:28:42 CDT

Google has a plethora of tools, many of which you’ve probably heard of, or already use. You need to create a Google Account in order to use some of these tools, including Google Notebook. To do so, just click on Sign In from the Google Home Page to get to the Google Accounts Login Page. N.B. You don’t have to have a Gmail account to get a Google Account. Simply enter any existing email you have - Hotmail, Yahoo, etc.
Once you've signed in, you will be brought back to the Google Home Page. Click on “My Account” at the top right to access your Google Account Page where you will find a list of any Google tools you have been using, including Notebook.
Google Notebooks is a great research tool because it allows you to clip and collect information as you’re browsing the Web. You can add clippings of text, images and Web links to Google Notebook as you find them.
In addition, you can access Google Notebooks from any computer with an Internet connection through your Google Accounts login.

This is how it looks:
- You can have more than one notebook – one for each research topic. They will be listed on the left.
- If we look at the Le Corbusier Notebook, you’ll notice I’ve divided it into various sections: General Information & Resources, Images, Textual Clippings and so on.
- If we look at the Gaudi Notebook you’ll see that I have a section for Video for an interview I found on YouTube. (The interview is with the author, Julio Cortázar, speaking about the effect of Parc Guell on his writings.)
This is how it works:
- Search the Web via Google Notebook. E.G. modernisme
- When you find a result you like, look for the link underneath it that says “Note This”. Once clicked upon it will change to “Duly Noted” and the Web site will be added to your Notebook.
- The window that pops up in the lower right corner is the mini-Google Notebook. You can see that our selected site has been added to the Notebook.
- If I click on the link for the site itself, then I can clip part of the text from that site directly into my Notebook. I can do that by copying and pasting it into a new note in my mini Notebook.
- When we go back to our Notebook (either from the Mini Notebook window using the Tools menu, or by going back to the Notebook already opened in another tab – if you choose the latter option remember to refresh), we should see our most recent additions at the top.
- You can then add a comment to your new notes (just click within the note itself), and you can drag and drop your notes to their appropriate sections within the Notebook.
- You can even drag and drop your notes between Notebooks, to reorganize your material.
Other things you can do with Google Notebook:
- You can search across all your Notebooks. This is an easy and quick way to retrieve your information. E.G. Search for Ronchamp
- You can also share your Notebooks with collaborators if you’re working on a joint project. Click on “Sharing Options” on the top right to get more information about that. It’s very straightforward.
  N.B. Your Notebooks are private by default.

Wikis

Anonymous — Wed, 20 Jun 2007 16:13:59 CDT

A wiki is basically a Web site that allows for collaborative authoring of documents. It’s a good tool for keeping a permanent record of information that needs to be updated and edited by more than one person. (N.B. This outline is a wiki that we authored together as a team).
Let's look at Case Western’s Graduate Art History Association wiki. We can see that in addition to their Table of Contents, there is also a search function that you can use to find documents and resources posted on the wiki. Click on “Guide to finding a museum job”. If I want to add to this list of resources, I can click on the Edit button. To edit I must login and be a registered user – so editing is restricted to individuals affiliated with Case.
Thus, the persons who create a wiki can determine who, if anyone, can edit that wiki. It can be anyone on the Web, or just selected individuals who are invited. So not all wikis are unvetted entities, which is what comes to mind when we think of something like Wikipedia. Like any other online tool, wikis can be authoritative sources if authored and edited by experts.
Here’s another wiki put together by the Bradley University librarians. It’s a repository of various art resources and guides which they are collaboratively authoring. They’ve made the decision that anybody can edit their wiki so that if I click the Edit button I’m able to start editing right away.

The great foolproof thing about wikis is that the history of changes that have been made to the wiki is maintained. So, by clicking on the History button, it’s always easy for editors and contributors to consult and, if necessary, revert back to, previous versions of a wiki article that has been modified.

Everyone’s heard of Wikipedia. It’s not an authoritative resource because there’s no formal peer-review process. And to be fair, Wikipedia does have a disclaimer that says they cannot guarantee the validity of the information found in their wiki. Thus, no one should be citing Wikipedia. However, many of the Wikipedia articles have a bibliography which points to authoritative sources that were used to write the article. For instance, in the entry on Mannerism, if you click on “Further Reading”, you’ll find a listing of books and essays, the majority of which are in the Watson Library.

This brings us to Citizendium.org which is a wiki project to create a reliable encyclopedia of information with articles contributed and edited by experts. In order to become an author or editor you must register and supply some information about your credentials in the field of expertise that you wish to write about. It’s slightly tougher to become an editor because you have to supply a c.v. with significant professional experience in Editing.
What’s great about Citizendium is that it’s using the open collaborative power of Web 2.0, and particularly of wikis, but with guidelines and best practices. This way it’s not just collecting random opinions, but ensuring a collective reliability. You're encouraged, as experts in your respective fields, to consider applying for authorship, and contribute to an authoritative free online compendium of knowledge.

Google Book Search

watsonlibrary — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 11:08:24 CDT

Another Google tool that you have probably heard of, but maybe not used, is Google Book Search. As Google describes it, you can "Search the full text of books to find ones that interest you and learn where to buy or borrow them."

Google started its digitization of books in conjunction with five major libraries in 2004. By now it has, according to an article in the New York Times*, digitized more than one million books.

A good example using Google Book Search is one based on a real reference desk question where a researcher was looking for books on paper history and paper manufacture in Holland for a paper conservator. WATSONLINE had a number of books on papermaking but only one or two we could connect to Holland, so we tried the search papermaking Holland OR dutch OR Netherlands in Google Book Search. We were happy to see how our terms came up in so many books.

Notice that there are different kinds of views depending on whether the book is in copyright and depending on agreements with publishers and authors. Notice that in the Charles Dard book, I can again search for the word Dutch and find many pages where it appears. Notice, also, that many of the older books have full view (public domain). These can be downloaded. There are “snippet” views for some books, which means you can see only small portions.

Some features of Google Books as can be seen in the Munsell book are:

About the book with basic bibliographic material like title, author, date, length and subject.
There may be key terms, references, contents, chapter titles.
There are usually links to bookstores and libraries.

Google Books is not the only digitized book game in town. Two older projects among others, Project Gutenberg and the Open Content Alliance, have digitized books in the public domain (roughly, books published before 1923). These books can be read online or downloaded, but are not full-text searchable.

Among the searchable digitized books you may already be familiar with Amazon’s Search Inside the Book. A relatively new entry in the book search process is Live Book Search from MSN. Try a search on papermaking in Live Book Search.

SearchEngine.com has a comparison of several book search products. Notice Book Search x 3 which allows you to search three book databases at once.

Finally, here are some reasons, in no particular order, to use Google Book Search:

Find a book about your subject
Find mentions of topics, people, art works
Find which books have most coverage of your topic
Verify a citation or a chapter heading
See the exact publication information
Find similar or related books
Find a name in a genealogy search
Supplement a library catalog search

We hope you find it a useful tool.

This concludes our overview of Web 2.0. We’ve squeezed a lot in but there’s always more to know. As was said in the introduction, members of the team would be glad to help you in any way we can with any of the tools discussed here. Just let us know.

*History, Digitized (and Abridged).(Money and Business/Financial Desk). Katie Hafner.
The New York Times (March 11, 2007): pBU1(L). (3744 words)

Podcasts

watsonlibrary — Fri, 15 Jun 2007 11:07:25 CDT

What is a podcast? ·

Podcasting is an appropriate next topic after RSS, because it also deals with the idea of syndicating or publishing something, this time audio, to many people at once. In addition podcasts can be delivered automatically using software capable of reading feed formats such as RSS. The term podcasting is a combination of iPod and broadcasting.
"A podcast is a multimedia file distributed over the Internet using syndication feeds, for playback on mobile devices and personal computers.”
In layman's terms, podcasting is audio on demand. Listen to what you want, when you want.

Our own museum has decided to promote content about its exhibitions and objects using podcasts. If we go to Metropolitan Museum Podcasts we see the icon that says we can subscribe to the series. Alternatively, we can download individual episodes.

Listening to Podcasts ·

Podcast series can be subscribed to in the same way that RSS feeds are and can be handled by the same readers like Google Reader or Bloglines. For example, in the Watson Library Google Reader I have subscribed to the Met’s podcasts and I can listen to (link to) any of the episodes such as the one on Washington Crossing the Delaware.
(Since I am using the same aggregator – all the elements of sharing, organizing and tagging are the same.)
I could also go back to the Met podcasts download an individual episode to my computer and play it. (E.g., download the Podcast on the Greek and Roman galleries, and play it.)
There is dedicated “podcatcher” software that you can download (at work you would need administrative privileges) such as iTunes or Juice where you can store subscriptions or episodes or music/audio files. These can be then synced with a portable device, such as an iPod or other mp3 player, for listening anywhere. (The screenshots at Juice give you an idea of how the audio files can be organized in these podcatchers.)

Searching for Podcasts
Searching for podcasts using directories and search engines is at present uneven. Most are searching the descriptive data around the podcasts. There is not much in the way of advanced searching. And coverage of podcasts sometimes depends on the the podcast creator registering the series with the search provider. That being said, there is still a lot you will find. We’ve listed several links for searching but let me show you the first, Podcast.net.

Podcast.net is straight forward. You can search by Title and Description or other fields. A search on museum art brings up various series. And within the series you can see and listen to episodes. Notice how many museums are creating Podcasts, it seems like a natural fit for “audio on demand”. If you search on National Geographic there is an interesting travel series called Walks of a Lifetime . Many universities and libraries have created Podcast series.
PodcastBlaster
PodcastInspector
PodcastAlley.com
Yahoo (podcasts.yahoo.com)

Tools that Search within Podcasts
These tools are actually searching the text of what was spoken in the podcast – speech recognition. They provide “chunking” of the search results, that is, they can take the user to a specific portion of the podcast where a specific word was spoken. It’s a great way to help skip into a 2-hour podcast to exactly the information they are looking for.

There are several but let’s look at Podzinger.

Podzinger.com "allows users to find audio and video content based on keyword searches and then skim the results for relevance the same way they would for text. Consumers can then "jump-to" a specific location in the audio and video without fast forwarding or listening to the entire file."
We can search on “jasper johns” (Go to MoMA Podcast and listen to the snippet or the whole thing)
Another feature about podzinger is RSS search alerts. Each search you perform generates an RSS feed and instructions for adding it to iTunes, Yahoo! Music Engine and standard RSS readers like Bloglines or Google Reader. So from my Jasper Johns search I added a feed and will get any new podcasts that Podzinger adds that contain the name Jasper Johns.

Uses of Podcasts. There are educational and entertainment reasons to listen to podcasts and we see that many museums are using them to provide information about their exhibitions and objects. Some other possible uses for creating podcasts might be:

curatorial and other departments might make podcasts describing their collections and/or processes for new staff, interns and fellows
the library could make podcasts about its resources
any audio information that is useful in an "on demand" way lends itself to podcasting.

Is it Difficult to Make a Podcast? Two members of our Web 2.0 made a Podcast with equipment-at-hand and lived to tell the tale! (Actually they said it was pretty easy.) You can see their advice below and you can listen to their Podcast at Odeo.

How do I make my own podcast?

How to Create and Promote a Podcast by About.com is one among many free online tutorials that provide step-by-step instructions on creating your first podcast.
Important tip: you'll need a home to store your audio files, such as a server. Don't fret if you don't have one: there are sites that will host your files for free, such as Our Media.

Google Scholar

Anonymous — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 15:24:51 CDT

The next two topics, Google Scholar and Google Book Search are not really Web 2.0 technologies. However we decided to include them because they are valuable web-based research tools.

Google Scholar is probably the more familiar and I will be brief. At some point Google decided to create a subset of its millions of scanned Internet webpages focused on scholarly material in order to better serve academic communities. The database for Google Scholar includes peer-reviewed and other articles, abstracts, technical reports, theses and books. Google gets this material from academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations. Some of the sources are Blackwell, Ingenta and PubMed. JSTOR, the database of full-text searchable journals to which Watson Library subscribes, also has a collaboration with Google Scholar.

Let’s do a search in Google Scholar with the words Venice Islam. What we should look for are articles that are not JSTOR (which we could search directly) but that look like they might supplement what I would find in our subscription databases. Of course we always have to evaluate our sources. There seem to be several articles that might be worth pursuing.

Google Scholar is particularly strong in science. This search paint raman OR spectroscopy gives a number of relevant looking articles analyzing paint make-up in art objects. In some cases full text will be available, more often just an abstract, but Google Scholar is acting as an index. Note that some articles have “cited by” numbers.

Google Scholar has strengths and weaknesses, some of which are listed here.

Advantages of Google Scholar

Metasearch for free.
Multidisciplinary.
You sometimes get full text, but citations and abstracts (especially of items that we do not have in subscription) are also useful.
Relevance ranking (What Google is famous for). Also shows the “cited by” counts (Cited by probably more useful for science)
Available from any Internet connection
Google name / Google Interfaces
When on-site, knows electronic availability (if Library Links is activated)
Good place to start researching an unfamiliar topic.

Disadvantages. The major questions about Google Scholar relate to the scope, coverage, and accuracy of the content.

Not clear what sources Google Scholar is including (lack of transparency).
Studies show Google Scholar misses some articles the native interface would find (Google Scholar searching JSTOR vs JSTOR searching JSTOR)
Data not always scholarly.
Some problems with search and display (faulty date logic and faulty OR logic)
No way of sorting by publication date
Can’t limit to peer-reviewed articles

Who Should Consider Using Google Scholar

Everyone should be aware of it.
Art History researchers will have more control over their searches and displays in specific databases like JSTOR or BHA. They will also know the exact scope of what they are searching. However, a Google Scholar search may find relevant material outside our holdings.
Scientists and Conservationists looking at scientific topics will find Google Scholar very useful.
For anyone, it’s a good place to start researching an unfamiliar topic.

Perhaps you want to add Google Scholar to your del.icio.us account!

RSS

Anonymous — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 20:23:31 CDT

These icons are commonly used
to indicate the presence of an RSS feed.

· Of the various terms in the Web 2.0 lexicon, RSS may be one of the less familiar.

RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated digital content such as blogs, news feeds, and Podcasts.

The initials RSS stand for, among other things, Really Simple Syndication. Instead of you going to all your favorite blogs and websites to see what’s new, you can have the new content syndicated, or published, to you. This is another example of the interactive nature of Web 2.0
This is what a raw feed looks like: Eye Level, a blog mentioned earlier, has a feed. On a more popular level there’s Netflix-New Releases. The feed file consists of headlines, a short text description and link to a web page. You can cut & paste the web address for a feed into an aggregator.

Since information can be “fed” to you – where do you find it? What you need to receive the information is a feed reader, or an aggregator. Feed readers help organize and deliver RSS feeds you have subscribed to. They will automatically check for and import new content, so you only have to visit one place to see your favorite information. Some feed-readers are:

Google reader : As with Google Notebook, you need a Google account to have your own Google Reader. You can easily create a free Google Account here. If you already have a Google account, just add Google Reader to it.
Bloglines : You can create a Bloglines account. Bloglines was one of the first popular readers.
Technorati - the focus here is on blog feeds.
NewsGator Online is becoming popular. There is also NewsGator Go which is a mobile version (synchronize your online reader with your Blackberry).

Let’s look at Google Reader. I’ve added a number of subscriptions to Watson Library's Google Reader. Let me point out:

That you can see which entries are new (meaning that you haven’t read them). Look at the entries for the New York Times feed of Arts and Design.
That you can see the entire source article (click on the arrow). Look at some entries in American Art.

That you can “star” items you find interesting
That you can share, tag and email items.

You can add a new subscription by finding the URL of the feed and pasting it into your feed-reader. E.g. You can add the Eye Level feed that we looked at before.
You can also use Google Reader to search for subscriptions. Try searching for the Drudge Report or Winterthur.

That you can organize your subscriptions into folders. You can unsubscribe very easily, so you can feel free to “try” certain subscriptions to see if you like them.

That all of this is web based and the content is not impacting your computer space. And the links mean that the content is not duplicated everywhere.

Live Bookmarks

A “live bookmark” is a feature of some web browsers like Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer version 7 that lets you easily add RSS feeds like you would a bookmark or “favorite”. Not everyone in The Museum has Internet Explorer 7, but many do. You usually know that RSS is available from a website when the orange RSS icon lights up. Live bookmarks are, like other bookmarks, machine specific. Live bookmarks might be a good way to test how you like the idea of a “feed” without even opening an account.
For example, we can go to the New York Times and choose one of their many feeds and subscribe.

Applications and Examples

Some journal publishers provide full text of new issues and some provide Table of Contents that are available through RSS. Some of the sites you might look in to see whether any of your favorite journals are available are listed here:

Some examples of journals with RSS feeds that we came across are:

Finding feeds. Finally, there are directories for RSS feeds like http://www.syndic8.com/ and http://www.2rss.com/. Or you can go to your favorite websites and look for the feed icons. It may be obvious at this point, that for almost any area of interest, professional or personal, there is a feed that will keep you updated.

Flickr

Anonymous — Tue, 29 May 2007 16:31:05 CDT

Flickr is an online tool for storing, presenting and sharing digital photographs or digital images. It’s a place where you can upload your own pictures, organize them, tag them, and then choose to make them completely public, completely private, or restrict them to a select group of colleagues.
Since Flickr is owned by Yahoo, you need to set-up a Yahoo account to use it, but it's completely free.
I'm going to login to Watson Library's Flickr account.

You can organize your photos into sets. Our Book Conservation set gives you a virtual tour of the Watson Library Book Conservation lab. Let’s look at this particular image (Book Conservation at a Glance).
Because I’m logged in, I can change the title of this photo, add a description, as well as notes within the image to highlight details. I can also add tags to the image. This information can then be searched by those who are allowed to view this photograph.
Here’s a great example of the use of the notes tool to highlight details within an image: http://flickr.com/photos/timothysschenck/70716448/. In this photograph notes have been used to label the ruins in the Roman Forum.

Take a look at the tags for this photograph. Notice that there isn’t a

link for me to add a tag. That’s because you can only tag photographs if the author allows you to. I can however, add a comment, as have several others. Thus, you can control how people interact with your photos in Flickr: you get to choose who, if anyone, can see it, who can make comments, who can add notes, and who can add tags. As with other Web 2.0 tools, contrary to popular opinion, there is a healthy degree of control you can have over your content and what people do with it.

Another thing you can do in Flickr is place your photo on a map to indicate where the photo was taken. This is called geo-mapping. Here’s another photo of the Roman Forum. If you click on the map link, you’ll see the mapping of this photograph. (Choose Hybrid view). You’ll also see other photos taken in the surrounding area posted by others.
Another thing to consider about Flickr is that it can be a good source of images. You can often find images in Flickr that you would not be able to find using a Google Image search. Searching by location, for instance, is a great way to find images of architecture in a certain place.
Sample Search: To find images of Le Corbusier’s chapel at Ronchamp you can enter the terms "le Corbusier" Ronchamp in the search box on the top right. Selecting a photograph from my list of results, I can click on the Rights information to see the permissions, and then proceed to download it if appropriate.
Here are a few examples of how Flickr has been used by Museums:
- This is a list of all the Museums groups in Flickr.
- The Brooklyn Museum has been very active in Flickr. Here are their sets of photos.
  - They’ve used Flickr to document museum events, like exhibition openings.
  - They’ve used Flickr to document the progress of ongoing museum projects like the Mut Expedition archaeological work at the Temple Precinct of the Goddess Mut at South Karnak. Looking at the Mut Precinct: Temple A set, you can see that they’ve really taken advantage of Flickr functionality in presenting their photographs. E.G. the Temple A-Front 1976 photo has notes labeling parts of the site, a description with links to further information, tags, and provides viewers with an opportunity to comment.

They’ve used Flickr to reach out to their audience by forming the Brooklyn Museum Group. This group gives their visitors a space to share their Museum experience by posting photos of their trip to the Museum as well as comments on the discussion board.

Social Bookmarking Sites (del.icio.us)

Anonymous — Tue, 29 May 2007 15:36:53 CDT

Del.icio.us is one of the many tools that fall under the rubric of Social Tagging or Social Bookmarking sites. In order to understand what that means, it’s useful to think in terms of the following concepts: Access, Tagging, Searching, and the Social element.

ACCESS:

When most of us find a Web site we like and want to be able to access again, we bookmark it in our Browser. If we’re using Internet Explorer as our Browser these bookmarks are called “Favorites.”
However, these bookmarks or favorites can only be accessed at the one computer where you have bookmarked them. If you’re at home, or traveling, or even working from multiple computers within the Museum, and you need to get access to these favorites, you can’t.

With Delicious you can. That’s the difference! Delicious is essentially an online account of your favorite Web sites that you can access anywhere, anytime.

How it works:

1) Go to http://del.icio.us/

2) Create an account – this is completely free and it’s a one-time set-up.

3) I’m going to login to a Delicious account that I set-up as an experiment for the Drawings and Prints Department.

4) Let’s say you’re surfing the Web and stumble upon a site you wish to bookmark. E.G. Search Google: Rembrandt draftsman Louvre

5) Copy the site’s URL and click on Post in Delicious.

6) Give your bookmark (post) a Description or Title – it's best to use the site’s title.

Now here’s where we get to the concept of …

TAGGING:

7) You can add TAGS to your bookmarks on Delicious. By adding descriptive keywords (tags) to your bookmarks, you will be able to easily find them again. (E.G. Tags: Rembrandt Drawings Louvre Exhibitions).

8) Your new post or bookmark should appear at the top of your list. Clicking on the hyperlinked title will bring you to the site.

9) Notice the list of tags on the right. The number next to a tag indicates how many sites you’ve tagged with that word. E.G. click on RareBookDealers

SEARCHING:

In your Browser (Internet Explorer), there’s no way to search your Favorites. You have to remember what the Web site was called and scroll down the list to get it, or remember what folder you might have put it in. In Delicious, you can simply find the sites that you bookmarked by searching for keywords. These can be words that are in the site’s title, or words that you used to tag the site. E.G. Search “incunabula” in your favorites on Delicious.

SOCIAL:

We've talked about tagging your bookmarks so you can search and access them easily within your Delicious account – but why is this activity called social tagging?
Here’s exactly why: In addition to searching your favorites, you can also search all of Delicious for the term “incunabula” and see what other sites people have tagged with that term. You can then add those sites to your account by clicking on “save this”. (E.G. Incunabula Database, Incunabula Short Title Catalogue). This is a really good way of finding related resources.

Please Note: Unless they are imported bookmarks from your Browser, all your posts are automatically “shared”, i.e. publicly viewable by everyone on Delicious. If you’d rather keep your bookmarks private you can do so by clicking on "Edit' and checking the box next to “do not share”.

Podcast Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 14:18:30 CDT

What is a podcast?

In layman's terms, podcasting is audio on demand. Listen to what you want, when you want, how you want.
Wikipedia's definition includes the following description: "A podcast is a multimedia file distributed over the Internet using syndication feeds, for playback on mobile devices and personal computers. The term, as originally coined by Ben Hammersley in an article in the Guardian on February 12, 2004, was meant as a portmanteau of "broadcasting" and "iPod". Like 'radio', it can mean both the content and the method of delivery; the latter may also be termed podcasting. The host or author of a podcast is often called a podcaster. Though podcasters' web sites may also offer direct download or streaming of their content, a podcast is distinguished from other digital audio formats by its ability to be downloaded automatically using software capable of reading feed formats such as RSS or Atom."
Podcast Expert: Lots of interesting info about podcasting. There's even going to be a Podcast and New Media Expo in September 2007!
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has a podcast series.

What do I need to listen to a podcast?

A portable media player, such as an iPod or mp3 player (you can also download and listen to them on your computer)

iTunes or other software for downloading files from the Internet, preferably from a broadband connection.

How do I listen to Podcasts?

You can subscribe to a series, and most subscriptions are free.
You can download individual episodes or podcasts to play on your computer or portable mp3 player.

Is there an aggregator for just podcasts?

Yes!
Instead of going to individual websites for their podcasts, you can use a podcatcher. A podcatcher is software that allows you to subscribe to your favorite podcasts using their RSS feed. When new content is available, your podcatcher will automatically download them for you. You can then listen to them on your computer or transfer them to your MP3 player.
We used Odeo to syndicate our podcasts. iTunes and Juice are other popular podcatchers.
You can also use regular RSS aggregators like Google Reader and Bloglines too.

How do I make my own podcast?

How to Create and Promote a Podcast by About.com is one among many free online tutorials that provide step-by-step instructions on creating your first podcast.
Important tip: you'll need a home to store your audio files, such as a server. Don't fret if you don't have one: there are sites that will host your files for free, such as Our Media.

Art-related podcasts

The Met's podcasts
NPR's Visual Arts podcasts
MoMA Audio (Note: Clicking this link will open MoMA's podcasts directly in the iTunes application)
Freer Gallery's podcasts
Corning Museum of Glass - Meet the Artist

Library podcasts

Searching for Podcasts

Podcast.net
PodcastBlaster
PodcastInspector: Not a Podcast directory itself, but a search engine that searches all the major Podcasting directories at once. Brought to you by the folks at PodcastPickle.com.
PodcastAlley.com
Yahoo (podcasts.yahoo.com)

Tools that Search within Podcasts: These tools are actually searching the text of what was spoken in the podcast – speech recognition. They provide “chunking” of the search results, that is, they can take the user to a specific portion of the podcast where a specific word was spoken. It’s a great way to help your user skip into a 2-hour podcast to exactly the information they are looking for.

Podscope.com (Podscope lets you search the spoken word for audio and video that interests you – searching the transcripts of the podcast.)
Podzinger.com (also searching audio and video – searching the transcripts of the podcast) Some results have transcript and highlighted words and you can just hear (and see) the snippet around the chosen word.
http://blinkx.com/ searches audio and video
Pluggd.com: search and share audio and video podcasts. HearHere, is their newest feature that makes it easy for people to find exactly and precisely what they want within an audio or video podcast.

An interesting article from Wired Magazine about how the text of audio files is searchable. There are several search engines mentioned in the article.

What can podcasts do for YOU?

Watson Library can create tutorials or other news that Met staff can subscribe to.
Visitors and graduate students can use podcasts for self-guided tours
Keep you informed, educated, even entertained.
S:\HAZEN CENTER\Podcasts\podcasts

Real-life scenario: A couple of weeks ago, I (Robyn) happened to be at the Reference desk when one of the contract lecturers here (who I think also teaches art history classes) came in looking confused. He said he was just told that he should consider doing a podcast for his class. He was concerned because he felt that if he did a podcast, no one would show up for class. So I sat him at one of the Hazen terminals and showed him how to listen to the Met's podcasts, because they give a good example of how a podcast can provide supplemental material to an exhibition, class, etc. MMA podcasts in no way replicate the audio tours, and do not tell you exactly what you see in the exhibition; rather they provide additional "bonus" material that helps you understand the exhibitions more thoroughly. I think the patron was pleased and had a better idea of what he needed to do.
This was interesting because although we hadn't thought about using podcasts yet in that way for Outreach, it goes to show that this is somthing that's probably going to be happening more and more. Hopefully now we can figure out a way to get IS&T on board with making it easier for MMA staff to create their own podcasts, not just listen to them.MuseumPods

Google Scholar Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:40:16 CDT

What is Google Scholar?

from Google Scholar
from Wikipedia
Google Scholar is a free service which searches for scholarly literature including peer-reviewed articles, abstracts, technical reports, theses, books.
It delivers citations to articles, books, links to full text, link to abstracts. Some full text will be free, some pay-for, some will be things we already subscribe to like JSTOR and Ingenta.

Google Scholar Data (where is it getting its scholarly material?)

What's included:

There is no list of sources. According to Google it includes academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations.
It is a fact that there are more full-text freely available sources for Science than for the Humanities on the Internet.
From Greg Notess in Aug. 2005: “Some prominent collections include ACM, Annual Reviews, arXiv, Blackwell, IEEE, Ingenta, Institute of Physics, NASA Astrophysics Data System, Pub Med, Nature Publishing Group, RePEc (Research Papers in Economics), Springer, and Wiley Interscience, although not all in their entirety. Many Web sites from universities and nonprofit organizations are included but only documents that seem like scholarly journal articles.”
We know that JSTOR is included in GS search now. You get an idea as you see results. Project Muse is included.

What's not included:

Elsevier’s online journals in Science Direct is one important science source not covered in GS. Elsevier launched its own search engine, Scirus in 2001 for scholarly journals in science. Many other science sources such as Pub Med are covered in both Google and Scirus.

Examples

raphael "colonna altarpiece" Shows many full-text articles from JSTOR, but also examples from some other journals which we subscribe to that are not in JSTOR (e.g., Renaissance Studies).
painting raman OR spectroscopy A science example. More science (vs humanities) indexes and articles are available free on the web.

Pros and Cons Advantages/Strengths:

Metasearch for free. Multidisciplinary. You sometimes get full text, but citations and abstracts (especially of items that we do not have in subscription) are also useful.
Relevance ranking (What Google is famous for). Also shows the “cited by” counts.
Available from any internet connection
Google name / Google Interfaces
When on-site, knows electronic availability (if Library Links is activated)
Good place for scholarly info on an unfamiliar topic.

Disadvantages/Weaknesses:

The major questions about Google Scholar relate to the scope, coverage, and accuracy of the content.
Not clear what sources GS is including (lack of transparency).
Studies show GS misses some articles the native interface would find (GS searching JSTOR vs JSTOR searching JSTOR) – (Example: Search for Raphael and “colonna altarpiece” yields 10 Jstor results in GS and 29 in JSTOR (Nov. 28, ’06))
Data not always scholarly
Some problems with search (faulty date logic and faulty OR logic)
No way of sorting by publication date

Who Should Use it at The Museum

Everyone should be aware of it.
Art History researchers will have more control over their searches and displays in specific databases (like Jstor or BHA). However, a Google Scholar search may find relevant material outside our current indexes or holdings.
Scientists and Conservationists looking at scientific topics will find Google Scholar very useful.
Departments such as Editorial and Education (or any individual) wanting to find scholarly information about any topic can certainly take advantage of Google Scholar.

Readings on Google Scholar

a list of readings about Google Scholar suggested by Jill Cirasella, Brooklyn College Library, at a Metro SIG meeting, October 18, 2006)
Power Point presentation from same meeting
Bell, Stephen J., and Michael J. Krasulski. What's Google Up to Now?
Notess, Greg R. Scholarly Web Searching: Google Scholar and Scirus
Tennant, Roy. Is Metasearching Dead?

Google Book Search Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:39:26 CDT

What is Google Book Search

From Google: "Search the full text of books to find ones that interest you and learn where to buy or borrow them."
From Wikipedia: "Google Book Search is a tool from Google that searches the full text of books that Google scans and stores in its digital database."

What you get:

"About the book" with basic bibliographic material like title, author, date, length and subject (doesn’t have place of publication).
You may get key terms, references, contents, chapter titles.
You almost always get links to bookstores and libraries where you can find the book

You also get one of four views of the book:

Full View: "If we've determined that a book is out of copyright, or the publisher or rightsholder has given us permission, you'll be able to page through the entire book from start to finish, as many times as you like. If the book is in the public domain, you'll also be able download, save and print a PDF version to read at your own pace."
Limited preview: if a publisher or author joins the partner program that Google Books has, you can see a few full pages – can conduct searches within book. Most limited preview books will be current.
Snippet View: For books that may still be in copyright. Give you up to three “snippets” in context. Can then search and get more snippets. Sometimes snippet doesn’t have the word you searched. Contents are not complete – seems to be an algorithm
No Preview Available: Just get the basic About. Dictionaries fall in this category. Get enough to know whether the word is in the dictionary.

Example: "colonna altarpiece". You will find at least one of each of these "views" represented there.

Controversy

From Wikipedia: "Google Book Search remains controversial. While many hail the initiative for its potential to offer unprecedented access to what may become the largest online corpus of human knowledge, the publishing industry and writers' groups have criticised the project as a copyright infringement. The Authors Guild of America and Association of American Publishers have individually sued Google, citing "massive copyright infringement." Google claims it represents fair use, and is the digital age equivalent of a card catalogue with every word in the publication indexed."

Uses

Find a book about your subject
Find mentions of topics, people, art works
Verify a citation
Verify a chapter heading
See the exact publication data
Find similar or related books
Supplement a library catalog search
Genealogy or biography - find a name
Creates readership for books
Check for plagiarism

Other Book Searches

Live Search Books
Amazon's Search within the Book
There are also Project Gutenberg and Open Content Alliance

A comparison of some booksearches.
Book Search x 3 allows you to search three book databases at once.
Read a children’s book, Happy Hearts, from the Internet Archive by flipping pages.

Readings/Reference

About Google Book Search
Inside Google Book Search (blog)
Kevin Kelly. Scan This Book!, New York Times Magazine, May 14, 2006.
Wikipedia's entry on Google Book Search
Download Books For Free From Google Book Search (Search Engine Watch blog)

Google Notebook Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:38:44 CDT

http://www.google.com/notebook

Allows you to clip and collect information as you browse the Web.
You can add clippings of text, images, and links from Web pages to your Google Notebook without ever leaving your browser window.
You can access your Google Notebooks from any computer by using your Google Accounts login.
Since Google Notebook lives in your browser, you won't be left with a scattered collection of notes, Word docs, and browser bookmarks to sort through; all your web findings will be gathering into one organized, easy accessible location that you can access from any computer.
You can share your Google Notebook with the world by making it public. You can also invite collaborators.

Blogs

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:35:33 CDT

Everyone’s heard of blogs by now. I think, however, the difference between a blog and a regular Web site, needs to be clarified.

A Web site typically consists of static pages that can only be edited and added to by the authors of that Web site – i.e. the people that are controlling content and doing the coding. A blog, on the other hand, is something dynamic, which can be added to by anyone within a certain community. (It should be noted that while many blogs are entirely public, it is possible to restrict a blog so that it is viewable only to a certain group of people.)

We’re looking at Eye Level, the Smithsonian American Art Museum Blog. By clicking on the About link we see that the blog’s purpose is to encourage discussion beyond the walls of the museum, and to encourage collaboration between curators, conservators, critics, and bloggers. We can also see that Eye Level has an authoring team which includes Eleanor Harvey, the Chief Curator.
If we go back to the Home Page of Eye Level and scroll down we can see what are called entries or “posts” by members of the authoring team presented in reverse chronological order.
One big difference between a blog and a Web site is that many blogs, such as this one, invite users to comment on their posts. You can comment on a post by clicking on the comment link at the end of it. Here you’ll see the SAAM policy on submitting comments. Their policy encourages commentary; “Lively discussions and different opinions are encouraged.”, but also lets you know that comments are moderated and will be edited or deleted if they are questionable or off-topic. Thus, there is a healthy degree of control that blog authors can have over their blog – it’s not just something that is out there in the wild. There are ways of making sure that an interactive environment like a blog works properly as a collaborative space.

Another great feature that blogs have is their search function, which allows you to retrieve all current and archived posts and comments by searching on keywords. In this way blogs are much better organizational tools than email or storage drives which are difficult, if not impossible to search. Let’s look at the Walker Art Center Visual Arts Blog. If I want to find the post announcing the Director Kathy Halbreich’s departure I can simply search on the keywords “Kathy Halbreich departure” and get right to that entry, along with all its comments.
What also makes blogs very unique is their ability to bring in content from other sources (like journals, newsletters, and other blogs or sites) and aggregate them into one place. Blogs can also incorporate other media, such as video and audio files. (The video file is from the Walker Art Center post on “Sweater Sculptors”, and the audio file is from the Renaissance Blog of Professor Peter Gillgren from Gotland University, Sweden.)
So, a blog is a great way to keep a particular audience, or people within a discipline, informed about the latest relevant news. It’s a way of sharing information quickly and collaboratively. A nice example of a blog that does this very well and simply is The Art History Newsletter, which is a collaboration among several Art History Doctoral students. If you click on the About Link, you’ll find their mission statement: “We synopsize news and opinion of interest to art historians and provide original reporting on conferences, lectures, and other special events.”

Google Tools Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:30:18 CDT

You need to create a Google Account in order to use many of the Google tools outlined in this section.

Google Accounts Login Page: https://www.google.com/accounts/Login

Google Docs & Spreadsheets

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:22:29 CDT

Google Docs & Spreadsheets is an example of a Web-based text editor. Such editors provide an online location to create documents, including spreadsheets in this case, that are then accessible from any computer, and they allow collaborative editing, comments, and tracking of changes.
Reasons to use an online text editor or spreadsheet:

Share documents with people who don't have access to your local Share drive -- including other Museum staff
Work simultaneously with collaborators
Easy to use, but capable of more complex modifications
Access documents from any computer with Internet access, anywhere -- add references from the library of Alexandria while you're there
Avoid creating multiple versions, so you're always working in the most updated text
See changes easily
Discussion forums for tricks, problems, and new ideas
Make documents available via other Web tools -- put your material in play with everything else on the Web

Disadvantages:

Formatting options may be limited (or require some new learning)
If your internet access is severed, you're (temporarily)sunk. (But the file will be waiting for the next time you're online - the data won't be lost if your computer crashes.)

Some examples:

Dan Lipcan has used Google Spreadsheets to make a list of auction houses and their call numbers that combines and cleans up data from several other lists. The key feature: the program let him publish the list as a Web address that can now be linked to by the Watsonline homepage, so any library user can click on the link and search on or print out the list.

You can find all kinds of samples. Here's a link to a Lifehacker suggestion on using Google Spreadsheets for holiday card mailings. And check out the comments from the supergeeky user who tracks the status of her outgoing Christmas presents with it! And the soon-to-be bride who updates her wedding music playlist with it!

Other similar tools:

Writeboard: The Writeboard form is extremely open and simple, and might be preferable for short texts or for collaboration with less-computer-savvy colleagues. Just as there are an almost endless suite of Google Tools, but the makers of Writeboard have created a set of

RSS Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:10:32 CDT

These icons are commonly used
to indicate the presence of an RSS feed.

Here's what it is

This basic definition of web feed may be very helpful to explain the general concept: RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated digital content such as blogs, news feeds or podcasts. (WK).
Wikipedia's entry - For users, a method of subscribing to your favorite websites. For content creators, RSS provides a standard format for pushing your content out to subscribers automatically.
This is what a raw feed looks like: NYT - Art and Design - You can cut & paste the web address for this feed into an aggregator.

Feed readers, aka Aggregators

Feed readers help organize and deliver RSS feeds you have subscribed to. They will automatically check for and import new content, so you only have to visit one place to see your favorite information. You must create an account in order to use one of these tools.

Bloglines : Watson Library has a Bloglines account here: http://www.bloglines.com/public/watsonlibrary. Bloglines is one of the most popular readers.
Google reader : excellent if you have a Google account.
Technorati - the focus here is on blog feeds.

NewsGator Online is becoming popular. There is also NewsGator Go which is a mobile version (synchronize your online reader with your Blackberry.)

Live Bookmarks

A “live bookmark” is a feature of some web browsers like Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer version 7 that lets you easily add RSS feeds like you would a bookmark or “favorite”. Your know that RSS is available when the orange RSS icon lights up. Live bookmarks are, like other bookmarks, machine specific.

How to set up and use RSS feeds (1)

Get a feed reader by downloading software or creating an account
Find feeds you're interested in
Add these feeds to your reader
Check your reader regularly for new content

How to set up and use RSS feeds (2)

Use a "live bookmark" enabled web browser, e.g. Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer version 7 (at MMA some of us are still on version 6)
Add live bookmarks to a specified folder
Check the feeds at your leisure

Finding feeds

There are web site directories for feeds such as:
- http://www.syndic8.com/
- http://www.2rss.com/
Also, some aggregators, like Google Reader, allow you to search for RSS feeds
Or, you can go to your favorite sites to see if they have a feed.

Applications and Examples

Tables of contents for scholarly journals. Sometimes abbreviated TOCRSS, this is a very exciting application of RSS technology and one that's appropriate for our patrons. Here is a list of some of our journal providers who have TOCRSS feeds:
- Cambridge Journals Online
- Peeters Online Journals
- University of California Press (Caliber)
- University of Chicago Press Journals
  
  Some sample TOC journals are:
- Classical Antiquity – TOC
- October – TOC
- Journal of the American Musicological Society - TOC
- Leonardo - TOC

There are also some full text feeds that are free:

American Art
African Arts
Revue d'Égyptologie
Winterthur Portfolio

New library material
- Watson Library's My Library Account. Though not strictly an RSS feed, we can email you automatically when new material in your subject area is added to our collection.
- Bury Libraries, UK. They have a variety of feeds notifying patrons about new acquisitions -- they are also an Innovative library. [remove?]
- [investigate & edit] The Shifted Librarian recently posted a call for libraries with RSS feeds embedded in their catalogs, available at her wiki. It's organized by ILS vendor, and there's an Innovative example in the bunch.
Sample non-art feeds:
- New York Times RSS
- Orbitz RSS

Overview pages

dmoz page for RSS

Keeping Current about RSS

You can follow the blog RSS4lib

Wiki Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:09:48 CDT

What is a wiki?

Wikipedia is the most famous wiki. Here is their definition of 'wiki':

A wiki (IPA: [ˈwɪ.kiː] <WICK-ee> or [ˈwiː.kiː] <WEE-kee>[1]) is a website that allows the visitors themselves to easily add, remove, and otherwise edit and change available content, typically without the need for registration. This ease of interaction and operation makes a wiki an effective tool for mass collaborative authoring.

Another notable example of a wiki is here.

Examples

* http://www.world66.com/ and http://wikitravel.org :Two wikis for travel information.
* This is a wiki for a resource guide, in this case business information resources.

Platforms (or wiki farms)

A "wiki farm" is a server or a collection of servers that provides wiki hosting, or a group of wikis hosted on such servers. Wikis can be free or paid for. An article in Wikipedia compares Wiki Farms: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_wiki_farms
* PBWiki
* WikiSpaces
* MediaWiki

Advantages

* Customize as much or as little
* Easy to learn and edit
* Can be updated by anyone & everyone from anywhere with an Internet connection
* Provides a central repository for group-edited documents
* Can easily revert back to previous versions
* Access to editing permissions can be limited to registered users
* Findability
* Many free wikis available

Disadvantages

* Vandalism (or inadvertant mistakes) - manageable but requires oversight
* Can be disorganized
* Concerns about ownership
* Not all wiki editing is intuitive

Wikis versus Blogs

* Here's one opinion: Stewart Mader on Wiki vs Blog. The core of his argument is "...blogs are a better communication tool when you want to get information out to people, and want to enable feedback, but keep the original text intact. Wikis are better when you want information to be touched - and enhanced - by as many hands as possible."

wiki	blog
No one owns content	A person owns their own post
No specific organization	Organized in reverse chron. order
Anyone can edit others' work	Author edits, others comment
Perpetual work in progress	Posts are permanent
Good for collaborative work	Good for starting dialogue and for disseminating information

Applications?

* Curatorial departments can share links & resources
* Some institutions are using wikis as an intranet
* A Reference wiki could include:
** Subject guides
** Pathfinders and tutorials
** Info for staff: policies, etc.
** Anything we need to keep track of in a more static (but edit-friendly) format
** Example: University of Huddersfield, UK
* Lots of personal applications too. After 5 pm, please. [http://ourbooks.wikispaces.com/ | A book club example!]

Some good reading

* A ''New Yorker'' article from July 31, 2006: Know it all : can Wikipedia conquer expertise?
* This article is two years old, but still descriptive of Wiki features: Wide Open Spaces: Wikis,Ready or Not
* Discusses using wikis to communicate with patrons: Using Wikis to Create Online Communities
* Some considerations before you start: So You Want to Build a Wiki?

Blog Research

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:09:17 CDT

What is a blog?

"blog" is short for "weblog"

Definition from Wikipedia :

a website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order.

often provide commentary or news on a particular subject
the "commenting" feature of blogs allows readers to post responses to author's entries
typically combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. Most blogs are primarily textual although some focus on photographs (photoblog), videos (vlog), or audio (podcasting), and are part of a wider network of social media.
blogs can be usually be navigated by the reader using "catagories" or the archive links; some blogs have search engines for their own content
blogs often link to content in their posts, either to other websites or other blogs

Common blog terms :

"post" - (n.) an entry on a blog; (v.) to publish an entry on a blog
"permalink" - the url for a specific blog post
"categories/tags" - subject words assigned to a post by the author that describe the post's content; a way to organize posts
"Trackback/pingback" - links to other sites that refer to the post
"blogroll" - a collection of links created by the author of a blog to other blogs and websites, usually found in the sidebar

How to find blogs

1. Though blogs increasingly show up in regular Google searches, etc., there are also search engines that look for blogs exclusively.

Examples:

Google Blog Search
Google Reader
Technorati
Blogdigger
Bloglines
Feedster
IceRocket
PubSub
Sphere

2. Browse the blogrolls of blogs that you already like to read.

Aggregators

(see the RSS page for more information)

Aggregators keep track of blog feeds for you so you don't have to check your favorite blogs everyday to see if something new has been posted.

Examples:

Bloglines
Google Reader (see the Google Reader page for more information)

Creating Blogs:

Blogs are easy to create and some sites will host your blog for free. Blogs can be public or private.

Example:

Blogger

Some examples:

Museum blogs:

Walker Art Center hosts a number of blogs
Visual arts
Off Center
Education
New media
All of Walker's blogs

Smithsonian American Art Museum
Eye Level

Blogs about museums:

Museum Madness
Mario Bucolo Museums Blog

Art blogs:

Modern Art Notes

Subject specific:

Egyptology blog
Egyptology news
Southeast Asian Archaeology News Blog (SeAArch)
Material World (an interactive, online hub for contemporary debates, discussion, thinking and research centred on material and visual culture)

Companion blogs to journals:

Museum Anthropology
Artforum / Diary

Library blogs:

The Robert Goldwater Library

Original Research Materials

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 11:03:10 CDT

There is no abstract available for this page revision.

Introduction

watsonlibrary — Tue, 29 May 2007 11:01:04 CDT

Welcome to our introductory overview class on Web 2.0.

Until a few years ago, the Web could be defined as a network of largely static Web sites which were authored by one person, or a body of people, and passively received by users. Web 2.0 is a way of referring to tools that exist on the Web which are interactive because they allow the user to collaborate in their creation. In this “next generation” of the Web, users are able to tailor online tools to suit their particular needs.

Here are some points that Web 2.0 technologies have in common:

-They harness the collective intelligence of a community by encouraging collaboration rather than just a one-way transmission of information.

-They live on the Web, so they can be accessed anywhere, anytime, and you don’t need special software to use them.

-They are intuitive, so you don’t have to be an expert to use them.

We’d like to give you a quick tour of nine Web 2.0 tools that we’ve identified as currently predominant, and which we think might help Museum staff with their research, administrative and organizational needs.

If anyone is interested in learning more about any of these tools, the Watson Library has a Web 2.0 team whose members will be happy to meet with you either individually, or as a group. Just let us know!