Library Assessment…12.30.11

100 Things to Watch in 2012…12.30.11

TEDxRainier – Chrystie Hill – Libraries Present and Future…12.29.11

Cory Doctorow: The Coming War on General Computation…12.29.11

New Program: What Sarah Said – “Episode 1 – Copyright Trifecta”…12.29.11

Library Tech Talk…12.28.11

The Future of Digital Libraries…12.28.11

How to Give and Ask for a Raise…12.28.11

New Pew Report: Religious Americans Embrace Technology Just as Much as Those Who are Less Religious…12.28.11

From Mashable today:

“There may be preconceptions that faithful Americans skew older in age and are traditionally set in their ways, but according to a new study, religious Americans embrace technology just as much as those who are less religious.

A new report from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project found that Americans who are members of religious groups are just as likely – if not more likely — to use the Internet, have broadband at home, use cell phones and send texts. Religious Americans are also just as active on social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

‘There is a view point that the more tech-savvy a person is the less religious they tend to be,’ Jim Jansen, a senior fellow at the Pew Internet Project and author of a report on the findings, told Mashable. ‘Our study shows that religiously active Americans use technology at rates in line with the general population. In fact, the “casually religious” — those who go to church about once month or so — actually use some of the technologies that we surveyed in higher percentages than their non-religiously active peers.’…”

Digital Public Library of America…12.27.11

Part 2

Perspectives on the Digital Public Library of America

Experts Predictions for 2012 in Technology, Business, and Economics…12.27.11

Experts are making predictions for 2012 in a wide variety of technology, business, and economics areas…

Marc Andreessen: Predictions for 2012 (and beyond), CNET

5 gadget predictions for 2012, ComputerWeekly

Gartner Predicts 2012, Gartner, Inc.

Five predictions for the communications world in 2012, The Guardian

Worldwide System Infrastructure Software 2012 Top 10 Predictions, IDC

Security Predictions for 2012, InfoWorld

6 Crazy Tech Predictions for 2012, Mashable

12 predictions for 2012, NESTA (National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts)

Smart Guide 2012: 10 ideas you’ll want to understand, New Scientist

Five big data predictions for 2012, O’Reilly Radar

Tech highlights of 2011. Predictions for 2012, Smarter Computing Blog

The Definitive Guide To HTML5: 14 Predictions For 2012, TechCrunch

Predictions for 2012: economic recovery, The Telegraph

Four Personal Finance Technology Trends for 2012, Time Techland

How HZO Technology Works – Protecting Electronics from Water…12.27.11

Luis von Ahn: Massive-scale online collaboration…12.27.11

Harvard’s Digital Content Preservation Storage…12.26.11

The Internet Archive Wayback Machine: Preserving the History of Web Pages…12.26.11

How an Applicant Tracking System Reads Your Online Resume…12.26.11

Visualizing 2011…12.26.11

Intel 2012 Technology Trends….12.26.11

How to Borrow eBooks from Open Library…12.26.11

The Kingdom of this world is become the Kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever, Hallelujah!…12.24.11

Hallelujah, for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth, Hallelujah!
The Kingdom of this world is become the Kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever, Hallelujah!
King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, and he shall reign for ever and ever, Hallelujah!
(Revelation 19:6; 11:15; 19:16)

Christmas Video – It’s About The Cross…12.24.11

Christmas With a Capital “C”…12.23.11

Amazon.com vs. The World…12.23.11

eCommerce Wave Grows and Grows…12.23.11

40 Internet Companies Come Out Publicly Against SOPA…12.23.11

From TechCrunch:

“Since the list of 120 or so SOPA supporting companies hit the Internet yesterday, the lines have been drawn; People are publicly promising to pull thousands of domains from domain registrar Godaddy after it appeared on the list as a supporter. Other people are calling those people ’bullies.‘

Whether you’re for or against SOPA has become somewhat of a pain point amongst techies, with the overwhelming majority, including myself and almost every other writer on the TechCrunch team, leaning heavily towards ‘against.’

SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act) essentially allows ISPs to block entire domains because a piece of hosted content infringes copyright. As the bill approaches deliberation in House of Representatives next month, a steady stream of Internet companies have taken anti-SOPA stands. After all, sacrificing innovation to save a dying business model is a close as it gets to anathema in these parts…“

This Christmas – Find Out Who is Jesus, really?…12.22.11

“After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, ‘Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.’…

There are wise men and then there are wise men, if you know what I mean. You can find a lot of smart people teaching in colleges and universities, but they may not qualify as wise people. .The Wise Men of today’s text were smart enough to follow God’s directions

Matthew calls them MAGI. Despite the beauty of the popular Christmas song, they most certainly were not Kings. The word MAGI is usually translated as ‘astrologers or Oriental scientists.’ Their profession was a combination of modern-day astronomy and astrology.

‘From the east’ points to origins in Mesopotamia or Persia. The Magi were a powerful and influential priestly caste among the Medes and the Persians. These priest-sages were extremely well-educated for their day and were known to specialize in medicine, religion, astronomy, etc. The Persian Magi were well known for their higher religious and intellectual achievements.

They knew of the story of the coming Savior no doubt from the presence of Jewish people like Daniel in their country centuries before. Their honor in history is that they were intellectually honest enough to look for God’s revealing of himself and then acting upon that knowledge.

Dr. Paul Meier writes: ‘There is nothing the least bit improbable about a group of sages being attracted by some event in the heavens and then trying to investigate it more closely. The ancient historians of Greece & Rome were fond of describing astronomical phenomena and the effects they had on the lives of people.

In that region of clear air and in that time of poor artificial lighting, the nights were long and the heavens were quite impressive.’ The stars told them that a new king was born to the Jews and they mounted an expedition to find him.

The lesson is clear: WISE MEN WENT SEARCHING FOR JESUS THEN AND THEY STILL DO TODAY…”

--Wayne Dobratz

The Gospel of St. John 3:16-17:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved!

Find out Who is Jesus, really?

Copyright Implications of Mass Book Digitization…12.22.11

New ComScore Report: 1 in Every 5 Minutes of Time Online Spent on Social Networking Sites…12.22.11

From TechCrunch:

“You already know that social networking sites have been getting huge around the world, but an annual report out today from comScore shows what exactly is going at a wonderful new level of detail, with surprises for even long-time industry watchers like me.

1 in every 5 minutes of time online is now being spent on social networking sites, up from a mere 6% in early 2007. The sites, led by Facebook, now reach 82% of the world’s internet-using population — about 1.2 billion people in total. This growth is happening across coun
t ries, with 41 of the 43 countries that the web measurement firm tracks showing penetration of 85% or more…”

Student Panel – The Future of the Academic Library…12.22.11

IBM Forecasts 5 Innovations with the Potential to Change Our Lives in the Next 5 Years…12.21.11

This year’s predictions:

·    People power will come to life
·    You will never need a password again
·    Mind reading is no longer science fiction
·    The digital divide will cease to exist
·    Junk mail will become priority mail