Research Buzz has highlighted a new database of open source clipart. It’s just starting up, so content is somewhat limited right now, but this is definitely a site to keep an eye on. Everything is in SVG format, (which makes absolutely no sense and is a pain in the &%*), but it’s still worth tracking.
“Yes, so you’d like to check out a book little 4th grade boy? Please place your fingers on this pad….ok, Andrew Stevenson? Alright, here are your books. Have a nice day.”
That’s a conversation that will apparently be happening frequently at schools in New Zealand. The Office of the Commissioner for Children in NZ approved a fingerprinting system for school library borrowing. Hmmm, that’s not a bit unnerving is it?
thanks to Blake from LIS News for the link
Now while I could not, under any circumstances, wear this shirt on the reference desk, I think it would be a good conversation piece at a family holiday gathering, or in a bar on a Saturday night. Thanks Lipstick Librarian!
Yeah, yeah. So Google IPO-ed today. Too bad I don’t have any venture capital lying around to take advantage of their auctioned off shares. LiB expects the prices of the auction shares to be unreasonably high, and for the prices to drop off in the following months. But hey, that’s just a prediction from a financially-inexperienced librarian who lost $1000 on her one and only stock purchase, and vowed to “never waste my money on the effing stock market again.” One would have thought that investing in the company that holds the patent to GIS technology would have made money. Similarly, one would think that investing in Google would make money. But please remember that the stock market is a fickle system folks. *sigh* All the same, if I had money to burn, it would be going into Google. Sad, but true. Cherrio.
Google’s Image Search now has a feature that gives you, at the top of the results for image searches, images that have appeared in Google News recently. Problem is that it works just as vaguely as the regular image search, as it relies on captioning of photos for metadata. So, a search for “Cheney” brought back three news images–one of Bush & Cheney, and two of Bush by himself. Still some tweaking to be done obviously. By the by, has anyone else noticed that you get different image search results if you repeat searches? Run an image search, and I guarantee that after 30 seconds or so, your results will change dramatically. Very weird. If this was happening in one of the proprietary databases we pay for, I would be throwing a hissy fit. But, since it’s Google, and it’s free, I can’t do anything but bitch about it on my blog 
The American Foundation for the Blind brings us the Braille Bug site. Targeted toward children, this site teaches about braille, offers a braille reading club, braille games, and more.
Reuters reports that Bush & Cheney will testify before the 9/11 Commission on Thursday. However, they had some conditions:
1) That they appear together
2) That the hearing be held behind closed doors…
3) without being recorded…
4) and without transcripts of any kind
Nice! Yeah, I wonder if they’re going to hold anything back? Cuz, ya know, if they did, that would be dishonest and all….
OK, so I know today is Ben & Jerry’s free cone day, but I would have to walk several hilly blocks to get to the one in my town, and walk several hilly blocks back, and it’s rather hot right now. So, lazy LiB says screw it. There’s Ben & Jerry’s in the freezer–I’ll make my own sundae
Attention all users of Librarians’ Index to the Internet: LII would like its users to take a short, ten-question annual user survey. To take the survey, go to: http://tinyurl.com/3c886
If you run into technical problems with the survey, e-mail survey@lii.org
Responses are due by midnight (Pacific Time), Friday, May 14.
Mmmm, Google Blaster. If you don’t know what blasting is, it’s the ability to enter multiple search queries, and have them all searched at once. And with Google Blaster, you get a tabbed results screen. Very nice for queries relying on variations of terms or names. Much easier than formualting a true-to-life Boolean query with lots of () and + and – and *. Me gusta mucho.
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