In an effort to get children to sign up for his library's summer reading program, Mill Creek, Washington librarian Mickey Gallagher ate 18 worms (like the ones pictured here). I commend him on his devotion to his work but I have to wonder what he'll have to eat next year to get them to sign up? Many thanks to LISNews for seeing this one.
Jim Riordan jriordan@bpl.lib.me.us
The Portland Press Herald published over last weekend the Literary Map of Maine. The map can be linked to by clicking here: http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/news/literarymap/map.html#map. A printed version of the map is/was available in last Sunday's edition of the paper.
The map offers an engaging look at dozens of authors in Maine's past as well as presents prominent books featuring Maine locations. The lists is a good source for brushing up on some of your favorites of the past or of becoming aware of lesser known works or authors.
Possibly the best feature of the online version of the map is its ability to be added to by reader suggestions, so the usefulness of the map is & will continue to be a work in progress of the reading community.
Zamzar
Zamzar is an online file conversion site. I have turned to this very useful site several times over the past year in aiding patrons of the library. The site hasn't failed a file conversion yet that I've tried. And, it's free.
One of the common reasons I've used Zamzar is for library patrons who bring in a disc with a WPS file on it. WPS files are documents created using Microsoft Works Word Processor which occasionally cannot be open or are opened in hieroglyphic-like text using updated versions of Microsoft Word or Office. Another common problem with opening patrons' files at the library is a docx document; these are documents produced on a newer version of Word than what is on our computers. So, the conversion problem exists for systems above & below the level of Word we own.
To convert a file, in the first step on the site, you'll need to have a document saved on the computer or available through a disc & upload the file to the site. The next step is to select the file type you wish to convert to. Next, enter an email address at which you will receive a url link to an updated version of the document. Last, click the "convert" button. 
The time needed to convert the file & send an email to you is usually under two hours. For faster service, you can register & may need to pay a small subscribing fee for a subscription. So, if you are in urgent or at-no-charge need of a file conversion, Zamzar may not be for you. There are other file-conversion sites (such as Free File Converter), but I am not familiar with their success rate or what costs may be associated.
In addition to text files, Zamzar can also convert audio, image, & video files. I haven't yet used Zamzar for either of these types of conversions, but I would imagine their success rate is as good as the text conversion rate of success I've had.
Another option for converting files is to download Microsoft Works 6-9 Converter.
FastStone Capture
One of my favorite web tools is another free download called FastStone Capture. This tool is, according to FastStone's website, "a powerful, lightweight, yet full-featured screen capture tool that allows you to easily capture and annotate anything on the screen including windows, objects, menus, full screen, rectangular/freehand regions and even scrolling windows/web pages." [Note: I'm not exactly sure where FS gets their concept of the capture tool being "lightweight" as it is not an actual object. Perhaps they mean it's light on the amount of memory needed to store it? Or maybe they're just being funny].
FS Capture allows you to create image documents of portions of a computer screen. These images can be stored as jpegs or as other image types.
FS Capture is a particularly useful tool. I have used it for almost all blog posts I've done. Here is a link to a past blog entry I made that relied heavily on FS Capture: http://bangorpubliclibrary.blogspot.com/2007/11/identity-theft-what-it-is-how-to-avoid.html.
Another cool way to use FS Capture is to freeze an online video such as one on YouTube to create your own pictures. Here's one I did from a very popular music video from the 1980s: 
To download FS Capture, click this link: http://www.faststone.org/download.htm.
Any Other Useful Tools?
If you know of any useful tools or websites, feel welcome to share them here on this blog.
Let me know if you have any questions. Patrick Layne: playne@bpl.lib.me.us
For those of you who aren't total NPR geeks like me, last week there was a peace on the Maine Public Broadcasting Network on libraries in Maine. It included our very own Barbara McDade as well as Linda Lord the deputy state librarian. The gist of the piece is that while the declining economy is shrinking funding sources for libraries that same decline is increasing the public's need for libraries. Have a listen.
Jim Riordan
jriordan@bpl.lib.me.us
Dailylit.com
Dailylit.com is a website which originates from the idea than many people today face greater demands in their time & quite often the most regular reading people do is on a computer screen.
Dailylit.com's creators, thought, "A-ha! Why not allow people to sign-up for a service to receive small portions of books to their email addresses & have them incorporate the reading of books into the same type routine as checking their email."
The site allows a user to choose a book -- there are over 750 books currently available -- or books to receive on a regular basis (each user can set up a personalized installment schedule) to an email account. The site claims most installments can be read by an average reader in about 2 to 3 minutes, with 5 minutes being the maximum.
Most of the books offered by Dailylit.com are free, having entered into public domain or simply offered for free by the copyright holder. There also are a number of books available for a small fee, which is usually under $5. These title range from books such as The Prince & the Pauper by Mark Twain for free & Fieldwork by Mischa Berlinski for $6.75.
Dailylit.com admittedly is dominated by romance novels among its newer titles. So, the site may be exactly what you're looking for or exactly not what you're into. I think that the newness of this idea has made it relatively limited in its initial scope, but, I believe that this idea will catch on & that the consumer will ultimately help shape it into a greater, more varied version of what it currently is.
I do think, though, the site is quite successful in that it presents a few hundred or so of the classics. The site actually seems perfectly suited for book discussion groups, allowing all participants to get the same installments emailed to them at the same pace-- and all without having to find at the library or at a bookstore enough copies for everyone in the discussion group.
Hulu.com
For TV & movies junkies, just about the best site around is hulu.com. This site, launched just a few months ago, is a more sophisticated version of what youtube.com is. Whereas youtube.com has hundreds of thousands amatuer videos (which run the spectrum to the truly inspired & genius to the utterly depressing & unnecessary), hulu.com has hundreds of professional quality clips, episodes, & even entire movies available. And, it's all for FREE.
Better, the video available for free is top-quality stuff. A sampling of the movies available are: Master and Commander (starring Russell Crowe), Sideways (starring Paul Giamatti), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (starring the never-better Jim Carrey), & the cult favorite, The Big Lebowski (starring Jeff Bridges).
The best part about hulu.com, though, is the amount & diversity of older TV shows available. Got a hankering to see every episode of the first two seasons of The A-Team? hulu.com's got it. Want to see the entire series of the critically-acclaimed, but cancelled-anyway Arrested Development? hulu.com has that too. If you are a Steve Carrell or Stephen Colbert fan, you can check each out on The Office or The Colbert Report on hulu.com, or, for their earlier work, take a look at them on The Dana Carvey Show, which aired a total of seven episodes back in 1996.
The only drawback to hulu.com? Ads will pop-up on the screen & you have to "x" them to make them go away. This was particularly annoying recently when I was watching a report on George Carlin's death & had a Chili's ad appear at the bottom of the screen.
Otherwise, hulu.com has quite a bit to offer & I think you'll find something worthwhile if you give it a try.
Freedocumentaries.org
Another high-quality video website is freedocumentaries.org. The site offers hundreds of videos on a wide array of categories such as environmentalism, animal activism, human rights, health issues & American history.
The titles on this site range from the high-profile movies of Michael Moore & the 2004 Academy Award winning The Fog of War by Errol Morris to the much lower profile, but still expertly done, movies such as The Yes Men & The Invisible Children. The site features many videos produced by & previously aired on PBS, HBO & CBC.
So, if you're more a 60 Minutes type than a sitcom watcher, I'd recommend freedocumentaries.org over hulu.com. With either one, though, you've have plenty of variety & quality to choose from.
Patrick Layne
enabled "smart phones." Like all libraries, Bangor Public does its best to keep up with the technology being used by its patrons. To that end, we have created a mobile version of our website designed to be viewed on devices like iphones or blackberries. Its called BPL Mobile and can be found at this link or on our home page.What's Different?
Almost all of the content available on our main web site is also available on the mobile web site. You can order a library card, find out when we are open, access the Ask a Librarian page, and much more all on the go. The biggest difference is that it has been scaled down for viewing on a smaller screen. We've done our best to keep our web sites original look. You will see a smaller version of the Bangor Public Library banner as well as the green and blue color scheme. At the same time we have tried minimizing things that will slow download times. A lot of the images have been eliminated and the content from several pages has been incorporated together. Because there is no standard screen size for mobile devices we have also set the text to automatically collapse or expand to fit whatever screen it is being viewed on. That's why if you look at the site in a regular web browser the text streams off to the edge of the screen. Several web pages, like the blog and the events calender, could not be reformatted for mobile use since we do not have the authority to change their coding.JSTOR Access
After previously only be available to library card holders from within the Bangor Public Library, access to JSTOR is now available to card holders off-site. You can gain access by following a link on the library's Online Databases page at http://www.bpl.lib.me.us/reference/FindingJournalArticles.htm. By clicking on the bluish-green JSTOR link, you'll be prompted to enter in your last name & your library barcode number.
According to its website, JSTOR offers "a high-quality, interdisciplinary archive to support scholarship and teaching. It includes archives of over one thousand leading academic journals across the humanities, social sciences, and sciences, as well as select monographs and other materials valuable for academic work. The entire corpus is full-text searchable, offers search term highlighting, includes high-quality images, and is interlinked by millions of citations and references."
One of the unique features of the JSTOR database is that all of its journal holdings begin with volume 1, issue 1 for every journal it owns. So, if you have a compelling interest in reading Economic Geography from cover to cover since it began in 1925, JSTOR would be able to accommodate you in that pursuit.
The database, however, does not have the most up-to-date issues of the journals it documents; most journals have a three to five year embargo. [Embargoes on electronic access are a publisher's way of maintaining demand for print versions of journals]. For Economic Geography, this embargo would keep reaching your goal of reading the entirety of the journal as 2002 is the current embargoed year for this journal.
JSTOR is relatively scholarly in nature, but that does not mean that its 1,115 current journal holdings are not in demand. In the past year, I have been able to find approximately thirty articles for our patrons on JSTOR that were not available elsewhere. I know that other staff members have used this database quite regularly as well.
We are excited to open up access to this database for our card holders. Let me know if you have questions about JSTOR or have trouble opening it from your home or office computer.Playaways
The library has added ten more Playaways. Here are a few of the new titles:This audio format for books has been very popular with our library users since we first put these on the shelf last November. Many times that I've checked the shelf, all but one or two of these have been checked out. Right now, there are several available -- maybe because our Playaway fans didn't know we have added a few new ones!
Let me know if you have any questions or suggestions.playne@bpl.lib.me.us
Have you ever wondered where exactly in Maine Henry David Thoreau was when he was in "The Maine Woods"? Ever thought you might know where the fictional St. Cloud, Maine, in John Irving's "The Cider House Rules" is meant to be? Do you think you know what towns in Maine, real or imagined, have provided inspiration or the setting for the many works of Stephen King?
The Maine Literary Map Project, a project co-sponsored by the Portland Press Herald & the Maine Regional Library System, aims to create a map, with the public's help, of these literary sites in our oft-celebrated in verse & prose Pine Tree State. The project seeks to have the reading public rediscover or learn of for the first time many great books which celebrate Maine culturally, poetically, & geographically.
The project, when completed, could resemble a 2005 New York Times creation of a literary map of Manhattan. This appealing & thorough map can be seen at this link: http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html/books/20050605_BOOKMAP_GRAPHIC/.
There is also a West Virgina literary map (http://www.fairmontstate.edu/wvfolklife/literarymap/index.shtml).
Jeannine Guttman, editor of the Portland Press Herald, announced this idea on May 11th. The full text of her article, which provides more information on how to contribute & the philosophy behind the map's creation, can be seen by linking here: http://proquest.umi.com.prxy1.ursus.maine.edu/pqdweb?index=11&did=1477212071&SrchMode=3&sid=1&Fmt=3&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=1210685265&clientId=48171&aid=1
Or, if you'd just like to dive into offering your contribution, visit the Portland Press Herald page at www.pressherald.com, then click on the "contribute to our literary map of Maine" link. You can also submit an entry via mail; mail entries can be sent to 390 Congress St., Portland, Maine, 04101, care of Marcia MacVane. Submissions will be accepted until June 8th. A finished map is scheduled to appear in the Portland Press Herald late this summer & a more detailed map is planned for the Press Herald's website.
Take another look at those Robert McCloskey, Linda Greenlaw, & other noted Maine authors' books to see if you can determine where this or that scene occurred. Read the aptly-named, "The Way Life Should Be," by Christina Baker Kline. Visit the fictional Spruce Harbor setting of Richard Hooker's "MASH Goes to Maine." And, while you are at it, help me -- possibly you too -- figure out where the Crabapple Cove of Hooker's imagination is that Hawkeye Pierce is supposed to be from.
playne@bpl.lib.me.us
Are you having a problem with your Ipod that the instruction manual does not explain how to remedy? Have you lost or just don't want to bother with searching for the manual for your TV? Can't figure out the complicated technical jargon in the manual for your new digital camera?
Fortunately, in our world of ever-increasing gadgets & ever-increasing gadget-created frustration, there is a great one stop source for solutions to many of the technological confusions we face. FixYa is a website that provides free tips on how to repair or troubleshoot hundreds of common problems for devices such as cellphones, MP3 players, printers, refrigerators, video games consoles, turntables (hey, they are making a comeback), & even wine coolers.
FixYa was, according to its website, "founded by an entrepreneur who decided to take advantage of the fact that consumer products manufacturers are not providing adequate support through their web sites. Although these products become more and more technologically advanced, their manufacturers are not allocating the necessary resources that are required in order to provide good technical support." The great hook of FixYa is that its basis is on real consumer's experiences with technological problems & solutions, & not based on the often confusing or incomplete manuals provided by a product's manufacturer.
FixYa has a relatively straight-forward means of searching. The homepage quick-lists links to dozens of major manufacturers. By clicking a manufacturer name, the page will reset to list the categories of products produced by that company. Great, too, is that the site has pictures of the products, so you won't need to know a product number to access the information about it.
The other means of searching is a simple search box much like a Google or Yahoo search box. In this search box, you can enter either a product name & number if you have the "find a product" selection clicked. Or, if you've clicked the "find a solution" button, you can enter, for example, "playstation 2 blank screen" or "heating coil dishwasher whirlpool" to get to series of possible answers to the problem.
So, keep FixYa in mind the next time you have trouble with one of your gadgets. Unless, of course, the gadget you're having difficulty with is your computer. In that case, you might have to dig out that user's manual after all.
Patrick Layne: playne@bpl.lib.me.us
April 5th Video Game Tournament
The video game tournament on April 5th proved to be a great success. Around 50 teens competed in either the Dance Dance Revolution or the Guitar Hero III tournament in what turned out to be an all-around fun day. In addition to the competitors, dozens more friends & family members saw the rather mind-boggling skills displayed by the players in each game. The championship rounds for each game had the crowd cheering as loudly as the fans do at Fenway Park -- I'm not exaggerating. Okay, maybe I am exaggerating -- a little.
I was personally impressed by the skills of all the players in these games. Much of my amazement stems from just how inept I was a playing each of these games. I still think of myself as somewhat active & coordinated (even at the "ancient" age of "in my mid-thirties"), but next to the teens' abilities at these games, my ability at each game was the equivalent of trying to start a fire with two wet stones, while the teens had blazing bonfires going. I'm not totally sold on all video games being of value, but I really believe that being good at Dance Dance Revolution & Guitar Hero III (and many other video games) does speak volumes towards a person's organizational skills, coordination, and concentration levels.
The success of the tournament encourages the library & me to plan more such events for the fall. I would like to host a tournament for Madden NFL. Madden NFL is, after all, arguably the most successful gaming franchise of all-time. A Madden tournament would probably take place of the course of several days, given the length of individual Madden games. Of minor note, I am also terrible at this game. The last time I played I threw 4 interceptions with Tom Brady as my quarterback.
Another idea we're working on is getting adults, especially senior citizens, involved in gaming. I've read about the success of games like Wii bowling (you can too at http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1127/p01s05-ussc.html) in engaging older generations in what often is viewed as a younger generation pastime. The idea of getting seniors into libraries for a gaming night strikes us as something we'd love to be a part of.
The slate is truly open for the future of gaming at Bangor Public Library. We would like to hear your thoughts on gaming at the library & any suggestions you might have for a future gaming tournament.
You may send any ideas or comments by responding to this blog post. Or, you can directly email me (Patrick Layne) at playne@bpl.lib.me.us or give me a call at 947-8336 x127.
Pictured below: Dance Dance Revolution competitor Alex in action on April 5th.
