NEW RESOURCES
The British Library has launched LibCrowds, a platform for crowdsourcing BL projects. “Our first project series, Convert-a-Card, is dedicated to the retro-conversion of printed card catalogues into electronic records, in order to make them available to a worldwide audience via our ExploreBL catalogue, which already includes nearly 57 million records.”
Newly-formed: a non-profit organization for librarians of color. “Coming together through JCLC Inc. are the Black Caucus of the American Library Association (BCALA), the Chinese American Librarians Association (CALA), the American Indian Library Association (AILA), the Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA) and REFORMA: The National Association to Promote Library & Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish-speaking.”
A database of images from Serengeti Trap Cameras has been launched. “Over 320,000 photos from the National Park in Tanzania are now available to view online, providing a vivid insight into its ecology. The treasure-trove of photography was captured by 225 remote cameras located around the park between 2010 and 2013, as part of the University of Minnesota Lion Project, which began 45 years ago. ”
TWEAKS AND UPDATES
The Alkmaar Regional Archive of the Netherlands has joined the Flickr Commons.
Twitter is trying to make tweet conversations easier to read.
“From now on, opening up a tweet’s page—the page you get to if you click on the time or date on a tweet—shows the most noteworthy responses to it at the top. In a blog post, Twitter product manager Akarshan Kumar says it uses a variety of criteria to determine this, such as whether the original account has replied. It’s a little bit like the way Facebook filters items for the News Feed, but applied to replies to single tweets.”
USEFUL STUFF
A review of another Chrome tab organizer: Spaces.
SECURITY ISSUES
Oh look, another Adobe Flash update.
AROUND THE SEARCH AND SOCIAL MEDIA WORLD
Google has started indexing URLs with emoji characters.
This is interesting. Twitter is blocked in China but the Xinhua News Agency is publishing a column of tweet roundups. “Xinhua’s new column, called ‘What’s being said on Twitter about China,’ began last week as a way to communicate the top stories about China coming from foreign media outlets. The purpose behind the new Twitter-driven column appears to be two-fold: first, to give the illusion that China is recognizing the medium as an important tool to understand how the West views the country; second, to control the reality of what that view is.”
The Getty Research Institute has acquired the archives of The Margo Leavin Gallery. They will be digitized. “In nearly 200 linear feet of records, the archive includes correspondence with collectors, foreign and domestic art dealers, and museums as well as exhibition files, photographic documentation of exhibitions, and annotated auction catalogs noting prices and buyer information. There are more than 80 works on paper or unique ephemera created by such artists as Hannah Wilke, H.C. Westermann, Billy Al Bengston, Claes Oldenburg, Sherrie Levine, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, William T. Wiley, Andy Warhol, and many others.”
Google Play has a new Family Friendly section. “Inside of the Family Friendly apps and games section, Google has laid out some handy quick links for parents in the drop down menu. You’ll find everything from age based categories, as well as break-downs by genre, like action, adventure, arcade, card etc. In fact, there is an entire page with some editor selected titles, and apps categorized by popular children’s characters and franchises like Elmo, Dora the Explorer, Teenage Mutant Ninja turtles, Disney, LEGO and more.”
OTHER THINGS I THINK ARE COOL
A curriculum for teaching history to kids using a time traveler theme is being Kickstarted. “Making History is a teaching curriculum made to engage students with a Time Travel theme, hands-on projects, and using multiple subjects. Teachers can use just one of the projects, for just one subject, or they can collaborate with other teachers and use multiple subjects to create a richer learning/teaching experience.” It ends on 13 June so hurry up, and good morning, Internet…
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