Tom Roper's Weblog

The oldest man on Facebook

More on the "why do you have a facebook dude " discussion: I feel honoured, though I am sure it is untrue, by the allegation that I am the oldest man on Facebook, but as Facebook has been recruiting what someone euphemistically called a "higher demographic," I am sure it cannot be true. Even if the young man who said "you're like 70 dude get off facebook" was right about my age, I am sure there would be older people.

Latest instalment: a message saying, "you are the oldest person on facebook. go have a heartattack you loner goof"

I see son of blog people: L'Affaire Gorman in the Times Higher

I have refrained from involving myself in L' Affaire Gorman II, the  debate about Michael Gorman's remarks in his blog posts, Web 2.0: the sleep of reason  and The siren song of the Internet, because I'm not sure what I can add and in any case T.Scott Plutchak says it far better than I could.
For the earlier controversy, see here: http://tomroper.typepad.com/tr/2005/03/michael_gorman.html

Today the Times Higher Education Supplement has got wind of it, and runs an article on page 2, with comments from Jenny Fry of the Oxford Internet Institute, Will Murray of JISC's Plagiarism Advisory Service, Nicola Pratt of UEA, Ben Fairweather of De Montfort and  Andrew Keen. They don't quote any of  Michael Gorman's professional peers, that is to say librarians.
It's not online yet, and much of the THES content is subscriber-only, but perhaps it will be available tomorrow.

Royal Ascot: third day, Gold Cup

230 Norfolk Stakes: Spirit of Sharjah
305 Ribblesdale Stakes: All My Loving
345 Gold Cup: Yeats
420 King George V Stakes: Colorado Rapid
455 Hampton Court Stakes: Tranquil Tiger
530 King George V Stakes: Eradicate

My record for the past two days is not inspiring: 12 selections, 0 winners, 2 placed

Royal Ascot: second day, Prince of Wales Stakes

230 Jersey Stakes: Major Cadeaux
305 Windsor Forest Stakes: Satwa Queen
345 Prince of Wales's Stakes: Notnowcato 
420 Royal Hunt Cup: Trafalgar Square
455 Queen Mary Stakes: Sweepstake 
530 Sandringham Rated Fillies Handicap: Lady Grace

Making Web 2.0 work for you and your library: further thoughts

I was sorry to miss, thanks to the train timetable, Mark Clowes' overview of web 2.0 technologies and Bernice Baker's presentation on blended learning. But I was there in time for an announcement by Ian Baird from Teeside University of the long overdue merger of the University Medical School Librarians Group and the University Health Sciences Librarians Group. In the afternoon, Heather Gardner and David Brunt demonstrated some practical library applications of web 2.0, in particular current awareness services, based on their experience of the Primary Care Current Awareness Service (PCCS) they run in the East Midlands. David moonlights for Intute, and I was interested in how Intute content can now be embedded in other websites. They also showed how the Royal College of Midwives has used Google Co-op to build a customised search engine and how they used Pbwiki for the nurses current awareness bulletin. On issue is that many NHS IT departments block wikis, which brought to mind the similar restrictions school students face in trying to use social software
Anne Welsh presented on Blogging for the bewildered, based on her experience of using Web 2.0 applications in the information service at DrugScope. I was struck by how they use a wiki for their acquisitions manual, but perturbed that the blogs they run don't allow comments. She showed some good uses of screencasts.

Royal Ascot: first day, St James's Palace Stakes

230 Coventry Stakes: Declaration of War
305 King's Stand Stakes: Dandy Man
345 St James's Palace Stakes: Creachadoir
420 Queen Anne Stakes: Cesare
455 Ascot Handicap: Raucous
530 Windsor Castle Stakes: Fat Boy

why do you have a facebook dude

I received this message in my Facebook inbox. I swear it is authentic, and not a product of an automatic teen-speak generator. I have preserved the original spelling, use of lower-case throughout and punctuation:
"why do you have a facebook dude your like over 50 [52 actually-TR] at least i just want to know ? not being  dick or anything"
Why indeed? I suppose I have to fill the time until Charon comes to take me over the Styx somehow.

A postscript: on the pages of the excellent Facebook Drink application, another of the bright young things says, apropos of something I wrote, "dude the guy below me is the oldest guy i have ever known to own a facebook. I find this funny"

Swimming in Rodmell

The Parish Pump pages of the Sussex Express rise high above their usual banality with an item about a Canadian author and swimmer, Rick Taylor. I suppose a North American counterpart to the late Roger Deakin, author of Waterlog: A Swimmer's Journey Through Britain. According to the Rodmell and Southease Parish Pump correspondent: "Taylor, a Canadian writer from Ottawa...is in the UK to research his latest book Water And Desire – about swimming with writers and mortality... he swam from Rodmell to Southease bridge, thinking about Virginia’s last walk to the river".

Technorati Tags: rodmell, swimming, virginiawoolf

The quest for reliable wifi

I'm in Sheffield, having delivered my presentation at the LfN study day (account to follow) and waiting for the train. With time to kill, I though a little light e-mail and  blogging would be a good way to pass the time. I found myself in Sheffield Central Library (where I last was for a conference of the Library Campaign long long ago). They had no wifi, but helpfully printed out a list of places that did. Ruskin's bar sounded good, though I wonder how Ruskin would have felt about having a bar named after him. They had wifi, but it failed to work at all. I type this from the Showroom Cinema cafe, where they have a functioning connection, but it won't collect any of my Gmail. It will have to do.

Technorati Tags: sheffield, wifi

Making Web 2.0 work for you and your library

Tomorrow I'm speaking in Sheffield, at a Libraries for Nursing study day on Web 2.0, making Web 2.0 work for you and your library.
Here's the handout, as a pdf: download lfnsheffield.pdf and here's my presentation: