The Future of the Public Library

Some might say that the future of the public library is at a crossroads. Traditional circulation statistics may be plateauing. Traditional reference service may actually be declining. Children's services, including materials and programing continue to do well-- when given the proper resources. Our one area of growth would seem to be providing free Internet access to the public.

Yet libraries still seem to be receiving overwhelmingly positive support from local communities. Even when circulation and reference statistics are stagnating or declining. Positive support even from survey respondents who state they seldom, if ever, use the library.

But there are money problems. And the things we provide, and the people we hire to help provide them, don't come cheap. At some point, (and that point may be sooner than we know) we may be faced with some hard decisions about the future of public library service.

Here are some choices to ponder:

• Children's programing vs. Reference services
• Materials vs. Computers and online access
• Online materials and databases vs. Open hours

Anyone have a crystal ball?

BOOK REVIEW: The scientific basis of love (NOT!)

Author Jim Ottaviani and illustrator Dylan Meconis present a new volume in publisher G.T. Labs series of scientist biographies using the graphic novel format. In Wire mothers : Harry Harlow and the science of love
we're introduced to the University of Wisconsin professor whose work in the early 1960s attempted to introduce the concept of "love" or at least maternal love into the common parlance of the scientific community. At the time, "proximity" was the term in use.

Harlow himself provides the narrative flow of the story as he introduces himself and his work to a new janitor at the research facility at 600 N. Park Street (affectionately referred to as "Goon Park"). He experimented with infant rhesus monkeys to demonstrate the natural tendency of young to seek a "mother" for comfort and security, raising them with inanimate mothers made of wire or cloth. Analysts at the time were making the argument that "attachment" was based on nursing (i.e. food). Harlow's argument in the book states "It's not about food, and it's not about attachment. It's about clinging, and cuddling. It's about comfort. And love."

There's some pretty valid points to be made about the morality of animal experimentation, and the authors do touch upon that in the notes section. But earlier in the text, Harlow referrenced B. F. Skinner's attempt to raise his own daughter in a new device he called a "baby-tender," a box with filtered and humidified air, partially sound-proofed, with one side made of safety-glass through which "they could talk and gesture to her." The accompanying illustration shows a toddler behind glass. With tears running down her cheeks.

Proximity, indeed.

What with graphic novels themselves being something of an acquired taste, not to mention what I would imagine to be a rather limited audience for scientific biographies, and topping it all off with squeamishness-inducing aspects of animal experimentation, this particular work would be a pretty tough sell for most readers. Still, it was a fascinating look at a time and place not far removed from many members of the greatest generation.

Trying this again

After seeing the previous post, it looks like some changes happened that I don't understand. So I thought I'd try to do the same things again.

Testing the fonts:

• This is Font (the default/first in the list)
• This is Arial
• This is Courier
• This is Georgia
• This is Lucinda Grande
• This is Times
• This is Trebuchet
• This is Verdana
• This is Webdings (supposedly-- it looked a lot different when I tried it at home on my Macintosh)

Testing the font sizes (all in Font)

• This is smallest.
• This is small.
• This is normal.
• This is large.
• This is largest.

And by the time I got to the end of the list, I noticed I was back in "Arial." But this line still says "Font." So I guess all the types sizes aren't available in "Font." Well, that bites.

This is bold using "Font" in normal size.
This is italic using "Font" in normal size.
This is a test of the colors, but there was a problem in the italic test because it was still bold, after I though I had turned it off. Seems to take some getting used to. Anyway, colors, RED, ORANGE, YELLOW, GREEN, BLUE, INDIGO, and VIOLET (to my color-name challenged eyes).

Here's a link to Linkcat.

Here it text that's:
Left aligned.

Centered.

Right aligned.

And Justify Full. (Which doesn't seem to do anything, at least with a short block of text).

Here are numbers again.

1. One.
2. Two.
3. Three.

Here are more bullets, even though I used them with the font and size tests above.

• Bullet 1
• Bullet 2
• Bullet 3
• Bullet 4

Here's a block of text that I clipped from an amazon.com summary:

Let ME tell you a story about a girl on Long Island, who always tried to play life by "the rules" - as outlined in the Secret Handbook of Long Island Rules.... That girl, uh, woman, is me, Teddi Gallo. I'm the mother of three kids under the age of eleven, best friend to Bobbie (who denies there's any such thing as a secret handbook, but who knows all the moves by heart) and the daughter of June (who has inside info on the rules, but has a reserved room at South Winds Psychiatric Hospital, as well). And if I don't have enough to send me over the edge, my too-handsome-for-his-own-good husband seems determined to drive me crazy. But why? This is the tale of how I had to rewrite that old, dusty handbook - and while doing so, I suddenly discovered the secret to happiness was living by your own rules. And that has made everything different.

No word-wrap on the hyphenated text, I see.

Spellchecking and Spell checking seem to be okay but Schpelllchecking should be a problem.

I'm attempting to add a photo file from my computer next. Nothing seems to be happening. I don't have any video files so I won't bother trying that.

Time to check out the "Preview" button. Well, there seem to be all kinds of changes with fonts and text sizes that aren't apparent when I look at my post while composing. So the HTML fairies are drunk, or just mean bastards trying to make me look like a fool.

Let's try that "Preview" one more time.

Nope. It looks like the "Font size" is going crazy. The five sizes look to be four small sizes and one big size. And the subsequent text, even though it looks normal in my "Compose" layout, seems to be using a large font size right through the Colors, Create a Link, and Alignment tests. Hmm. I tried them in the default "Font". Let me try them again by cutting and pasting below, then using a different font.

Testing the font sizes (all in Arial)

• This is smallest.
• This is small.
• This is normal.
• This is large.
• This is largest.

Testing the font sizes (all in Courier)

• This is smallest.
• This is small.
• This is normal.
• This is large.
• This is largest.

Testing the font sizes (all in Times)

• This is smallest.
• This is small.
• This is normal.
• This is large.
• This is largest.

So this doesn't seem to be working out as well as I had hoped (i.e. doing what I want it to do).

So I'll try again later.

I Can't Think Of A Title For This Post...

...and it's making me crazy! Bloggers in general must have a gift that I clearly don't share. But I need to get something together here so I can get this assignment done. Sort of throw myself into the deep end, as it were.

Let's check out the cool buttons.

This is a larger font size. This is a smaller size. This is the largest size. This is the smallest. And we're back to normal.

This is a different font. It's called Trebuchet.
This is another different font. It's called webdings. (Translation: it's called Webdings. I don't think I'll be using it much)

This font is called courier. I don't know where that name came from.

This font is called Georgia. Probably because it looks like the state.

This font is called Lucida Grande. So I'm guessing it's an Hispanic font.

This font is called Times. Probably related to the New York Times. On his mother's side.

This font is called Verdana. Which is a city in California. (I just made that part up.)

And we're back to Arial. Which was the name of Kevin Bacon's love interest in the movie
Footloose. (heh)

And we're back to Font. Because it's at the top of the list.

That was fun.

This is bold.

This is italic.

This is color. So is this. And this. And this, this, this, this, this, and this. This is black again. But it's actually the color black I picked from the color template. I don't know how to shut the color template off. I wonder if anyone will notice?

This is a link. (surprise, even though I already did a link before)

I don't think I want to deal with aligning text that much.
Left align.

Right align.

Center.

Justify full. (doesn't seem to do anything. I'll have to try that later.)

Here is a numbered list of numbers.

1. Three.
2. Two.
3. One.
4. Two.
5. Three.
6. Fourteen.
7. Sorry, just messing with you anal-retentive types. (Is anal-retentive really hyphenated?)

Here are some bullet points.

• forty-four caliber
• forty-five caliber
• twenty-two caliber
• thirty-eight caliber
• five bullets is probably enough
• something about a grassy knoll

Block quote. I'm not sure what this does. It appears to indent the text. I'm guessing if I had enough text it would be included in a "box" that visually sets it apart from the rest of the text. I wish there were some way to test my theory though. But I'm helpless when dealing with technology. *sigh*

There's a spellchecking button that says "Done spellchecking" when I press it.

That stupid block quote button is still blocking things. This used to be left aligned. So even though I clicked the block quote button, it's still turning on when I start typing. This is frustrating. And when I highlight this whole block, it just makes a smaller block under the previous block. This is frustrating.

I clicked on the Edit HTML button, to see if I could do something with that. Too much detail! Although I did add some text to the line way up at the top where I noted that the color text box was still using color text block black, instead of default (i.e. "colorless") black. But I don't want to poke around in the HTML editor too much on my first assignment. Maybe later.

Stupid block quote.

Still want to try missspelling fot the spell schekcer. Three words are underlined in that sentence. Let's see if the spellchecker can find them. Okay, that sentence has a word underlined too! Is it possible spellcheck (one word) is actually spell check (two words)? Let's fire up the spell checker to see. Wow, twelve misspellings in my first blog. Three in this paragraph. Seven font names. Surprisingly enough, the word "bloggers" is not spelled correctly. Nor is the parenthetical (heh) I added after my first link. (double heh)

Running out of time. More later.