libraries | Chris Aldrich

Read Social Media Isn’t Going to Save You From Social Media (KIRISKA)

Everyone has a bone to pick with existing social networks. There are plenty of legitimate concerns, but the fact is that social media has also been incredibly valuable for many people. If your business depends in large part on connecting with others or engaging with an audience, it’s hard to simpl...

The heading really says it all.

I’ve been spitballing with a few people about how to create alternate funding ideas including making smaller community-centric hubs and infrastructure to both center the smaller interactions as well as help create healthier funding centers for our technology. Smaller local news outlets and libraries are better places for these spaces to stem from in my opinion. Setting up these structures isn’t easy (or cheap) however.

As for the confusion on the IndieWeb pieces, you’re not wrong. The community knows this is an issue and is slowly, but surely working on it. Naturally it’s a slow process because it’s all volunteer driven, but we’ll get there.

Read Social Attention: a modest prototype in shared presence by Matt Webb (Interconnected, a blog by Matt Webb)

My take is that the web could feel warmer and more lively than it is. Visiting a webpage could feel a little more like visiting a park and watching the world go by. Visiting my homepage could feel just a tiny bit like stopping by my home. And so to celebrate my blogging streak reaching one year, this week, I’m adding a proof of concept to my blog, something I’m provisionally calling Social Attention.

You had me at “select text”…

If somebody else selects some text, it’ll be highlighted for you. ❧

Suddenly social annotation has taken an interesting twist. @Hypothes_is better watch out! 😉
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:03AM

How often have you been on the phone with a friend, trying to describe how to get somewhere online? Okay go to Amazon. Okay type in “whatever”. Okay, it’s the third one down for me…
This is ridiculous!
What if, instead, you both went to the website and then you could just say: follow me. ❧

There are definitely some great use cases for this.
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:05AM

A status emoji will appear in the top right corner of your browser. If it’s smiling, there are other people on the site right now too. ❧

This is pretty cool looking. I’ll have to add it as an example to my list: Social Reading User Interface for Discovery.

We definitely need more things like this on the web.

It makes me wish the Reading.am indicator were there without needing to click on it.

I wonder how this sort of activity might be built into social readers as well?
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:13AM

If I’m in a meeting, I should be able to share a link in the chat to a particular post on my blog, then select the paragraph I’m talking about and have it highlighted for everyone. Well, now I can. ❧

And you could go a few feet farther if you added [fragment](https://indieweb.org/fragmention) support to the site, then the browser would also autoscroll to that part. Then you could add a confetti cannon to the system and have the page rain down confetti when more than three people have highlighted the same section!
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:18AM

I want the patina of fingerprints, the quiet and comfortable background hum of a library. ❧

A great thing to want on a website! A tiny hint of phatic interaction amongst internet denizens.
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:20AM

What I’d like more of is a social web that sits between these two extremes, something with a small town feel. So you can see people are around, and you can give directions and a friendly nod, but there’s no need to stop and chat, and it’s not in your face. It’s what I’ve talked about before as social peripheral vision (that post is about why it should be build into the OS). ❧

I love the idea of social peripheral vision online.
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:22AM

streak: New posts for 52 consecutive weeks. ❧

It’s kind of cool that he’s got a streak counter for his posts.
Annotated on March 28, 2021 at 10:24AM

This looks interesting: The Altadena Public Library has created a “Library of Things”, starting with mobile hotspots and laptops. They plan to expand to include other items like telescopes and virtual reality equipment.

Watched Medieval helpdesk with English subtitles from YouTube

Helpdesk support back in the day of the middle age with English subtitles. Original taken from the show "Øystein og jeg" on Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK)in 2001. With Øystein Backe (helper)and Rune Gokstad (desperate monk). Written by Knut Nærum.

Read How to Get Books When Bookstores and Libraries Are Closed (nytimes.com)

Even for people who have lost jobs or income during the coronavirus epidemic, there are books and reading material available online for free.

Bookmarked National Emergency Library : Free Texts : Free Download, Borrow and Streaming (Internet Archive)

A collection of books that supports emergency remote teaching, research activities, independent scholarship, and intellectual stimulation while universities, schools, training centers, and libraries are closed.