Daily Thoughts 12/6/2010 (First Break All The Rules, Learning Express, Ebooks, Apps)

Photograph of a stentor (announcer) transmitting a program at the Budapest Telefon Hirmondó, which appeared in the "The Telephone Newspaper" by Thomas S. Denison, in the April, 1901 World's Work magazine. This image is in the public domain in the United States, because it was first published in the United States prior to January 1 1923.

Daily Thoughts 12/6/2010

This morning on the train to work, I read some of First Break All The Rules What The World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman.  I like the authors definition of talent on P.71

Every role, performed at excellence, requires talent, because every role requires certain recurring patterns of thought, feelings, or behavior: This means great nurses have talent.  So do great truck drivers and great teachers, great housekeepers, and great flight attendants.

We had training today for Learning Express which is a test practice database.  A lot of people use this to prepare for civil service tests like the post office and the police officer test.  We went over the Job and Career Accelerator section which helps people create resumes and assess their interests for jobs.  I also spent some time going over Word 2007 looking at the formatting functions.

The trainer told me that they were planning four layoffs where she was working.  This seems to be hitting everyone.  She told me about an article about how the states in the United States are going bankrupt.  This will make it even toughter for federal employees. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/us/politics/05states.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=state%20bankruptcies&st=cse

I checked the displays today and read several issues of Publishers Weekly and Kirkus Reviews.  I wish we had money to order books this month, but money is tight.

I also did some shelf reading in the fiction section, a little bit of weeding in the oversize books, and placed a few movies and cds on hold for the book mobile.

I have been thinking a little bit about the structure of ebook sites.  There are two classification schemes that I have used for practical purposes, Book Industry Standards and Classification (BISAC) which is used by most bookstores and the Dewey Decimal Classification system.  The Dewey Decimal Classification system is antiquated. 

A lot of the internet bookstores have their own classification structure.  I like the way Strand Books classifies their books.  It is comprehensive and effective.  http://www.strandbooks.com/app/www/p/browse/
   I also like how Powell's books creates its classification http://www.powells.com/section/
For an interesting way to look at books, try Zoomii http://www.zoomii.com   I think it would be an excellent way to layout an ebook store.


Web Bits

It looks like Google Books just launched with a social books community based around an Android Reader.  This is a fast emerging trend which many people will not be ready for.


http://androidcommunity.com/google-ebookstore-launches-with-new-ebook-reader-for-android-20101206/
 
An article titled An App Studio On Fulton Street
 
http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/print/20101206/45407-an-app-studio-on-fulton-street.html


This is surprisingly important, most libraries are simply not ready to handle apps at all.  I am not even sure that many librarians even realize they exist.

On a more positive note, there is the Bluefire Reader App for Ipad which allows Ipad users to read Epub documents.  This would Ipad users to easily use library ebooks.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bluefire-reader/id394275498?mt=8

This is an interesting service.  The Mongoliad is a serial novel with chapters produced each month.  It is historical fantasy.

http://www.mongoliad.com/