people for a library-themed video game
Posts tagged library
An advocacy letter to our readers
3Hey all,
Some of my favorite librarians, the ones with an eye on how information is communicated in our digital age, have told us to get on twitter. We are. They’ve told us to get on facebook, and you can now logon to 8bitlibrary.com with your facebook name. You can fan us on facebook. They’ve told us that the mobile web is growing, so we’ve set up 8bitlibrary.com to work beautifully on an Android OS or iPhone mobile browser.
What are we missing? We are trying to continue to move forward. What are you doing that we aren’t? Librarians in the 2010-2020 decade need to be asking that question: what are our users doing that we aren’t yet doing?
Libraries, for the sake of our very existence, need to stay relevant. Not only for advocacy efforts, but for our future place in the information landscape of those we serve. Sure, 8bitlibrary.com is about “gaming in schools and libraries”. But we what we really care about is keeping the library and educational (information) communities in the same place as those we serve.
So, what now?
Also, I would love those of you surfing this site via the mobile web to give us a shout-out, via our comment box, from your phone.
Signed,
JP & the whole 8bitlibrary.com team.
The iPad in libraries
212 years ago
The iPad sounds like a library to me!
Here’s some thoughts on the iPad from the 8bitlibrary.com team:
Erin aka LibraryMafia:
Always unsurprised to see Apple unveiling the next new “must-have” gadget — and will be interested to see yet again how this one makes everything similar on the market obsolete. How long before Amazon abandons the Kindle? Probably can clock it with an egg timer. Of course, no matter how much prices may come down over time, technology like this will always be out of the reach of so many — which is why libraries are so critical, whether we’re providing books printed on paper or on touch screens.
The library community is so terrific about embracing open information. Technology wise, this is why there are so many open-source advocates in the library world. I personally think the iPad as a concept is great. (Apologies to the Apple fanboys, but) I think that the iPad is the opposite of open-source, and I mean that in a negative way. The DRM-laden closed source business that Apple runs is an expensive monopoly on “cool gadgets”. They have the market on selling cool, but Apple is in no way ACTUALLY cool; they sell overpriced machines and libraries are having budget crises all over the USA.
What I think 8bitlibrary.com readers can take away from the iPad hype is how game-friendly it is; just another example of why libraries need to get on board the game-train. Steve Jobs spent a good amount of time talking about the gaming aspect of the iPad.
Bringing those two ideas together, I think Apple could really help libraries by donating machines in a Gates-grant style. Imagine the possibilities of the gaming community coming together at their library, over iPads…
Andy Woodworth aka @wawoodworth:
No multitasking (again!), no camera (front or back), no Flash (seriously? everyone uses flash) and for ebooks, it’s still a computer screen for reading (no E-Ink!). It’s the same size as a Kindle DX with better offering and unlocked so you can buy any data plan, so it has that going for it. It gets my vote for “OOOO SHINY”, but not my money for what I want out of that kind of device. It’s a touchscreen netbook without some of the good features of a netbook.
Final call: It’s looks like Andre the Giant’s iPhone.(JP’s note: this was the second Andre the Giant reference in this blog in the last month. 80′s nostalgia FTW)
I’m viewing the iPad as a “netbook/e-reader/e-newspaper/game system”. Basically, they’re rolling everything minus the phone all together and selling it to us…and I couldn’t be happier. I see it as the ultimate in portable devices. It is small enough to carry around (great for reference on the go) and large enough that it really can be useful (goodbye squinting at small phone screens).
These few features really stand out to me:
- Keyboard dock available
- Access to iTunes Store apps
As far as gaming goes, you already have access to all the wonderful games in the iTunes store PLUS everything else the iPad offers. Nintendo and Sony. This is a call out to you. Your next generation systems should not just be all about gaming.
The netbook/e-reader/handheld gaming wars just got a bit more interesting.
Laverne Mann aka RedheadFangirl:
It was rumored to be at least a $700 starting price, so at $499 for a 16G, that’s more within the range of tech adopters. As a one month iTouch owner, I can see how valuable and easy I’ve incorporated it into my life. It bleeds into my professional librarian life with apps for chess (run a chess club), spanish (to work with patrons), and of course Twitter, FB, mail for prof correspondence. Erin, you are so right, those Xmas kindles are already out of date. The iBooks app is going to drive a lot of users to the ePub format of books.
I want one!
What are your thoughts?