Never enough

Only 1,900+ page views of The Trashy Librarian?  I must not be getting out.  Oh wait:  I tried blogging on Typepad, it's Tess McCarthy's Blog, of course.  That didn't turn out to be productive.  No, no, wait:  I got a sexy Tumblr account.  It is kinda sexy, what with the name Tess of the d' Libraryville.  Oh, and what do you call them?  Yea, a LiveJournal account. I'm not linking it here.   I have a Fast Cupid account (for when I was doing online dating over 5 years ago) which we won't dredge up either.  And, I've got a WordPress account too.  It's The San Francisco Trashwatch and I'm not really watching and taking pics of a lot of trash lately. 

My problem is that I'm a MULTIPLE BLOGGER.  (Yep, that's the name and I'm sticking to it).

Lessons learned for those with multiple blog accounts:

1.  Blog where you have the most content.
2.  Blog where your buddies blog too--get them to follow you so that you can follow them so that they can follow you. And, follow yourself too.
3.  Blog where it's easiest:  that means, you go to the blog that has the least amount of glitches for you--the one with the amazing UI but works crappy may not be the blog for you.  Again, you just wanna blog, man.  You don't want to battle technology.
4.  Re-blog across accounts. 
5.  Blog first on Word or Notepad or Google Docs.  Word can have you turn your work into a blog and you can set up your blog accounts through that feature--they use simple XML behind the scenes.  Notepad just lets you type things out then, you copy and paste into all you blogs, and Google Docs is just a seamless why of getting content in a holding cell and on to your Blogger blog.
6.  When you can't blog, upload pictures or other visual content:  you don't have to write to convey your thoughts.
7.  When blogging focus on one blog at a time.  You may think you can multi-task, but each blog has a feel to it's functionality and user interface.  Don't worry:  you'll get a sense of accomplishment for getting your thoughts out on one blog and you can always re-blog  your content.
8.  Mix it up:  don't blog everywhere all at once.  You can have different versions of the same story on each blog.  That's okay:  you gain insight somehow.
9.  Promote your blogs via your other blogs.  Say I want to promote my San Francisco Trashwatcher blog?  I can link to that on my Trashy Librarian blog.  Why not?
10.  Most importantly:  know when to shut down a blog.  As a multiple blogger, I have to realize where my passions are.  In Blogger you can hibernate your blogs, but I'd get rid of them.  So what if you had a real cool name.  The beauty about the Blogosphere is that there will always be pretty names--you just focus on making that content pretty, okay?

I got a great idea...

...why not use my mandatory discussion posts in my online classes as BLOG POSTS???

Trashy Librarian doesn't live here anymore...

...not that I'm Ellen Burstyn's "Alice," but I've decided to do an all new grown up LIS + Muli-faceted blog.  It's going to be more reflective than this one; maybe less factual and more fantastical.

Here's to change and all its facets...

PROS:

1.  I won't be associated with porn sites.
2.  People won't think I'm trashy.
3.  Potential employers won't have to worry about my kooky posts.  (I'll still write kooky posts, btw).
4.  The new blog will represent more of "me" and, this "more of me" is more than blogging about Library and Information Science.  More of me is blogging about how badly I botched a recipe or how I created a new comic. 
5.   The new blog will focus on my professional life instead of "grad school days."
6.   I can write about stuff I'm naturally curious about (Information Science stuff) without having to worry if the content matches the title of my blog.
7.   Typepad allows me to link in to LinkedIn--I think.
8.   Typepad has a more "grown up" feel.
9.   I want to re-direct my Google+, docs, blog and other things Google to a whole new level of access:  I only want to share my Google Stuff with people close to me--not strangers.
10.  Any "bad reputation" I've earned while blogging as The Trashy Librarian will magically be erased with the new content of my Tess McCarthy blog.  Besides, I've always wanted a blog after my own name.

CONS:

1.    God.  I have to start ALL OVER AGAIN on the page rankings.  Google really is great for bloggers--they've really got their search tailored to the individual bloggers out there and it's so easy to find a Blogger blog than anything. 
2.    I have to also start all over again in terms of writing content.  Should I re-blog, or just slouch forward towards Bethlehem in a Joan Didion kind of fashion?

3.    I think I've ran out of things to blog about.  That's worse than starting over again.

4.    I also think I've got nothing really important to say--so why blog about it?

5.    I'm still not a famous blogger--so why try?  (Man, I sound so negative, huh?)

6.    I will miss having a "catchy" LIS blog title.

7.    It wasn't so catchy anyhow?

8.    I will miss the UI (User Interface) of Blogger.

9.    Um...

10.  How am I going to get the five friends following my blog to follow my new blog?

"So the point of my keeping a notebook has never been, nor is it now, to have an accurate factual record of what I have been doing or thinking. That would be a different impulse entirely, an instinct for reality which I sometimes envy but do not possess." --Joan Didion, "On Keeping a Notebook."

There are pros and cons for sticking around here. I do say that I've made the transition already. My new blog URL is: http://profile.typepad.com/tessmccarthy

Don't have too many tabs open in your browser(s)...

I'm doing a research paper on the history of the James C. Hormel Gay and Lesbian Center and, of course since I am pulling together the whole picture, I've got tabs open from...God knows.  Each night, instead of closing out all my browsers, tabs and windows I choose to put the computer in hibernate mode.

I ignore warnings that I'm running too many resources at once.  And, you know?  There's a natural consequence to engaging in this behavior.  It's called browser fatigue.  Of course I am making that up, but two things occur when you engage in opening multiple browsers or tabs:

1.  Your ability (okay, my ability) to make choices on what to discard from browsing is greatly diminished after 12 opened tabs.  I've just determined that 12 is the magic number for me.  I'm not alone in making an argument like this.  I recently read something like this in the book, Wisdom:  From Philosophy to Neuroscience by Stephen S. Hall.  He cites researchers from Stanford and some other university--I forget the second institution.  The study goes basically like this:  people are given the choice of 6 samples of gourmet jelly.  No problems with people choosing.  However, when faced with over 20, their decisions take longer to arrive at.  Also, they feel a sense of remorse.  I'm thinking this is covered in the chapter of Neuro-economics:  a fascinating field of research.  I reaching my tipping point:  I can't decide what to keep open--I can't decide what to discard.  So, I leave it open.

2.  There's this notion in Information Science/Computer Science that in web design, people can't handle too many hyperlinks. Rubin sites research done in 2002 in which people keep doing what's called, "Backtracking" which basically means people get lost--and easily distracted so they hit the "back" button.[1].  I'd say that since browser technology has changed, people--instead--are guilty of "multiple tabbing" like me.  Instead of hitting the back button, they're opening multiple tabs.   

(BTW:  I'm finding it hard to ditch Richard Rubin's 2nd ed. of Foundations of Library and Information Science, because it's got juicy information on information science and user-centered processes and theories that information professional should know about).  

You don't want to know what I had up the other day, do you? 

1 Safari tab---just because I love it with iTunes. 

3 instances of Google's Chrome:  because I had 3 Google docs open. 

7 tabs open in Fire Fox.

19 tabs open in IE9:  Hotmail open, San Francisco Public Library links open, and, multiple links of San Jose State University's King Library links--open.

3 Adobe .pdfs open.

3 Word docs, and a partridge in a pear tree.

All of this was screaming:  "Yoo hoo!  Hackers?  Want to play?"  

At any rate, how am I going to alleviate someone elses' "information anxiety" [2] when I've got some anxiety-making going on in my own world?

References

[1]:  Rubin, 2004.  p. 47, citing Debra J. Slone, 2002, "The Influence of Mental Models and Goals on Search Patterns During Web Interaction," JASIST, 53--pp. 1152-1169.

[2]:  Rubin, 2004.  In the chapter "The Information Infrastructure," p. 2.

I am a victim of a link farm...

What's a link farm?  A link farm is a site that is made of up a crazy amount of links.  In fact, a "model" link farm will have link after link on a subject.  When you go to the page, all you see are links!

Wikipedia and About.com explain it better:
1. Wikipedia article on a link farm:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link_farm
2. About.com article on link farming:  http://webdesign.about.com/od/seo/f/is_it_linkfarm.htm

But, hey!  Why is the Trashy Librarian on this person's link farm?  (See picture below):

Yuck!  I didn't ask for this.  I e-mailed the author of the website and asked to take me off, but no response.  Also:  the URL is set to expire. 

Anyhow, if you have your own blog or website, please don't link to a link farm even though they link to you.  Most web portals and search engine companies like Google seriously try to omit these in order to provide the user with quality page ranking.  However, they can't catch everything. 

“The Networked Librarian” Talk by Lee Rainie, Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project

I. What's in a Name?

Should I still call myself the Trashy Librarian even if I stop blogging about or sharing photos of trash? What if, for some reason, I start dressing more professional and less trashy? Luckilly, my days of trashy dressing are over: going to an all-girls' Catholic school (wearing uniforms) cured me of it and so did a stern father.

That aside, these days there's all sorts of monikers for librarian bloggers. It's their superhero name. Check out the Free Range Librarian (for example), recently, she says the job market sucks.  I agree with her.  Or, the very popular, Librarian in Black who, okay, check this out:  has a cartoon version of herself as part of her logo!  How cool is that?  The Networked Librarian seems to look like the name of a website that has lots of employment information for librarians. But, is Karen Feridun thee official Networked Librarian? I'm e-mailing her...

II. What's This Research About?

The Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project did a study on Internet and cellphone use. Yep, a user study! I quote on the Vimeo splash link: "libraries can be actors in building and participating in social networks through their use of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and blogging and through delivering their time-tested — and trusted — services to their patrons." Don't we already do this??

“The Networked Librarian” Talk by Lee Rainie, Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project

It's news to me: Catching up on blogging about Information Science in the news

I've come across a lot of articles that speak to Information Science, but, haven't had the time to blog about it.  Just food for my own thought consumption.  Most of the articles I've come across have been from have been from the San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times that I've found fascinating.

On another note, I recently saw *A&E's "Hoarders."  Um, hate to say, but I've been "hoarding" all these news clippings and it's mounting.  Better to blog about what I've come across than to have the papers pile up.

*On yet another note, I don't understand the branding anymore with this cable station.  Wasn't it supposed to be Arts and Entertainment???  I think I can recall them programing more artsy stuff:  like programs about art, ballet, classical performances.  But, now they've gone to reality t.v. programing and crime dramas.  :/  <--frowny face.