[13538] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
Re: public access computer applications
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Thom Kevin Gillespie)
Mon Sep 25 20:03:04 2000
Date: Sat, 23 Sep 2000 00:12:34 -0500
From: Thom Kevin Gillespie <thom@INDIANA.EDU>
In-reply-to: <01C0246B.03DD28A0.jimros@sonoma.lib.ca.us>
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
Reply-to: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU>
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On Fri, 22 Sep 2000, Jim Rosaschi wrote:
> Most of our energy is spent on internet delivered resources, and
> not on content delivered via CD ROM or on the hard drive of the PC.
>
> I think a related question would be:
> "Which plugins and other junk is essential for a public use
> browser?" (and who decides when it is time to change?)
>
> Notes:
> Library of Congress is using Mr SID for their American Memory maps.
> Many places are requiring RealAudio or RealVideo or Appletime.
> Does anybody still care abour Shockwave?
> Adobe Acrobat is essential, and many places only work on revision 4.
I have to respond to this one. Statements such as "plugins and other junk
is essential for a public use" & "Does anybody still care about
Shockwave?"
Maybe the librarians in Santa Rosa don't care but all your kids and half
your adults do. The internet is not a library in the worst sense of the
word library meaning a place were old folks shhh people who are alive and
learning. The internet is a medium which expresses it self in constantly
changing fashion. If you haven't notice there has been a steady increase
of multiple media from text to the 'junk' supported stuff. The reason the
net is growing is because most folks like their info 'junked' up and this
is not going to change. I realize it is difficult to stay abreast and
install the constantly changing plug-ins for shockwave, real, acrobat,
java, vrml, etc but the information your patrons are trying to access
often need the 'junk' plugins. Not staying abreast will result in a
declining client base particularly among children who are your future.
I was going to suggest that most libraries should have Flash, Director,
DreamWeaver, Photoshop, Illustrator and maybe a 3D package such as Cinema
4D or form-z at a minimum because in a multimediated world these tools are
the real tools of newMedia literacy. Your patrons want to express
themselves and 'write' for the web and Word and WordPerfect are not the
answer. Most of these packages actually have great prices for non-profits.
I realize someone will respond with "But we don't have the expertise to
support these tools" but the answer is that you don't need to be able to
directly support the tools you can create community help groups of 'little
hands' who will do what the 'big hands' can not do. You also have the
books which explain the software right on the shelves so all you have to
do is point them in the right direction.
Might make more sense to ask your patrons at hand, all of them, what
'junk' they want rather than trying to guess.
Doesn't the Berkeley Public Library still check out hand tools?
--Thom
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