The Madcap Adventures of Pharnabus Filch #1

So I did a strip based on the title of the blog with more of a library focus. Its rough..very rough but what the hey..click on the picture to make it legible..

we've all been there right folks?

PODCASTS

Yeah, now this is more like it.

Big fan of podcasts. I think i discovered them about...hmmn..5 years or so ago? I was approached about being interviewed on one at the time and that led to me looking into them and finding a couple of burgeoning comic book podcasts which had just started up. I got friendly with a couple of them, provided some artwork for some of the sites and so on.

At one time i think i was subscribed to around 50 podcasts (not that I listened to them all mind you) mostly being comic book and video game related! I was working as a flatter and drawing my strip/doing comissions at night after looking after the kids during the day, so it was great to be able to listen to something while I worked.

I also..cough..used to a podcast myself with my wife. We were going through Marvel comics from the 60's, reading them in chronological order and reviewing/discussing/makingfunof them. But then she got pregnant with our third and morning sickness is not an attractive quality in an audio recording so there went that..

I would LOVE the library to get more on the podcast bandwagon and Lawley and I have taken some steps in that direction by recording a recent Genealogy talk at Coolbelup with the hope of putting that up as an audio podcast. I really think given how much we pay for these guest speakers it makes sense to provide the material to as many people as possible. If only 20 people can make it to a talk at 2pm on a Friday afternoon why stop there? If we have it available to download it can be so much more worthwhile.

I know we're also talking about recording Storytime (ye gods, i'm one of the people who do storytime) and streaming it live (with the option to download it later of course) using something like UStream i guess. That would be good too.

I really feel since all this stuff is pretty easy to setup and get going it makes sense to be able to provide as much content as we can as long as its not overly time consuming or expensive.

I know other librarys have authors read excerpts from their books. I would LOVE to start a podcast inviting local or even Australian authors to read the first chapter from their upcoming books which we could release as a podcast promoting Australian talent. I think its a great idea but I dont know, i may be missing some of the negatives.

Other libraries release podcasts where staff just discuss books and what they're reading, some release podcasts from the groups that meet at the library (i think it'd be particularly good for school aged kids to work on something like this) never mind the more practical uses such as using podcasts to update people on news, events or tutorials on how to search through the catalogue.

SOOOO many excellent options available - really keen to be involved in implementing some of them.

I'm not sure if any local libraries are doing any of the above but its a shame if they're not. As long as you have someone on staff enthusiastic to do it it really doesn't take that much time or expense to get one going and they can be quite fun once you get going.

As for podcasts I like, the main two i have followed for the last 4 years or so are;

The Player One Podcast - Great videogame podcast hosted by ex editors of EGM..and..

iFanboy - excellent comic book podcast. Expanded their weekly schedule to include video podcasts as well. Out of the thousands of comic book podcasts around (some release episodes every 2nd day!) this is the best.

If you like comics or videogames (I know of at least one other blogger on our web 2.0 journey that likes the latter) the there are MANY MANY options available to you.

twitterin' the day away pt1

Well, that didn't work. Tried to write the blog with the ipad but no good. Then again,I seemto have problems with blogger no matter what I'm using.

Off sick today (fromchildren minding duties) so I'm playing catch-up and decided I'll start with twitter.

My twitterid/name/thingy is msparkinson if anyone wants to follow me.

Edit: Whoopise - did i forget to do this part? I think I did.

Twitter! I like me some twitter. Its agreat way of dripfeeding constant information in tiny bite sized chunks! I have a number of library people that I follow and I'm getting constantly bombarded by interesting library related posts and information that I have no way of being able to consume. So theres that. As a basis for your personal learning network its a great tool (oooo, i used a buzz word). Then theres using twitter as a library tool - interacting with members and pushing out information about the library. Very good for marketting and communication and if you have someone sitting on the librarys twitter account all day keeping tabs on whats going down (in twitter you can keep track of any mentions you might get)..well, it really is a great way for direct (well, not direct but you know what i mean) communication with the public.

Facebook. I hate me some Facebook. I much prefer Twitter- i dont really like how Facebook works and what its all about but again its a great communication and marketing tool for libraries to use. Linking to pictures via flickr or promoting upcoming events is a great way to establish and build a community around the library and gives you that extra ability to interact a little more directly with the library members.

Cockburn has a great facebook presence that I believe links to the twitter feed as well so while theres a little crossover between the two, users that may not be following us on both services don't miss out on any of the updates that are posted. I just completed my first unit in my grad dip of Library Stuff at Curtin and my first unit was on this type of stuff exactly (and i'm not too unfamiliar with it in the first place) but I REALLY cant think of too much information to write about onFacebook in the library field strangely enough.

The State Libraries facebook page has general information about them as well as links, photos and general information that their followers (sorry friends, getting my social network tools confused) would be interested in reading or viewing. Interstingly they also provide access (its just a link I suppose) to their catalogue through the facebook page.

Its essentially a hub for everything State Library related for the public - which is a good use of the Facebook service.

Out of Print #13,16,17

I like the last panel



Another early favourite


overly sentimental?

more self indulgence..

Typing on my graphics tablet screenand ittends to miss letters so if there any tpos i sncry aplogse

a few more strips..



The thing about these strips is these are all realcharacters..ive changed their appearance obviously but the characters and costumes are all real...ok maybe except this dude.


This isone of my fave early strips..the colours dont look right, but whatever. Plus my first attempt at lettering by hand..it'll get better.

Out of Print comic.

I'm gonna post my old stuff cos theres been such an outpouring of interest to see them (Fred.)

These are a year old and they start out pretty rough. I basically took some public domain superheroes and centered the strip around them attending a support group (cos they're public domain. must be harsh.)

Again, i was rusty when i started these so be forgiving.

Again (2), click to read if you have a standard screen. stoopidblogger.

Pharnabus comic?

I tried to whip up a quick comic strip based on the title of the blog partly as a learning activity as its beena while. Annoyingly though it seems i dont have the right software anymore and it won install on this computer either - so ignore the bad lettering.

Was about a kid and his sister travelling through various novels..kinda lke Quantum Leap.

But then i had a better idea so this will probably be it. you mayhave to click onit to get a better view.

Delicious and such.

I feel like I'm starting off a lot of posts with "i'm not really into.." but its the same case here. I went through the whole Delicious thing in my uni course and i dont really get into social bookmarking myself. I mean, I see the advantage in having your bookmarks in the cloud so you can access them anywhere but I'm just as happy to use my own bookmarks on my own computer most of the time. And i can see the advantage of sharing bookmarks with others but I'm not worried about sharing my bookmarks with anyone and not too fussed on people sharing them with me. But again, thats just me.

Delicious is a good way of collating information and being able to jump directly to a topic or subject you may be interested in I guess. But i follow the sentiments of another blogger where I like to just search and sicover the information myself mostly. I've never really clicked with social bookmarking but I can definitely appreciate their importance and how they're used. (can you tell I'm strecthing for my 100 words - a rarity with me, normally I don't want to stop typing.)

I Do understand how they're helpful when it comes to implementations like Librarything though which is a very cool site. Unfortunately I'm not reading many books at the moment and I feel a little self conscious if I start clogging up Cockburns Librarything account with Graphic Novels..I wonder if theres specifically a site like that for comics. Will have to look into that as it could be rather cool. As far as I know Librarything has GN's in there as well - i just feel a little self conscious as the Librarys widget would be then filled with Spider-man and Batman. :) I should explain that on the Cockburn Library blog (and possibly the webpage, not 100% sure) they have a widget which shows all the books that the Librarystaff are currently reading.

Edit: As you can see by my librarything widget which is running all over the rest of the sites real estate, I've filled it with graphic novels in my collection. Librarything is pretty cool - and since i started putting graphic novels in my collection I've been contacted about putting up reviews or something. Im sure they're sent to every single person who puts graphic novels in their collection though but hey. *End Edit

Unfortunately I havent updated my reads for quite a while as apparently I'm still reading Lirael and a Harry Potter book. Oops. Sorry Lawley.

I've popped a few links over on the right there which should take you to my very empty delicious links collection which at the moment pretty much consists of the trailer to the new Green Lantern movie (!!) which just came out today! The Trailer that is, not the movie.

Glee!

Edit: Just added my own Librarything feed. Unfortunately it doesnt seem to want to animate which is making me sad. Oh well, I'll figure it out. Edit: I did, Yay me!

Wiki-Wiki-Wild West!

Does anyone remember that Will Smith song from that movie Wild West about a decade ago. Didnt that go "wikiwikiwiki wild west"?

Which has nothing to do with anything really. But it was a bad song and it said Wiki.

Anyway.

So. Wikis then. I've never been a fan of them for some reason but i understand how they're helpful and why they're popular. I guess I still have the mindset that anything that can be edited by anyone is not a good resource but thats growing more and more incorrect as wikipedia seems to have the answer to half the reference questions I come across these days. Much to the parents chagrin.

Wikis are handy for a group of people to be able to collect and information on a particular or group of topics and when you have enthusiastic people this can be a very good tool. I regularly see wikipedia being bandied around when people are asking questions or worried about keeping up to date with the goings on in the comic book world.