A Wandering Eyre

I am convinced that the more pregnant you are, the more your brain can only focus on babies. I think, biologically, this prepares you for having to concentrate on a wee person’s survival for weeks. I mean years and years. What was I thinking?!

As a result of having what my more experienced friends call “Mommy Brain,” I have been unable to do much of anything interesting. Couple that with the fact that it takes me twice as long and about twice the energy to do even the simplest tasks and you have a Jane who has energy only for nesting.

I am pulling the life trumps blogging card now and taking my maternity leave from this site for a few weeks. I will pop in occasionally with a quip. There will be very big news here on Friday. Not baby news, but actual library related news. Keep your RSS readers ready for that because I think it is fabulous stuff. Would I lead you astray? Never!

There will be an announcement and picture here of Baby Rochester once he decides it is time to join the land of the living, breathing people. He is officially one day late today.

I expect to be back annoying you with inane commentary later in May. Until then, I will be posting ridiculous updates and pictures of the most. wonderful. baby. ever on our family blog.

–Jane, expects to be less round by late May

The First Day

Originally uploaded by Wandering Eyre

Today, I have been happily married to the most wonderful man for two years. This picture was taken on the first day of our honeymoon in Edinburgh, Scotland.

–Jane, still pregnant

I have thoroughly enjoyed the small vacation of sorts that I have been taking the last month or so. I have immersed myself in the domestic needs of the Rochester household and concentrated on the business of gestating the child in my belly. I have not missed work, but I have missed being caught up on the goings on in libraryland.

I have already heard about some of the excitment from CiL including some not so Swift things and an incident involving the Brickskeller. I plan on catching up on everyone’s goings on in the next couple days. I am going to make an effort to be in this space more the next couple of weeks, until Baby Rochester makes his appearance. After that, I am taking about a month off for maternity leave and it will be very quiet around here, but a little more chatty over at Defying Genetics.

–Jane, must go get organized for the day has suddenly filled

In my last post, I was harsh. It is true. ITI, I still love you. You put on the best library conferences I have attended. Hands down. I will really miss Computers in Libraries and Internet Librarian this year. Our impending arrival will keep me homebound for awhile, but I hope to return when I am able.

–Jane, full of hormones

I have been busy getting the Rochester household ready for our new addition and I have neglected to read the news from library land. I saw a few posts pop up about Swift when they first popped up, but I did not read them. I think maybe I should have because I would have seen that Swift, which has been denounced as a waste in different ways by many people I respect, was created by the Otter Group.

This Otter Group.

I believe in giving people second chances, but it seems to me that this company has learned nothing in the two years since they were last on my radar. I suppose this just goes to show you that companies will pay money for anything. Crap, libraries and our organizations do it all the time. I know not all online tools are “free” but Karen makes a great argument about what we would like our organizations to be spending money on and this is not it.

I can see Swift being useful at a conference where the attendees and presenters are not Internet or technology savvy, but that is the target audience of ITI. People at CiL have some clue as to what is going on in the world. We already have a way to share the things Swift wants from us.

I want to know why ITI felt the need to use a product like Swift. How did they get bamboozled into that decision? Was it simply because the hive that usually exists around the conference (via Twitter, blogs, IM,etc.) can not be contained and thus can not be profited from? This whole discussion reminds me of a quote I use in presentations to talk about transparency and reputation:

“The reputation economy creates an incentive to be more open, not less. Since Internet commentary is inescapable, the only way to influence it is to be part of it… Putting out more evasion or PR puffery won’t work, because people will either ignore it and not link to it - or worse, pick the spin apart and enshrine those criticisms high on your Google list of life.” –Clive Thompson

We, the librarians in the Internet Tubes, see through things fairly well because we are smart and often like to read the fine print. We spend our days looking for new things to serve the public better by saving money, not making it. Please do not be surprised when we look your expensive horse in the mouth and tell you that the reliable and cheap pony we already own works fine because we see only a shiny toy with no substance that you are offering. Beware of things that only glitter.

–Jane, ITI, we already have transportation to the Ball, we do not need another ride. Now can we talk about wifi?