“What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.” T.S. Eliot

As you may have noticed dear reader that I have not put up a post for a while. I believe you are owed an explanation before I continue to post. Two things happened that caused the drop-off. First you may have read that Providence Public Library has split into two distinct organizations. One is Providence Community Libraries and the other is still Providence Public Libraries. This happened as of July 1st. As far as classes are concerned they are still in full swing. However they will only be held at the downtown location. You can find the newest schedule here. The second thing is that I lost focus as to why I started this blog in the first place. My original idea was to give a place for my students to go to when they are new to the Internet. I believe I achieved some success with this for a while. Unfortunately over time it changed to what started to feel like a trumpet of only what is new and not what is useful. As I attempt to restart this blog I plan to bring some basics back into the site with tips and good usable web stuff. I hope all of this makes some sense. It begins in the next post above this one. I thank you for your patience and your continued reading.

“The first human being who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization.” Sigmund Freud

So you have a gripe but do you have specific people or things that are annoying you? If so Snubster is right for you. At its core it is a stab at Facebook and Mypace’s Friends. For many people the goal of acquiring many hundreds of anonymous friends is really getting to them. Snubster on the other hand is all about the dislike. Finally a social site I can get behind. The site allows you to create lists of things that are annoying you and if they really get to you, you can label them "dead to me." It is a farcical site but sometimes just airing the injustice makes you feel better. This type of parody site has been around since friendster was popular and its counterpart fiendster came out. It may be pointless but it can be entertaining to read and revel in the someone else’s grievances. So if you need to join in a bit of whining then give this one a try.

Note: I should say this site is not always G rated when it comes to language so be forewarned.

“I had beautiful wavy hair and a waxed mustache.” Curly Howard

Before I begin this post a couple of small notes first if you don’t mind. I would like to apologize for the lack of posts. I have been sick and am now playing catch up. Also I thought I should mention a birthday. Growing up I had several people I looked up to, but this person was one of the tops. Today is (would have been) the 103^rd birthday of Curly Howard. So to Curly we can only wish him a happy "nyuk-nyuk-nyuk!". Now onto the post.

Recently I was on a message board reading other peoples thoughts and I started looking on the left hand side of the screen at the avatars. Avatars are the small pictures we choose to represent us when we step into a forum or a virtual social group. As I looked at them I noticed many that were left blank. I thought this was so strange. It would be like talking to someone at a party who is faceless, kinda creepy. So where does one get an avatar? Well there are tons of places on the net that have every style you can imagine. However for today I choose to highlight Meez. They have been around for a while allowing you to create static (non moving) or animated avatars. It is free. But if you want certain special extras, you can pay for them. Essentially you register an account on Meez and then go into creative mode. You can choose pretty much every part of your character down to the eyebrows. I think my favorite part is the animation that you can choose from. They have stuff like dance moves or expressions or foods for your virtual character to eat. Once you create your character they will give you a bit of code to paste into your registration page of the forum your in. If you are confused, they have a decent help page as well. Give yourself some style and give it a try.

“Happiness seems made to be shared.” Pierre Corneille

So you checked out Youtube and watched some videos but you wondered how hard it would be to put up your own. Well first let’s talk about why. Now that more and more gadgets can record video you may want to share it with friends and family. The problem is sometimes I receive video through email but I may have trouble opening them without special software. However if I go to Youtube, no matter the type of file, I can watch it without even downloading anything. This means if I take some video of a family reunion and want to share it easily I can. Ok, now that the why has been answered how does one post a video. It really is easy to do. First you must create a login so you can participate in the world of Youtube. Now you can click on the upload button. From here just fill in all the information like what type of video it is and whether it is private or able to be seen by everyone. Also, you can set whether or not people can leave comments. Finally you can browse for the video on your computer and upload it. From there it is up to you to send the link out or you can embed it on a website. This whole thing takes about 5 minutes the first time but makes spreading video just so easy. If you have a video that you want to show off then give this a try.

In the coming weeks I would like to showcase the response of students in addition to the standard posts. If the classes, the site, or handouts have helped you, let us know. Send an email to ssher at provlib.org.

"PPL has done me a great service. I am computer literate thanks to PPL...
Thanks for your response too!"
Art Toegemann

Thank you, Art, that is great to hear.