the pod bay door

:: Mike sent an e-mail reminding me that Arianna Huffington‘s new blog debuted this week on the web. It gained notoriety weeks before it began, when it was announced that the blog, part of the new web site, The Huffington Post, and known simply as “The Blog“, would feature up to 300 “celebrity” bloggers, including the following who have already contributed brief entries: Larry David, Walter Cronkite, Tina Brown, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Hall, Mike Nichols, John Cusack, Ellen DeGeneres, David Mamet, Harry Shearer, Paul Krassner, and David Frum. The group (so far) leans heavily to the left, and features mostly members of the entertainment industry. I love John Cusack (I want to BE John Cusack!), but I’m not sure what qualifies him and the others from film, tv, and music, to be blog columnists. Then again, doesn’t that define blogs – anyone can write about anything at any time, without the worry of a deadline or an editor? In this instance, the posts are edited, according to Mike, but I can’t find anything on the site to confirm this.

One thing missing from the blog are comments – readers cannot respond to the posts. Another section of The Post, The News Wire, does allow comments. It’s unfortunate that comments are not allowed on the blog. Comments on blogs are what make them interactive and worth revisiting. Comments make a blog lively and challenging by allowing for discussion and discourse.

I was talking recently with colleagues who like myself, contribute library-related blogs to the field. There are many good blogs covering many different aspects of librarianship. That said, I wondered out loud if we are approaching the moment where library blogs experience some kind of dot-com bust, wherein we reach a critical mass, and the library blogosphere does a self-correction, and reduces in size. Might the same thing happen to other subject-related blog communities?

My Bloglines feeds currently number 143 – there is no way I can keep up with following most of them. Arianna Huffington has created a community blog, with up to 300 handpicked contributors, perhaps the highest profile blog of its type. Will it be possible to keep up with so many contributors, or will it be easier because all are contributing to the same site?

The politics notwithstanding, I’ll be interested to see how this new template of a blog is received, and how it will develop. If only she would add comments to the mix.

Also published on Blogcritics.com.

:: Comment function is not working. Again. I’ll try to fix it soon. My apologies. Again. Argh.

:: Update – comments working again.

:: I’ll be in Jasper tomorrow until Sunday afternoon, attending the Alberta Library Conference.

:: I’ve learned today that the comment function on my blogs isn’t working. Comments can be submitted successfully, but never reach the site for approval. I’m working to repair the problem asap. My apologies to those who have posted messages and may have thought I was late to approve them, or was deleting them.

:: Update: Comment function is working again. Thanks to Tony for his help in solving the comment problem, as well as Demonsurfer on the MT-Blacklist Forum for suggestions on how to solve the problem.

:: Before this post, the number of entries on PBD and STLQ were equal: 559 each. The number is misleading for PDB, because I have yet to import the entries from the July-Sept 2002 version on Blogger. STLQ began in April 2003, some seven months after PBD migrated to Moveable Type. That STLQ has moved up to tie PBD for the number of posts suggests that my blogging priorities have become more professional than personal, not necessarily a bad thing. I enjoy posting to both sites, but lately I have been without much energy to post here, largely due to other activities, like the home renos.

Speaking of which, Geoff was over on Thursday to complete the installation of the baseboards, and to undo a wee bit of the laminate flooring, in order to remove a register which was inadvertently covered up during the original work. Terry came by on Saturday morning to help with repairs in the main floor bathroom, the walls and ceiling of which were damaged in the overflowing toilet flood of some weeks ago. I am indebted to Geoff, Kathryn (who helped with painting) and Terry for their kind help, guidance and encouragement they have provided during the project.

When this project began, I knew everything would need to be moved about in the living room, including my home entertainment equipment. Being lazy, I did not label the cords, cables and speaker wire which connected the nine units, including VCRs, DVD player, tv, tuner, turntable, cassette deck, digital box, and CD player. Geoff and Kenton reconfigured the setup for me, but I have been unable to get the 3.1 surround sound to kick in when watching tv. Last night, I tried to resolve it by moving wiring here and there, frustrations increasing as the evening wore on. I had moved my new laptop computer onto a chair next to where I was sitting on the floor, behind the Ikea entertainment unit, so that I could view wiring documentation on the Shaw website. I continually moved between the back and front of the unit, so that I could check the settings and determine if the rear speakers were working.

Around 2130 hrs, I stood up for the leventy-leventh time, and kicked something near the fireplace as I walked back around the unit. I looked back to see a can of dark blue paint, which had been covered but not sealed tight, tip over and spill paint on the floor. In a panic, I moved cables and wires, including the laptop power supply, out of the way as the paint globbed towards them. I grabbed paper towels and tried to mop up the paint. It was an incredible mess. I scooped up paint with whatever was handy, dumping it into a large plastic paper shredder basket which I had been using for garbage while working in the living room. At one point, I thought the paint was moving towards more cables, so I pushed the chair on which the laptop was sitting away from the paint, causing the laptop to fall and crash on the floor.

At this point I thought, what next? I checked the laptop, it was fine (praise be to the Sony engineers), and continued to remove as much paint from the floor as possible. Eventually the thicker paint was removed, leaving a large, bluish blob in its wake. I began cleaning the floor with a wet dishrag, which helped somewhat. I filled a bucket with hot water and continued cleaning. Eventually I filled the bucket with hot water and Mr Clean, and used a brush to remove as much as I could. Luckily, I was able to remove 99.99% of the paint from the floor. Unless you examine the floor closely, there is no evidence paint was spilled there last night.

Exhausted, I returned to trying to solve the wiring mess, and didn’t get far. It still isn’t working properly today. I’m set to raise the white flag. The frustration is compounded knowing that before the equipment was moved, the wiring was configured in a way to make everything work the way I wanted it to work, including stereo sound.

Whatever. I bought some nice clothes and a new pair of shoes this weekend, and my brother Chris, up from Calgary for a few hours today, graciously helped me purchase my first cell phone. I am exhausted. On Thursday I will drive to Jasper to attend the ALC. I don’t know when I will post here again.