LISNews: Librarian News

First, I'm not through with the book yet, but I'm getting there. I did not expect it to be funny. The preface about the wayfinders/pathfinders in the book: "each page has a number, each section has a title." What a hoot!

I honestly did not realize there WAS a difference between a maze and a labryinth. Unfortunately, the image that kept coming to my mind was of the movie with David Bowie in it!

In terms of the intersection, as Morville puts it, between "ubicomp" and our physical world - it is rather amazing we all aren't just sitting at our screens blubbering about being lost. I think humans are all smarter than Morville seems to give us credit for. Just as a for instance (and not comparing us to ants), look at the abilities of the ancient Aztecs when it came to computing seasons by looking at the arrangement of the stars. On BBC's History of Navigation animation it states that sailors needed two pieces of information to go exploring: their current location by latitude and longitude and an accurate map. (Morville says the same thing in a different way - you need to know where you are and where you've been before you can know where you're going)

Latitude was determined by looking at the placement of the sun and the stars, longitude was eventually figured out by determining the differences in time between different places. Polynesians figured out sea currents, Vikings watched the swellsin the ocean near land....more to come