Category Archives: Trends
Lytro’s Light Field Camera
Wow! What a cool idea for a camera! Take a picture and don’t worry about focusing – you can focus later on an spot on the photo. Don’t believe me? Try it yourself! Go ahead . . . I’ll wait . . .
Isn’t that the coolest thing you’ve ever seen? From what I’ve read, Lytro is planning on building their own camera with this technology embedded. However, I’m hoping that they license the technology to other camera manufacturers, too.
Book – Going Mobile: Developing Apps for Your Library Using Basic HTML Programming
A new book from ALA Editions – Going Mobile: Developing Apps for Your Library Using Basic HTML Programming. It looks interesting, as I didn’t know you could create apps with just HTML, basic or otherwise. There’s a chapter on javascript, so it may be a little more than HTML, but it makes sense that you would need to use some sort of script. I’m looking forward to buying it, but print or ebook version . . . print or ebook version . . . print or ebook version . . . 
The Rolltop Laptop
A concept for a new type of laptop from Orkin Design in Germany. What do you think?
Multitasking Difficult for Older People
Researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, are finding that multitasking, or the ability to easily and quickly switch between tasks, becomes more difficult as you age.
They set up a study using two groups, e.g., one with an average age of 24.5 and another with an average age of 69.1. They asked each participant to view a natural scene and maintain it in the mind for 14.4 seconds. Halfway through the 14.4 seconds, they were interrupted with an image of a face and asked to give its sex and age, then asked to recall the original image.
Everyone was easily able to switch between the natural scene and the face. However, the older group had a much more difficult time releasing the image of the face and reconnecting with the image of the natural scene. Researchers are now looking into software that will train the brain to be able to release tasks and return to the previous one.
YouTube Live
In addition to streaming hosted video, YouTube is starting to stream live events. They’ve created a page where you can find what live events are currently streaming and those on the horizon. For example, it looks like they’ll be streaming the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton, as well as an Indian cricket match and Movie Math. As I look now, YouTube is live streaming 10 events, from a Paris fashion show to a live feed from the Vatican.
LED Displays in Contact Lenses
The University of Washington has been doing some very interesting research involving contact lenses. So far, they have embedded electronics into the lens, allowing diabetes patients to monitor their glucose levels. They use a red LED to provide feedback to the patient. Sounds better than pricking your finger!
They have also introduced a blue LED; they just need to insert one for green and they will have the option for full-color. They’ve been successfully testing on rabbits; no idea when human trials are expected.
This idea opens up many possibilities on the medical front, as well as informational and entertainment. They say that the images projected are semi-transparent, so you can still see your environment.
Unplugged for 24 Hours
Colleges and universities across five continents took part in a research project investigating the relationship between young adults and their electronic media, e.g., Internet, cell phones, TV, music. Not surprisingly, the students talked about being bored, disconnected, having nothing to do, lonely, frustrated, the day being very difficult . . . symptoms of addiction. You can read their thoughts – it’s very revealing of our society. I’m guessing that many of us would have the same reactions.
First Bookless University Library
The University of Texas at San Antonio opened the Applied Engineering and Technology Library last fall. It is our nation’s first bookless university library. Take a look!
Kindle Works with Libraries
Amazon has announced that, later in 2011, Kindle users (and Kindle reading app users) will be able to check out Kindle books from libraries. I assume this will work like hard-copy library books, e.g., limited number of copies and a check-out period.
This should also work through OverDrive, so this would be a great value-added service for those libraries that already use it.
