EDITOR'S NOTES
Makin' Media
by Dick Kaser
Ah, I can remember the days when it took a crew and a boatload of money to make a movie. Now, just about anyone can create video, using nothing more than a smartphone. And it doesn’t stop there. In this summer issue, we take a wild ride through all of the things libraries are doing with digital media.
Librarians, of course, are no strangers to digital content distribution, as authors Ashley Rosener and Sophia Guevara remind us in their wide-ranging review of the topic. While providing online access to research databases and holdings records is fundamental, they illustrate how today’s librarians need to offer access to streaming media resources, provide digital data preservation services, integrate library resources with course management systems, and even produce digital content such as blogs and podcasts.
The issue includes several tutorials. Law librarian Rachel Evans provides a podcasting primer, and learning technologies librarian Sharona Ginsberg shows you how to teach students video editing using free software. Chad Mairn and Joshua Stein, from the Innovation Lab at St. Petersburg College, explain how to replicate a 3D printer—or at least give it the old college try.
In a case study on the importance of recording and preserving local oral history, Cal LaFountain discusses his work to keep the history of a paper mill in Parchment, Mich., from being inadvertently erased. And Marshall Breeding delves further into the challenges of digital media storage and preservation.
For our EDTECH readers, Lorette Weldon, a school library media specialist, shares her approach to using media to stretch herself to the virtual limits, providing her students with educational enrichment even when she cannot be present.
It was difficult to cram all of these topics into a single issue of the magazine, but it makes for good summer reading and will prove to be an inspiration for your own media projects.
Dick Kaser, Executive Editor
kaser@infotoday.com
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