Intro: In which the author attempts to explain the reasons for this blog's existence
(Don't worry, I'm not going to title every entry in this manner. It would be sort of interesting to see how long I could keep it up before going insane, though.)
I have been fascinated with steampunk since way before I had a word for it. Old favorites of mine -- Jules Verne's stories, Young Sherlock Holmes, the short-lived TV show Voyagers! and more recent fare like The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series and the Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow film -- all fit into the steampunk category. The best definition of steampunk that I've found so far is "what the past would have been like if the future had happened sooner."
At the same time, I'm in a profession which is rapidly reinventing itself as a technology-based livelihood. The days of dusty old books are vanishing as digital information becomes faster and more accessible each day. When I went to the 2004 Internet Librarian conference this fall, I realized that there was an incredible amount of library-related technology I wanted to explore and write about, but my current weblog (Folderol) wasn't really geared toward high-tech library matters. I didn't want to give up Folderol, but I still wanted an outlet to talk about all this new technology and also a place to geek out on old-fashioned stuff that I find interesting.
As a result, the Steampunk Librarian blog was born, on a piece of scrap paper in a bar in Monterey. The idea is to focus on new information-related technology -- to discuss the rise of RSS, of blogs, of alternative ways of librarianship -- as well as to link to sites which celebrate the past. It's all going to be rather subjective and will no doubt evolve into something a little different than what I'm imagining this first night, but no matter. Feedback is always welcome, whether via comments or email at jinnet@spookylibrarians.com. Updates here may be less regular than over at Folderol, so I recommend that you subscribe to the RSS feed (Bloglines is especially good at maintaining feeds, I've found).
Many thanks to Heir of December Media for the site design and the Graveworm for helping me bend Blogger to my will.
Thanks for reading!
I have been fascinated with steampunk since way before I had a word for it. Old favorites of mine -- Jules Verne's stories, Young Sherlock Holmes, the short-lived TV show Voyagers! and more recent fare like The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series and the Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow film -- all fit into the steampunk category. The best definition of steampunk that I've found so far is "what the past would have been like if the future had happened sooner."
At the same time, I'm in a profession which is rapidly reinventing itself as a technology-based livelihood. The days of dusty old books are vanishing as digital information becomes faster and more accessible each day. When I went to the 2004 Internet Librarian conference this fall, I realized that there was an incredible amount of library-related technology I wanted to explore and write about, but my current weblog (Folderol) wasn't really geared toward high-tech library matters. I didn't want to give up Folderol, but I still wanted an outlet to talk about all this new technology and also a place to geek out on old-fashioned stuff that I find interesting.
As a result, the Steampunk Librarian blog was born, on a piece of scrap paper in a bar in Monterey. The idea is to focus on new information-related technology -- to discuss the rise of RSS, of blogs, of alternative ways of librarianship -- as well as to link to sites which celebrate the past. It's all going to be rather subjective and will no doubt evolve into something a little different than what I'm imagining this first night, but no matter. Feedback is always welcome, whether via comments or email at jinnet@spookylibrarians.com. Updates here may be less regular than over at Folderol, so I recommend that you subscribe to the RSS feed (Bloglines is especially good at maintaining feeds, I've found).
Many thanks to Heir of December Media for the site design and the Graveworm for helping me bend Blogger to my will.
Thanks for reading!
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