Google Enters Social Networking with Google+

Having failed on three previous occasions, Google is trying again to enter the social networking fracas with Google+, a new social networking site in "invite only" phase.

One of the crucial ways in which it differs from facebook is that it doesn't mash all your contacts together. Instead it creates circles, into which you divide your various acquaintances. That way you can complain about work without co-workers seeing it, send family vacation pictures to just family, etc.

It seems quite similar to facebook, though, and this salon.com feature gives a roundup of the assessments of a bunch of tech pundits.

Soon you may be invited to try it out!

FOR, June 20: Jurn.org

Featured Online Resource for June 20:

JURN.ORG

Jurn.org is a directory of open-source journals, indexing 4,283 arts and humanities titles. Searching is powered by google and doesn't offer advanced search functions; the collection is also browsable, and getting into the directory is good way of grounding oneself in the scope of the collection. Many of the journals--probably the majority--are peer-reviewed, instituted to be online and open-source.

FOR, June 13: VOKI

This week's Featured Online Resource is voki.com, which one of our librarians, Dr. Sean Henry, discovered yesterday. Like xtranormal.com, it supplies animated characters for short videos (60 seconds max at voki) you can create and share. However, unlike xtranormal, you can use your own or any recorded voice if you so choose; you can also use text-voice mode. Characters run the expected gamut of alternakids, anime-type characters, animals, celebs. Videos are widely-embeddable and ready to share. I made one this morning in about five minutes. And here it is.

Windows 8 Sneak Peek 1

In case you're not attending the D9 conference, the All Things D blog affords a sneak peek at Windows 8, which actually is very, very different from Windows 7.

Toward a Theory of Spacepower

A featured Government Document is Toward a Theory of Spacepower: Selected Essays, from the Institute for National Strategic Studies. It's edited by Charles D. Lutes et al.

It's a fascinating volume on an intriguing and partially-frightening concept. The intro says the essays in the book define spacepower as "the ability to use space to influence others, events, or the environment to achieve one's purposes or goals." Further, it states that spacepower theorists draw on sea, land, and airpower as analogies.

Essays discuss International Discussions Theory as applied to spacepower; Stategic Theory, Military Theory, the role of the President of the United States in spacepower, "real constraints" on spacepower, and many other topics.