Today was the first full day during which I really sampled through Rhapsody's offerings. Actually, "sampling" isn't even the right word because I mostly just went through the list of 580+ albums most recently added to their collection. So far I'm fairly impressed given my misgivings about these types of services. At various times today, I listend to some or all of an album from the following artists:

Esquivel
Chet Baker
Simple Minds (early stuff like "Sparkle in the Rain")
Stan Kenton
Stan Getz
Cannonball Adderly
Andrew Lloyd Weber's Phantom of the Opera
Steely Dan (the new album)
The Brian Setzer Orchestra
Split Enz (again, early stuff like "True Colours")
Jelly Roll Morton
Cocteau Twins
Looper
Dead or Alive (Best of!)
Bill Cosby
Django Reinhardt
John Hiatt
Q-Tip

I also found what is so far my new favorite album title and music group name - Lead Us Not into Penn Station by Professor and Maryann. I saw several Raffi titles, so I plan to check out their selection of titles for kids, and I was able to listen to one of my all-time favorites, Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring. Note, though, that not all of these were available for burning, only streaming.

I was doubly impressed that Rhapsody had some King Missile titles, but then they lost points for not having anything at all from The Jazz Butcher and nothing pre-Flood from They Might Be Giants. I'm still having fun, though.

RSS - The Next Killer App for Education

"Imagine having the news that interests you automatically delivered to your desktop, or being alerted to updates on your favorite Web sites without visiting them first. Picture yourself as a news provider to specific people who share your interests or just appreciate your commentary. Most commonly used to support the publication of weblogs and Internet news sites, RSS is an important development that promises to have a substantial impact on the world of education" [Tools, via elearnspace blog]

Some good examples for educators looking for ways to incorporate RSS into their web sites.

BTW, I still don't know exactly what happened to the Librarian Avengers site that hosted the infamous "Why You Should Fall to Your Knees and Worship a Librarian" page. I've changed the link at the top to point to Indiana University's School of Library and Information Science mirror since obtained permission to repost it. Please adjust your bookmarks accordingly.

I forgot to note that Illinois libraries will indeed be receiving settlement CDs from the music industry. From the SLS Friday Memo:

"Public libraries, please take note that you will be receiving music CDs in the fall as part of a settlement made with the Attorney General's office. Several states, including Illinois, joined together and successfully prosecuted several CD manufacturers and vendors for price fixing. The regional Library Systems were chosen to distribute the 156,000 CDs."

I can't wait to see which 156,000 CDs they picked!

Mobile Cameras and the Nature of Snapshots

"I'm taking a picture of the workshop folks, and they're taking pictures of me. We're all doing it with camera-phones.

When you carry a camera around that a) is a one-hand device; b) can send a photo by e-mail in a few clicks; c) takes not-too-terrible pictures; and d) has Bluetooth connectivity to the personal computer -- something has changed in the nature of picture-taking." [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]

I'm almost there, just waiting for the right deal. I really wish Nokia made the 3650 or something comparable for Sprint's network. Aaron, though, has beaten me to the punch. This weekend, he and his wife bought cameraphones, specifically the Sanyo 8100. He's already having fun, too:

"Through Sprint, we're getting unlimited 'vision' which includes sending and uploading pics to an online depository, web access and other things.  One really cool thing is that Mapquest sends clipped directions to email on the phone.  This might turn out to be one of those things that easily integrates itself into my life and I depend upon.  A killer app like AIM....

I take one issue with it all so far:  the text messaging is done via the web rather than the phone, so it takes about 20 seconds to send and receive.  I'll let you play with it soon.  I'm fairly impressed. Of course the 5300 has a flash and a zoom, but we didn't think that was worth another $100.

Did you know that they provide unlimited web space in which to upload all of your photos (for my plan)?"

In case you couldn't tell, Aaron is in his early 20s.

I was going to try to hold out for a 1-megapixel camera, like the Sony Ericsson 505i (watch a Quicktime video of it in action, link courtesy of Gizmodo), but I don't think I can hold out that long.  :-P

"Nokia's 3650 cameraphone, the one with the circular keypad and built-in Bluetooth, is free with service activation over at Amazon.
Read " [Gizmodo]

If you're willing to switch to T-Mobile, this is a very cool phone to make you switch. Free is difficult to beat. In addition to the Bluetooth and built-in camera, it has an MMC expansion slot and plays MP4 video. Barbara, if you haven't bought one yet, here's your big chance!

It's Official

"The MLK Middle School blogging project has, in the (slightly altered) immortal (?) phrasing of John Cleese, '... passed on! The project is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If it didn't still have a few Google-cached pages, it'd be pushing up the digital daisies! Its CMS processes are now 'istory! It's off the net! It's kicked the bucket, it's shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisibile!! IT IS AN EX-PROJECT!!'

I'm off next year to a full time librarian gig at Galileo High School, over on the north side of town, boasting itself as the city's Academy of Science and Technology. We shall see." [homoLudens III]

Good luck, Pat - it's MLK's loss. I look forward to seeing what you have up your sleeve for Galileo!

Business 2.0 has an infographic that explains the breakdown of "how labels and artists divvy up your MP3 dollar:"

The MP3 Economy

"The biggest chunk of your dollar goes to the online music provider. This explains why sites like Rhapsody can offer promotional discounts: When you buy a song for 49 cents, the site sacrifices its profit but the label still gets paid....

The Artist's Cut: Twelve percent is average, but successful bands often hammer out better contracts. In many major-label contracts, charges for 'packaging' and promotional copies are subtracted from the artist's cut, leaving the talent with a measly 8 percent. BMG, Universal, and Warner have announced plans to do away with such deductions for digital downloads."

I was hoping for a longer article when I saw the headline, but it's good to note that some labels will stop deducting PR costs from the artist's side of the equation. Another reason to head further down the digital download trail, although the cost of individual songs needs to get even cheaper before I'll start purchasing them en masse.

After all, that's the killer app of the file sharing services - "cheap" downloads of individual titles. Well, okay, free downloads of individual titles, but I'm willing to be a customer and pay something for them. I don't think it will be $0.79 for too many of them, though. A permanent fire sale of say $0.25 (maybe even $.030) would have me glued to my PC downloading songs from them.