One Click Additions

If you’d like to see the newest additions to the One Click downloadable audio book program through Recorded Books, take a look at the newest list of titles:

Adult Collection Additions, October through December (PDF)
Children’s & YA Collection Additions, October through December (PDF)

Four Things You Can Do… to get started with One Click Audio

Thanks to Joe Levy for coming around the state once again in October to re-acquaint us with the Recorded Books One Click Audio program. If you’re currently participating, here are his suggestions for getting going:

1. Get an icon on your home page. You can choose icons from the Box.net widget.

2. Link the icon — and any links off your website — directly to your login page. You can get the URL for your login page by going to the list of libraries on the GMLC site, finding your library in the list, and clicking on it. When you see the page that is blank except for a little box asking you to log in, copy the URL in the address bar (it will start kite.middlebury.edu). This way, patrons can avoid that GMLC page and go directly to login.
3. Link to the help page and the list of supported devices on your website. The help page is at http://gmlc.wordpress.com/recorded-books/recorded-books-help/ and the list of supported devices at http://www.oclc.org/audiobooks/techspecs/devices.htm.
4. Advertise, advertise, advertise. Let people know through

• newspaper articles
• blog posts
• email newsletters
• posters and bookmarks (you can contact Recorded Books directly at oneclickaudio[at]recordedbooks.com for promotional materials)
• your library’s Facebook site or Twitter feed
• business cards in audio book on cd cases
• shelf talkers on your audio book shelves
• on your SLIP printer receipts
• offering patron training sessions (and why not tape it for your public access channel while you’re at it?)
• catchy phrases (“You can now download audio books at 3 am in your underwear!”)
• on your overdue notices (“Next time, return it on time — try downloadable audio!”)
• don’t forget posters in places around town where people might be listening to audio — the local gym, the teacher’s room at the school, coffee shops, bus stops…
• downloading the MARC records into your online catalog (I’m working on getting these downloaded into the Box.net Recorded Books folder for all of you)

All of these ideas are great for Listen Up! Vermont too!

For more information on using One Click Audio, see the post from the August trainings, and look for the help page to be updated.

Statistics for Standards

Hello all –

here are the numbers you need for your standards reports:

Listen Up! subscribers: 848 adult titles, 250 children’s/YA

Recorded Books subscribers: 1990 adult titles, 821 children’s/YA

Best of luck with your standards reports.

Board of Directors Agenda, 11/16

Agenda
GMLC Board of Directors
November 16, 2009
via Skype

1. Evaluation survey — past programs; Project Advisory Board suggestions for new services
2. Project updates
3. Development Coordinator update
4. Budget
5. Winnie Belle grant

MARC records updated

I spent a little time this morning compiling the many MARC record files for Listen Up! Vermont into chunks by year, broken up by season. Hopefully, this will help ease the process of getting all those MARC records into your system!

Here’s a link to the reorganized folder: http://www.box.net/shared/kyo801kt0o. They can also be accessed, as always, through the Box.net widget in the left hand menu panel here on the Listen Up! blog.

I also re-organized the exisiting MARC records by year.

Downloading the MARC records for the Recorded Books collection is a bit more of an undertaking — I will get to work on that soon, hopefully this week.

Upcoming Trainings

Don’t forget!

We have two new Digital Library 101 trainings for Listen Up! Vermont scheduled for

Wednesday October 21st at 3pm EDT. Access Code: email Stephanie for code
Thursday October 22nd at 10am EDT. Access Code: email Stephanie for code

Simply go to http://www.readytalk.com and log in using the access code. You will need a phone or VoIP to listen to the audio portion. The phone number is 1.866.740.1260 — log in with the same access code for the audio. We recommend every participating library try to have one of their staff attend one of these trainings, which are a wonderful refresher and help you with 95% of the questions you will get from patrons.

Now that the One Click downloadable audio service through Recorded Books is up and running, Joe Levy is ready to give us all a refresher training. We have one scheduled for Wednesday, 10/28 at 11am in Stowe, and will be scheduling one in Brattleboro. Following these in-person trainings, we will talk to Joe about setting up some webinars, if there is interest; Joe can also possibly come to your library to see you.

Be sure to mark your attendance at http://gmlc.wordpress.com/2009/10/16/training-options/ — that way, we can cancel any sessions without participants.

Training Options

Please let us know what trainings you are interested in attending:

Update on Mango Languages

The newest service we are looking to start for GMLC members is the Mango Languages language learning database. The more libraries that sign up, the less expensive it will be for everyone — so we wanted to be sure members knew about the service.

We will be having an online look at the service on Monday, October 26 at 3:15pm. This will be done totally online, so you just need to be in front of a computer with the log in info (going out to members in an email).

Schools, this might be an especially great resource to offer (or to let your language departments or administration know about), as it will allow you to essentially offer a language lab in 18 different languages that your students can access from anywhere.

We would be looking to start the service with Mango’s new service, Mango Passport, which is available mid-November. This has a wonderful new interface; I do have access to the current Mango product, which is much more spartan and offers fewer languages.

Mango Passport will have 18 languages: Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, German, Mandarin Chinese, Russian, Greek, Brazilian Portuguese, Vietnamese, Thai, Turkish, Hebrew, Hindi, Arabic, Farsi, Irish Gaelic, and Korean. ESL programs will be available for all of the major languages (ESL programs for Spanish, Polish, and Portuguese speakers currently exist).

Each language has 100 lessons; the primary focus of the lessons are to create conversational fluency for the participant, helping them to communicate quickly and effectively. Mango will be putting out a new product for more advanced study, Mango Apprentice, in the Summer of 2010.

The language lessons are spoken by native speakers of the language, and at the end of each of the 100 lessons there is a target conversation — a quiz to see how well you have learned the lesson. The lessons have lots of opportunities to hear the words being spoken, see the pronunciation of the words, and see the English translations. Non-Roman languages have the phonetic pronunciation of the word written in the Roman alphabet as well.

This is a fabulous opportunity to offer a comprehensive language learning database to your patrons; even the largest libraries in our group should be able to do so for under $1,000 a year. Please be sure to let the GMLC know if you are interested — the more libraries, the less it will cost for each library! — or if you need more information. Contact Stephanie Chase at schase[at]stowelibrary.org.

Update your records… x2

It’s time for two quick updates:

1. Please review your barcode and patron number ranges and ensure they will still cover your newest patrons. Need to update? Please send an email with the new range end to vtaudiobooks[at]gmail.com.

2. Please also be sure your finance department/accountant/etc has the correct address on file for the GMLC: it is no longer PO Box 1029 in Stowe, but is PO Box 264 in Middlebury, 05753.

Thanks!

Recently Acquired Audiobooks (new & forthcoming)

2666 by Roberto Bolaño (MP3)
Al Capone Does My Shirts byGennifer Choldenko
Born Round by Frank Bruni (MP3)
Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore
The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson
The Healing of America by Marianne Williamson
Homer & Langley by E.L. Doctorow
Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving
The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown
My Life in France by Julia Child
Official Book Club Selection by Kathy Griffin
The Paris Vendetta by Steve Berry
Precious by Sapphire
Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan
The Scarpetta Factor by Patricia Cornwell
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen & Ben Winters
Shanghai Girls by Lisa See
Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew B. Crawford
South of Broad by Pat Conroy
Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder
That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo
Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson (youth edition) (MP3)
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy
U is for Undertow by Sue Grafton
Where Men Win Glory by Jon Krakauer
The Wild Things by Maurice Sendak & Dave Eggers (MP3)