Free Music to You from the Internet

I love my laptop computer. Unfortunately it is not as fast as my desktop computer. For this reason I do not download music files --take up too much storage space. But since I do love to listen to music while working, I spent some time locating good music--free--to listen to on my laptop.

Here are three free and totally different types of music sites on the web. Download the one you like the best, or all three as I have done.

Pandora allows you to play music just like you like. Start out with a song or artist that you enjoy. Pandora will play that artist, plus will mix in similar songs or artists. You indicate how you like the selection, and the music gradually is tailored to your tastes. You can create additional "stations" to fit your changing moods.

Radio Paradise is more of a conventional radio station. The music is mellow and varied. A playlist is included. You will hear a disc jockey occasionally, but otherwise there is no advertising or interruption between songs. This site is just click and go; no listener involvement necessary. If you wish, you can join as a member, chat, comment, etc. The "LRC" tab enables one to rate a song and to upload songs, though it appears not all songs played can be uploaded.

Last.fm makes full use of the latest technologies to bring music to the listener tailored to his or her tastes. The site makes use of "cloud tags" and monitoring techniques. You can see what is the most popular type of music, the most popular songs, tracks, artists, albums etc. Or, you can just listen to music after picking the genres you favor. Similar to Pandora, the station will gradually learn what you like best, and tailor itself to your tastes.

Best of all, these three sites are free, although you will be asked to join. So check them out, and if you decide to utilize any of them, consider the site my gift to you this Christmas.

Christmas at the Whitehouse

Christmas is special at the Whitehouse. Today I want to take you on an internet tour of the festivities there. First we have the Christmas tour of the wonderful old home, brought to us through the colorful paintings of Pamela Carroll. Learn a little history as you tour the rooms and see what the first family has been up to this Christmas. (hint: their pretty good at decorating!) Next, I know you want to read the official Whitehouse Christmas skit. This year's main performer is Barney, the Bush family terrier. He shares the stage, however, with Ms Beazley and the family kitty, known to those who love her as Ms Kitty. After you have read the skit, just click on any picture of Barney you see, and take the picture tour of the First Pets as they prance around the Christmas tree and all about the Whitehouse. Gosh, the way they act, you'd think they owned the place!

A New Way to Post Blog Entries

Today I am utilizing new technology to write this blog entry.  A post came to my attention this week through my RSS feeder on the subject of easing the burden of blogging.  Blogging is lots of fun, and when time allows can be a mental challenge. By that I mean it can be a challenge to put together an article of real interest.  Most of what  I post I confess is thrown together, grabbed from other sites, or very short.  Only a few articles have been challenging.  One of the reasons is that it takes time to undertake the interesting stuff, such as include pictures or links to other sites.  Well, This new website I discovered has changed that.

I am writing this piece on a site called WriteToMyBlog.  When I'm done, I will click a few buttons and this post will automatically appear on the Montgomery Advertiser blog.  It will also appear on my other blog, "Library Universe".  To create the link in this paragraph, all I had to do was click a button, cut and paste the target URL, click another button, and done!

WriteToMyBlog looks like a standard Microsoft Word application, with a few additional icons to enable doing those things that bloggers like to do, like post pictures easily and add links.  Word is familiar to most people, so using this new site is second nature. Oh, and I failed to mention, it is a web-based application.  This means that one can work on any computer through WriteToMyBlog. It does not require that you be on the computer that you usually use.  So go to the beach and write a blog!

It's pretty cool! 

Tags: Technology

NY Times Announces LIbrarians of the Year

This year's award winners are out in the New York Times annual award for Best Libarian.  The award is given to the best librarians in various categories.  To view the winners, click .