Hoopla

Important (and helpful!) updates coming to Hoopla and OverDrive!

Hoopla Digital and OverDrive have recently announced a few updates that will be extremely helpful to many patrons.

Here are the changes:

  • Hoopla is now available on Chromecast. Stream all of your favorite Hoopla movies and shows right to your TV! Using Chromecast, a device that plugs into the HDMI port on many TVs, patrons can cast borrowed video titles onto a larger screen right from the Hoopla App on their phone or tablet.
  • Hoopla is updating its iOS app. These updates will be available in the next few weeks.
    • Content tabs will now appear on the main screen, which will allow for faster discovery and quicker access to content.
    • The Browse feature will combine genres and collections and will assist patrons in finding all titles related to a collection of interest.
    • A trending search feature will be added to show patrons the most relevant search terms. This will help make their searching easier!
    • Quicker download speed in the iOS app! It will be easier for patrons to now when the download of a borrow item is complete.
    • An updated favorites feature: Grouped by content kind an artist, making it easier to find.
    • Updated help screen.
  • OverDrive will change “Bookshelf” on the OverDrive site to “Checkouts” on December 15. This is a major point of confusion that we covered in a previous post.  This new update should alleviate the confusion between a user’s bookshelf on the website and their bookshelf in the OverDrive app.

Pam (Baldwin)

Continue ReadingImportant (and helpful!) updates coming to Hoopla and OverDrive!

Sounds of the Season

It’s that time of year again. Pumpkin spice lattes make way for peppermint mochas. Leaves riot all over the sidewalk, bright carpets of scarlet and gold. The nights grow long and dark. But most of all, as sure as Thanksgiving follows Halloween, it’s time for your early birdie patrons to check out all the holiday music on your shelves, leaving you in the lurch when everybody else is ready to start rocking around the Christmas tree.

Time to go digital!

Still from A Charlie Brown Christmas, copyright Charles Schultz/United Features Syndicated 1965.
Still from A Charlie Brown Christmas, copyright Charles Schultz/United Features Syndicated 1965.

Freegal and Hoopla are your best bets for sing-along holiday cheer. Here are a few search tips and content examples.

freegalmusic

  • For a broad search, select “genre” from the top bar, then “holiday” from the genre sidebar on the results page.
  • To narrow it down a bit, try keyword searches for terms like “Christmas,” “holiday,” “klezmer,” etc. in the search box. Make sure your drop-down menu is set to either “Albums” or “Songs” for best results.
  • You can also choose “Advanced Search” at the top of the page, set the genre to “Holiday,” and use “Search All” as your default. This search gives the most visually friendly layout, and easiest results browsing.

Some cool finds:

  • Let’s Celebrate Kwanzaa, Peter Pan Kids
  • Christmas Music by Dogs and Cats, The Christmas Critters
  • Jazz Music for Thanksgiving Dinner, Disembogue Records

Hoopla100

  • Hoopla’s search interface is easier to navigate, but less precise.
  • A keyword search for “Christmas” will bring up a wealth of titles.
  • Filter by “music,” then select any title.
  • Each title has suggested tags for “similar items.” Selecting these will take you to comprehensive lists of “holiday titles,” “Christmas titles,” etc

More interesting results:

  • Grumpy Cat’s Worst Christmas Ever
  • The Karaoke Channel: It’s Thanksgiving!
  • The Golden Dreydl: A Klezmer Nutcracker for Chanukah

Although it’s fun to point out novelties and curiosities, rest assured there’s a wide variety of music, from the fun and lighthearted to the sober and tasteful, for everyone to stream or download. Take a few minutes to explore on your own, and report back on what you find in the comments section.

Leigh Anne

Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh – Main

Continue ReadingSounds of the Season

DC Comics and Graphic Novels – Now on hoopla!

Regular ShowGarfieldHushEarth One 

Every story has a hero! To add even more excitement to your patrons’ summer reading lists, Hoopla has added DC Comics and Graphic Novels. From Mordecai and Rigby, Strawberry Shortcake and Justice League to The Mis-Adventures of Adam West and The Illustrated Story of the Crusades, graphic novels and comics help children build reading & language skills; they help motivate teens to read & discuss literature; and they encourage adults to experience the joy of reading.

Hoopla’s office announcement states:

hoopla takes pride in announcing the addition, today, of DC Comics and Vertigo to all our library partners. And, just like heroes are known to do, all the iconic DC Comics Superheroes have arrived just in the nick of time for all of you planning reading programs around “Heroes” this summer!

Hugely influential graphic novels The Dark Knight Returns, All-Star Superman, Watchmen, and The Killing Joke are just a taste of what to expect. The Vertigo imprint is also represented as well, with Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman Vol. 1 joining our ranks.   WOW! To make this the ultimate superhero encounter, your patrons can now experience all of the DC Comics close-up action with hoopla’s Action View – our immersive-reading technology!

Learn more about the Action View experience in the web tutorial below, entitled: “comics on Apple iOS devices” https://youtu.be/MBngxyarFe

There is so much to experience and enjoy at https://www.hoopladigital.com/home

Debi

ACLA

Continue ReadingDC Comics and Graphic Novels – Now on hoopla!

Swing into Summer With New Hoopla Content

Hoopla ebook meme

You’ve seen it in action at your library: patrons who love digital reading really love digital reading. In fact, they’re most likely some of your most voracious customers.

Hoopla’s got some good news for you and your power users: by the end of this month, e-books—including comics and graphic novel options—will be available through Hoopla Digital with an Allegheny County library card.

The new content, which includes books from a variety of publishers, will be available through the browser interface as well as LightSpeed, the new Hoopla 3.0 version of their popular app. The eReader technology is built directly into Hoopla’s infrastructure, so there’s no need to download additional software or create a second log-in: everything you’ll want to read will be right there at your fingertips with no additional learning curve needed.

The Hoopla eReader will have a number of features your patrons may have already come to expect from ebooks, including appearance adjustments (such as font size and background color), bookmark creation, and syncing across devices. To make reading digital comics more enjoyable, the eReader also contains the Action View panel, which activates with a simple click or two, depending on what kind of device you’re using. Action View lets readers appreciate comics the way they were designed to be enjoyed, with both full-page and panel-to-panel views.

The content itself will contain a wide variety of reading choices for library users of all ages and interests, including kids, teens, African American fiction, and LGBTQ lit. You and your patrons will be familiar with many of the participating publishers, such as:

  •  IDW/Top Shelf
  • Orca Book Publishers
  • Paragon
  • PM Press
  • Riptide
  • Saddleback
  • Sounds True
  • Tyndale House

More reading choices, with no additional digital hassle? Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? The ebook content should arrive just in time for summer reading, which will give you and your patrons the chance to see for yourself.

–Leigh Anne (CLP)

Continue ReadingSwing into Summer With New Hoopla Content