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It Came from the Library!

Ready to hear a scary story involving two fantastic digital resources that are perfect for instigating Halloween fun?

It was a dark and stormy-uh…morning…when the library patron walked into their local library. They were there to check-out their favorite Halloween movie. When they approached the circulation desk they saw…A LIBRARIAN! No, something scarier…a TECHNICAL SERVICES LIBRARIAN!

This feels like an overreaction.

Anyway, they asked for help finding the movie but to their horror they couldn’t quite remember the title! It was based on a book written by Anne Rice. Brad Pitt was in the movie along with…Jonah Hill? No, you’re thinking of Moneyball. Did Anne Rice write Moneyball?

The patron’s movie plans were getting slashed right before their eyes until they were reminded of IMDB.com, the exact resource they needed — linked right there on their library’s website. The Internet Movie Database provides information on films, television series, and online streaming content. The patron was able to figure out the movie they were looking for and they found information about the cast, production crew, plot summaries, trivia, ratings, and reviews!

Yeah, I remember it being a 7.5 too.

They also learned through IMDB.com that Interview with the Vampire was recently re-VAMP-ed into a TV series. That’s going on the binge watch list. As the patron was checking out, they remembered their Interview with the Vampire themed Halloween party. That’s tonight! They meant to grab a copy of the original movie soundtrack! Surely, getting ahold of this item was going to be a hassle.

Oh no! The narrator was conveniently wrong for the sake of proving a point!

The patron was reminded of hoopla, the free resource through their library where they can stream all sorts of digital media like music, audio books, e-books, movies, TV and comics. They can stream this soundtrack directly from their computer or phone! They even found some Halloween e-books to read to their children after a fun night of trick-or-treating.

The library patron left with exactly what they were looking for and more, thanks to IMDB.com and hoopla. Both of which can be found on your very own library website. Scary stories don’t usually get endings as happy as this one. What a twist!

Derek, South Park Township Library

Continue ReadingIt Came from the Library!

The Updates Keep On Comin’…

As always, updates are plentiful in OverDrive land! The sun has officially set on the WMA and WMV formats, with a few exceptions.  It turns out that the deadline spurred a few audio publishers into action and we have a few WMA stragglers that will stick around for conversion to MP3 by mid-June.

There were some WMA titles with active holds and those patrons have received an e-mail notification that their hold will not be fulfilled. We will also be receiving a list of the WMA titles in our collection and will be checking for a supported format that we can purchase.

OverDrive Listen has also arrived.  Like OverDrive Read, OverDrive Listen allows patrons to listen to audiobooks directly in their browser, rather than downloading the files onto their device. You can also still bookmark, notate, and highlight as with downloaded files.  Find more information about this new format in the OverDrive help pages.

Starting June 1, there is more happening on the holds front as well. Patrons can now get a better idea of how long they’ll be waiting for requests. Rather than the total number of holds for a title, they will see a whole number ratio that represents the number of holds per copy.

And, finally, there’s more news about OverDrive’s new “Dyslexic font” option.  Starting on June 1, patrons will have the option to enable this font through their account settings on the OverDrive site itself.  This heavier-weighted font increases readability for patrons with dyslexia. The feature, when turned on, will work site-wide.

Jeff, South Park

Continue ReadingThe Updates Keep On Comin’…

The Switch is Flipped!

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Guess what!  Patrons can now select audio books as part (or all) of their monthly allotment of eight Hoopla titles.  No more fielding confused inquiries about why that format isn’t enabled.

The circulation period for audio books is 21 days.  As with the other formats (video and music), patrons can stream the content in their browser or use the Hoopla app to stream or download.

A link has been added to the countywide eResources landing page and the annotation has been updated. The changes are being made to the CLP website too.

In other Hoopla news, there is some exciting new video content available, including:

marilynkings speechiron lady

 

 

 

 

bruno  idiotbrotherbrooklyns finest

 

 

 

(I’ll watch anything with Paul Rudd or Don Cheadle.)

TAKE NOTE: Some of these newer movies have a loan period of two days rather than three.

I hope you and your patrons are enjoying Hoopla.  Feel free to share your favorite Hoopla content in the comments.

Sarah (CLP)

Continue ReadingThe Switch is Flipped!

There’s a new way to answer that age-old question: what do library users want?

We’ve just recently signed up for a free service that OverDrive provides called Recommend to Library. But don’t worry–it’s not an open invitation to request all the titles we can’t provide because they’re simply not available. Rather it’s a way to search the entire list of titles offered by OverDrive, including titles not currently available in our collection.

One way to see what OverDrive offers that we don’t currently own is to click on the Additional Titles radio button when you do a simple search.

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Another way to get there is to go the Advanced Search page on OverDrive. As you can see at the bottom of the image below, users can choose to search “Additional titles” here as well.

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In either case, what comes up will be a list of titles that match the search criteria. The first titles that appear will be those that we currently own, followed by those that we don’t.  If one (or more) of the latter is of interest, searchers can click the Recommend button.

For those with plenty of time on their hands and no particular authors or subjects in mind it’s also possible to browse the entire list of non-owned titles.  When users do a search of the library collection they’ll see this link at the bottom of their search results.

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One thing that might be a little confusing is that recommendations can’t be made by casual browsers.  They can only be made after signing in to OverDrive.  On the bright side, this means that users can keep track of the titles they’ve recommended in the “My Account” section of OverDrive.

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When the recommendation is made, users are prompted to check what action they’d like to have taken.  They can ask to be notified by email or to have the title put on hold for them–or both–if the library purchases the title in question.  They’ll also be required to confirm their recommendation.  For now recommendations are limited to 5 per day per person.

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So, what happens next? OverDrive creates and sends lists of recommended titles regularly for consideration by selectors.  Titles are added when they meet the selection criteria and funds permit.

Happy Searching!

Lisa D. (CLP)

Continue ReadingThere’s a new way to answer that age-old question: what do library users want?