Last fall, Google released a new collaboration product, Shared Spaces.  This allows you to create customized collaboration work spaces with anyone.  You can create a place to play games, plan a trip, make lists or search Amazon, with people you know.

For those of us who want a really fast snapshot of recent Internet activity and news on a topic, try Addictomatic.  You can simply type in a search term, and get a page highlighting the latest news from Twitter, Google Blog search, YouTube and more.  It’s kind of fun, so try it out — here’s my search on the Watson computer that won Jeopardy.

Related to our recent Surface preview:

From CrunchGear

An open demo of Microsoft Surface has been arranged to be held at the Drexel Libraries Hagerty Library 1st floor on Monday, May 17th from 10-3, with demos by Microsoft representatives on the hour.

Surface is a”revolutionary multi-touch computer that responds to natural hand gestures and real-world objects, helping people interact with digital content in a simple and intuitive way” (from the Surface website).

Here’s a still I grabbed from one of the application videos:

A few months ago I watched this TED Talk [thanks John!] on Sixth Sense technology from Pranav Mistry from MIT.  When I first heard about Surface, I immediately thought of this talk.

The possibilities!

Penguin UK is formatting books for the upcoming iPad, from Engadget.

[Thanks Larry!]

Apple iPad

One-and-a-half pounds and one-half inch thick.   Like a big iPod Touch.

This recent article in The Economist has details on the technology behind e-book reader displays.

There’s also mention of PlasticLogic’s QUE proReader, which is set to launch next week.  Here’s a brief article from engadget.

PlasticLogic's QUE proReader

We’ve got a free 30-day trial to the Kindle Ebook Reader!  Amazon has lots of details on how it works on their site.  The cost for the Kindle is currently $349, plus costs for content.

It’s pretty small and lightweight, about the size of a book. The black and white display is really nice, without any glare, and is reminiscent of a newspaper’s text.  It’s easy to add content, to change the text size and to turn the page. I think the scroll wheel is a little annoying, but I can’t really think of a better way to address the problem that it solves, off hand.

The Kindle can read content from ebooks, magazines, newspapers, and blogs, each associated with their own cost.  The blogs & newspaper content is usually more recent (and free) on the internet, but ebooks and magazines make a lot of sense for the Kindle.

Here are some reviews (and a short annotated review list at a Kindle blog).  Drexel library staff will soon have a chance to take a look at it yourselves!  Leave a comment, and let me know what you think about it.

I’m sure everyone has heard that University of Michigan is offering what has been called a “book ATM” in their library.  The machine can print and bind a 300 page book in 7 minutes or less, depending on the  model.  The titles available are either out-of-copyright or under specific agreement with the Espresso Book Machine company.

Here’s a good write up of the details of how that machine works, for those of you who like to know the ins and outs.

PlasticLogic just released information on their new text reader meant for business use.  It’s about the weight/size of a pad of paper, and appears (from their demo) to be durable and easy to use.

Thin and light

I always wonder about whether these kinds of things will catch on, and I’m sure it depends on the price point, but this is the first one that I’d even consider carrying around with me.  It’s not clear if you can load larger files (like full ebooks) on it, which is something I’d like to have with me on trips, as well as all my work documents.