PieLab

Just heard a story on NHPR's Word of Mouth about a very cool project called PieLab. You might have read about it in Fast Company recently. It's basically built on the premise that when conversations start happening in a community--and young people/designers are involved, good things will come out of it. It's another idea to come out of Project M, which is a really interesting workshop group of people who come together to envision a better world through design. And they're making it happen. Sort of like a Rural Design Studio for graphic design/creative thinkers. (And you remember when I swooned after I read Rural Studio, don't you? That was after Frank Lloyd Wright but before Room to Read).

I am so taken with this idea, I want to drive to Greensboro, Alabama right now and visit PieLab. But at 1500 miles away, I guess I will have to wait for the t-shirt. Or give PieLab investments as Christmas gifts. Applaud this idea wholeheartedly.

Maybe we should start serving pie once a month in our libraries? Here's a video to help you get in the spirit:

PieLab Promo from Project M on Vimeo.

What sorts of inspiration might we draw from this for our own community spaces within and around the library?

New WorldCat keyword widget

Released this weekend, the WorldCat keyword widget is pretty darn cool. You'll have to scroll down, though, to see it on our antiquated page layout (if you still read on the big screen, rather than your aggregator). Perhaps (sigh) it is time for some actual design skills to help us out here at IAG. I am feeling the need for some visual freshening. Or perhaps it's just spring fever.

Our original intent in keeping It's All Good in its current polkadotted fashion was to encourage everyone in libraries or library school who, like us, had limited design skills, attention spans and hours in the workday to devote to blogging to consider its merits and see how easy it was. "See," we said, "See how we're using it in the totally out-of-the-box, you don't need special tools way." But by now that ship has sailed...

But back to the WorldCat Keyword search widget. Designed especially for content pages or blogs that are relatively narrow in scope, you can build a refined keyword search right into the widget...and then of course you can also change it and get results right in the cute box. Play around with it and see what you think. Better yet, put it on a couple of blogs/pages and see what your users think.