Broadly, the DMC at OhioLINK includes nine (9) databases: Art and Architecture; Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics, Digital Animal Sounds; Digital Video Collection (1,529 videos); Foreign Language Digital Videos; Historic and Archival Digital Media; LANDSAT 7 Satellite Images; Sanborn Digital Maps; Science Digital Media; Social Sciences Digital Media; each database is broken out into its own collection.

For instance, being a playwright, I was interested in Henrik Ibsen and discovered that searching the Digital Video Collection there was a video named Henrik Ibsen: The Master Playwright, from Films for Humanities and Sciences.

The Digital Media Center is available at http://dmc.ohiolink.edu/

There is so much in the DMC, though, that I thought I would highlight individual collections, starting with the Art and Architecture Database.

My opinion on the matter has always been that of a passive tool. I will help the person find the information they desire. I will not judge the request nor will I interpret the information for them. I find it equally important in matters of collection development. Collection development is the process of selecting the material that will be included in a library collection. There are policies on this that state, usually, we will collect all books that meet this criteria: X Y Z. Policies are usually in place to ensure the orderly and unbiased purchasing of materials that represent a variety of viewpoints on a subject: after all, a library is purchasing material for more than one person: more than a hundred people; and in some cases, more than one thousand. So, who is to say what is right and wrong? My view on income taxes may be entirely different than yours. My view of alcohol consumption and smoking is likely different as well. No one person can posture his or her view as being the final view or the only view on a subject. This is why it is awful to see librarians willfully refusing to purchase a children’s book (a Newberry Award winner) because it mentions the word “scrotum.”

The euphemistic pattern in our country, especially with regard to bodily functions and bodily parts, is really quite comic and sad. Pathetic. Another recent example is the woman who complained of having to see the word “vagina” on the marquee of a theatre running the Vagina Monologues. Frankly, the fear of the body is the fear of the self and the denial of more than half of one’s existence. The people who fear the body will be greatly pleased in some distant future when the body is removed and our minds, brains, consciousnesses float around disembodied in some plastic manufactured container. Body experience will be relegated to the trash heap of history and will be re-phrased as inputs and outputs. The brain will live forever in Tupperware, but what will living be like? The fear of the body says as much about the person, who longs for a plastic body: hairless, odorless, neutered, removed of all reality, meaning, and vitality. These people feel the same about their children and their children’s minds: plastic, neutered, inoffensive. They are the same people who promote fairy tales stripped of the lightning flashes of mythic meaning; the unconscious depravity that makes life potent and worthwhile. The sisters of Cinderella don’t cut off their toes to fit the shoe; instead they struggle make it fit, or worse, just give over to apathy and don’t really care at all.

The librarians who refuse to purchase this book and place themselves in the Godly position of doing what the parents should do: decide what their own children will see, read, and know, are violating one of the most sanctified ideals of the library profession. They are accountants who embezzle. They are judges who take bribes. They are priests who molest. They are guilty of a great betrayal and are sad, sad representatives of their profession.

Each human should have the right to select the forms of human expression to which he or she will subscribe. For children, this is the role of the parent. If a parent doesn’t want his or her child exposed the word “scrotum,” that is their right. But parents all too often revoke this right, expecting society to do what they should in fact be doing: and then become outraged when it isn’t done to their taste: parents who use libraries as daycare centers; require televisions with vchips rather than actively engaging their children and paying attention to what they do and what they are exposed to; require schools to teach their children about sex, provide showers, feed them, baby-sit them: but not discipline them…in short, parents who dispose of their responsibilities.

Secret parts was the word in Medieval times. Unmentionables. Bathroom. Restroom. Behind. Hoo Hah. Peepee. Tinkle. It’s all enough to make one want to throw-up.

In re-designing the course, I relied quite a bit on the approach used by Betsy Bruce. Bruce is certified in several Adobe products, including Dreamweaver, and it was through an Adobe e-seminar that I learned of the Box Model’s comprehensive approach to site design.

Now, the CSS Box Model is nothing new, of course. In fact, I frequently point participants in the Intermediate Dreamweaver workshop to CSS Zen Garden for a fine example of what can be accomplished using CSS and DIVs. I have also created websites that take advantage of the visibility and hide attributes of DIVs in combination with javascript mouseover functions: Web Resources. But until I designed a workshop that centered around the use of the Box Model for a page structure I never fully realized how quickly pages could be laid out, nor how completely all aspects of the page could be controlled. And, of course, Dreamweaver makes it very easy to access the full functionality and power that DIVs offer web developers through the CSS Panel.

If you're interested in web design and haven’t taken advantage of what DIVs have to offer, please take a look at the CaseLearns material I have provided on my site or the material that Betsy Bruce offers on her own (link at my site). Additionally, if you are interested in more advanced features, including designing your own xml files and rss feeds, I encourage you to take advantage of Adobe’s online events and on-demand seminars.

Let me know what you think!