Sunnyy with a 0% chance of rain HIGH LOW 79 53
Diamond Vols drop weekend series to Gators
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Monday, April 12, 2010 Issue 58
E D I T O R I A L L Y
PUBLISHED SINCE 1906 http://dailybeacon.utk.edu
Vol. 113
I N D E P E N D E N T
Actress and Tennessee native Dixie Carter dies at age 70
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Dickens goes digital UT Libraries get media friendly with new mobile-ready Web site Robbie Hargett
Miss. governor says Confederacy flap not worth ‘diddly’ NEW ORLEANS — The dustup over Virginia’s proclamation for Confederate History Month seems like a lot of noise over something that “doesn’t amount to diddly,” Mississippi’s governor said in an interview aired Sunday. Virginia’s Republican governor, Bob McDonnell, apologized for leaving out of his proclamation any reference to slavery. He added language to the decree calling slavery “evil and inhumane” after being criticized for reviving what many Virginians believe is an insensitive commemoration of its Confederate past. Fellow GOP Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi said he doesn’t think the proclamation was a mistake. “To me, it’s a sort of feeling that it’s a nit, that it is not significant, that it’s not a — it’s trying to make a big deal out of something (that) doesn’t amount to diddly,” Barbour said in the interview aired on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Staff Writer David Ratledge and Teresa Walker, Hodges Library technology staff members, discussed the future implementation of UT Libraries Mobile during a presentation in the Communication Building’s new Scripps Convergence Lab last week. UT Libraries Mobile is an attempt to create a mobile library presence for Internet-accessing mobile devices, such as the iPhone or Blackberry. Instead of going through the traditional UT Web site to get to the library home page, users can open UT Libraries Mobile like a smartphone application, similar to the familiar iPhone “apps.” One reason behind the idea is the fact that these kinds of Internet-accessing mobile devices, like the iPhone and Blackberry, are becoming more prevalent. “This is something that’s here to stay,” Ratledge, associate professor in Library Technology Services, said. “It’s not a shortterm thing, and it’s something that we need to make a part of our regular dispensing and usage of information.” Ratledge’s team observed similar projects from other universities to get a better understanding of what they wanted to do in creating with UT Libraries Mobile. “We were very careful from the very beginning to say that we did not want to duplicate our main Web site,” Walker, associate professor in the library’s
Integrated User Technology Department. “We wanted to pick out the things that made sense and start there.” The seven categories of UT Libraries Mobile include an Hours/Locations section, a Search section and a
Computer Status section. Under the Computer Status category, users can view the status of open computers in the Commons. Users can also contact the library through UT Libraries Mobile, as well as make comments on the mobile site. The Search function allows users to browse library online content, such as eBooks, articles, images and data. “While you might not want to sit down and read a 300-page book on a little phone screen, a lot of people are just wanting to scan through and find quotes or something like that,” Walker said. UT Libraries Mobile also provides IM services and text services, with which the team members are still experimenting. Although it seems like an application, Ratledge made it clear that UT Libraries Mobile is actually a Web site. “An app is very hardware specific, so if you create an iPhone app, it’s only going to run on an iPhone,” Ratledge said. Creating a Web site then allows for it to be used across multiple devices, instead of having to create multiple versions of the application to be compatible with specific devices. Some of the functions are still in the works. The team wants to integrate media streaming over mobile devices, as well as upgrade the Search function to include the entire library catalog. “We know that this is just the beginning,” Ratledge said. “There is a lot we want to learn, in particular from everyone else.”
Magnitude 4.4 quake, others shake San Diego SAN DIEGO — A cluster of moderate earthquakes near the U.S.Mexico border is continuing to rattle southern California one week after a magnitude 7.2 quake slammed the area. The U.S. Geological Survey says a magnitude 4.4 earthquake struck at 9:42 a.m. Sunday, about 11 miles west of downtown Calexico. Six other quakes above magnitude 3.0 were also reported in a threehour period. No damage or injuries have been reported. Scientists say the increased seismic activity is normal following the magnitude 7.2 earthquake last Sunday. Officials say the Easter quake killed two people and caused an estimated $100 million in damage to California alone. Station wagon crashes in Pa., killing three children HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania state police say a station wagon has crashed into a highway guardrail and rolled down an embankment, killing three young children. Police say a 57-year-old woman was driving the car Saturday night in tiny Middle Paxton Township, in Dauphin County. They say the car veered out of its lane, crashed through the guardrail and hit a guide wire before going airborne and slamming into a tree. They say it went down a 50foot embankment and landed upside down. — The Associated Press
Hayley DeBusk • The Daily Beacon
The National Guard College Fishing Championships were held on Fout Loudoun Lake and at UT this weekend. Top 25 college fishing teams attempted to qualify for the 2010 FLW College Fishing National Championship.
Fair transports job interviews to Web Kristian Smith Student Life Editor With unemployment still a problem, the job search can be challenging. Now students at UT have a new and innovative way to find employment. The Virtual Career Fair, hosted by CareerEco and UT’s career services, will be available for students in engineering, science and technology. This fair is unlike a traditional in-person job fair. Employers register online and post available positions. Each employer has their own chat room with specific hours of availability and job-seeking students can interact with the employers. Gayle Oliver-Plath, CEO of
CareerEco, the company hosting the fair, said students can also upload their resumes and drop them in “job boxes” for the particular postings or companies they find interesting. “Employers can see which students are interested in their company and can send them an e-mail asking them to come to their chat room,” she said. Oliver-Plath said a video feature is also enabled, and employers can invite students to video chat (if they have a Web camera). She said one way to stand out is to initiate a private chat by right-clicking on an employer’s name. Oliver-Plath said since this fair is non-traditional, students must behave and prepare them-
selves differently than they would for a traditional face-toface job fair. “It’s a good idea to have an ‘elevator pitch,’” she said. “This is one or two sentences that you can say or write about yourself as an introduction. You must be concise.” She said students should not enter chat rooms asking, “Do you have any jobs?’, but should say the things that are most important and interesting about them. Some things, like asking questions and doing research, still apply to the virtual fair. “It’s really important that students come to the table with compelling questions, even though it seems really casual,”
Oliver-Plath said. “Also don’t use ‘yup’ or any other casual language familiar with texting or IMing.” This is the first virtual fair that UT has hosted. Leslie Fox, coordinator for Career Services, said she thought this fair would be good for students in engineering, science and technology. “We felt these groups would be comfortable with the technology, and these fields still have opportunities,” she said. Since the College of Engineering did not have a live fair this year, Fox said the virtual fair is a good way to reach out to those students. “(Virtual fairs) are created for employers who have already
been at fairs but still have opportunities or employers who may not reach out to UT at a live fair because of costs,” she said. Oliver-Plath said there are many advantages to a virtual fair. “It’s extremely time-efficient,” she said. “Employers can see your resume, interact with you and find out things very quickly. It’s much more straight-forward and allows students to come across companies they normally may not stand in line for at a traditional career fair.” She said previous fairs at other schools have been successful. See CAREER on Page 3
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