John LeMasney (lemsy) is an artist, graphic designer, and technology creative. He is located in beautiful Nelson County, VA, but works remotely with ease. Contact him at: lemasney@gmail.com to discuss your next creative project.
Ana Devecka showed an interest when I started making monograms for friends, so here is my set for her. Ana is a sweetheart, creative and funny. She’s a mom and a wife, and very proud and dedicated to her family. She likes to help people, and always wants to find new ways to do it. I used this set to try to use font combinations to represent those qualities of hers. Are you interested in what Inkscape could do with your initials? Let me know!
Okay, so those of you who know me on Facebook know I like Foursquare, the geolocation microblogging app. I also like Android, the phone OS from Google, which has a cool barcode scanning capability. I’m fond of QR codes, which are square barcodes that you can encode URLs, paragraphs, and other strings of text. Bring it all together, and you have a way to scan a barcode to check in to Foursquare. I use an app for scanning to Foursquare called PhiSq available in the Android Market for free. I also use a free site to generate QRCodes from the Foursquare Venue URLs at http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ — copy and paste the Venue URL into the form, and voila: a QRcode that you can import into Inkscape. However, Inkscape has its own barcode generators in the extensions, and I’m sure they would work with the scanner as well.
I imported them into Inkscape, placed them in a grid, with explanatory text, and printed them out. I’m thinking about taping these to the back of my laptop, though you could get the scan right from the screen where you’re reading this. Although, unless you’re also on Rider’s campus, you’ll have a heck of a time getting any points or badges for the checkin.
So this was in response to Khurt Williams request for me to work on the idea that he and his family came up with, essentially a character to raise awareness for Diabetes and the rituals that go with it. I like what I did, but I really prefer his original image that he gave me for inspiration a whole lot more:
Thanks for the opportunity, Khurt, but quite honestly, I think your original is quite possibly the better solution.
The only way you’ll be able to read this is if you click on it. The full size is 20″x30″ and it’s an infographic depicting one week in the life of a librarian. Anyone who knows Janie Hermann knows just how busy she is, but it’s nice to see it all laid out.
libraries, hard work, work, numbers, stats, info, infographic, Janie Hermann, Princeton, Princeton Public Library, lemasney, open source, Inkscape, design, poster
So foursquare can be used as a brand building tool, to let people know the venues you visit, the kinds of things you do, and in a way, the kind of person you are. If you check in to museums, coffee shops, and libraries, it says something, and if you check into other kinds of places, it sasy something different. However, going further, it’s a game.
It allows you to vie for control over spaces, even if it just means something to a few people. It can be a lot of fun. For instance, several months ago I created the venue “Moore Library” at Rider University which happens to be the building that houses my office. Dave Reynolds, who also works in this building, took the venue (became Mayor) after a long ongoing bout of checkins. In order to maintain your status you have to check in at least one day per month more than another foursquare user. He slowly crept up and rigorously overtook me after a few months of me sporadically forgetting to check in, and it was a friendly, but sobering, loss with much social fallout.
After a few more months of steady checkins, this morning I regained the Mayor title, when I saw the message depicted above on my phone.
And I plan to keep it.
A library in New Jersey has apparently removed a book from its shelves due to pressure from a political group. The problem, first and foremost, is that the protocol for the removal of the book was not strictly followed, and instead, a leader in the library decided to simply bypass the process of removal and just sort of make it disappear. The book is Revolutionary Voices: An Anthology of Queer Youth and the removal controversy is detailed at as well as , and http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/08/nj_public_library_removes_lgbt_book_after_request.php . My biggest concern is the cited reason for the removal: Child pornography, which is in response to the image that my image spoofs, available for your review at — Note that the image may not be suitable for all viewers, at least out of context, but certainly is reasonable enough in the context of art, sexual identity issues, and coming of age in the LGBT community in a world that generally does not accept nor understand it without help. In reality, it looks like a blurry picture of two wrestlers next to a blurry picture of a scout leader and a boy scout. Bad art? Maybe. Child porn? Hardly. Also, some of my favorite librarians in NJ are being given some negative focus for raising their voice about the issue: the unilateral removal of content without proper review. Meanwhile, the rest of my favorite librarians in NJ are showing their strong support for a book that’s being met with (in my opinion) homophobia and prejudice.