[ Music ]
>> Hi, I'm Lisa Von
Drasek from the University
of Minnesota Library's, the
Archive and Special Collections,
and I am the children's
librarian, but today we're going
to be talking about books
that we love to give as gifts
for the holiday season
with us to day is?
>> Jan Fransen, and
I am the Service Lead
for Researcher Information
and Discovery Systems.
>> Okay, and we're
going to interrupt.
What is that?
>> [laughing] What is that?
That means that I work with
people around the university,
our faculty and our
students, all of our users,
with our discovery systems,
meaning the interface
to the catalog, and also with
researcher information systems,
which is information
about what our researchers
at the University of Minnesota,
primarily what they
have published,
what their research outputs are,
and how they can create
a presence for themselves
that creates the
best possible view
of what their research
work is for the public.
>> Oh, thank you.
And?
>> I'm Arvid Nelsen, hi.
I am the
Curator/Librarian/Archivist
at the Charles Babbage
Institute, which is a center
for the history of
information technology.
>> So if I came to you
and asked for materials
from your collection,
what are the kinds
of things you would have?
>> We have a variety of books
and archival collections,
corporate papers, personal
papers talking about the history
of computing from the
perspectives of the people
that created them, marketed,
sold them, but increasingly,
also, how they've been
used and incorporated
by different communities.
>> Oh, thank you, so what
did you bring me today?
>> Well, I brought you a
book called Diamond Age,
and the subtitle is, A Young
Ladies Illustrated Primer,
and it's actually from 1995.
It's kind of an old book,
but it's about a topic
that continues to
be really current.
It's nanotechnology
is the basis of it.
It's a cyberpunk sort
of sci-fi type book
in the not-too-distant future,
and the reason I chose this
for gift giving is
because I have two kids.
They are not little
kids anymore.
They are 18 and 21, and I was
kind of looking for something
that may be would
interest both of them.
One of them is a
high school senior,
probably going into engineering.
Plays a lot of video games.
I kind of wanted a book that
talked more about video gaming,
and I didn't really find
what I wanted there,
and my daughter is an actress.
She's in her senior year of
college and is a theater major,
and I wanted something for
her that talked a little bit
about the craft of acting, and
what I liked about this book is
that it does a little
bit of both.
So the premise of the book
is that there's a young girl,
and she gets through
a series of mishaps.
A book that wasn't
really intended for her
but is intended for
girls her age.
It's a book that's interactive.
She opens it up.
She sees a character who
looks a lot like herself,
maybe a little bit older
version of herself,
and that character is the
star of various stories,
and they're stories that
are based on, you know,
Grimm's Fairy Tales types
of things, folklore,
and stories from throughout
time, but they're stories
about her and as she grows,
though stories grow too
and get deeper, and she
learns more about the world
through this book, and the
second part of that, she, to me,
is the most riveting
character of the novel of a lot
of different characters,
and the one is someone who's
on the other side of the
book, Miranda, who's an actor,
or actually, in the context
of this novel a Ractor,
who acts in something
called Ractors,
which are interactive
media experiences.
So the person on the other
hand, may be a bunch of viewers
in different places are
watching the action happen.
In this case, it's the action in
the book, and she is in a room
by herself acting it out
with other actors who are
in other rooms by themselves,
and their physical appearance
is whatever is on the screen,
but their movements
and so on are based
on what they're actually
doing in the room.
>> If someone was a person
who likes science fiction
and fantasy, is there
another book or series
that you would compare this to?
If you like this, you would
also like this series?
>> I'd almost always go back to
this author, Neal Stephenson.
Actually, my favorite his
books is called Snow Crash,
and there's a little
bit of a tie, in fact,
between these two books.
Snow Crash actually
features a librarian.
Well, not features.
There's librarian in the story,
and it's also written in,
I believe, the very early
90s, but it creates a world,
if you remember Second
Life, it's like Second Life
where you can kind of goggle
into this universe to be part
of this interactive universe.
So it's a little bit of
a real like in that way,
but it's the same author.
>> Arvid, you know, that really
reminded me of one of the books
that you brought today.
This Second Life, gaming,
being someone else --
>> Yes.
>> Trying on different personas.
Can you talk about - do you
have a book with you today?
>> I do. I actually brought two
books from CBI Social Issues
in Computing Collection,
which really tries to look
at how different communities
have interact with computing.
I chose books that tries
to bring computing,
the history of computing,
people's real, everyday
experiences.
There are a lot of great books
out there about the designers,
the inventors, the
creators, you know,
some of the great individuals
of computing, but people think
that that's where the
story of computing stops,
and I think that's just where
it starts, and we get more
about how people are
actually interacting with it.
So one story that I think
is really interesting is
Being Emily.
This is a young adult novel
by a Minnesota author named
Rachel Gold, and in this story,
Emily is a transgender girl
who's born Christopher,
and it's the story of
her experience of coming
out in a small town
in Minnesota,
coming out to her
family, getting adjusted,
but what was interesting to me
for the Babbage Institute
collection is
that online interactive video
gaming communities provide an
opportunity for Emily and
other people in her peer group
to explore gender identity and
interact with individuals in,
you know, being able to have
people respond to her as female.
So I just thought that was a
really interesting take on it,
and even also turned out to
be just a really, I think,
touching story about
a heroic young woman.
>> So a great why
read for 12 and up?
>> Exactly.
>> Great. And I saw
another one on your pile
that was also young adult.
>> I'm not sure which
one you're referring to.
>> Well, why don't
you share this one,
because all of this are
very excited about it.
>> All right, well, I suppose
it would be young adult,
but I think it's also for the
youthful older person, as well.
>> Right, so this is
your basic crossover,
anyone over 12 would
enjoy this story, history.
The title is?
>> It's The Thrilling Adventures
of Lovelace and Babbage.
The Mostly True Story
of the First Computer.
So nothing says the
holiday season to me
like the Victorian Era.
So this is essentially a
steampunk graphic novel
about the origins of
computing in the 19th Century.
>> And this is a new book?
>> It's a new book.
It came out in 2015
by Sidney Padua.
She is a computer graphics
designer for Hollywood films
who got into cartooning,
and someone encourage her
to explore the history of Ada
Lovelace for Ada Lovelace --
>> So is this her
first book, too?
Or trade?
>> I believe it is.
She started this is an online
web comic, and then it turned
into a book, and, you
know, for those of you
who might be turned off had the
idea of simply a graphic novel,
this is probably the most
text heavy graphic novel I've
ever seen.
>> Can you open up and
show us the inside?
>> Yeah, absolutely.
Well, there's wonderful graphics
that you would expect to see.
>> Uh-huh, multi-verse.
>> The multi-verse.
>> Already, I'm interested.
>> So she tells the story, the
real story of Ada Lovelace,
who was daughter of Lord
Byron, and Charles Babbage,
who is the inventor of the first
computer in a graphic form,
but every page has
multiple footnotes.
The footnotes have
extensive endnotes,
and many of the endnotes have
their own extensive footnotes.
So you can read it
anyway you want.
You don't have to get
bogged down and read it
like a scholarly
text and, you know,
disrupt your narrative flow
with the graphic novel in order
to read the footnotes.
You can actually read
the footnotes themselves.
They're really educational
but they're not boring.
They're really funny, and it
just makes an excellent read.
So Ada Lovelace's
tutor, William Friend,
is apparently a very
conservative mathematician
who doesn't believe
in imaginary numbers.
So a footnote pertaining
to him says, "Certainty,
not uncertainty,
is quoted from one
of Ada's tutors, William Friend.
I had to double check that three
times before I could believe he
had written something so
perfectly in character.
Friend was a mathematician
so conservative,
he didn't believe
in negative numbers.
Don't even get him started
on imaginary numbers.
>> That's great.
That's great.
>> But it's wonderful.
So after the original
story, the real story
of the first computer,
which sadly ends
with Babbage not being able
to successfully complete it,
and Ada died, unfortunately,
at the age of 36.
So she decided that what
she should do is explore an
alternate universe in
which they were able
to complete the machine
and engage in adventures.
So they use it to fight crime.
>> So we move into
a fantasy element.
>> Exactly, which is really
fun, but at the same time,
there are still wonderful
footnotes that talk
about history and
the characters,
the biographical lies
in the historical events
in the 19th Century.
So you still get to go on
this fun, imaginary adventure,
but there are still
opportunities for learning.
>> So this is a book, Star
Wars, is all over the news,
and I've been thinking a lot
about books that I'm giving.
One is Syllabus, and this
is by the cartoonist, yeah,
Linda Berry, and it's an
inspiring volume of how
to release your own creativity,
and then as, you know,
coloring books are
very hip and hot now,
and I'm loving Star Wars
Doodles, because if I'm going
to wait in line for three
days for tickets to Star Wars,
this will give us
something to do.
But I'm also thinking about what
I want for the holiday season,
and you've given me some ideas.
Arvid, what are you
thinking about?
What would you love to receive?
>> Oh, gosh, whenever in doubt,
I always return to Iris Murdoch.
She's my favorite novelist,
but I think I actually want
the Neal Stephenson novel
that we saw today.
>> Oh, and?
>> Well, of course, after
hearing about it and seeing some
of the pictures and hearing
a footnote, I definitely want
to read this one next.
>> Well, thank you for being
here, and happy holidays.
>> Happy holidays.
>> Happy holidays.
