#23 wrap-up

Overall, the webthing challenge was enjoyable and worthwhile, and it was useful to be explore all of the web 2.0 things, even if I didn't care much for what I found on a couple of them. For instance, although I found little on YouTube to inspire me personally, it is a phenomenon that is very exciting and a great forum for everyone. I already knew about LibraryThing but because of this challenge I learned more it and it's probably the one I talked-up the most to my family. As for what the library should get more involved in, maybe some of the applications that enable collaboration between staff at different branches (Googledocs). And it might be a good idea to add some computer classes for the public that explore some of the same things in the challenge. What I liked the least was that while I would have loved to thoroughly investigate some of the Web 2.0 services, by the time I did the basics of each step of the challenge, so much time was already spent that I couldn't devote more. Will Web 3.0 provide some way for us to bend time?

Thing #22

I did things a bit out of order here, but blogging about them in numerical order. I had heard that doing the NJListen exercise was turning out to be impossible on our PCPlus computers in the branch so I brought in my laptop and used it to attempt this task earlier today. With the help of another staff member and well over an hour of time, we did finally successfully download an audio book of Pride and Prejudice. It takes forever and uses a large amount of memory space but I think that once I get my MP3 player, and I get accustomed to the long down-load time, it will be worthwhile to use this technology and service.

Thing #21

http://www.comedy4cast.com/

the above links to an ok podcast site, I listened to the one about creating new business-speak words.

Similar to my experience with YouTube, I find it very easy to find a variety of clips, but nothing that seems especially worthwhile, and quite a bit that were of such low quality (as to content and/or technique) that it was more annoying than interesting.

Sorry to be so negative, but that does sum up my experience with these last few exercises.

I should add though, that weeks before exploring YouTube for the purpose of the webthing challenge, I found it useful for a graduate school assignment. I had to write a paper for my Traditions in Oral Narration class, about the listening experience. I searched YouTube for storytelling videos and found one to base part of my paper upon.

Thing #20

Link to a YouTube video of a daffodil blooming:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKLSgn1Yr3Y

I browsed around youtube for quite awhile, trying various searches and didn't really find much worth watching, maybe I'm just not in the mood.

Thing # 19

The Web 2.0 resources, on seomoz.org, I want to check out further are:
http://wufoo.com/ because it might be useful for creating an online survey to use with library customer groups;
http://www.esnips.com/ because it looks like a good comprehensive and flexible (& fun) web content storage and sharing tool
http://www.onesentence.org/ very intriguing! As a student of storytelling, who loves really short, high-interest stories, I couldn't ask for a more suitable site! I am amazed to learn how compeled I am to keep reading the one-sentence stories of strangers.

I would like to investigate the game sites that earned awards but I know I don't have the time and if I did I'd probably get hooked, so I'd better not. shoot!

http://www.newsvine.com/ hmmm, maybe, I'm reserving judgment until I have more time to check out this news/social content site
http://www.thebroth.com/home.html This could be lots of fun with visuals - my favorite mode of perception, I want to play with the mosaic!

I think "Content Aggregation and Management" is a type of catch-all term for sites that don't fit into a more specific category.

Thing # 18

Google docs would be great for collaborative projects with teens. For instance, if I had a group of teen volunteers working on preparing a Reader's Theatre presentation for younger children, and the teens wanted to work on an original script together. Each member of the group could contribute, as their time allows, to a script, or a series of scripts (they could each be working on their own script but all of them in the same document, with an agreement that each can only directly edit their own, but make suggestions for the others') in progress on a Google word processing document.

Also, I'm currently on an NJLA committee that does most of the work via e-mail. A shared Google document used to manage all the work contributed by each member would be very useful - and really save space in my e-mail account!

Thing # 17

Public wikis are useful, any group separated geographically can work together virtually on the same project. Wow, isn't that an escape of the space/time continuum?

Thing #16

Wikis are cool. Very often, it seems like some of the best Google keyword search results, for a random topic, come from wikis. One of the best things about the World Wide Web is this opportunity for enthusiasts to form a community around their shared interest. Googling specifically for wikis seems to brings up just a bit less commercial junk to the top, but not much less. Of course the first results are always Wikipedia-associated.

Thing #15

On Library 2.0:
Anderson's essay, "Away from the 'Icebergs'" was the clearest and most concise viewpoint among the 5 perspectives. This is an opportunity and a quagmire. Libraries must embrace the changes, but make sense of the explosion, in technology and information.

Thing #14

Technorati is useful for giving an at-a-glance view of what's getting the most attention online. Unfortunately, a lot of attention is paid to commercial junk and the same infobites we are getting over and over on tv networks. What I did enjoy, though, was some of the links to video shorts. The YouTube video, An Engineer's Guide to Cats, was funny, clever, and sweet.

it's delicious!

del.icio.us is great! I've known about this website for a while and have meant to start using it ever since but never took that decisive little step until now. That's one of the magnificent things about this web challenge, that it's turning my "gotta use this" into "I'm using this and it's great!"
It will take awhile to make my delicious favorites list as useful as the favorites lists on all the various computers I use (my laptop, the ys desk terminals, the ys office desk terminals, etc.) but once I catch up, it will be so much superior to have a master favorites. And fun too, of course - I love the clouds. And the highlightable notes feature is very cool.

webthing #12
Yep, NetLibrary is easy to join and use and I wouldn't have any problem helping a library customer get started with it. I especially like the search content feature.

webthing #11
I like LibraryThing very much. While I had heard about it and looked at the site briefly before, I had never opened an account. It's fun and easy to use and has some cool features. It's fun to know how many other people also chose that particular title and so on.
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/bluegreen

I would like to just comment at this point - the notion that the oclwebthings challenge will take only about an hour each week is utter nonsense! Here is a case in point - how can a library person resist spending hours on this site alone?

webthing #10
As a digital non-native, my first impulse when contemplating TECHNOLOGY is to whine along the lines of: "sure all this new stuff is exciting and wonderful and useful but who has time to keep up with it?". OK, that's counter-productive. Let's see, at this moment in time, in my work and home life, I am most interested in two techy things: social networking and e-books. I have no personal interest in socializing online but as a library professional I know that there is a virtual world I need to learn about in order to be effective in my work. Already, by simply taking a few minutes each day to read NJYAC (New Jersey State Library Youth Services) listserve postings, I am benefitting from the ideas and knowledge of others in our field. So I need to explore the online communities of the library users I serve and want to reach out to. The development of e-book technology could benefit me personally as well as professionally. I listen to an average of about 10 titles per month via cassette and cd format plus about 12 per month in print format so I look forward to the day when a truly useable form of portable e-book reader is available. In the meantime, when I get my MP3 player and load it with books on sound files, I can stop juggling all those cassettes while I walk, and discs while I drive. Reader-bliss.

Webthing #9

The Topix feed finder was pretty useless, the Sindic8 was a bit better, because its search tool seemed to yield more interesting (to me) feeds. But I'm still not impressed with this whole RSS thing. Who has time to read all this stuff anyway? I didn't find any more feeds I wanted to add to my Bloglines account, but I do feel more informed about this technology.

RSS exercise

I had heard about RSS but never pursued it because I never really enjoyed reading blogs, nor do I really use internet headline resources for my daily news intake. I prefer to browse through a real paper newpaper while I drink my morning coffee.
But, I did it because I had to for the webthings challenge. I will force myself to occasionally look at my bloglines account and check some of my selected feeds and time will tell if this is a technology that I actually use. This was a time-consuming exercise and it will consume a great deal more time to make use of my bloglines account.
Perhaps, if I do use it for a while, I might be able to envision a way for it to contribute to my work and/or leisure life, rather than to waste more of it, which is how I feel about it right now!

Community Quilt

Community Quilt
Originally uploaded by militude

This beautiful quilt hangs in a prominant area of our library and was created to celebrate our library community. Staff member Tina Gunsaulis, a talented quilter, put this project together. I sewed together one of the squares. This photo is tagged oclwebthings in my Flickr account.

Queens Zoo: Mallard Ducks

Queens Zoo: Mallard Ducks
Originally uploaded by adrisbow

Here is someone else's photo from Flickr. I found it by searching keywords bird and public (in tags only). It's a nice photo and it was very nice of adrisbow to share it with the world. It's just ducky!

princess

princess
Originally uploaded by militude

OK, now I'm posting this into this blog directly from Flickr. Doesn't Princess look like a harmless little creature? Well, you would not believe the noise this cat can make, usually in the middle of the night. She's almost totally deaf so she (presumably) doesn't realize what a racket she makes.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Flickr experience

I'm learning how to play with Flickr photo program. This photo was uploaded from an hp image zone scan of a personal photo. I've opened a Flickr account and put this photo in my first set, but haven't figured out yet how to upload it from Flickr into this blog.

Habits of Lifelong learners

In effective lifelong learning, the most difficult habit to develop is an ability to retain laboratory lessons, or education-in-isolation. If I don't use it, I lose it. The easiest habit to develop is continuous and prolific reading, including reading (and other exposure to media) that is outside my comfort zone.

Test Post

This is my very first blog-authoring. It is part of a web 2.0 challenge at my work organization.