Finished! Just in time for August 15th!

Woohoo! Just in time for August 15th! I had a lot of fun! Thanks again!

Thing 23: Reflections

The 23 Things session was excellent and a lot of fun. I learned quite a few things such as LibWorm and LibraryThing that I had no idea existed. My most favorite one to work with is Digg and Youtube as I use them both frequently already. The more social websites I do not use as I like my privacy more than broadcasting everything about myself. The most challenging thing was finding working podcasts and searching through LibraryThing for ThinkLang. LibraryThing can be very difficult to use. If I had a camera, I would be more tempted to use video and pictures but since I do not, the library will have to make due without it. Podcasts are probably the newest thing to me as I honestly never use them. I prefer to read something rather than listen to it since I feel I go much faster that way. I’ve given short shrift to podcasts but I believe in the future they will have more use and become more widespread as technology increases and becomes more available to the public at large.

Many librarians could benefit from more use of wikis though we already use one in the library to store all of our documents. I will most likely be using the image generators more as I simply did not know they really existed in this fashion. I will especially find a use for them for making signs and pamphlets. In all, I was quite familiar with many of these pages but I learned many new things so I was very pleased with the course.

Thing 22: Developing your own 23 Things for your Library

I have enjoyed the program very much since I began it and I think that many librarians can benefit from it. I would imagine that for my own library that 90% of the librarians should look over the 23 Things and get used to the websites and concepts. While all of these sites are excellent, I would at least adapt the librarians to the most commonly used websites on here like Flickr, Youtube, blogs, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and wikis. GoogleDocs would be excellent in getting working PDFs which we so badly need. While the more social aspects like Ning would be nice for them to know, I doubt that they would use it. Others such as LibraryThing, LibWorm, feeds and other items like that they will likely not use either, though it is good that they exist. The more creative/artistic items such as the image generators might see some use, so I would encourage that.

I feel that at least learning and having an understanding of these 23 Things is paramount for adapting to the future in libraries. I don’t necessarily see them all being studied by many of the librarians in my library however, I know that there are a few doing the 23 Things right now .

Thing 21: Podcasts

Podcasts work very well for audio focused people.

I randomly selected a podcast that was not a storytelling podcast. I found Stephen Bell’s podcast from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. This was found from http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Podcasting . Mr. Bell believes that part of the future of libraries will result from relationships with our patrons and an embrace of technology as a librarian entrepreneur (which is his term for being creative with new ideas and technologies.)

To have more of a meta intake, I selected a podcast from the Library at Mohawk College and their explanation of how they moved from video to dvd to now using Podcasts. This was found from the http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Podcasting link on 23 Things. Unfortunately, it seems that many of the podcasts are now offline, which could say a few things about podcasting in general. First, while it is a new and exciting way to communicate with the public, a few of the libraries in the links no longer link their podcasts, which tells us that there is not much demand and use of them, or that it may be too hard and expensive to maintain them.

My take is that it is literally something that someone could use more as an MP3 or something on an IPod, which is literally what we are calling it. General internet use is unlikely though if you can maintain a steady supply of your local library patrons attention to it, it could be very helpful and informative. I think that the most helpful podcasts will be those tailored to the patrons of a particular library. It would not be often that someone had the urge to simply go to look at Denver Public Library’s podcasts unless they were very publicly well known. Podcasts would not be helpful to our patrons simply because many do not have access to a computer and have no need to listen to anything other than their music. If they were to listen to podcasts, it would have to be about videos they could watch in Youtube or games they could play on the computer. Job search podcasts could be of help, but usually people needing help with job search around us can barely use a computer much less know what a podcast is.

I generally think podcasts or something like it could be the wave of the distant future for us due to our patrons technological ability and attention span. Currently, it won’t be used, but in the future when our patrons have more access to computers and IPods and more, it could start being used especially if it gives a guided tour of the library and is automatically downloaded etc.

Naturally the hyperlinking does not work yet again. Can't edit, can't fix it. It simply pastes the code into the text so here once again are all the links.

http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Podcasting - was used to find the links
http://braincast.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=225810 - Mohawk College Library Podcast
http://library.uncg.edu/depts/ref/podcasts/mp3/PW26_bell.mp3 - Stephen Bell's podcast

Thing 20: Youtube

Youtube is one of the best Internet resources around right now. Just the sheer number of video and data is astounding and you can nearly find whatever you want on it. It is one of the most popular websites used by the public in libraries if not the most popular. Librarians should be apt to use Youtube and many are already creating great videos.

One of the most interesting is What are our future library leaders thinking? I thought this was a good take on people’s thoughts on the future of libraries and what their challenges are, specifically that mention around the 5 minute mark about how librarians need to get used to and accept new technologies such as texting, Youtube, Twitter and so on. It is especially informative about working with other co-workers and other staff in meetings and commissions when personalities are at play or when there needs to be a strategy to move forward with improving the library. These library oriented videos tend to focus on ideas of the future or detail fun events at local libraries that could be used in advertising the library such as gaming events, part of the new Library 2.0 meme. Other videos available include opening events and speeches at conferences.

I think the videos are effective according to the audience who wishes to view them. Kids and teenagers will want to see gaming events available at a library, which will encourage them to check their own library’s offerings on that subject and at least get them in there. Opening events and other meetings tend to be for posterity and as a way to record the history. If the event is something the public would attend, they could be drawn in if they see sizable numbers of people in the videos. But librarians would definitely get the most out of knowing about the future of the library and many videos detail that.

Due to more bugs that the blogger will not fix, it continues to paste code in instead of hyperlinking anything. Unfortunately I will have to paste each thing here.

What are our future library leaders thinking? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goQZRW_-9qA

Gaming Events - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZQT55ExeF0

Thing 19: Google Docs

Google Docs is a very nice program! I had not realized the power of it until now. It is very crisp, clear and easy to read. It doesn’t have as much clutter as Office which is nice and it might lose out on some extraneous functions that Office has, but it is free and excellent for people who just need basic functions. I imagine this will cut into Microsoft’s profits eventually when more people see how excellent it is. Saving as a PDF is certainly the best part as now you would not need special programs to create a PDF file and that is probably one of the best parts for me! The sharing aspect is neat as it can help collaborations between people. Google Docs is certainly something I will be using more of in the future and it does solve the problem of editing PDF files to a degree.

Thing 18: Wikis

Wikis are something I like working with. Wikipedia is pretty easy for me to get around and I do believe that there is a lot of fact-checking despite what many people would say about the site. The discussions are lively, especially around the most active wikipages like President Obama’s. I wouldn’t worry about beginning a page on Wikipedia as there is likely someone who will eventually do it who will use more sources and have better knowledge of whatever it is. At any rate, I do use it for quick information as encyclopedias like MSN’s Encarta is disappearing offline.

As far as the Wetpaint blog goes, I like it but it is pretty buggy. I couldn’t get it to let me edit my front page until I clicked edit 2 or 3 times. By then, I had made an extra page to try to fill in for the front one I couldn’t edit. Something about the toolbar resizing itself over and over again. Though as far as free wiki’s go, its not too bad!

I do however value my privacy so I do not post too much personal information and that is the way I like it.

Thing 17: Libworm

LibWorm is an interesting RSS feed based website. It has quite a lot of information available. I searched for book challenges and found that the RSS feeder looks for anything with “challenge” in it. It was interesting to note that it does take in U.S. security issues besides challenges on book content. I believed that it would only find the book challenges but it does take in quite a lot of information that may need more filtering to find what you are looking for.

Searching by categories, subjects and tags can be a bit unwieldy. This would be good for looking for random information or to get an idea of what categories contain. If you search by date, it can be difficult to find what you are looking for. Relevance is a bit better though it can be difficult to filter down to what you are looking for if you are looking for anything in particular other than a grab-bag of items.

My library does have a few things listed, however it is mostly old job positions and a message from our keynote speaker, who gave an excellent speech on our staff day. I believe LibWorm is a great example of Library 2.0 but our library is still in need of a few more 2.0 things we are working on. All in all though, the website is interesting for having a smorgasbord of thoughts and information available it its feeds, though use of it every day might not be feasible.

Thing 16: LibraryThing

LibraryThing is a very interesting resource for librarians. It is like a big database of books with tons of relevant information to them. It is also a social gathering place. I had a horrible time trying to find a few things though such as ThinkLang. I’m glad it was posted on 23 Things cause I was about to give up on it. I especially like the collection of Dead People’s books to see what they read as it is very interesting. This website is like a one-stop shop for cataloging and database perusal. I added 2 books but I find that many of my books are in the system already so I kind of quit. I wonder if that means that the database and submissions are detailed extensively or whether I’m shallow and have nothing to add. Lots of fun to look around but hard to get around with all that information organized the way it is.

Thing 15: Digg

Digg is one of the few websites that I look at everyday! I usually look through all of the new entries until I reach the last entries I looked at before. The quality of chosen websites is usually very interesting for me. Much of the time I have seen the news elsewhere but every now and then something new pops up for me. Since I play video games a lot, I am always interested in the many random links of the Gaming section in Digg. These stories are usually voted up enough to appear on the main site and if I am not familiar with them I will read them. Quite a lot of the time, there are collections of photos that are pretty cool, like the Derinkuyu Underground City in the Cappadocia region of Turkey. There are many other photo collections that Digg pulls up so it is pretty fun to browse Digg often!

Since the blog will only post code due to a bug, I cannot make hyperlinks. Here is the Derinkuyu Underground City http://digg.com/world_news/Derinkuyu_Underground_City_photos

Here is Digg Gaming : http://digg.com/gaming

Thing 14: Delicious

My Delicious page is here.

This is a very fun website to use! I like bookmarking websites and I have a lot of bookmarks to go around. I enjoy being able to share this will allow me to find the best of the best websites so I don’t have to go around Digg or somewhere else and hope that I find something good. I can let someone else do it for me! The website is easy to use and I hope to find more pages that I will enjoy. I will just have to remember that I need to share them back! I am quite familiar with this site.

Thing 13: Tagging

I believe tagging can be helpful, especially to librarians. They can help coordinate and correlate like subjects so if you are interested in finding something in that tag, you can find something like it. I realize it can be quite chaotic especially if you start mixing tags or if there are too many like tags (for example: vampire or vampyr, just because I see a copy of Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer here.) Tagging should help aid us in our searches and if someone doesn’t like tags, they certainly don’t have to use them. I’m not sure what could go in their place. Usually they are small and out of the way and used on many sites now.

Thing 12: Twitter

Twitter can be an interesting chat program and perhaps an effective news program if information spreads rapidly. It is much like Delicious except with people and their short texts instead of people’s bookmarks. It is much like a shorter Facebook and MySpace page and a more long lasting chat database so people can follow what you are doing on chat longer. It is the middle ground between chat and Facebook. The last thing I heard about Twitter was all of the remarks Sarah Palin makes on it and other sites and how the media immediately responds to it. Regardless, when I first heard of it, it was a site to broadcast what you were doing minute to minute anywhere you were. I just didn’t think people had all that much interesting to say other than “waiting in line at Starbucks.”

Thing 11: Instant Messaging

I’ve used AOL Instant Messenger a few times throughout the years so I’m generally familiar with how instant messaging works. I mainly use it to send files back and forth to my friends more than I use it to chat, which is pretty funny I guess. Don’t worry, the files aren’t anything illegal.  I have chatted with a few people and I know the ins and outs to it especially since I have to disable Yahoo Messenger constantly on public PCs! I can LOL, ROFL and I know I’m 1337 and LFG half the time in many video games.

Using chatting software in a library is ok with me, except that the Yahoo Messenger program frequently causes errors and installs over login screens causing issues. Public PCs can pretty much be used anyway the public wants except they cannot install software. For many of our patrons, they only use it for a little bit of research and a whole lot of gaming. So basically, chat is not that big of a deal. We only discourage installations.

To be honest about the chatting part, I can’t have that going on at work so unfortunately I cannot do the chatting part of this. Thanks though.

Thing 10: Ning

Ning.com looks like a slightly different take on the traditional social-networking sites. It appeals more to interests or professions than it does networking with people from your school or life. In this way it is pretty fascinating for the opportunities it can provide for librarians in many different locations to interact with each other and possibly learn a few things.

The ALA Ning section is very nice, with a forum, blog, photos and videos. I especially like the “Older than the IRS but young at heart” quote they have. By using these tools to interact, we can improve our knowledge and libraries in a multitude of ways!

I looked for something off the wall, and I found the Classic Rockers Network since I happen to like classic rock. The way that particular page worked was different than a normal Ning group like the ALA page, as the CRN has the general layout of a Ning page but does not have a link or an address attached to Ning. It is however available in Ning’s search. Generally, the same options are there and has more subdivisions based on the band or group that people prefer. I can definitely see the power of Ning to bring different people together who have never met before based on their affiliations or things they all happen to like.

Thing 9: More Facebook

I’m a privacy freak so going around on Facebook when I fully know they are taking down everything I touch and blab it to everyone around kind of freaks me out. I’ve read many of the interesting news stories about what they do with the information and how the information never disappears once you post it. As well, many employers look to this information and go through friends of your friends. They find something they don’t like and it reflects negatively on you. At any rate, I can find quite a bit of my friends just from the fact that Facebook knew who I was before I entered that information. I did not submit my email for the search yet they knew all. Still not too happy.

Thing 8: Facebook

Interestingly Facebook knew just who my friends were already since I used an ancient email address for the signup. I am a very privacy minded person so naturally I gave them a fake name. Apparently they recognized my email address and listed quite a few people I knew. I assumed my fake name which was Way oftheBook was blabbed out back to them. Naturally not wanting to be a Grade A moron I had to post my real name and not much else since they had all that info already. Not too happy about it. I did not let them check through my email by the way. This is great for marketing and virtually a Petri dish for studying every social connection you make. Now I get to be categorized 100 different ways unless I just don’t participate. The dark side in Web 2.0 is the loss of privacy.

Thing 7: RSS Feeds

RSS is a fairly old system that many people never use. What is great now is that there are readers to capture these and use these to update. RSS can cover many different websites and I did choose to add Unshelved to my Google Reader for the purpose of Thing 7. Much like Thing 6, I am not sure I would want to add too many things to Google Reader since I would likely add way too many things and get overwhelmed with stories and updates I might not necessarily want to read. I realize that can speed up your Internet use, but I do like to see all that a website has to offer instead of a truncated update. The RSS feed can be great fun if it is a small content update like Unshelved or a blog post, though I still enjoy looking at the full website for now. If I feel I need to go faster, I will switch to using more feeds in Google Reader now that I know it is there.

Thing 6: Blog Readers

This is a neat little system. It is apparent that Google is trying to become a one-stop shop for just about anything. I do like how it works, however I may not use it that much since I tend to just go to the website in question instead of looking to see what was updated on Google Reader. It is a good way to track what has been updated, especially if you are short on time, though I don’t see too many librarians using this except the most technologically savvy. While I realize it may be faster to look for updates from Google Reader, I do still enjoy looking around the other sites as you can quickly get bogged down by new information on Google Reader if you have a lot of blogs to read through.

Thing 5: Image Generators

I like image generators for quick gags mostly. Image Chef is easy to update and it loads pretty quickly. The pictures are easy to manipulate. I like the comic strip generator and its many choices. However, BigHugeLabs seems a bit unwieldy. By the way, the FD Toys link on the 23 Things page is not the right address as it goes right back to BigHugeLabs.

Image generators can be a useful tool but I imagine they are used more for laughs than anything else. Much like the Flickr mashups, these links are pretty fun and depending on the website it can be quick and easy to make a picture that has the text you want with it. Unlike Flickr mashups, this will work well on posters, flyers, pamphlets, and signs so that you can get the customization you want for your message without having to manually edit a picture in a photo program. I might be using more of this! These images are from Image Chef.

Thing 4: Flickr Mashups

Flickr Mashups can be a lot of fun. I ended up spelling my name here. The Flickr mashups at least to me don’t have much portability to blogs. The sketchpad link seems to me to simply jump back to regular pictures and doesn’t have that much utility. The ability to transport these would make them more fun, though maybe I am having errors with it. Image Generators have more portability so I would see them as more useful overall. The copying and pasting parts don't seem to be working out for me as well as saving them, so I have the picture up above. Maybe it is my browser?

Thing 3: Flickr

Flickr is a great site to look at many photos of many different things. You can find nearly anything you are looking for from created photos to artwork to photos taken by a camera in a tour. Nearly everything can be loaded onto Flickr, as long as it doesn’t violate the terms of service. There are many competitors like Webshots, but Flickr has definitely taken a large share of the market for Web 2.0.

I found that my favorite is the Library of Celsus in Ephesus, Turkey. Built in 135 A.D., its ruins are majestic. There are many cute puppies and all kinds of Texas oriented stuff from flags, boots, the state and more, but it is the historic ruins that caught my eye on this search.

Thing 2: Learn about Learning 2.0

Hello all!

Seeing as how I completed setting up this blog, I feel I've completed Thing 1. Now on to Thing 2!

As a note aside, I had actually completed these 23 Things sometime before, I simply had not posted them to the blog but kept them on notepad since I really had to have the appearance of working and not blogging at the moment :) I would argue it is part of my work but I do have other duties to attend to that are far more pressing honestly. With that though, here is my thoughts on Learning 2.0

The thought of Learning 2.0 is challenging and fun. For myself, quite a bit of the information has been learned a long time ago. Functionally, Library 2.0 is truly adapting the Library to the challenges, technology and relevance of the future. As Web 2.0 further develops, increasing mass participation in information and content knowledge and dispersal, the Library will be increasingly needed to allow individuals to process and harness that information to their own ends. From viewing and creating their own videos in Youtube to peer to peer communication in anywhere from MySpace, Facebook, chat programs and more, Web 2.0 is a vast information trail that will change how the library functions and how patrons will use the library. Books will be online, social networks and others such as Twitter and Delicious will allow patrons more access to information than ever before.

Ultimately, as John Blyberg says, the libraries have to adapt to patron’s new needs with technology and sifting through that new information that is coming through the forefront with wikis and more. Large segments of the public to this day are still computer and information illiterate and will need guidance and support in accessing the information that they need in their lives. Ultimately, Web 2.0 is a virtual place for people to congregate, share and stockpile information that is relevant to their lives. Libraries need to know how to tap into and guide people in that virtual place.