Thing # 23: The End!

I completely forgot to post an end to the 23 Things! I finished it on time, though. I promise!! It's been great fun, and I'm thinking about starting a blog just for the fun of it. Not sure what I'll call it, though, or even what I would write about. :-)

Thing # 22: How Far We've Come

Looking back over the past couple of months, I realize how fast this whole 23 Things flew by. It's been a lot of fun, and I learned some things that I'm not sure I would have spent my time on otherwise, which is the whole point of this exercise. I hope that I can continue to keep up with the Web 2.0 stuff as we keep moving into the future.

Thing # 21: No More School!

I'm very glad that I've finished my Master's Degree, but I wish I had known about the tools listed in this thing while was in school. They are pretty cool!
I probably wouldn't have been very good at following these calculators, because I am truly a procrastinator at heart, but I may have at least tried!

I think it would be good for students to try these out. The timeline gives good ideas about ways to organize the student's time. I wonder how well it would work for high school students.

Thing # 20: Who reads books?

I do!! I love reading. I've never gotten involved in any of these things, but I can see how they'd become very popular, especially Book Stumpers. I don't know that I agree with the $2 cost, justto post a question, unless it's to keep people from turning it into a trivia site.

As a sometimes reference librarian, many of these can be very helpful to patrons, especially those who are looking for a book they read as children.
I could spend lots of time on these sites, but I know I shouldn't, unless it's for work, of course. :-)

Thing #19: More Socializing!

Outside of the "Big Ones," there are plenty of different social networking sites. I just never really thought of them that way.

I've been a member of Project Playlist for a couple of years. At first, I really liked it, but it's gotten to the point that the song links don't work very often, and MySpace won't allow the playlist on their site anymore.
Some of the other sites mentioned are very interesting, especially Bake Space. I love baking, and it's always great to find new recipes and people whom with to talk about them.

I've used Webjunction for library related stuff before, especially their short workshops.
I think that I could probably become interested in many of these, but like everything else, they can be a terrific drain on my time, which is pretty skimpy these days, anyways.

Thing # 18: Socialize!!

Social networking is fascinating! I've had a MySpace page for about three years, and a Facebook for around one year. I like both of them, although I've spent a lot more time on MySpace than Facebook. They both have their pros and cons.
The main reason I first joined was to keep in touch with friends and family. They are both great about helping you keep up with stuff; better than just email, because the information in spread out over multiple people, rather than requiring the owner of the information to notify each person individually of news and pictures and whatever.
I've looked over some of the pages of libraries, and I think they're great! I think they could be improved upon, because they don't need to be a simple extension of a webpage, but should be more dynamic and interactive.

Thing # 17: Podcasts

Podcasts are very interesting and informative radio-type shows that can be listened to whenever convenience allows. I've never really gotten too involved with them, however, mainly because I haven't taken the time.

I wandered around a couple of the pocast directories, and found some interesting things. I added one to my Reader named Let's Travel Radio. It's interesting because they have a wide variety of different programs and themes. I don't know if I'll make a habit of listening to them, but they're fun for a change.

When I was in grad school, I had to use Audacity to create an intro to a podcast. It was fun to do, and not difficult, as long as you pay attention to what you're doing.

Thing # 16: The Best time-waster ever!

I absolutely love YouTube. You can find the best (and worst) videos ever! I like music videos, and short clips from movies and tv shows.
I love FRIENDS!


I also enjoy watching Library book cart drill teams perform. Here's our drill team, the Suwannee River Rollers, performing at the Florida Library Association Conference 2008 in St. Pete, FL.

I can definitely see YouTube being a great thing to advertise library programs, give tours and orientations, and even offer reference and reader's advisory or read stories to kids. We'll have to try some of those and post them on our website.

Thing # 15: Roll it on out

Rollyo is a pretty cool search engine builder. I can see using it for shopping, travel, recipes, or even specific reference questions. I think the biggest problem is that it can be too limiting. One of the biggest points on search engines is to find websites you've never heard of. If you limit your research only to sites you already know about, you're probably missing out on a ton of great information.

Image by: jlastras

I did a search on asparagus, limiting it to recipes and health. Almost all of the hits were either http://www.allrecipes.com/ or sponsored sites that had nothing to do with my search. I like allrecipes, but it's not the only place I want to search.

I think it can be very useful, but you have to learn how to use it correctly. It's not as easy to use as Google, that's for sure!

Thing # 14: Who's productive online?

With all the cool stuff online, I can see how some of the online productivity tools can be very popular. I really don't know how much they really boost productivity, though.

All the widgets are a lot of fun and great time-wasters, but I don't see them as tools for simplifying things. I added the countdown widget to my blog (not that I'm ready to be done with 23 Things) and I found it as easy as any other html code copy/paste.

The online calendars are great. I use Google Calendar to keep my entire life organized along with the rest of my family's. I wanted to try out Scrybe, but I had to just put myself on the waiting list for it. I'm trying to find a good calendar program right now to help keep out meeting room schedulres organized. Right now, we have an old-fashioned day-by-day calendar, and it's so easy to overbook, or just have the calendar disappear of the desk.

I'm really excited about Zamzar. We don't have Office 2007 or Microsoft Works, so people who bring in files from those programs can't open them. Zamzar will (hopefully) help us out with that issue.

Overall, I think it's a lot of fun to play with this stuff, but a lot of it is a pain or a big time-waster, rather than a time-saver.

Thing # 13: Books and More Books!

I could spend days in LibraryThing. No, really, I think I could. I'm sure it's a well-known fact that most librarians love books, and I'm certainly no exception. It's a really fun way to find out what other people and libraries are reading.

There are so many uses for this website. Book clubs, small libraries, groups of friends, ...etc. could find this extremely useful. Did I mention that I love books?

So, I think this is a great way to organize personal libraries, just for the fun of it. The internet is such a cool place, and it's constantly evolving.

Thing # 12: Wiki knowledge

Wikis are great communication tools, because they're a great way to share knowledge and information without having to email. There are definitely many uses for this, and of course, the most common wiki is Wikipedia.
I know that there are two schools of thought on Wikipedia. It could be terrible trash that people just make up for kicks, or it could the wealth of human knowledge stored online. Personally, I don't believe in either extreme. There is plenty of information that is open for debate, and plenty of people defend their Wikipedia words to the death, but it is not the be all end all of knowledge.
Okay, back to wikis in general. There are plenty of uses for wikis, from recipes to teaching tips, web resources to packing lists. I don't think to use them very often, but I'll have to play with them more.

Thing #11: News and Stuff

Social Media is an interesting thing. People are always interested in knowing what other people like or don't like. This is why sites such as Digg, Reddit, Newsvine, and Mixx are so popular. Of course, there's always information available that isn't so popular or mainstream. These sites could be used as tools to create popularity for information.

I can certainly see how useful these sites would be for use in the library. You never know when a patron is going to ask about a news story, and it's always a good idea to stay informed. Of course, gossip and jokes seem to be fairly highly rated on some of these, which is not surprising at all.

I think these are probably time-wasters in many ways. It's great fun, but we can get so bogged down in any of these sites, that we can completely lose track of what's going on locally or even in the building where we are sitting.

It's an interesting problem.

Thing # 10: Tagging and Bookmarking

Del.ico.us is a rather odd name for a website, specifically for a site about bookmarks. It is a useful site, though. It's a great resource for people who are constantly changing computers or need to keep a lot of bookmarks organized.

I can't say that it's my favorite site, however, mainly because I noticed that the Delicious toolbars try to take over your computer. They're more invasive than I like, but the tagging is a great idea. I like being able to organize all the websites I use, so that I can easily find them.

Of course, many people use different words for different things, so it may not be so simple to organize other peoples' bookmarks to your satisfaction. I can see many uses for Delicious, and I've met many people who abvsolutely love it, but I'm not so crazy about it. Maybe I'll try using it again for a while to see if I can get acustomed to its quirks. Here's Hoping!!

Thing # 9: Share and Share Alike

Playing with pictures is so much fun! There are so many creative ways to display pictures for people to see. This one was taken during our Big Read Kickoff, and I used Big Huge Labs to turn it into a Jigsaw Puzzle. Cool, huh? These are just for fun, and I'm sure there are many uses in the library, even if it's just putting pics on the web for free advertising.

I especially like the photo cubes and slideshows available. They're so much more interesting to look at he a regular old slide show. This stuff is getting to be loads of fun to play with!

Thing # 8: Virtual Communication?

Of couse, while communication might be transferred virtually, it really is communication. Technology has created so many different forms of communication, that we are rarely unplugged. We have telephones, texing, social networking, IM, webconferencing, and the list goes on. I think I've been involved in all of them at some point. I have MySpace and Facebook, text messaging on my phone, four different email accounts, and as a student, I participated in web conferencing daily on Blackboard. I also participate in Ask A Librarian, Florida's vitual reference. It's been lots of fun, because I stay in contact with friends and family so much more than I would strictly by phone or letter. It can become a little overwhelming at times, however. We get so involved with all of these things that we are constantly involved with other people. It's great, but often exhausting. I can't complain, though, because it means I stay extra close with everyone I care about.

Thing # 7: Image Fun

Online image generators are a lot of fun! There's so much interesting stuff available. For this, I used http://generatorblog.blogspot.com/. Like the mash-ups, this is great for unleashing creativity in the library, for kids, teens, or adults. Some of them are very easy, but some are quite complicated. You have to be very careful, however, because so many apps are copyrighted. Libraries always have to beware of copyright infringement.

Thing # 6: Mash 'em up!

I decided to use a spelling mash-up. They're a lot of fun and can help unleash creativity. I can especially imagine teens having a good time using these kinds of mash-ups. Web apps have gotten very exciting and advanced, and there are so many different things people can do. They're definitely addicting!

Thing 5: Flickr Fun!

Photo by Michaeljohn

Flickr is a great photo-sharing resource. There are so many amazing pictures that are available for anyone to look at. I especially find Flickr's Creative Commons portal fascinating. Creative Commons allows anyone to use pictures created by someone else, without restrictive copyright laws interfering with art and creativity.

There are probably many things libraries can do with Flickr. The most obvious, of course, is to post event photos for everyone in the community to share. The library could have online photo contests, also, to bring the community together.

There are, of course, privacy issues. It seems a bit scary to post all of your pictures, which tell your life story, online for all the world to see. People can make certain that those photos are kept private, naturally, but there are worries, especially when there are children involved. If people are careful, however, it's not too difficult to avoid giving too much information away.

I've never used Flickr, Photobucket, Picassa, or any of the other photo sites for my own ppersonal use, but I may try it out, just for the fun of it.

Thing # 4: RSS

I love my Google Reader! In some ways, it saves me so much time. All of my favorite blogs and news sites are readily available in one place. This could be a great tool for librarians. We all need to keep up with current events, and RSS is a great way to do that.
I've had my reader for probably six months now, and I made the same mistake that everyone else probably makes. I incessantly clicked on those little orange boxes until I was subscribing to so many feeds, I became completely bogged down. I've learned to tone down my enthusiam, but it's another way of showing how overloaded we are today.
Some of my favorite feeds include the humorous ones: Cake Wrecks, Unshelved, Engrish, etc. but I really enjoy Stephen Abrams' blog, as well as The Swiss Army Librarian and A Librarian's Guide to Etiquette.
I imagine I'll keep subscribing for a long time.

Thing # 3: Blogs, Blogs Everywhere!!

Wow!! There are a lot of blogs! It's really amazing. One of my biggest questions is: How are we supposed to keep track of all this information? This thing focuses on searching blogs.

Technorati is pretty amazing. Upon searching, however, I don't really like the way their hits are chosen. For example, I searched for one of my favorite blogs, "Cake Wrecks" and was disappointed to find that Technorati's hits mostly included posts from various blogs that mention "Cake Wrecks", but no links to the actual blog.

I also checked Google's Blog Search, mainly because everyone in the world uses Google. I like the relevancy of Google's search better, but Technorati has a lot more features available for blog searching, whereas Google is the same old basic search bar. I think people need to learn how to use both sites, as they both have their uses.

I couldn't believe that there were so many blogs created every day. We truly are in the middle of the information age. It's a great time to learn!

Thing # 2: Web 2.0 Excitement

You can't go anywhere today without hearing about Web 2.0. Many people say that's it's just a publicity thing, and that Library 2.0 is the same. When you look at how the the world interacts today online as compared to 10 or 15 years ago, however, it's clear that something has changed.
I think we spend far more time online than ever, but there's always so much going on, that we have to keep up! That's the whole point of Neflin's 23 Things. It's a way to teach us how to keep up and have fun while doing it.
I know quite a bit about Web 2.0, from school and just for fun. There's so much, from Flickr, to RSS... Del.cio.us, MySpace, Facebook, Blogging, and list goes on. It'll be fun to try out new things I haven't used before, and we'll how it goes!!

Neflin's 23 Things in Action

I decided to try this 23 Things out so I can keep up with all the nifty tech tools available today. As a librarian, I feel it's vital that we work to stay ahead of, or at least on the information curve for the sake of our community. This promises to be an interesting and entertaining adventure into the world of blogging and whatever else will be thrown at us by the people at Neflin. Here's to the next "thing"!!