Week 8 - Thing #19 continued

I was just looking through some of the other award-winning sites on the seomoz.org 2007 Web 2.0 Awards, and I realized that craigslist (first prize winner for Classifieds and Directories) has a lost and found category. Sadly, I read of lost dogs in the Baltimore metropolitan area, but do keep in mind that this is a terrific place to look if you've lost an animal companion. I had not known craigslist included this. Just good to know...

Week 8 - Thing #19 - Web 2.0 award winners

I've been playing around with Citysearch, an Honorable Mention under the City Guides and Reviews category. If you want to include your own city, you may. I entered Belcamp, because I'm trying to keep my stuff related to work. But the real value is looking around your area for places to eat or explore or have fun. I haven't decided if it is as good as some of the other winners. I think it's a bit clunky and not as clearly explained in its purpose as the winners, so I guess that is why it's gotten an honorable mention and not a ribbon. It also has lots of ads. Still, I am enjoying searching these winning sites.
See www.citysearch.com.

Week 8 - Thing #18 - Online Applications

Hello, out there.

I just want to experiment a bit with this document-creation application. I have used Writely (when it was called "Writely," that is) before for online collaboration, but Zoho Writer is new to me. So I think I'll play around, with colors and with typefaces as well.
Let's try some characters, like the British £. OK, now for something irrelevant and silly: .

Let's try something else - Background Color. Oooh...very cool.

I wonder if I can export this to my blog. Well, let's try.

Oh, very cool - I just published this from my Zoho Writer account. And my little experiments showed up just fine: my background color, my colored text, my smiley face, all that good stuff.

Now maybe I'll go play around with Google Docs (or Writely, as I remember it).

Week 7 - Thing #17 Playing in the Sandbox

I glanced at some of the other blogs yesterday, and I realized that everyone else seems to be having a lot more fun with this. I'm diligently and studiously working through my 23 Things, and each one is an interesting task, but the keyword here is "task," as in work. So I'm going to have fun from now on, following the very good example of my library pals who are just having some fun.

So of course, the first thing I do is get very serious about which Favorite Books to include in the Maryland Libraries Sandbox, and instead of saying "any Nancy Drew book," I say something about Heinrich Boll, who writes about Catholic existentialism and war and turmoil of the soul, all that heavy German stuff. I need to tell myself, "Lighten up!!"

I've added my blog to the blog place and all that.

So what is this for? Well, I have the information at hand now to create a wiki for, let's say, planning our big trip this summer to be part of my son's wedding. (I'll keep it private, of course.) Or maybe we members of the Public Services Division steering committee of MLA could set up a wiki for our next program scheduled for the fall. Hmmm...that might work. Or maybe I could use a wiki to plan my annual end-of-the-summer party for my friends, when we can hang out in my backyard and drink cosmopolitans. Yes, the possibilities are endless.

Just for fun, this is what a cosmopolitan looks like:

Week 7 - Thing #16 - Wikis

Wikis could have lots of uses for us in the library and the larger library community of users. For one, I think people, and I don't mean just library staff, creating their own subject categories for materials makes a lot of sense. I can also see group collaboration in many areas for library staff - planning for meetings and training workshops, organizing committee projects, preparing for conferences, the list goes on.

I particularly liked the Book Lovers Wiki fromPrincton Public Library, and thought it was a terrific idea. We already have Readers Place, which provides lots of opportunities for readers to submit their reviews of books, but our Readers Place coordinator has a certain amount of (necessary) editorial control over what is posted. I see the need for some control on a site such as that. But suppose beyond Readers Place, we also provided for an Amazon-like opportunity for people to write brief reviews, kind of snippets about books that they particularly liked. OK, so the reviews might not be masterpieces of writing, but neither are Amazon's user reviews. Readers can give honest impressions of books and maybe drum up some conversations about our materials.

I wonder if HCPL could use a wiki to provide users with an opportunity to add community information. Is that animal rescue organization holding a fundraiser in Forest Hill? Hey, HCPL has the community wiki resource available to post information about where and when. Is the town of Bel Air holding a community concert next Wednesday night? Great, post that information on our community wiki information board and get the word out. Maybe other entities could provide wikis as well - Harford County government, the towns of Havre de Grace, Aberdeen, and Bel Air, and other community groups - and we could all link from one to another. One world indeed! Linked from one to another...

Didn't we have a community resource guide once? (Maybe we still do, but I don't think I've used it for years - don't even know where it is.) Well, what if we have a wiki that allows community groups - non-profits, government agencies, and so on - to post information about the organizations - name, contact persons, addresses, telephone numbers, links to Web sites, purpose statement, and so on. Let the community keep the information up to date. And yes, occasionally, we or someone will need to clean up the wiki, to clear out entries for groups that no longer exist, but each group would be responsible for keeping information accurate and up to date. Just some ideas on using wikis...

Week 6 - Thing #15 - Whew! Web 2.0 and beyond

I'm reeling a bit from our readings, with all sorts of heady thoughts. Consider Rick Anderson's "Away from the 'Icebergs'" and the various icebergs we are encountering in our workplaces, and then consider Web 3D and by extension Library 3D in Dr. Wendy Schultz's "To a Temporary Place in Time." Do we want to start thinking about that paperless library, that collection of monitors and computers but not books? This is very, very exciting - a library as an Internet cafe and more, where people can come for their Web and Internet needs, interacting with one another in virtual space, meeting, gathering information, sharing ideas in blogs, consulting wikis for information, and on and on.

But where are we in this? I think we have a very large part to play in just providing that space and that access to information. Yes, I know Anderson questions the entire notion of a book-filled collection, and so here I am, a selector of materials, that is, hold-it-in-your-hands content and not virtual content, and I'm thinking, "Oops, there goes my job." But wait...what of virtual content? People will still need information and will still want to have access to dependable, good, solid, accurate content. Might we continue then to play a part in delivering all that?

I think as Michael Stephens points out, we must continue to sharpen our Web 2.0 skills and at the same time open our minds to collaboration. Why not allow users to create subject tags for materials? If that makes it easier for them to access that resource the next time they use the library, fine. The tags worked. Why not collaborate with other library systems to generate our own ILS through open source software? Then when the Dynixes of the future go away, we won't have to worry about disruption in our systems.

This is a very exciting time to be in library work. We needn't fear losing our jobs or even losing that traditional sense of "library" for now, at least, since plenty of people will still want us to give them readers' advice on mysteries and to facilitate book discussion groups and to point them to the appropriate reference source for information on that odd insect that is eating their rhododendrons, but as the years pass (and they are passing swiftly), more and more of our users will be shifting to Web 2.0 applications and, hey, Web 3D applications as well. But you know, I'm really looking forward to our future training in...Library 3D.

Week 6, Thing #14 - Technorati

I've set up a Technorati account to claim my blog, so now I'm part of that scene. I looked up "Learning 2.0" as instructed in our Thing #14, and I got lots of blogging on Web 2.0. Lots of buzz on that one. I can see Technorati as something that grows more useful as I read blogs more. Like, keeping track of favorites and all that. But until then, I'm not sure how much I will use it. I think as the 2008 election year approaches, I'll be reading more and more of what people are saying about the various races, and I then will need to use my Learning 2.0 experiences with these 23 Things to keep track of what's what.

This and that on technology

Read this PW Daily article below for more on what publishing industry personnel are doing - a bit of Maryland Libraries 2.0 kind of stuff.

XML Rules at O'Reilly's Confab

I've been wondering about XML, if it would be useful to learn, since it makes document sharing so much easier. But of course, the article goes beyond that to discuss books on demand and so forth and even mentions Chris Anderson and his book The Long Tail. Just thought you might like to read it...

Week 6, Thing #13 - Del.icio.us and so on and so forth

I have not had a chance to view the 12-minute video for this Thing, but I went ahead and played around with Del.icio.us and figured it out. It's soooooo easy to use. I started by focusing on, again, foreign films, or more generally, on films, but bookmarking favorite sites for film information. Then I explored the PLCMCL2 site and I clicked into roseygirl12000's Del.icio.us bookmarks, then into TappydogA's bookmarks. Roseygirl has a lot of good, solid library reference sites that are ones I might add to my account. TappydogA's bookmarks were not as useful to me. Somewhere or other in my journey on Del.icio.us I found a "film" bookmark category. (I thought it was roseygirl12000's, but I can't find it now!!) And when I clicked to it, I saw my own bookmark for a film site. Whew! There I was, along with all the other technocrats, doing Web 2.0 stuff, in the big league, so to speak.

The idea of creating your own tags is a useful one. LC subject headings are hard to remember, and it's easy to mess them up. They are not at all forgiving if you make a mistake in word order or anything like that. The good part of that is that there is a great deal of accuracy when you know the system and you are searching. The bad part is that you need to know the taxonomy in precise terms. Tagging on Del.icio.us makes for a kind of anarchy, but it works for searching. For one, when you are creating those tags, suggestions below can guide you along. "Oh, yeah, 'cinema' is a good term too. I'll include that as well in identifying this film site." And so on and so forth.

Can we use Del.icio.us at HCPL? Absolutely! I would like to follow roseygirl12000's example and tag a lot of sites that I use for general reference in responding to those reference questions. If I'm in another branch, no problem! I've got my Del.icio.us account at my fingertips. Kind of like taking your personal reference library with you, no matter in which branch or wherever.

I see a use for tagging itself as well. Let's find a way for patrons to do some creative tagging for their favorite materials in the library, for example. We might need to edit the occasional spelling error in a tag or clarify a tag that is way off, but you know, I bet the tags would be user-friendly, clear, and accurate. We needn't dispose of LC headings for our subject identifiers, but why not add the new, anarchic tags? Just a thought.

Week 5 - Thing #12 - Rolling my own

OK, I've created a Rollyo search engine for foreign films, which makes a lot of sense because foreign films are what I purchase for the library system. And I guess what you will want to see here is the results of one of my searches. Rashomon is a great favorite, so let's take a look, using my Rollyo search engine. Link below for the results: http://www.rollyo.com/search.html?q=rashomon&sid=297274.

So now, when I am looking up reviews or any other information on movies, I have a simpler way than opening up yet another browser, looking through my "Favorites," clicking on this source or that source until I have a whole lot of windows opened, all just for information on one movie. Now I think I'll create one for music sources.

Meanwhile, I've been looking at PLCMC's One Search, and this is precisely what we could use at HCPL, so that our patrons using something similar could search all of our databases at once. It would save them a lot of time and trouble. Isn't Web 2.0 really about easing our interaction with the Web and the Internet?

Week 5, Thing #11 Library Thing

I had heard of Library Thing last semester in probably the best class I've had so far in library school. I think it might be the site I use the most in all of these twenty-three things. Here's the URL for my little catalog I've just created: http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php. I plan to add tags and then post more books and invite my book club to sign up as well. As you can see so far, my tastes range from Victorian literature to ancient and modern world literature, and I've got lots more to add. The Harps that Once... is a collection of ancient Sumerian writings. Gunnar's Daughter is probably my favorite novel by Sigrid Undset. So there you have it!

Week 5, Thing #10, cont. - Avatars

OK, here it is, my little avatar thing. Ain't she sweet?

Avatars are a little bit fun but kind of silly. I mean, they are so skinny for one, and I know we are trying to combat obesity in America and all that, and maybe your skinny little avatar will be some sort of inspiration to walk off those extra pounds. I don't know. I do know that I've dutifully created an avatar, and now that I've learned how to export her image, I'll introduce you to her. I'm calling her "Roman Woman" - she's skinny (well, yeah, what else is new?); she has Face 2 with dark brown eyes, short, messy hair, a purple chiton (that's an article of clothing, not a deformity or anything like that), and a tropical rainforest background. I might change that part of it. I didn't realize it was a rainforest. I thought it was just a deciduous forest. She's got those big eyes that remind me of that mediocre artist, Margaret Keane. (See also "Welcome to Keane Eyes Gallery.") Did you ever see Sleeper , the Woody Allen movie about the guy who gets frozen and then is defrosted way in the future? In one scene, the Diane Keaton character is looking at a painting of something, I don't know, a puppy dog or something, with those big eyes, and she exclaims in awe and appreciation that it is "Keane, really, really Keane...no, it's Cugat!" Both mediocrities. Anyway, these avatars all have big eyes like Keane paintings. Well, not quite as big as those, but big enough to remind me of Diane Keaton in that movie. Anyway, I'm sorry that you cannot view the avatar. If you figure out how to download the Yahoo avatar, let me know.

Week 5, Thing #10 Image Generator

I just thought I'd show you my image generated from The Generator Blog's suggestion to turn an image into a sketch. I've used that tiger from Amsterdam. It's pretty cool. Maybe people will think I drew it...naaaaa. Now I think I'll develop one of those anorexic-looking avatars. On with those 23 things! You might want to try this as well, so click on the link below to get to the Sketch site. http://www.dumpr.net/sketch.php

Week 4, Thing #9 Exploring Merlin and other things

I got introduced to Merlin through the Maryland Library Association, at one of the Executive Board meetings. I think Merlin might provide a possible answer to a persistent problem in Maryland - how to involve library staff from all over the state in library activities as well as MLA meetings and programs, even if those staff people are working in the far reaches of the state. And you know how Maryland is - small but spread out. If you live on the Eastern Shore but want to attend an MLA program in Western Maryland, plan for a long drive. So Merlin might just be part of the answer, with its interactive tools for meetings and discussions.

Beyond that, I looked at the suggested newsfeeds search tools and thought they might be useful, particularly Technorati. I just kept following links for movie reviews or Hillary Clinton or other interesting topics and found it useful to an extent. I do think that with some exceptions, the blogs I found were not too impressive - mostly a bit on the boring side. Well, let's face it, most of us are just ordinary people and we just may not have that much to say that will spark interest. As I used to say to my students in my writing class, "Look, no one has to read what you write, except for me, because I'm paid to do it. Your parents will read your writings as well, because they love you, and anything you do is wonderful to them, so they will read your essays. But no one else has to read this. That's why you have to make what you write interesting." And so on and so forth...

The point is that blogging can serve a purpose - or many purposes - but if you are going to blog (beyond this exercise in 23 Things), be courteous enough to make your blog postings worth reading.

So what does that have to do with Technorati and other search tools? Like I said, if you have an urge to find out what others think of a particular movie or of a political figure, search on a site like this and read some blog postings. Otherwise, stick to the news.

I did find Technorati to be easy to use and I think the interface was cleaner or whatever the word is that would mean it's easiest to look at. Good layout, not too cluttered, easy to search...
Hey, but this is really just all for exploration of the new technologies, and I must admit, I've been learning a lot, and I've had a few good laughs as well. I hope you are having fun as well.

Going Back to Week 1 - The first two Things

Well, I actually never commented on the first two things, and I certainly don't want to get through all this and find out that I can't get that little MP3 player because I messed up in my very first week or so, so here goes on Thing #1 and Thing #2. (Why do I keep thinking of Dr. Seuss whenever I refer to these various Things? Ah, the Cat in the Hat...)


When I first read about the Maryland Libraries Learning 2.0, I thought the program might be daunting, but now that I'm working on it, I'm really glad that I have this opportunity to stretch and work my way through these tasks. I think they look pretty do-able, even if I've never held a digital camera before or done a Podcast. Well, at least I've listened to Podcasts before, so I know what they are. This all kind of blends in with my lifelong learning stuff, because I have always felt that education all of one's life is essential to being alive. So this is my opportunity to learn about all of the stuff my kids already know about and to use these applications for myself. They might even make life easier for me.

This program will extend what I learned in a very good class at the University of Maryland on technology in libraries, by giving me practical, hands-on experience. In my everyday life, I have even found myself reading the "Circuits" section of the New York Times and actually understanding what is being written. For example, yesterday, I read an article about the shift of television from analog to digital - with the big change to occur on Feb. 17, 2009. So unless I get a converter or subscribe to cable, I may be in trouble, along with lots of other people in this country. But the point it, I understood what the issue was. Whoo, whoo for me.

If you'd like to read that article, here it is below:

Converters Signal a New Era for TVs

Week 4, Thing #8 continued...

All right, so I think this is the correct URL to my Bloglines account, and if it isn't, I'll just work on it some more and edit this post to reflect the correct URL. And now you will know what I like to read (I'm adding to it all the time), including hurricane news because I like to keep up with the weather...no matter how extreme.

http://www.bloglines.com/public/DLS

Some thoughts on our new technologies

A couple of technology-related articles caught my eye this morning - first, a pretty funny one from the New York Times, a piece of commentary by a mother, who joins Facebook in order to discover what the fuss is and to see if she can connect with her teenage daughter.


‘omg my mom joined facebook!!’


It's hopeless, 'rents. You probably will not be able to relate to your kids through Facebook, but you might have fun trying.


The other one is far less amusing, from The Guardian. It's about blogging in Iran, more specifically, the president's blog and government action to monitor blogging in a nation of bloggers. (Farsi is one of the top ten languages for blogging world-wide.) Yes, President Ahmadinejad has a blog. But more than that, citizens of Iran must register their blogs before they are allowed to publish their postings. Otherwise, it gets filtered out. So much for an open Internet.

Iran's big brother for bloggers


So here I am, sitting at work, experimenting with new technologies and finding out so much just from our 23 Things, while others are having their blogs blocked because they haven't made them for open inspection by a government directive.

Week 4, Thing #8 - RSS feeds

Setting up all of this was really very simple to do; however, unfortunately, the Washington Post Book Review feed is not working. I get either a blank page or a message that the page cannot be found. Oh well...but the other sites seem to be fine. I'm still trying to figure out how to provide the URL address to my public bloglines account. Hmmm...I wonder if I left something out in all this. Anyway, RSS feeds are convenient if you want a digest of the news and then an easy link to the fuller story. I'm not certain I will be keeping up with various blogs as time passes, but for now reading these is fun as well. I will work on this optional activity in the days ahead.

Week 3, Thing #7 continued

I just glanced at some other blog postings in other library systems, and I found one that discussed the blogger's dog - Reggie. Hey, that's my dog's name. And blogged Reggie was adopted from the SPCA, while my Reggie was adopted from the Humane Society of Harford County. Her Reggie's image was posted because Reggie's human companion has a digital camera, which I don't, and he looks a lot like my Reggie. How about that? So I commented to the blogger about our Reggies. That was fun. Sort of like instant friend or something; well, not that she necessarily would consider me a friend, but you never know.

Week 3, Thing #7- Technology concerns

You know, this is all a lot of fun - blogging, Flickr accounts, RSS feeds, and so forth - and I think it has lots of practical applications as well, but I have a question: Who has the time for all this? No, no, I'm not complaining, and I'm really glad we are doing this and learning so much and that the emphasis is on fun, but seriously, what it comes down to is what is a person giving up in daily life to keep track of, let's say, four other blogs, ten newsfeeds, and various friends' Flickr postings, as well as keeping up one's own blog? OK, so here are some practical applications: let's say you are in the military, and you get sent to Iraq, and you want to keep people informed about what you are doing and how you are faring, but you don't have time to send messages to everyone (well, you do with your e-mail distribution list, but others not included in that list might want to follow your journey as well), so you set up a blog and post. Makes sense, right? Or let's say you're into arts and crafts, and the Flickr toys have that artsy-craftsy feel to them - you know, little trading cards with your image on them, posters of your favorite images, and so on and so forth - so Flickr toys could be great fun as well and maybe useful, etc. I can see keeping in touch with friends through Flickr and various blogs, etc., etc. I guess I really shouldn't be too concerned about people spending even more time in front of their computers, keeping up with their favorite blogs, gazing at the latest images posted by their friends, reading their newsfeeds. Afterall, what did they do before all this? Maybe watch some television, hang out with friends, that sort of thing. I guess I just worry sometimes that while we are in front of the computer, might we be detaching from real civic engagement? Just a thought and a concern...

Week 3, Thing #6 Mashups

I've spent a lot of time looking at these various toys on Flickr, and yes, they are fun, etc., but since I don't own a digital camera, I'm not sure I will use any of the toys anytime soon. However, if I did, I think I'd make a calendar. Yes, I could even do evil things with it, like create a calendar of delicious-looking foods for my friends who are perpetually dieting - lots of rich chocolate desserts, mountains of ice cream during the summer months, images like that. I could create a calendar of snakes, let's say, and give it to a friend who is scared of snakes - a different snake each month. I could torture people with things like that. But then I'd lose my friends, wouldn't I? But, hey, isn't this supposed to be fun? If I don't have a digital camera to play with, I can have fun thinking about what I could do if I did have a camera.