Podcast 11.0

Once again podcasting is easy and can be informative. I happened to listen to one on Dubai which I knew little about and found it pretty interesting. All topics can be found and one could subscribe to a regular podcast of interest. I can't think of a particular need for our library to podcast. We have a facebook and students could use that to gain information and comment back. Podcasts are most useful to listen when someone wants to rather than when a particular program might be on say television and would need to be recorded and can be automatically sent to a computer with an RSS.

10.0 Wiki world

Wiki, like UTUBE are interesting, easy, free for anyone and fun to use on a personal level. Some people believe everything you see/read is true. Not true! I think this is a buyer beware. Wikis are similiar to webpages but more user friendly for anyone to make their own. I like the idea that the author can remove inappropriate comments. I don't think others should be able to edit wikis that they have not written so it is good that there are controls on that.

From a library standpoint, wikis could be used to teach a lesson including add URL , share about a special exhibit or collection, share information on public services, fundraising etc. Wikis are similiar to webpages but more user friendly for anyone to make their own.

9,0 Chat and IM

Very useful for casual updates to friends or coworkers. Can get an instant response with little disruption to other work. I would recommend email for something that I wanted documentation on.

From a business perspective, it is useful to answer customer service questions in a very timely manner. Libraries could have chat feature, but it would require someone on the staff to be dedicated to responding.

8.0 Social networking Facebook

In general I think social networking is too personal for me. I enjoy reading other people's posts and looking at their pictures, but so far my own site if very neglected. I have searched and found an old friend from 25 years ago and that has been fun. I have privacy concerns just about exposing my ordinary life to all. My library job is not dealing with the public, so I have no need for a professional site. My library has forbidden staff to use Facebook at work because of concerns recently over viruses transmitted through Facebook.

7.0 Delicious

I thought this would be most useful for libraries or teachers. Tags could be set up for particular areas of interest or for classroom projects. I think it would be interesting also to view others' sites of topics that I am interested in.

The availability of seeing my bookmarks/tags anywhere is nifty, but usually I am using my work or home computer so it is not that useful for me on a personal level.

6.0 You tube

This is a video about small town in CT where I first worked in a library. Enjoy!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4BWqnstrxM

This instructional video explains the Library of Congress Numbering system.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4djuA5ZfOWE

You tube is an easy way to share a short event such as a parade or a self-made informercial. Many of the item are of aappeal only to the creator and are of low quality. Some are similiar to a real commercial and are fairly well done. They can also be informative and instructional and entertaining. Dance demos can be found as well as how to do household projects. I am not surprised at the growing popularity among adults and youth.





Libraries could make their own as a virtual tour for patrons to introduce them to staff, facilities and services.

5.0 picture is on my profile

5.0 Flickr etc

I think flickr is a fabulous way to share photos with others and to see photos of topics of interest by strangers. I tried unsuccessfully to upload a photo from flickr to my blog, but successfully added one from my computer. Other people had become a stream about this problem of granting access also. Flickr makes it extremely easy to tag photos in multiple ways to organize them.

As far as library use and legal issues of photos of patrons that is not a part of my job now. In the past when I worked at a small town library most people were thrilled to have their photo be a part of the community information. I believe we did have written permission. Most community events at a library are not "news" in my opinion, but more of interest and also to encourage future attendees.

I plan to use flickr more because it so easy and free. Picasa seems to have more complex editing such as collage and photoshop to remove blemishes from photos. Both seems user friendly.

Lesson 4

I think the RSS could be quite a timesaving for repeated sites. In my own searching I frequently am looking at new sites of interest such as travel destination or health related requests which change over time. This lesson is useful for me to practice adding links for others to see also. Some of the subscriptions I started with sent me to various unrelated topics and I was not sure why. Perhap someone can enlighten me on what happened.

Mexican beach travel site: http://www.google.com/reader/view/feed/http%3A%2F%2Fsquaredancemagazine.com%2Ffeed#stream/feed%2Fhttp%3A%2F%2Fsquaredancemagazine.com%2Ffeed



Square dance magazine:

http://www.google.com/reader/view/feed/http%3A%2F%2Fsquaredancemagazine.com%2Ffeed#stream/feed%2Fhttp%3A%2F%2Fsquaredancemagazine.com%2Ffeed

Southwest airline travel
www.southwest.com

3.0 Computing in the Clouds

I created a spreadsheet document in google docs. The software seems pretty simple compare to Excel in Microsoft. I sent it to a buddy in this program and now we both are in the clouds. I did not previously know about Google docs and think this could be useful to share and let others either view or change my documents, but I was disappointed it was not as useful as Excel in terms of formatting and computations.

Libraries today need to meet the needs of patrons on their terms: how they want to communicate via im, flickr, email, etc. and when they want to communicate which is with instant feedback usually.