The Questing Librarian

IB Enters Hawaii Five-0 Theme Song Contest

2010-09-22T16:04:00.002-05:00

What started as a personal idea turned into a community building project that the IB community could be proud of. All of the Independence Regional Library staff along with volunteers, patrons, our local response area police officers and the teen band, Rinsen, contributed to make the video. Even though making a live action video was something new to me, it gave me the opportunity to learn by doing. I spent many hours of personal time shooting the environmental and vehicle clips, learning to use the video editing software and creating and editing the 30 second entry. It really was a team effort and it shows in the video.

The “director’s cut” of the video shows all of the participants and includes credits of everyone’s efforts both behind the scenes and in front of the camera.

When the entry was posted on the CBS website for voting, the sound seems to drop and the video stops 9 seconds before the end. So I posted it on YouTube so that voters could see the video the way it was sent in. rapierson posted the link in the comments section of the CBS site so that voters could see the full video without the technical difficulties.

To vote for this video in the contest go to: http://bit.ly/bV2GTR . Voting begins after 3PM EST on Thursday Sept. 16, 2010 until 3PM EST Sept. 23, 2010. This is for the top five videos. Return to the CBS link on Thursday, Sept. 23 after 3PM EST to vote for IB again. The winner will be announced on Thursday Sept. 30. You can vote more than once for the video. Just refresh the web browser and retype the word verification and vote. Every vote counts!

If Independence is fortunate and the public votes for IB’s video entry, the branch will receive an autographed surf board from the cast of the new Hawaii Five-0. We hope to put it in our recently dedicated teen area, now called “The Zone”. All participants will get their picture taken with the surf board as a thank you for participating in the project.

Thing 70 : MP3 Downloads That Are Legal & Free

2009-02-24T13:24:00.013-05:00

This discovery exercise explores beyond Thing 48 and discusses various websites for free and legal MP3 downloads. With this year's library theme for Teen Tech Week being, "Just Press Play" (March 8-14, 2009), I wanted to be ready when someone asks me about free downloads for their new MP3 player. Librarians normally have to do some explaining about free music downloads--such as free music doesn't always equal the current popular songs they are listening to now and if they do find it, it might not be legally uploaded to the Internet.

After going through the 35 website suggestions mentioned in the discovery exercise, I narrowed it down to less than 10 that I would recommend to patrons. I eliminated them if they required any sort of software download or registration, others simply because I thought they were too difficult to navigate to find if there were songs available to download and what was available wasn't worth the effort of the search. Here are the cream of the crop that I thought were the least painful to use and have the most available for selection:

For Downloads to Listen To:

C|Net's Music.Download.Com
CNET has a very simple to use website for free music downloads. You can click on the link "111,052 Free MP3s" at the top of the web page and browse alphabetically. You can sort by artist name, song name, average rating, total listens, and others. Another way to search is to type the name of the artist or song you are looking for in the search box at the top to see if you get any hits. If there is a match, click on the link that says "see all free tracks". Then click on "download free MP3" to start downloading. You can play the song first to see if you want to download it. No registration required.

MP3.com
Mp3.com works with a wide array of musical artists. Click on the "Free Music" Tab and start browsing. You can sort the list by genre or by artist's name. Click "Play" to listen to the song first. Click on the "MP3" button and begin downloading when you're ready. Registration not required.

MP3Raid.com
MP3Raid is a search engine that locates MP3s on the internet. It offers the widest range of free music available. Just type in the artist or song you are looking for in the search box. You may need to rename the MP3 files that are downloaded but MP3Raid will walk you through what you need to do. Registration not required.

PureVolume
PureVolume says that it is a website for the discovery and promotion of new music and emerging artists. Artists have the option of making each of their songs available for free download. Type in the album, artist or song name you're looking for. Click on the link for the artist name. Songs will be listed in the playlist. Some are available only to listen to, others you can listen to and download. Click on the "download" button and begin your download. No registration required.

For Downloads to Use in Your Creations:

Jamendo
Creative Commons MP3s. New artists upload their albums under Creative Commons promote their work. You can play, share, and download the songs to listen to or to use in your own works.

CCMixter
Site dedicated to music that you can download to remix and post your results, all under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommerical 3.0 United States License. Click on the "Search" button to get started.

Don't forget that many artists will offer free downloads of a few songs and podcasts to promote their work. If you go to their website or Myspace page they will mention if that is something they do.

Thing 56: Smilebox

2009-01-25T22:33:00.002-05:00

Make a Smilebox slideshow

I'm backtracking a little bit this entry and picking up Thing 56 : Smilebox. I've been waiting for some of the books to come in on hold that we have done for bookclub to take pictures of. I didn't want to make any members nervous by taking pictures of them in bookclub so I opted to take pictures of the books instead--ha-ha! Smilebox is a small download and will probably fit easily on a flashdrive. There are tons if ideas for slideshows, ecards, scrapbooks, photo albums, and postcards. Plus they are always posting new templates constantly. Creating a presentation was easy. Smilebox is very similar to Scrapblog in Thing 29. It has an intuitive user interface to add photos from your camera, computer or online. Choose your template, add your photos, choose music or not. If you want to add your own music or select from the music selector you will have to pay for the premium design for $1.99 or pay a $5.99 monthly fee for unlimited use.

You can save your creation, email or post it on your blog or website for free. I emailed it to myself and at the bottom of the message received a URL link for it. I also added it to this blog entry easily. Just copy and paste the code into your blog post. Thanks Smilebox for new ways to jazz up your photos!

Thing 69: Feed My Inbox

2009-01-09T20:19:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise has us exploring Feed My Inbox. Feed My Inbox takes the RSS feed of any blog or website and sends it to your email. It was simple to use. I tested it by subscribing to the comic strip, Unshelved. I made sure that I copied the RSS feed and not the website's URL. Unshelved also has a direct link to subscribe via Email so I could have done this directly without having to use Feed My Inbox. But, not all websites have this service. The confirmation message showed up in my email and I just clicked on the link to activate my subscription. The email also suggested that I add updates@feedmyinbox.com to my address book so that my email provider would not think it was spam.

Feed My Inbox would be good for someone who only has a few feeds to keep up with. But as with anything, time has a way of making a few feeds into a lot of feeds. So for me, I can't say that I would be using Feed My Inbox unless it is to make sure I don't miss an infrequent update in my Bloglines reader. After I received my first feed from Unshelved I promptly unsubscribed. I have way too many feeds to keep up with so a feed reader is much better for me. Also, by using a feed reader, you can avoid some spam that sometimes crops up from sending RSS feeds to your inbox.
As for recommentations to patrons, it would be on a case by case basis. Many websites already have a way for you to directly subscribe on their site. Still it is handy to know about as a back up.

Thing 68: Filtering Flickr

2009-01-08T23:15:00.004-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at two filtering sites for Flickr photos: flickrCC and Tag Galaxy.

I started with my favorite search term--fairies. I always love the whimsy and fun associated with these pictures.

flickrCC - I was simply amazed by the amount of creative commons photos that were available for fairies. I liked that it had check boxes if you wanted photos for editing or for commercial use. It even has links for if you want to edit the photo inhouse or use Picnik. Also you can click on the size you want and it immediately gives you the URL so you can link to it in your blog, website, or presentation. And of course there is a link back to the Flickr page from which it comes from if you want to comment or add to your faves.

Tag Galaxy - The visual appeal of Tag Galaxy is simply stunning. You enter your tag search and it gives you your tag as a main planet with smaller satellites orbiting your tag that are related. You can select any of these additional related tags to focus your search. Since there are many variations on how to spell fairies, singular and plural, I was glad that Tag Galaxy pulled these out for me automatically. I added: fairy, faerie, faery, and faeries. Very handy.

Then Tag Galaxy pulled together my search into a planet of 309 photos. It would have been nice if flickrCC told you how many hits you got on your tag search. In Tag Galaxy you could zoom in our out with your mouse wheel or show your results in fullscreen mode. You could rotate this planet of photos and select any photo from the sphere. One mouse click gets you a close up and title. Click again and you get the description as well as a link to the original Flickr page so you can get your URL for the photo. Click the "X" to go back to scanning the photos. Be careful about using these photos, they are not all limited to creative commons so you'll need click through to Flickr to be sure it is OK to use.

Then I did a second search to see if fans of the book Neverwhere by: Neil Gaiman had posted any creative commons photos that were inspired by the book. I wanted to spice up my slides for my book club quiz show. I used flickrCC and it brought up 31 creative commons photos. Then I went into Flickr's advanced search option and tried the same search--Neverwhere limited to creative commons photos. This brought up 70 hits. So there were some that may have been missed by flickrCC. Then I went to Tag Galaxy and did a search for Neverwhere. This brought up 96 hits, but since it does not have a way to limit to just creative commons photos I would not be able to use it to search for photos to use in projects.

Overall, both flickrCC and Tag Galaxy have their advantages. Even when you use the same tag in each they bring up a different set of photos to browse. I would tend to use Tag Galaxy for personal use and browsing and flickrCC for specific things and to search for photos for projects. I would also include an advanced search in Flickr itself for photos for projects. They both have a place in my toolbox. Thanks flickrCC and Tag Galaxy!

Thing 67: Stress Savers

2009-01-04T18:53:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise has us exploring three sites: Dial-A-Human, CustomGuide, and UserNameCheck.com.

Dial-A-Human - Dial-A-Human gives you the exact number to press to avoid navigating nerve-wracking phone trees. This will certainly come in handy with several of our library patrons who seem to have a passion about contacting businesses--for all sorts of reasons. I am only afraid that if we offered this for one business and then another was not on the list, there would be disappointment--the expectation was there. The list is mainly for popular national entities. It looks like my phone company/DSL provider is on there but not my cable provider. They even have links to send a new number or report a bad number or broken link. A handy site to have in your reference toolbox.

CustomGuide - CustomGuide offers great tipsheets on the most popular office software products. These will be very handy for both staff and patrons. It is expecially helpful because it offers multiple versions of products such as MSOffice. Now if I have a patron who needs a quick introduction to a software product the library has, I can print out a quick .pdf tipsheet. Thanks CustomGuide!

(Image courtesy of Travelin' Librarian.)
UserNameCheck - Usernamecheck lets you check many Web 2.0 sites to see if your favorite handle is already taken. I ran a check on my favorite username and was very happy to see that it was unique. However, Usernamecheck did think that my handle was being used on two sites that it was not. When I went directly to the sites, they could find no evidence of anyone using that username. Another little thing I noticed is that when you type in your handle to check, be sure to click on the "Check" button. Just pressing [Enter] on the keyboard will sometimes not make it run, or not run correctly. This site seems like it would be more of a novelty than a reference tool, but it was still fun to see it run the check.

Overall, I predict that I will be adding Dial-A-Human and CustomGuide to my reference toolbox. UserNameCheck is fun but I don't think I'll be using it very often. I have to have a reason to register on a site, I just can't see registering for everything to be sure that I have my favorite handle.

Thing 66: AllMyFaves & 43 Marks

2009-01-03T21:16:00.005-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at AllMyFaves and 43 Marks.

AllMyFaves has living breathing people selecting the best of the web and categorizing it for you, sort of like the early days of Yahoo or the DMOZ Open Directory Project with Google.

I was really surprised to still see the logos for Washington Mutual, Wachovia, and UBS under the banks category because of the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis. I was also surprised to see Second Life in the chat category. I guess it could be called 3D chat. I haven't exactly thought of it that way but I guess it makes sense. I think that it is interesting that they include news readers like Bloglines in the Blogs category but don't include photo editors in the photo cateogory like Picnik. And where is Yahoo! Chat in the chat category? I thought they were the largest chat service. Has someone surpassed them? Also there is no Wired magazine in the Tech category. OK, I'm really starting to get concerned about this site listing the "best" sites in their respective categories. Maybe AllMyFaves is exactly that, the favorite sites of the developers.

I checked out LiveLeak in the video category and yes it is a video site that leaks video media to the public. I also took a look at Break.com and yes it was in the correct category (videos). It's theme is free videos, pictures and comedy for guys.

Then I signed up at 43 Marks to take a look at their start page. It seems like everyone is getting on the start page band wagon. My favorite start page was a part of YourMinis, which they have shut down but still offer widgets to put on other start pages, websites and blogs. We talked about widgets in Thing 26. After YourMinis closed their startpage I moved to Netvibes. I based this on popularity and also it was rated #1 in the 2008 Seomoz Web 2.0 Awards. The organization of 43 Marks is very clean and simple. Simplicity and ease of use are good traits to have. But the layout of the site I think is better for someone who has only a few bookmarks to keep up with, not the 773 like I have on Delicious.com. Also someone who likes the clean lines of Facebook, Google, or BookJetty might also enjoy 43Marks.

I took a look at Propeller in the Info/Ads category. According to its decription: "Propeller is a social news portal, meaning that it is programmed by you — the audience. Our members post links to stories from all over the Web." Hmm, shouldn't it be in a social news category like Digg? 43Marks didn't have a news category. Then I took a look at Kijiji in the same Info/Ads category and this time yes it was classified correctly--it is a Free Local Classified Ad site.

I can see someone using AllMyFaves and 43Marks as a crash course introduction to Web 2.0. But depending on your tastes and style, you might find yourself moving on to other places to organize your social networking and newsfeed day.

Thing 65: Greed Is Not Good

2009-01-02T22:54:00.005-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at the Financial Crisis of 2008. Remeber Gordon Gekko (Michael Douglas) from the movie, Wall Street (1987), and the famous "Greed Is Good" speech? About how greed was good for the Teldar Paper Company and for that "other malfunctioning corporation called the USA?"

Well the Subprime Mortgage Crisis of 2008 has set that bit of knowledge on its ear. Now that "malfunctioning corporation" called the USA is having to bare the burden of Wall Street's screw up with mortgage backed securities. In the early 2000s all the qualified consumers that wanted a home, pretty much had one. So to keep making money the banks turned to subprime borrowers to keep the money rolling in. They pretty much had a "Don't ask, don't tell" policy for sub-prime borrowers. Don't tell us anything about yourself because we really don't want to know. If we knew we really shouldn't be lending to you in the first place. And why do you think that they send you all of those credit card applications in the mail?--well--as P.T. Barnum is credited with saying, "There's a sucker born every minute." Telemarketers and mass mailers both know that if they can only convince 1% of the people they contact to get their product they are still going to make a mint. So that is why they do it.

The sad thing is for those that haven't established credit yet-- college students, people that married early without establishing credit on their own, people starting a small business (the business does not have a credit history), or people who recently migrated to the US will not be able to get the loans they need to make a better life. The domino effect is already happening.

Thank your lucky stars if you already have an established credit history. If a crisis happened such as a long term illness (hopefully you have insurance), you would probably be able to get a loan to help pay the bills. If not you will have an extremely difficult time bouncing back.

For businesses, consumers, and the government its time to pull in the belt and start acting responsibly. It is the responsibility of consumers to live within their means, build a savings, and resist the temptation to buy every "next new thing". Maybe consider volunteering to give back to the community instead of always "consuming". Consumption is considered a disease after all.

For businesses they need to drop the get rich quick scheme and make do with the consumers that are responsible like they did pre-2000s. For the government--don't just throw money at it (TARP) and think the problem will go away. Not everyone should get the money. Only those that qualify--let them sweat like consumers do and have lawers present with binding contracts. There better be strings attached to this money to hold the CEOs accountable. Better yet--they should all be fired and new management take their place before they receive any money. And those managers fired should be blacklisted from handling any sort of funds for at least 15 years. Jail would be too good for them, they should have to work a front line service job (not handling money) and serve all the folks that they made suffer. They should get the lowest paid wage that they offered to their employees and a scarlett letter emblazoned on their shirts to show all that they have screwed up.

And we want a transparent government to know who exactly is going to be holding these greedy thieves accountable and to hold them accountable if they don't enforce the law along with tighter regulations for the industry as a whole to prevent this thing from happening again. And other industries trying to clamor on the bailout bandwagon..let's just stop it now. Enough is enough.

When it comes to business and personal finance I always check Money Magazine and BankRate.com. They both are objective have a good focus on what is useful for the individual. So for the financial crisis of 2008 they are going to offer articles that will help an individual make the best choices with their finances. An example is Money Magazine's article, "Answers to your crisis questions". Here's some articles from Bankrate.com, "Surviving a workplace bankruputcy", "Tips to coping with the economy in '09", and of course there's ratings (it is BankRate.com after all) "Safe & Sound Ratings : Is your bank safe? Now you can find out."

There is a sequel to Wall Street in pre-production called Money Never Sleeps (2009). Lets hope that the script reflects the current financial times and ponder what Gordon Gekko sees in the Magic 8 Ball...probably "Cannot Predict Now", "Reply hazy, try again" or "Ask Again Later."

Thing 64 : One-Hit Wonders

2008-12-31T17:51:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise has us exploring several websites that are good at one thing--but that one thing is really useful. I will certainly use the tools that will make blog posting easier such as CopyPasteCharacter.com, and PicApp. Now I can post correct spelling of names and locations and use quality creative commons stock photos.

If I was still in college I could certainly see the use of the KuKuClock. Who wouldn't want to sneak in a nap between classes but not run back to their dorm or apartment? There are many students now who use the clock on their cell phone instead of a watch.

I would certainly use Stormpulse if a student needs hurricane tracking information but as for myself--I feel as if I'm knocked over the head with hurricane data every hurricane season. In this information soaked world, I only want to know about the hurricanes that would be a direct threat to my immediate area. (Now when hurricanes turn into news stories that is a different matter.)

Being a gamer, I have always enjoyed name generators. I could also see the usefulness if you are writer too. Got writers block for that new character? How about generating a new character with the FakeNameGenerator? Also great for biographies to protect the names of the innocent. GeneratorLand.com had a couple of generators that I enjoyed: The Creepy Elf Name Generator (I got Amold Flashbackbright--don't let this guy near any matches), The Super Hero Generator (I got The Fabulous Typhoid Stranger---Here I come to save the dayyy!-Or is that a Super Villian?), and of course The Character Name Generator (I got Gayle Defranco, moody fortune teller from Huntsville--I forsee lots of fun in this!)

And last but not least--the Twitter Status Generator--when life isn't all that interesting! (I got "Spellbindingly curious and fed up with tastiness."--Snack break anyone?)

Other things I discovered while using Regator were:

Lookybook - Children's Librarian's might enjoy Lookybook. Similar to LibrayThing but exclusively for Childrens' Picturebooks. Search by subject, author, or genre. Honored by Time Magazine as one of the top 50 websites of 2008.

Mathway - Step by Step Math Problem Solver. Great for students in need of a math tutor. Over 4,305,881 problems solved!

MEDTING - Have a student who has to have an image of a disease or condition and it is no where to be found? Give MEDTING at try. Only physicians can upload and share these medical images and videos.

Thing 63: PDF Form-Filler Freeware

2008-12-30T14:17:00.006-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at the Foxit Reader, a freeware alternative to the Adobe Reader. Why would you consider Foxit over Adobe? Because it allows you to fill out non-editable PDF files. Now you can have a professional looking application in no time. It's small enough to fit on a flash drive, Version 3.0's Installer: .exe, 3.69 MB, so you can take it with you anywhere. One negative, it will require you to install a toolbar on your web browser to download it. But you can hide it if you aren't going to use it. Also it likes Internet Explorer over Firefox.

But what caught my eye while I was using it is that it has a "Convert to PDF" option. I have Powerpoint presentations that I would like to convert to .pdf because .pdf makes the images more clear. You will need to install the PDF Creator portion of the Foxit Reader in order to use it. I wanted to see if my Powerpoint presentations would save horizontally instead of vertically like they did when I attempted to convert them using Zamzar. When I upload a .pdf file to Slideshare I can't rotate the layout to be landscape so all the slides looked like they were on their side. The Foxit Creator will add a red notice saying "Generated by Foxit PDF Creator. For evaluation only." mark at the top of each slide when you convert. When I uploaded it to Slideshare it did load horizontally but it changed my bullets to the letter "n" and my emotes to the letter "J". Also the hyperlinks associated with the presentation were lost. So after all of that I can't use Foxit Reader to convert my Powerpoint presentations to .pdf either.

If I know that a library patron has a flash drive or comes in with a laptop and needs to fill out a non-editable PDF file I will certainly recommend the Foxit Reader. Otherwise I'll recommend PDFescape if they do not. I will still recommend Zamzar for conversions to .pdf, just as long as you like the way it turns out! Thanks Foxit--this will be a lifesaver to many people at our branch!

Thing 62: Web-Based PDF Editors & Form Fillers

2008-12-29T17:51:00.005-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at two web-based PDF editors--PDFEscape and PDFFiller. There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to fill out a form due to the document creator making it a non-editable PDF form. Most of the time these are for important applications such as for jobs or colleges and nothing could look less professional than having the form filled in by hand. PDFescape and PDFfiller both come to the rescue. Both just require you to create an account using your email and creating a password. Both make filling out forms a snap. You can upload forms from your computer or from a URL. But depending on how often you would use a service like this will determine which is best for you.

PDFescape - If you want to avoid having the logo and link printed on the form you would have to pay for one premium credit. When you register you get 2 free premium credits. Premium credits are sold on the website at $4.99 for 5 credits; $8.99 for 10 credits; $16.99 for 20 credits; $29.99 for 50 credits; and $49.99 for 100 credits.

PDFfiller - For Fax, Email, Printing or saving to computer the fees are: $9.99 unlimited use, unlimited forms for 30 days. $69.99 unlimited use, unlimited forms for 365 days. $12.99 unlimited use, unlimited forms for 1 day.

For library patrons I would recommend using PDFescape since if the patron registers they will get 2 premium credits to print without the logo and web link. They may only need to use a PDF editor one time. This would allow them to use the service without a long term commitment. This service will certainly be used at our branch!

Thing 61: Facebook and Libraries

2008-12-28T17:41:00.004-05:00

This discovery exercise has us exploring Facebook for library related things. I'm amazed by how many people I know that are on Facebook. A few have found me that I haven't heard from in years! I must admit that I didn't start using it until one of my coworkers showed me what she used it for (a little application called Dogbook) and I knew that I had to try it. I thought--well at least I'll know one person. Little did I know how that one person turned into many!

I will say that I see more from the people participating in the Learning 2.1 project on Facebook than on Ning! I think because it can be used keep up with a variety of things, not just one topic, it keeps people coming back to it vs. going to several sites to do the same thing. It is similar in its consolidating ability to the likes of start pages and feed readers.

I did add the Explore...Discover...Play! app to my Facebook page but it was not the most intuitive to find. I tried searching for it on Facebook but it did not turn up that way nor was is linked on the Learning 2.1 blog. It was however, linked on the main page of Ning so that is how I got it added to my Facebook page. I also added the WorldCat and My LibraryThing apps as well.

I also did a search for PLCMC and they have Facebook page now. The profile shows the library logo, address (including a linked map for directions), phone number, and website. It also includes feeds for upcoming programs and events. It also gives a place for fans to leave comments and feedback.

Searching for the word 'library' brought up about 500 hits. Everything from library staff to associations, interest groups and events were represented. Limiting the search to "pages" showed libraries as public buildings but also included some commercial entities like Library Thing. "Groups" brings up your library associations and interest groups. Events look like pages created for events taking place at libraries. Not all of these were library sponsored. I saw many library catalogs available by limiting it to the "Apps" tab. The WorldCat app would do a similar service. I added several groups to my Facebook page including: SecondLife Librarians, FacebookApps For Libraries, Internet Librarian, Libraries Using Facebook Pages, and Web 2.0 Tips and Hints. Now I'll have way to much to keep up with but at least I'll be able to see what others are doing and come up with ideas for Facebook pages for my library clubs. Thanks Facebook!

Thing 60: Facebook

2008-12-27T23:34:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at the famous social networking site Facebook. Joining is easy and you can decide how much or how little to add to your profile. I also like that you can hide your birth year. I don't mind if folks know my b-day but you should never ask a lady for her age! ;) It's the main reason I do not have a Myspace account. That and Myspace just feels rather strange to me. It doesn't have that clean organized look like Facebook. Profile pages seem haphazard and cluttered. Others have such strange fonts that they are just plain hard to read!

While searching and adding friends to Facebook, I became a fan of NPR, added Last.FM, Twitter, and some fun games to my profile. I also enjoy using Virutal Bookshelf for keeping track of things that I have read and sharing them. Since I also use Meebo, I was thrilled when they added Facebook to their site so that you can IM with your Facebook friends as well anyone else on the major IM networks. Its nice that you can decide how much of your Facebook profile you want friends to see. If they are acquaintances you might want to use your limited profile, for friends you could show you full profile.

I know that I'll be adding a Facebook page for book club. It's on my "to do" list for the new year. For my gaming clubs I'll add them to Facebook too and possibly to Myspace. The usefulness of social networking sites for library PR is wonderful!

Thing 59: AuthorsOnTheWeb

2008-12-25T22:47:00.004-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at AuthorsOnTheWeb and its related sites published by TheBookReportNetwork.com.

I started my tour with the AuthorsOnTheWeb site itself. It is a website design and and Internet marketing service for authors and publishers. It shows featured, current and just launched websites and blogs of authors and Internet marketing campaigns. It even shows authors on tour and news articles featuring their books and authors.

AuthorYellowPages lets you browse authors alphabetically or by genre. It even lists the top ten authors searched for on the site.

The BookReportNetwork site lists all the separate sites that they publish on the network. These include: BookReporter, ReadingGroupGuides, GraphicNovelReporter, FaithfulReader, Teenreads, Kidsreads, AuthorsOnTheWeb, and AuthorYellowPages. I especially enjoyed discovering the GraphicNovelReporter. It has separate review areas for adult fiction, adult non-fiction, teens and kids. It also lists its Best Of Lists, Books into Movies, Coming Soon, Bestseller Lists, and Awards. Now I'll have a nice place to browse adult graphic novels that might be of intrest to our branch book club.

I have seen ReadingGroupGuides before. It is geared more to the mainstream bookclub fiction reader so I don't normally pull my reading guides and discussion questions from it. For the science fiction and fantasy titles our club reads, I normally go directly to the author or publisher website first, then I'll browse discussion boards geared towards the genre next. ReadingGroupGuides have guides grouped by everything imaginable--from Title, Author, and Genre, to Best of Favorites, Most Requested and Themed Reads. It does give tips for discussion questions when there is no guide available. But I like the Typical Discussion Questions by Canadian Book Clubs better for the genre we're reading. You can register your book club and the site gives you tips on starting and running your own book club. You can even get a book club makeover if your group has hit a rut.

BookReporter.com is the site that I think Sandra really wanted us to take a look at instead of AuthorsOnTheWeb. AuthorsOnTheWeb looks like it is more of a business to author/publisher site, not a business to reader website. BookReporter includes Reviews, Features (including a Fantasy Author Spotlight that I will certainly use), Author Profiles and Bibliographies, Books Into Movies, Awards, Coming Soon (which lists upcoming hardcover titles), Bestsellers, and New In Paperback. I am sure that I will read the Coming Soon, Bestsellers, and New In Paperback sections quite often for readers advisory and to keep up with the latest for our patrons.

Thing 58 : Reducing Your Carbon Footprint Meets Web 2.0

2008-12-22T16:37:00.006-05:00

This discovery exercise has us exploring the Going Green Matters for green ideas. After adding the RSS Feed to my Bloglines reader, I browsed the site. There are news sections on everything from Carbon Footprint to Wind Power.

Since it is the holidays I took a look at Practical Tips for 'Going Green' This Holiday Season by Keep America Beautiful.

Some of my own favorite green holiday tips are:
1-Use gift bags instead of wrapping paper. That way they can be reused several times before they wear out. Then when they do wear out recycle them.

2-Send e-cards as much as possible. Not everyone on my list uses email but for those who do I can certainly save quite a bit of paper.

3-Clean out your home of unused items and electronics to donate to charities like Salvation Army, Goodwill, and your local food bank. Not only will you have room for your presents, your donated items will be used by those who need them most. Be sure request a written list of what you have donated for a deduction on your taxes.

4-Buy a small fir tree the size of a potted plant and keep year round for a permanent Christmas tree. When it starts to get too big, do a bonsai method and trim off about 1/4 to 1/3 of the root ball. Repot in the same pot or one slightly bigger if you want it to fill out. Now you have a permanent tree that you can always keep. When branches dry out or fall off you can grind them up to use as mulch. I still have the same tree that I purchased over 10 years ago.

Another great ecology minded resource that wasn't mentioned in this exercise but that I enjoy is The Nature Conservancy. My grandmother belonged to it and I have always admired and respected their cause. Founded in 1951, it is "the leading conservation organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people". Includes a handy carbon footprint calculator. Going green is easy anytime of year with these environmentally friendly web sites.

Thing 57: Tastespotting - Foodies Rejoice!

2008-12-21T22:45:00.008-05:00

This discovery exercise has us visiting Tastespotting, the website that allows users to browse by pictures instead of by keywords for their favorite food items. Each food item has been submitted buy the users themselves but are reviewed by the team at Tastespotting to be sure it falls within the submission guidelines.

I created a free account and set to discovering what Tastespotting had to offer. It was certainly easy to discern what you might like trying, or avoiding, simply by browsing the pictures. Bookmarking your favorites for future reference is easy, just click on the star in the bottom right hand corner of each picture. Soon I had a page full of favorites. From poached pears to stir fried bok choy there was plenty that caught my attention.

I then tried the search feature to see what was available. I typed in tea, tea party, and tea sandwich and got some very intresting selections. Since it was December and I was on the tea theme, I thought I would see if there were any references to Russian tea. The only thing that kept coming up were entries referring to Russian tea cookies, but not the tea itself. So I thought, this would be a good candidate to add to Tastespotting!

I finally found a site called Crazy for Tea that gave a good overview of Russian Tea, recipies for it--both traditional and instant, the ceremony, the Samovar, as well as a Russian Tea Cake/Cookie recipe. Then I just clicked on "Submit New" and added an image of the Samovar from Crazy for Tea (images must be 250x250 pixels). Then I cropped the image to the most interesting parts. I included the link for the site, and added a description. Then Tastespotting let me choose from categories that best fit my item and I checked to be notified when they added my entry. It may take up to 24 hours before it appears on their site because they review each entry.

Now I'm just waiting to see if it will be added. When it is, I'll feel that Tastespotting will be ready for the holidays. Now I'm inspired to make some Russian tea and watch The Nutcracker! This is a great website for Foodies everywhere. Mmm-mmm-yummy!

Thing 55 : Slideshare - Making Presentations Available Online

2008-12-15T23:35:00.000-05:00

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Web 2.0

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: internet 2.o)

This discovery exercise has us exploring Slideshare, the online community and service for sharing presentations. Setting up an account is easy, the usual email address and password is all that is needed. You can add more in your profile if you like. I searched for Learning 2.0 and Web 2.0 presentations and Slideshare gives you several sorting options for your search such as by relevance, latest, views, or downloads. Not only can you search slideshows, you can also search users or groups/events. It is very easy to post a presentation to your favorite social networking tools. Just click on the icon of the tool you want to use and copy and paste the code or go through the menu to log in and add. I added the above presentation that way. I also installed the Slideshare blog sidebar widget to show my presentations and also added it to Facebook.

For usefulness, I immediately thought of my science fiction and fantasy book club, Outside the Inner Limits. I do a quiz show as an icebreaker and do the discussion questions at the end. So I used my first quiz show as my Slideshare test. My best experince with uploading was by using the Upload tab and then choosing single upload. I tried uploading both a .ppt version and a .pdf version. I had to convert my file to .pdf using Zamzar because we do not have the full version of Adobe Acrobat for me to save the file. When I uploaded the file converted by Zamzar, it appeared in portrait view and I could not find how to change it to landscape view. So I deleted it. The images were much clearer in the .pdf version though. Now if someone missed book club they will still be able to see the quiz show and discussion questions on the blog.

I can also see using Slideshare to promote events at the library and post on a blog or website or to use when away at conferences, especially if you need to take an airplane and are limited by what you can take with you. You could even record the audio for technology workshops and add it to the presentation so that staff or patrons can take the workshop online anytime. Thanks Slideshare for giving easy portability to presentations.

Thing 54 : Bookjetty vs. LibraryThing

2008-12-06T15:49:00.002-05:00

This discovery exercise explores Book Jetty and other social book tools, primarily LibraryThing which we covered in Thing 11. It was simple to create a free account on Bookjetty, just make up a user name, password and have an email account. My local library was not included in BookJetty's supported libraries so I sent them an email requesting that it be added. They responded the same day and said that they would add it within about a week if the library's catalog had a z39.50 gateway. The closest libraries to me that were available were all academic libraries, not too good if I wanted to get the latest sci-fi or fantasy NYT Bestseller for book club. It does have that sparse minimalistic interface like Google and Facebook. That's good so that the site doesn't look too busy, but sometimes it's too sparse. You have to figure out how things weave together on the site yourself. Both BookJetty and LibraryThing give you tours but LibraryThing goes into more detail on what is on their site and gives descriptions. BookJetty's tour is only screenshots that you have to figure out yourself. With LibraryThing you can catalog with Amazon, Library of Congress or 690 World Libraries. With BookJetty you catalog only using Amazon. BookJetty has 300 libraries in their library listings. They are mostly academic libraries. Both are adding libraries and bookstores all the time but LibraryThing is certainly in the lead.

BookJetty's claim to fame is that it will immediately let you know the status of books in your collection at the libraries you have selected in your preferred list. But what if your library is not available to add to the preferred list? You would have to email BookJetty to get all of the individual libraries that you wanted added to BookJetty and that is only if they have a z39.50 gateway. LibraryThing will also let you know what libraries have the book available and instead of adding libraries individually to a preferred list they use Worldcat instead. Worldcat, a union catalog of materials held in libraries world-wide, will let you see what libraries have it and you can link to their catalog to see if it's available for checkout.

LibraryThing has become so popular, 470,000 users, that it now needs to charge for accounts that have over 200 books. I assume this is to be able to provide the server space. After 200 books you can either pay $10 a year for unlimited uploads or $25 for a lifetime membership. I did not see a book limit on BookJetty although it did mention that if you upload more than 100 books that starting with 101 they will be put in a queue.

Since I have an active science fiction and fantasy book club I am always looking for discussion question ideas for the books we are reading. I have had very good success on the discussion forums in LibraryThing. I compared the discussions on titles we have read on BookJetty and there simply aren't as many discussions on the titles I like to read. Here are some examples: Storm Front (BookJetty), Storm Front (LibraryThing); Guilty Pleasures (BookJetty), Guilty Pleasures (LibraryThing); Dead Until Dark (BookJetty), Dead Until Dark (LibraryThing), Anathem (BookJetty), Anathem (LibraryThing), Neverwhere (BookJetty), Neverwhere (LibraryThing).

So far as sharing books with my social network, I tend to use the Facebook app - Visual Bookshelf but for bookclub purposes I like to use LibraryThing. BookJetty has some innovative ideas and if they add some other cataloging sources and boost their user base they will do fine. I think that both BookJetty and LibraryThing will appeal to bibliophiles everywhere. They just offer different styles to appeal to different users.

Thing 53 : LitLovers - Book Club Ideas

2008-11-26T11:22:00.007-05:00

This discovery exercise explores LitLovers, a site for book club ideas. The site is divided into four areas: LitClub, LitCourse, LitBlog, and LitFun. Since I coordinate a science fiction and fantasy bookclub at my library I wanted to see if there were resources we could use.

LitClub - The "Reading Guides," "Most Popular Books," and "Books We Recommend," were geared towards mainstream bookclub titles such as--The Kite Runner, Running with Sissors, and Water for Elephants. I did not see many science fiction or fantasy titles and when I did, they were classic titles like-Dracula, Fahrenheit 451, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Mists of Avalon, and 1984 not the contemporary titles that my club likes to read with the exception of The Time Traveler's Wife, Wicked, and The Road by Cormac McCarthy and that is probably only because it's an Oprah Book Club selection. You could browse by title or author that was available but it didn't give you a search box to just search for a title or author. It does give useful tips for those starting out a book club--Questions for Fiction, Questions for Non-Fiction, Icebreakers, and How to Start and Run a Bookclub. I took a look at Wicked by Gregory Maguire to see what resources were available for the title. The readers guide give a brief overview of the book, a biography about the author, extras from an interview with the author, book reviews, and book discussion questions.

LitCourse - There are 10 courses you can take in the catalog that cover topics such as Literature Matters: Why We Read, How To Read : Finding Meaning, and How To Read : Theme. Each course takes about 15 minutes to complete--just long enough to enjoy while having a snack! There are 5 steps to each course--the lecture (15 slides), reading suggestions, a study guide and a quiz to test yourself. You can get a certificate at the end of the quiz for completing it and scoring yourself. I found this section to be the most useful for my bookclub. I think our group would get a lot out of these courses and appreciate the novels they are reading even more.

LitBlog - Is a discussion of the thoughts of the website authors and the current pulse of many bookclubs and the direction they seem to be taking.

LitFun - Covers tie-in ideas for suggested titles. Top books adapted for film, LitFood with recipes from around the world, and even book clubs for kids.

I would certainly use the LitCourse section the most for my book club but I can certainly recommend it for other book clubs or to patrons who want to get more enjoyment and understanding out of the books they are reading.

Thing 52 : Snip it with Clipmarks

2008-11-23T17:41:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise explores Clipmarks, the free online service that allows you to clip the portions of articles on websites and save or share in a variety of ways. The account is free and simple to create. If you have an email address and can make up a password, you're in. First off I added Polyxena as my guide to see what kind of articles she was posting. Then I clicked on the "Help" button to learn how to clip articles. It certainly walked you through step-by-step how to do a clipcast. I added five articles to my clips.

You must be at a computer where you can install web browser toolbars. So this would not be something you could use on a public computer. It would have to be your own. Clipmarks installs an icon on your web browser. Click on the icon and then select the items you want to clip. It includes the website you got it from so you don't have to worry about referencing your source. I made one of them private to test out if it would show up on my clipmarks widget on my blog and in Facebook. It did, so I can assume that marking a clip private just means it won't show up on Clipmarks. It will still be shared on your blog or other places you have installed your feed for it.

I can certainly use it to keep track of news that I might not otherwise bookmark. It is also nice for going back and referenceing exactly what I have read. I'll certainly use Clipmarks for remembering what I have read whereas I'll just keep up with the news streams on Bloglines and Furl to see what's new. I'm sure if I want to remember something from my news feeds I'll have a handy way of doing that now. Thanks Clipmarks!

Thing 51: The State of Library 2.0 - Social Networking Comes of Age

2008-11-01T18:21:00.003-05:00

Libraries have been using Myspace and Facebook to market programming to teens and adults for a while now. Since we are on our patrons' friends lists they can know about programming they are interested in instantly. Handing out flyers that include these URLs to these sites begins the PR but then it becomes word of mouth as patrons browse each others pages. Ning and Facebook in particular seem to keep librarians in touch with each other and conferences and continuing education.

There have been blogs created for all sorts of things to reach out to patrons and library staff and get their feedback. Everyone uses them--library directors, bookclubs, children's programs, brainstorming resources, you name it. Meebo along with Questionpoint has really put reference librarians right where the students are. When they try it the first time they are overwhelmed with the ease of use. The library in Secondlife is pushing this envelope further with bringing the community to the patron where ever they are.

Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube have been used to good effect for library PR and presence on the web. Wikis have been used as archives and repositories of information that is difficult to find by conventional means. Del.icio.us has made library bookmarks of useful sites transportable no matter the computer upgrade and LibraryThing has been used by bookclubs and librarians alike to promote and archive books with a theme.

I've used image generators and wayback machines for student assignments. I've referred patrons to use web based productivity tools as an alternate to software the library didn't have--GoogleDocs, Zoho, Zamzar, and Letterpop to name a few. Since everybody knows me as the gamer librarian for adults, teens think I'm cool enough to ask for help with their Myspace page. If anything, discovering social networking tools have helped me up my credibility with library patrons. And if that happens then they'll come to ask for help about other things--like research papers. ;)

For myself, I wondered if there was a Web 2.0 gizmo that would help something that I've been frustrated over. And I found it--GMeta's recipe card generator. This generator will let you add a recipe to either a 3x5 or 4x6 recipe card--front and back. It will save the file as an adobe document and you can save it either on site or download to your computer. If I print out a recipe from the computer on a regular 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper--I will not use it. So this will certainly keep my recipe box happy.

I see libraries and social networking becoming more and more intermeshed. If the community feels they can communicate directly with the library and have a stake in its development then they will feel more invested in it and feel it is a vital resource.

Thing 50: Cookout

2008-10-29T22:30:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise has us looking at Imcooked.com. It's like a YouTube for cooks. Since it was fall I thought I would take a look for Russian tea or apple cider but they were not posted. So I thought, "How about pumpkins?" So I took a look and sure enough--tons of recipes for pumpkins. Some of the more interesting ones were: Pumpkin Bread, Pumpkin Hummus, Roasted Winter Vegetables (including pumpkin) and my favorite--Pumpkin Brulee. Mmm. Now I'll be ready for the Great Pumpkin to arrive.

I'll certainly consider it if I come across a stumper recipe or student assignment that needs an international dish. Getting the "how-to" as well as the recipe is great for beginning cooks.

Thing 49: Soundbites

2008-10-26T14:00:00.003-05:00

This discovery exercise explores Snoundsnap. It has a vast array of sound effects and snippets that are available. Since Halloween is coming up I thought I would search for some scary sounds. Scary Movie eat your heart out! Some of my favorites were: a witch's cackle, creepy organ music, scary background noises, squeeky door, wolf howl, and cat hiss. It was simple enough to download the MP3 to my PC. Sound clips can be used for slideshows, attention grabbers during storytimes, presentations, on a welcome kiosk--or library haunted house? Muh-wah-ha-ha! Where was this when I started my book club quiz show? Well the nice thing is that I know about it now. Thanks Soundsnap!

Thing 48: Free Music Downloads

2008-10-25T09:38:00.007-05:00

This learning exercise featured C|Net's music.download.com. It is very easy to use for free music downloads. Don't expect to find that "one song" that you've been looking for but you can probably find other songs by the same artist or songs that sound similar on the site for download. It's nice that you don't have to create an account for this service. At the time of this blog post there are 111,052 songs for free download. There are many ways to sort the songs--song name, artist name, average rating, total listens, total listens last week, date added and date updated.

At the bottom of the page is a search box. I limited the search to "Artists" and looked for Tiesto. When you click on the "see all free tracks" link you will see if there are songs available for download or not. If there are it will say "Download Free MP3" in the Playlist. I downloaded a song from Tiesto's Elements of Life CD called "Global Harmony". This is certainly not one of the headliner songs on the CD but it was available for free download! Downloading was simple and it gave you options for what file you wanted to save it in on your PC. If you want to upload to your MP3 player just follow it's directions.

I'll certainly keep download.music.com in mind for patrons who would like music downloads for their MP3s. But since patrons are using public PCs, downloads are a hit or miss thing. If their portable device requires a software download to interface with the website, they may be out of luck.

One of the commentors to this learning exercise mentioned Red Ferrett. Red Ferret is a directory listing of other free music download sites. It boast's "One Million Free and Legal Music Tracks." The more time you have the more this listing may be useful. As with many free sites, some are better organized than others.

Don't forget the music downloads that are available on the library's downloadable content service called Overdrive. You'll need to download the Overdrive Media Console to your PC at home first but then you can transfer those songs to your MP3 player. Overdrive music downloads are not available inside the library unless you have a wireless device to access the Internet. Otherwise you'll want to download from home.

If you want some creative commons MP3s check out Jamendo and Freesound. They allow you to download anything on their sites. Many budding musicians will post here to get exposure. These are great for programming, slideshows, and background music before presentations.

Many artists will offer podcasts of their music for download. If you go to their website or Myspace page they will mention if that is something they do. The artist that I did a search on for this exersise, Tiesto, has a weekly podcast that I download and listen to. I keep track of it in my Bloglines feed reader.

I have so many hours of music downloaded to my Ipod from my CD collection that I'll be in retirement before I go through the entire rotation. With many smart phones/PDAs having Internet capability, now you can go to sites like Last FM, Pandora, and Seeqpod and have the songs streaming into your headphones without having to download them. I've found that I can get many more major label artists this way since I'm not actually downloading the content. This is more like a radio service but without commercial interruptions.

Seeqpod even lets you arrange a playlist which is great for programming in a pinch. Say you need a song for a storytime activity and all the copies are checked out from your library collection. Go to Seeqpod and search for the songs you need and 95% of the time they are there. Create an account so you can save your list and save it on the website. Then if you have a smartphone/PDA/laptop with Internet capability you can go to the site and play the song list that you created. It's certainly a backup. I wouldn't use it all the time because depending on the latency of your internet connection it may come to a grinding halt in your program. But its a great backup.

These sorts of sites will certainly keep expanding. I'm sure that we'll have an update to this exercise in the future.

Thing 47: Rock On with Jam Studio

2008-10-22T14:18:00.004-05:00

I easily created an account with Jamstudio. All that was needed was an email account and password. If I was musically inclined I'm sure that I would have played around with it more because there are infinate possiblites. Everything is available for preview so you can get your sound just right. Select your chords, choose your instruments, select your tempo, 4/4 or 3/4 time, and the sounds you want for each of your instruments. It even lets you play your pages in what ever order you choose for a long composition. I just created a very simple A A B A style pop song. Major cords in the A line, Minor cords in the B line. I called it "Trial and Error". You can share your song with others via email, including yourself.
This could be used to introduce students to the basic concepts of music and draw them in. Now they can be their own mix masters and not feel intimidated by the virtuoso composer in music theory class. I could also see the songs being used for what ever project you are working on--slideshows, programming, etc. because you certainly wouldn't have to worry about copyright since they are your own creations. Rock on JamStudio!

Thing 46: Updates, Part 2

2008-10-21T09:14:00.004-05:00

Unfortunately the links in the Zoho Notebook that was used to explore Part 1 and Part 2 of the updates to the Original 23 Things do not directly work. You have to rest your mouse over the hyperlink and right click and open the link in another tab or window. It took me a bit to figure that out.

Library 2.0 - I think it has went from it's introduction phase to staff to implementation with patrons. We're comforable enough with its resources and terminology now to start thinking of how it can be implemented to facilitate the needs of patrons. From workshops to new communication tools, libraries are reaching patrons where they are to offer services.

Wikis - Wikis are wonderful for collaboration to pool information knowledge quickly as soon as its found out. People as a whole have more knowledge together than a singe person. I've seen wikis created for games and books so that players and readers can have a quick list of references. I have a wiki that is a humble work in progress that will be an archive of PLCMC gaming programming. I have everything stored in Box.net ready for linking, I've just got to design a nifty homepage to draw readers attention. *Sigh* So many projects, so little time.

Web Based Apps/Productivity - Zoho and Google are still king of the hill in the web based app world, but it will certainly be useful to let patrons know about other up and comers as options if needed such as Adobe Buzzword and Microsoft Office Live. It is simple phenominal how many web based apps that Zoho has created since 2006. Google Docs and Spreadsheets combined with all the other features that Google offers is another great package.

Web 2.0 Awards - I love Seomoz's Web 2.0 Awards so I was tickled to find The Crunchies - another set of Web 2.0 awards to compare them with. Crunchies is more for innovators in the field as a whole whereas the Seomoz awards have winners for each cateory of Web 2.0.

Video - YouTube and more. I am simply amazed at what is available online now. Now there's Joost, legally offering 20,000 TV shows a day, requires a software download; Myspace videos, and the major networks CBS, ABC, NBC, Fox now offer their shows but include commercials. PBS Videos are availabe via the library's NCLive subscription and some are available on Snagfilms. Snagfilms is a way for documentary creators to distribute their work. You'll see PBS, National Geographic and Indie documentaries that you would see featured at Sundance. If you have Netflix just download the player and view films online.

Podcasts - Most websites will have podcasts available in audio or video format. Just add to your feed reader. I've really enjoyed seeing things that I might otherwise forget to watch or listen to if not for my podcast feeds. This will be a natural extension of library programming with the advent of easy to film and upload devices such as the Flip. What a great outreach tool for patrons that are homebound or homeschooled!

Netlibrary and Overdrive - Our library's downloadable content is changing. NCLive is dropping Netlibrary so unless our library picks up the subscription on their own we will lose some great resources such as the Pimsleur Language Learning series. Overdrive's big claim to fame is that it is compatible with Ipods now but doesn't feature bestsellers yet or have a comprehensive foreign language collection. I do not like the overdrive media console. I liked that on Netlibrary you could at least view the ebook text inside the browser window without having to download or checkout. Now with Overdrive you do. I also used Netlibrary to supplement our print resources for adult learners taking online classes. Their college library is miles away and not everything is accessible through the college library's website. Overdrive's ebook collection is mostly entertainment. I don't see as much nonfiction. I hope this will be remedied by collection development so it will be a useful resource. Otherwise it will not be used.

Thing 46: Updates on the Original 23 Things

2008-10-20T17:03:00.004-05:00

Blogger - I was fortunate that when I created my account on Blogger in 2006 I was one of the lucky that were selected to use the New Blogger when it was in beta. So I got to learn Blogger in it's new format. I also use Facebook and browse Myspace but have been hesitant to create an account on it. Facebook seems more civilized than Myspace. Myspace makes me feel like I would be exposed more than I would be comfortable with.

Flickr - Flickr Uploadr and Picnik have made Flickr an even more valuable tool. I haven't heard about Flickr Places so this was a welcome find. It uses geotagged photos and gives you a listing of groups and featured photographers that focus on that place. I can't believe all the new Flickr mashups available. Wow! I was intrigued by the All of Ibiza from one Google Map.

Bloglines - I was considering Google reader but when Bloglines updated its features in it's Beta I decided to stay with it. For finding feeds I still like Technorati but I also like Google Blog search. I've come across single topic image generators that I've bookmarked, but none have come close to the archival depth of the Generator Blog, keep up the good work guys!

LibraryThing- I still like to use LibraryThing, but I also add books to my Facebook accout using Visual Bookshelf. I also like to use the LibraryThing widget for my bookclub blog to list what we have read.

Rollyo - Rollyo is still king of the self made federated search of websites you trust. Keep on rolling!

Thing 45: Flow Charts and Mind Maps

2008-10-19T22:32:00.006-05:00

I chose Gliffy to explore as a web-based flow chart utility and MindMeister as my web-based mind map/brainstorming utility. Setting up accounts on both was simple. Gliffy let you create your flow chart directly after making an account but needed email confirmation before you could make it public. MindMeister needed email confirmation before letting you use the tool but it showed up in my email in no time. Since I am on vacation at this point, I thought I would use it to toss around some ideas for how to spend my time. "What to do on vacation?" is what I called my flowchart diagram and mind map. I know that my flowchart is not technically correct since I did not link anything. But I got my thoughts down to see them.

I liked that MindMeister gave you a video tutorial immediately after logging in. Their help files were very nice too. Gliffy's layout was very intuitive and labeled very well. I had a flow chart of vacation ideas in no time. I would probably use flowcharts for conveying ideas to a group and mind maps for personal brainstorming and exploration. It's nice to have a tool that lets you visualize your ideas and their connections to decisions that you make.

Thing 44: Jott this down

2008-10-14T22:15:00.007-05:00

I've always wanted my own personal transcriptionist. I remember seeing old movies and TV shows where a person, usually a secretary, would transcribe something for some important "pooh-bah". They would have to know some superhuman shorthand. Now I get to be the special "pooh-bah" with Jott! Jott, would you please take this down? I could get used this. ;)

Setting up an account was very easy. I called in a reminder to myself to check out the Learning 2.1 blog next Monday. The "How To" links on the Learning 2.1 blog post were dead but they were simple enough to find on Jott's site. With the Basic Account, it shows you how to create a Jott Note, Set a Reminder, Post a Jott Link, Listen to a Jott Feed, and Add an Item to a List. There are even downloadable apps for your favorite gadgets like: desktop widgets, iPhone, iGoogle gadget, Outlook and Blackberry. It even gives you tips on improving your transcriptions.

I created some "To Do" lists and sent email to individuals that I had imported from my Plaxo account. However, if I wanted to send a group email I would have to upgrade my account. I'll be Jotting this blog post but I wanted to type it out first so that it would sound coherant and include all that I wanted to say. Jott walks you though how to do it on their how-to page. Also, you can name new lists and organize them in what ever order you like.

It looks like "Jott the Vote" is no longer active. You'll no longer be able to contact the candidates to give them your questions, comments and concerns and have your message posted on Jott the Vote. I guess Obama and McCain have other Web 2.0 gizmos to keep them occupied. I also learned how to Jott to Twitter and sent a little verbal update its way. If you want to hear the Questing Librarian blog via your phone, you can now do that via Jott. Check out the "Listen to the site with Jott Feeds" widget in the right sidebar of this blog under Subscribe. Thanks Jott for helping to write down ideas at the moment of inspiration and store for later use. A very useful tool.

Thing 43: Getting Musical with MIDIs

2008-10-12T16:10:00.004-05:00

I was amazed at how many songs on the Internet had MIDI versions. I'm not a musician, so I won't be using MIDI sequencers for creating songs anytime soon, but it was good to find out what they can do. I didn't want to download any software for this exercise so I used Jamie's online sequencer suggestion from the Learning 2.1 activities forum. For my song, I decided to try Scott Joplin's "Maple Leaf Rag" from Ragtime Piano MIDI files by Warren Trachtman. There were plenty MIDIs of this song to choose from!

I saved one to my hard drive and then uploaded it to the Online MIDI Editor. I could choose to play the song in Quick Time, Windows Media, or Real Media. The editor let me transpose up or down 1 octave at a time, double the tempo or half the tempo, delete tracks so that I could hear a single part played. In the case of "Maple Leaf Rag" there are the right and left hand piano parts so you could take one of them out to just hear one side. I can really see how a musician would appreciate this so you could hear how your particular part should be played out of the entire composition. You could also show the midi result as text. You could always revert to the origial file at any time. When you created a new MIDI from your original track, it gives you the option to save the altered file.

As for finding sheet music for the song, I tried to download the suggested MidiNotate Player v.1.1.1 but it was no longer available from the Hitsquad Musician Network - Shareware Music Machine. So I did a search for Maple Leaf Rag sheetmusic and came up with one from Free-Scores.com. Guitar Chords were available at FolkGuitar.us. Since the song was first published in 1899 I thought it might be available online.

I can certainly see the usefulness of MIDI files for musicians to help them learn the parts of a song and to fill in parts when not all members of the band are present. Their small size makes for easy downloads. As for myself, I'll probably use them mostly to make my slideshows more interesting.

Thing 42: Following Discussions with Usenet News/Google Groups

2008-10-05T17:50:00.006-05:00

I've used usenet newsgroups for quite a while and was delighted when Google took over and maintained the Usenet newsgroup archive from DejaNews. I find that I use usenet for very specific things such as the alliancesecondlife and the LibGaming groups. I also like to see if the books I'm offering as selections in our branch book club are being discussed. It's a place to get ideas for book discussion questions.

I browsed Society.libraries.talk and subscribed to it. I don't know that I will use it often but it is good to see what is being posted. Expecially if something about libraries or librarians comes up in the mainstream press and what people are saying about it.

Overall Usenet/Google Groups works best when there is a group of dedicated users that want a place to discuss topics by invitation only. That way you always know that the messages will be on topic. I suspect that special social networking sites like Ning are also eating away at its user base, but Usenet/Google Groups offers the flexability of having discussions posted to your email in what ever format you choose.

Thing 41: Going Native with Live Mocha

2008-09-28T22:18:00.005-05:00

The hardest part of this exercise for me was deciding on what language I was going to explore. As a student I studied French, but I wanted an all together different experience. I narrowed it down to Japanese and Mandarin Chinese and had a tough time deciding at that point. There are aspects of both cultures that I enjoy but when it comes to purely speaking the language, the tones of Chinese sound like flowing musical notes to me, circular like a Tai Chi form. Japanese seems stacatto and linear. Like a katana strike. So I decided to step out into the unknown wilderness of Mandarin Chinese.

Creating an account on Live Mocha was simple, pick your language and add a little information about what you are looking for in a language buddy. You can post what country you are from if you like. In less than an hour I had four people send me friend requests to want to be a language buddy. There is no pressure to begin speaking with a buddy. You can start when you are ready.

You can really go at your own pace with Live Mocha. You start with learning the pronunciation and Live Mocha shows you a slide and the Pin yin words to start with. There is space below to write what you think it means. Since many others have taken the beginning part of the course, the answers had already been filled in. I'll be repeating things for a while to get used to the tones. For some sounds there is no English equivalent and I feel like I'm speaking from the back of my throat. You then proceed to reading, listening, magnet (match the words to the corresponding box), writing, and speaking. You get points along the way and are shown your progress at all times to keep you motivated. Overall Live Mocha was a fun experience and not intimidating. Take your time and enjoy the exploration. Before you know it you'll start to feel comfortable with your new language adventures. I'm sure that I'll take Japanese as well just to compare the experiences.

For our library this is a great tool to offer as a referral if our foreign language materials are checked out and the patron can't fit a CPCC or Crossroads Cafe language course into their schedule or book a time at the International House. We just lost our subscription to Rosetta Stone and at the first of year, 2009, we'll lose Netlibrary--which means no more Pimsleur Language Learning digital audiobooks either. Our new digital media provider, Overdrive, has some foreign language materials but not extensive. So Live Mocha will fill many language learning needs and fit any schedule.

Xie_Xie/Arigato Live Mocha!

Thing 40: Going Retro

2008-09-22T22:14:00.003-05:00

I created an account on Retroland and began exploring its version of the wayback machine called "The Retropedia." Browsable by topic or you can search by keyword, Retroland gives you many avenues for exploration. You can browse by TV, Movies, Toys, Music, Fashion, Arcade Games, Food, Places, and School Daze. I guess what surprised me most was how much junk food was popular in every era! No wonder we keep dentists in business. The other thing that surprised me was that many people enjoyed the same things at school, with field trips topping the list.

Things that I was reminded of that brought back a smile were The Muppet Show, Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, The Empire Strikes Back, The Princess Bride, trips to the beach with my grandparents and playing games like canasta, UNO and Monopoly, PB&J sandwiches, popcorn, and Coke Classic-when it was still made with sugar instead of high-frutose corn syrup. I would make my granddad laugh when I repeated the commercial slogan, "Ahh, Now that's the real thing!" We would keep it in the car on the way to the beach because it would keep me from getting motion sickness. I also enjoyed browsing the Book Worm forum and seeing how many entries were posted for favorite comic books and Dr. Seuss.

Retroland certainly made it easy to navigate popular culture by decade. This will be a useful supplement for students who have been assigned a particular decade and need to find out what was popular during that time.

Thing 39: Animoto Energizes Your Photos

2008-09-21T19:36:00.006-05:00

Here is the short video I created with Animoto.

Video Title "Touring Asian Gardens"
Producer Christie BW - The Questing Librarian
Images/duration 11/0:30
Track Tafubar - The Wicked Thoughts of You (MoShang Asian Space Mix)
Artist MoShang & Various Artists*
Video description - US National Arboretum, Asian Collections and Bonsai and Penjing Museum, Washington DC (1/21/01) during ALA Midwinter.

My experience with Animoto was very straight forward. My only delay was that the photos I wanted to use were still on floppy disks! I recently upgraded my computer and forgot that it does not carry a floppy drive, so off to the library with my photos I went to do the digital transfer. I started by uploading about 17 photos and then narrowed them down to the ones I most wanted in the clip. I ended up with 11 photos and found some nice creative commons music available at Jamendo by Tafubar, who had a guest appearance on MoShang's album. I then uploaded the video to my blog, emailed it to myself, added it to YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and anything else I could think of.
I can certainly see some practical applications for promoting and showing the results of library events. These short clips could be used as attention grabbers or filler before programs. Overall a very nice tool. Thanks Animoto for making it easy!

Thing 38: Comic Generators

2008-09-13T19:45:00.009-05:00

After browsing several comic generators for library related strips, I came across two that I enjoyed. The first was Shelf Check #254 by Poseygalore on Toondoo.com. After just coming down from the summer reading marathon, I can really appreciate it. The second one I enjoyed was from StripGenerator. It's called "Whoa there, We got ourselves a Reader!" Great fun.

Next I signed up on ToonDoo to create a comic of my own. I called it Wonderland after Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I took four photos and uploaded them to Flickr. Then I took the small size and uploaded it to ToonDoo using the ImaginR feature. The images appeared and you could crop just the part of the picture you wanted. You could also resize it. After you name and save, it's saved in your photo gallery for use. What took me the longest was choosing what background I was going to use that wouldn't clash with the photos. After that it was a snap to add the speech balloons. You can choose from several types and you can resize the balloons and even what direction they are oriented by dragging the mouse in the direction you want it to go.

I have had a few patrons with student assignments asking them to create a comic strip. Now I can offer them something that looks really snappy and it's fun to use. I can also use it to create fun publicity for programming. Another item for the Web 2.0 toolbox.

Thing 37: Music Finders

2008-08-31T18:19:00.004-05:00

I tried both suggested music finders, Pandora and Last.FM. I used my current favorite artist, Tiesto. Since trance music is not something regularly heard on local radio stations in my area, I've always surfed the net to find out the latest trends. I enjoyed both music finders and they each featured artists that I had not heard of. I liked that they offered extensive bios and artist cross-references. I could not pick one over the other in terms of better choices but would use both to see what is out there on the trance scene.

There were however a couple of negatives: I did not like that you couldn't hear many of the songs in full on Last.FM, many were just snippets. How do you know if you will like it or not if you can only hear 30 seconds? Pandora only loads one song for you to listen to at a time but at least you get to hear the full song. Overall, I'll use both services in addition to other sources I normally check.

Thing 36: Online Photo Editors

2008-08-24T18:02:00.004-05:00

For this discovery exercise, instead of taking several photos and testing them on one editor, I took one photo and looked at several editors. I posted the results on Flickr, tagged Cinnamon, since that is the subject of the photo.

Original Photo
Here is the original photo. This is our neighbor's cat, Cinnamon. She is too skittish to hang around if I go outside but I got this shot from the kitchen window.

Picknik
Registration required. For an inexperienced photo editor like myself I found that Picknik offers the right amout of simplicity and level of detail. It also helps that Picnik is already the photo editor partnered with Flickr and Box.net, both of which I use to store my photos. Very nice.

Splashup (Formerly Fauxto)Registration required. If I was a Photoshop user I'm sure that I would have taken to Splashup. But there was no tip sheet and some things I just didn't understand how they could be used. So for this novice, the picture probably didn't turn out as good as it could have.

Pixenate
I appreciated that I did not have to create an account with Pixenate. I could just upload my picture and get to work. It was also nice that Pixenate gave you the ability to upload your edited photos directly to Flickr or save to disk. I was able to get the contrast I wanted on Pixenate but not the level of sharpness.

Snapfish
Registration required. Very limited on what it offers for online photo sharing-except for email. It really pushes you to buy things. It didn't even give me a place to save the images I edited back to my PC. I had to right click and copy and save it myself. I was afraid I wasn't even going to get to do that. Like Pixenate, I was able to get the contrast I wanted but not the level of sharpness.

Pixer.us
Another nice site that I did not have to register on. I just uploaded my picture and set to editing. It gave me the ability to save back to my PC. Pixer.us gave me the sharpness that I wanted but not the contrast.

CellSea
Since I do not have a cell phone camera I did not use CellSea.

ImageEditor
ImageEditor would not let me upload my original, untouched photo to edit so I did not use it.

Wiredness
No registration required. Wiredness gives you many places you can upload your photos from and back to. You can integrate with Flickr or Picasa, save as a .jpg, .gif, or .png. You can also bookmark the site directly to Delicious, Stumbleupon or Digg. I wasn't able to get the level of sharpness or contrast that I wanted though. Again this may be due to my lack of photo editing experience.

Overall I choose Picknik for its ease of use and intuitive layout and autocorrect features. At almost every level there is an auto-fix feature which made it so straight forward. I recommend Picknik for online photo editing whether you are a novice or an expert. If you are an expert you may appreciate Splashup more.

Thing 35: Micro Blogging

2008-08-17T22:12:00.011-05:00

I created an account with Twitter and it was very straightforward through the whole process. One glitch, when I went to pull friends lists from my email accounts, Twitter kept hanging up. But searching for library and librarian brought up several people and places that I knew right away so I set them to 'follow'. The 140 character limit of Twitter means that I'll be using TinyURL often. :) It was also easy to add Twitter as a badge to my blog and to my social networking sites. I like that I can add a message to Twitter and have my status show up in all of the places I have linked it to.

I tried to create a Jaiku account but there are not accounts available at the moment. Jaiku said it would email me when an account came available. It's in the process of joining with Google. I wonder if that is the reason I could not sign up.

So I tried Pownce . It has a much easier 'find friends' feature. You can also see who your friends are friends with. Sort of like Facebook and MySpace. You can create a personalized theme for your background and can add links, files, or events. It allows you the largest amount of space for your microblogging.

I can really see micro blogging as a useful tool for library program promotions. Especially as an eye catcher to your website. It's also a nice way to alert readers to updates to your blog or website.

Thing 34: Fitness Calculators

2008-08-16T22:28:00.003-05:00

I created accounts for both Nutridiary and FitDay and compared them with our local fitness calculator Fit City Challenge. Between Nutridiary and FitDay I liked FitDay best. I had more of the foods that I eat in it's database and it was very straightforward to use to get a breakdown of how I obtain my calories.

The clean interface also helped FitDay be more intuitive. A less busy interface means that there will be less to distract you and you are more likely to find what you are looking for. The activities list was not as extensive as I would have liked but it was very easy to approximate a similar exercise. I was disappointed in that I did not see anywhere on either site to input whether you take dietary supplements or not--especially things like multi-vitamins and calcium.

On a separate comparison, I'll still log my exercise time in Fit City Challenge because of the incentives at work. According to the FitCity site: "Eligible employees will be rewarded with one half () vacation day for every 200 points earned through participation in the Fit City Challenge, for a maximum of 400 points and one (1) vacation day per calendar year." Not bad for something I do everyday anyway. Might as well get credit for it.

One thing that does bother me though is the over reliance of many of these calculators on solely the BMI alone. If you are athletic, then you know that muscle weighs more than fat. A football player will be classified as obese based on BMI alone. So as with any of these fitness calculators, keep that in mind and get a better picture by getting a body fat test during your annual physical at the doctor. Overall I'll log my fitness hours on Fit City Challenge but keep my food diary with FitDay. Even though I'll log both on both for comparison I like those features the best on each.

Thing 32: Online File Storge Redux

2008-08-13T22:56:00.006-05:00

Two posts ago, I received some helpful comments about why Omnidrive was not working for me. Come to find out, Omnidrive is no longer an active site and is probably going out of business. But Box.net offers the same service and also uses ZohoWriter for editing documents inside it and instead of Snipshot, uses Picnik for photoediting--which is also used by Flickr. Awesome! Setting up an account was very easy, uploading documents and photos a snap, and editing them--Zoho Writer and Picnik pop open right inside Box.net. You can add tags to your items for easy searching and have the option to share your documents with a handy URL. I'll be using this resource alot!

WFAE Features New Library Book Truck

2008-08-13T22:03:00.004-05:00

While driving to work today I smiled as I listend to our public radio station, WFAE. They featured our library's new yellow book truck that is encouraging kids to read throughout the summer. Studys show that reading during the summer keeps children at their reading level or improves it. The hope is that the books the truck brings will excite the children to come to the library to get their own library cards and discover what resources their public library has to offer. It also featured our branch's very own Ms. Ursula reading Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst and Ray Cruz. Way to go!

Thing 33: Online Art Games

2008-08-10T16:03:00.006-05:00

This discovery exercise was quite fun. I explored all of the online art suggestions on the Learning 2.1 blog plus Jamie's suggestion in the ning forums. Falling Sand was interesting but it didn't keep my attention long enough to create anything with it. Since it was moving all the time it felt more like an Etch-a-Sketch with a mind of its own. Mr. Picassohead pulled me in and I tinkered with it a good while. I also liked that you could email your creations to others or yourself.

Zefrank's Snowflake Maker took me a couple of times to get the hang of. The trick is not to do too many swipes through. The more you add the less you can see the details.

Zefrank's String Spin was amazing to watch while it whirled your doodles into fantastic shapes. You can even change direction x,y, and z axis and even color of your strings.

The last one I played with actually came from the Learning 2.1 Forums on Ning. Jamie mentioned her favorite was JacksonPollock.org and I just had to try it since I've used Pollock's signature paint splatter style on some Japanese lanterns I have in my living room.
Overall it was great fun!

Thing 32: Omnidrive - Online File Storage

2008-08-09T18:58:00.005-05:00

Omnidrive looks like a wonderful tool but was unavailable to me at the moment because it is currently in Beta and they have reached capacity in terms of number of users. I have signed up to receive an email when they start accepting new users. The Zoho Writer account that I created in Thing 18 is still working fine and when Omnidrive comes available again I'll complete this exercise and also utilize the Snipshot feature for editing photos.

Thing 31: Plaxo - Stylish Organization

2008-08-06T23:53:00.008-05:00

I will say that I was really impressed with this discovery exercise. Before Plaxo I had all but given up on trying to update my yearly calendar with important dates and anniversaries. Now I'll never have to

1-buy another day planner or

2-add another reoccuring date again!

Signing up was easy enough, Plaxo walked you right through the process and gave you suggestions on what to explore next. The trick with calendars is to create your different calendar categories first (work, home, etc). Then when you add an event select the calendar you want to add it to first--then add the rest of the data. If you don't remember to select the correct calendar then the event will have to be deleted and added again to the correct calendar. There were some quirks with the calendar, I couldn't set an event for every two weeks or three weeks, etc. Those I had to put in each event manually. But most every other sort of reoccurance was available. Viewing each of the different calendar categories and overlaying them onto the same calendar was straight forward. Countdowns were easy to do, just click on the event and check off the countdown box. Task lists were easy to create, and I'm glad that they didn't force you to put a deadline on them. When you check items off, Plaxo marks them out and deletes them.

iCalShare took me the longest to pick up on, simply because I didn't know where to look on Plaxo to find where to add the iCal calendars. It's not visible from the main calendar screen, you have to click on the 'Calendars' tab at the bottom of the screen and click on 'Share & Manage'. Then click on 'Subscribe to iCal'. iCalShare had some interesting calendars but I just wanted a simple astronomy calendar so I chose 'Science' category and then chose the Eclipse Calendar. Now here is what stumped me for a while. When I clicked on the word 'Subscribe' in iCalShare it would try to add the calendar to the default Outlook calendar. I didn't want to use that so finally I noticed that if I rested my mouse over the little calendar icon next to the word 'Subscribe' the calendar address would pop up in the marquee at the bottom of the browser. So I jotted that down and then directly added it to Plaxo and Presto! the iCal calendar worked without having to sync it with an outside calendar.

I tried printing the Plaxo calendar in both Firefox and Internet Explorer. It works best in landscape view and I had more space in the calendar if I used Internet Explorer. Your results may vary depending on what web browser and version you have.

I'll certainly be using my Plaxo calendar, not only for important birthdays and anniversaries, but also for work. This will certainly replace my print outs of the 'Systemwide Meeting & Important Dates Calendar' from the staff intranet. I'll be able to more effectively plan going to library conferences and continuing education workshops. You could use it for the staff desk schedule, although getting everything to fit in a small space for printing might be a challenge. You could also use it to advertise in-house library events and outreach activities if your library doesn't already have a calendar for that on their website. You probably would want to create a separate Plaxo account for that so that it is dedicated for that purpose. Here's a little library events calendar that I made public for sharing.

NPR Reports on the Resurgence of Libraries

2008-07-30T22:50:00.012-05:00

Stop the press! It's an NPR 'driveway moment.' All Things Considered featured a segment on how "Libraries Shine in Tough Economic Times."
It proved so popular with listeners that many responded the next day and were featured in "Letters: Resurgent Libraries".

With the down turn in the economy, patrons are coming back to the library in record numbers. If ever there was a need for libraries, now is the time.

What was most impressive was that the Library Director for Boyd County Public Library, Debbie Cosper, was working the reference desk while she was doing the interview with Melissa Block! Kudos for Cosper!

LOLCat photo becomes famous!

2008-07-23T21:43:00.004-05:00

My little LOL cat photo is only 4 days old and has become famous! It has been used in an article in NowPublic, a participatory news network which mobilizes an army of reporters to cover world events. The article is "I can haz lolcode?," by Rob Peters. It covers the efforts by lolcode.com to create a real computer language that is supported on multiple platforms. Enjoy!

Google Knol - a more serious challenger to Wikipedia

2008-07-23T20:13:00.005-05:00

Google has come out with a potential Wikipedia killer. Its latest product, called Knol (short for knowledge), will require article writers to post their name. You will not be able to post anonymously. Others can edit your knol, but you can choose to accept, modify or reject any edits that others make. They predict multiple articles on the same topic with variances of opinion. The author can also choose to accept ads on their Knol. If they accept those ads, Google will compensate them substantially. Will this be World Book or Britannica killer? Probably not, unless it can really offer features that World Book, Encyclopedia Americana, and Encyclopedia Britannica excel at, such as outstanding graphics, maps, charts, timelines and video clips that easily explain difficult concepts.

I see it as a possible first stop for certain kinds of research. But it will not replace everything. It will be no replacement for the kind of in-depth research that would be available at your library. But many will attempt to use it for exactly that since it's easy. Doing real research is time consuming and as Americans who want instant achievement, Google Knol will satisfy the need of instant gratification.

For more information, check out Google unfurls less laughable Wikipedia, by Cade Metz in The Register.

Thing 30: LOLCats

2008-07-20T00:25:00.005-05:00

more cat pictures

For this discovery exercise I got to know what LOLCats were all about. I've seen many of these photos in emails that friends have sent me but just didn't realize where they were being generated. Then when I explored many of the popular LOLCats sites I found where they originated. It's hard to believe that this Internet phenomenon has been around since 2005. It's been mentioned in Time Magazine, Wired, the New York Times, even Business Week and the Wall Street Journal!

Shown above is my favorite LOLCat, which is actually a collage of several in the 'Invisible' theme. Just in time for the Summer Olympics comes the Invisibl Olimpiks! I can just imagine these cats taking over gold, silver, and bronze medals.

I also created my own LOLcat using the LolCat Buildr. I've always thought the angry wet cat look left a lasting impression. The picture came from funnycatpix.com. Then I just added Dr. Banner's famous line from the Incredible Hulk in LOLcatspeak and presto!! A great looking LOLcat. Meow!

SnagFilms - Documentaries Finally Have Distribution

2008-07-17T15:54:00.006-05:00

For too long it has been a challenge for creators of documentaries to have access to a distribution network to get their films to the audience that would like to see them. But SnagFilms has changed all of that. You can watch the documentaries for free and you can also place them as a widget on your web page or blog or other places that accept them.

That means that advocacy groups would benefit from the documentaries that support their cause. That also means for libraries, another way to assist patrons with access to non-fiction videos that they might not otherwise have in their collection. These are professionally made documentaries. They are not the garage filmmaker kind that you would find on YouTube. These you will find at the Sundance Film Festival and are produced by the likes of National Geographic, PBS, and IndiePix. SnagFilms is to documentaries as Project Gutenburg is to books. A great resource. Check out Jefferson Graham's article, "SnagFilms gives documentaries an online outlet" in the USAToday for more details.

Thing 29 : Scrapblog - Online Scrapbooking

2008-07-14T14:09:00.006-05:00

I have really enjoyed getting to know about Scrapblog. It took me a while because when I read "favorite" books in the exercise description I panicked! I thought--I have so many favorites! So I decided to do the most influential books instead. When I read these 5 classics they influenced everything else that I enjoy reading. I have also posted the scrapblog to Flickr. They are tagged as "scrapblogbooks." There was a slight glitch, when I tried to share/post to Flickr directly from Scrapblog it only seemed to load the first page. So I exported all the slides as .JPGs to my PC and then uploaded them to Flickr. No problem.

I can really see using Scrapblog in many different ways to showcase what the library is doing. What a way to jazz up your branch photos. Also they can be used for PR to showcase a program you want to feature, to commemorate library volunteers, retirees, or staff functions. You could even highlight your trip to ALA or Internet Librarian! They could even be used as prizes for summer reading or any other library contest. Over all, Scrapblog is a very useful tool.

Could Google's Lively Be the Next Second Life?

2008-07-09T21:33:00.005-05:00

Although still in Beta, Google's 3D Virtual World called Lively could be the next Second Life. You still have to download the software to use it, like Second Life, but it allows you to make widgets of your avatar and room and place them on your website or blog--making it web-based. You will only need Flash and a small plug-in for it to work. Do I sense a new craze coming our way? Only time will tell. Get more details in Matt Vella's article, "Live from Lively, Google's New 3D Virtual World," in Business Week or Garett Rodgers' article "Google's Secret Project Turns Out to Be Second Life," on ZDNet.

Online Games Article for The Gaming Zone

2008-07-09T09:17:00.004-05:00

I have written an overview of Online Games for the Gaming Zone Blog. It defines online gaming and terminology, role playing games (RPGs), servers (shards), payment options, and web-based online games. Enjoy!

Review of Tishomingo Blues

2008-06-30T21:39:00.005-05:00

Elmore Leonard is back at his spellbinding best with one of his latest offerings, Tishomingo Blues, which takes its readers through a string of nerve-wracking events. The tale blends big city mobsters with backwoods criminals and a very confused high-diver. Only Leonard can weave a tale like this and leave the readers on the edge of their seats. Step into a world where justice takes a back seat to the whims of the heavy hitting criminals.
Dennis Lenahan is a diver in his late thirties who has come to Tunica, Mississippi to work at a new casino. He has traveled from one sideshow to another trying to carve out a living after being a phenomenal diver in college. He’s somebody that you’d describe as someone who’s seen it all. So, to say he was relatively unfazed when he witnessed a murder from atop his forty-foot ladder is not surprising. He’s certainly rattled a bit, but just wants to finish his stint and get paid.
The murderers are a couple country boys who take the law in their own hands and think they run the town. Enter Robert Taylor. Taylor is a gangster in town from Detroit with designs on taking over the drug trafficking in the area. His plan involves intimidating the men who Lenahan saw from his high perch. Taylor is a slick-talking man with no a take-no-prisoners attitude. He befriends Lenahan and tries to recruit him to his side. He offers him protection from the men he saw commit murder as they attempt to intimidate him to have him keep his mouth shut. Lenahan is in a real pickle as he wants to remain safe, but isn’t sure if he wants to enter a life of crime.
This tale is spun in the Deep South where the confederate flags still wave with pride. The climax of the novel takes place during a Civil War reenactment where every attention to detail is considered. Leonard weaves this story with a mixture of 21st century crime with 19th century sensibilities. Only the accomplished crime novelist, Elmore Leonard, can pull off a tale which sounds so unbelievable on the surface and make you believe it’s happening in real life. Lenahan is the catalyst in the novel because whichever way he winds up leaning as he weighs his options. You can just sense that his calm, reasonable demeanor is the only calming influence in the story and you pray that he doesn’t meet an untimely end and hope he emerges as unscathed as possible in the hornets’ nest that Leonard presents in Tishomingo Blues.

By-line:

This article is contributed by Heather Johnson, who regularly writes on ITT Tech Reviews. She invites your questions and writing job opportunities at her personal email address: heatherjohnson2323 at gmail dot com.

Guest Reviewer on the QL Blog

2008-06-30T21:13:00.002-05:00

Please welcome Heather Johnson, guest reviewer on the QL Blog.

She regularly writes on ITT Tech Reviews and has written articles on the College@Home Blog including 40 Most Useful Mashups for College Students and 50 Ways to Greenify your Classroom and Campus.

She will be writing a book review of Tishomingo Blues by Elmore Leonard. Let's give her a big QL Blog welcome!

Book Review on Reader's Club

2008-06-09T10:44:00.005-05:00

I just reviewed Storm Front by Jim Butcher for Reader's Club. This is the first in the Dresden Files series. Reader's Club is a guide to enjoyable books for adults and teens. They will be hosting the summer reading program for adults this year called Relax and Read. Sign up and read 5 books over the summer and enter the drawing for some great prizes. It is available to adults 18 and over that are Mecklenburg County residents or PLCMC card holders.

Game Review on the Gaming Zone Blog

2008-05-22T12:32:00.004-05:00

I am also the administrator of the PLCMC Gaming Zone Blog. I just posted a review for Puzzle Quest : Challenge of the Warlords. It's a multiplatform Puzzle/RPG/Strategy game. The Gaming Zone blog posts all the gaming happenings going on at the public library. There is something going on for all ages all the time!

Sci-Fi Fantasy Book Club a Success!

2008-05-21T09:10:00.008-05:00

I have just started a new Science Fiction and Fantasy Bookclub here at Independence called Outside the Inner Limits. A friend of the library was interested in starting a group and so we brainstormed and he came up with the title. I have started a blog for the bookclub to keep up with the latest happenings. We had 4 patrons come to the first meeting but I have a feeling that our second meeting is going to have a bigger crowd. I can't keep copies of the next reading selection on the shelf! We are meeting every other month (Jan., March, May, July, Sept., and Nov.) to give everyone a chance to place a hold on the title and read it before the next meeting. I'm going to try asking multiple choice questions from the book in a game show format like "Scene It" or "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" for an icebreaker. The winner with the most correct questions will get a prize--probably a book club journal. Now all I need is to find some game show music--hmm. ;)

Australian Exchange Librarians Come for a Visit!

2008-04-23T13:46:00.009-05:00

Our 2 Aussie Exchange Librarians, Lynette and Jane, stopped by the library this morning. We just found out about them coming last night! One stopped by to see me teaching "Internet Basics." I belive it was Jane. She asked if she could have handouts from two workshops that I do--"Internet Basics" and "Finding and Using Online Pictures." She really liked the "Finding and Using Online Pictures" idea of introducing patrons to not only Google Images and Microsoft Clip Art but also to introducing patrons to library subscription databases that have pictures as well. We both would like to offer an online photo sharing workshop using Flickr and are both trying to get Google's Picasa software installed on our PCs to help patrons who have cameras that need software to access their photo folders. Also we both think that doing an online scrapbooking workshop would be another great idea. After their tour they enjoyed coffee and Krispy Kreme donuts. From their reaction we noted that they liked them far better than the Dunkin Donuts they had before. :) Sigh! Now I'd like to go to Australia and see their library, Yarra Plenty Regional Library.

Thing 28: Magazine Image Generators

2008-04-20T12:12:00.004-05:00

After looking at the magazine image generators featured in this discovery exercise, I chose the Wired Magazine Cover by Xerox. I used my Meez Avatar and added a superhero cape (Yes I know that capes are uncool according to The Incredibles but I liked it better than a mask. After all, I want folks to know who I am to ask for help. ;) but to get her to fly I had to play games to get enough coinz to get the animation. Superhero flying was a premium item.

After I created the cover I could not right click and select "save image as". So to get the image I took a screen shot using Alt+PrintScreen and pasted it in MS Paint and cropped the image to just the magazine cover. I have also uploaded it to Flickr and tagged it LibMagCovers.

I could see using image generators to create unique signs for the library to grab patrons attention. Like creating a programming sign that looks like a magazine cover and putting it in the magazine display area. I'd be curious to see how many people would pick it up for novelty or for the programming being offered. You could certainly use them as prizes for contests. Who wouldn't like to see themselves featured as Time "Person of the Year" or on the cover of the Rolling Stone?

I have referred patrons to specific image generators when they have an assignment that calls for it. I've had students that needed to create cd covers and comic strips for projects. I could certainly see using image generators as a sequel workshop after one that covers online photosharing or digital scrapbooking.

The QL Blog Gets a Makeover!

2008-04-17T22:26:00.005-05:00

I've been wanting a 3 column blog for a while and have been looking at many templates. I wanted something that didn't have obvious margins so that if I put something in, like the Photobucket video, it wouldn't look like it had run off the column and into the sidebar. Three sites that I really got ideas from were: Webtalks New Blogger Templates, Free Blogger Skins, and FinalSense : Free Blogger Templates. After much comparison I decided to use the Denim 3 column template from Webtalks. I really like how it lays out the blog and with the ability to change colors in various parts of the template, I can make things stand out and easy to read.

I think I got inspired after I created my new Meez Avatar. She had such a fresh look that I wanted a new blog template to go with her!

Thing 27: Photobucket - Photosharing and More

2008-04-17T17:25:00.007-05:00

I created a remix of Cicely Mary Barker's Flower Fairies to explore the site.

Photobucket introduced me to many features that were incorporated directly into the product itself. Instead of looking at 3rd party apps after I had used a photosharing tool (like Flickr), Photobucket has some of these features as a part of its service.
It was a nice way to quickly put together a slideshow or create a remix--complete with fade options and even music. Then you could quickly get the code you needed to link it to what ever blog, webpage, or email you liked.
Photobucket is partered with Meez.com to offer avatars. This gave me an opportunity to go back and look at my Meez account that I had made a few months back and really take a look at its features. I've added a Meez Avatar as a widget in my sidebar. I like it much better than Yahoo! Avatars because it's 3D vs. 2D. Plus the animations show up better in the widget.

I don't think I would use Photobucket for personal use because anyone can use photos you post if you make them public. But I would certainly consider using it for PR purposes for the library. If people are incorporating the library into their works then that's spreading the word about what the library offers.

Now Flickr is partnered with Picnik to offer similar photo editing and creation services as Photobucket. In my mind Flickr and Picnik serve different audiences with different purposes than Photobucket. I'd use both, just for each for certain projects.

Thing 26: Widgets on YourMinis

2008-01-10T16:18:00.001-05:00

Ok I spent wayyyy too much time on this one. I actually have tried several start pages in the past so I went back and reviewed them first and worked with the YourMinis startpage last. Some of the others I tried were: Netvibes, Pageflakes, iGoogle, MyYahoo!, and Protopage. This was a continuation for me of an earlier "thing" : #19 Web 2.0 Tools - Start pages : "Pimped Out" Personalized Home Pages. Each has their bright spots. MyYahoo and iGoogle have the bonus of being a part of a persons email account so you can link directly to other parts of your Yahoo or Google accounts easily. Netvibes, Pageflakes, iGoogle, MyYahoo and YourMinis have widgets by well known content providers. Protopage and YourMinis had unique widgets I hadn't seen before. Many will let you add your own custom made widget but you have to sign up for a widget developer account. There were many times that I wanted to add a widget from one site to another and each startpage had content providers they partnered with. Unfortunately if your startpage was not among the "preferred" providers it was very difficult to add it to your startpage. Many times I thought it wasn't worth it to try to go through the added steps transfer to another startpage's site. If you were adding the widget to your personal webpage or blog it was much easier. Just copy and paste the code like with other sites widgets.

With all of them you could customize them and drag and drop widgets where you liked on the page. Some more so than others. Protopage and Yourminis gave you the closest feeling of an open desktop with their dark backgrounds and ability to place the widget anywhere on the page, not just in a certain order. Protopage also gave the added bonus of letting you create multiple rows of tabs not just one row with a left/right arrow like with Yourminis. That way you could see all of your tabs in one glance.

I finally leaned towards the YourMinis startpage because of how their widgets interacted with sites that I already use and also for how the startpage was laid out and how the menus were laid out to add new widgets. I'll cover how I use the startpage by tabs.
Tab 1 - Productivity
Here I added the ususal suspects: calendar, weather, the web search widget, bookmark widgets of heavily used sites--its nice that they open in a separate tab or window (depending on what browser you have). I also added my avatars from Yahoo! and Meez and a wood elf picture linked directly from the web into a frame--nifty.
Tab 2 - Reference
I tend to scribble down notes on a little slip of paper and then would forget where I put it when I needed it. So I created a Reference tab and used the notepad and text editor widgets for little reference tidbits. There is even a widget called ScribePad that looks like you are typing on a little parchament scroll. These notes are especially handy when I do NCKnows online reference because I can access it from any browser on any computer under any login.
Tab 3 - Books to Read
LibraryThing covered in Thing 11 doesn't have a separate menu for books to read. I could add tags to my books called "ToRead" but I find that I use LibraryThing more for books I have already read. There is a site that has a separate "Books to Read List" called Shelfari. It's similar to LibraryThing but I haven't really looked into it to compare more than that. I do know that LibraryThing seems to have more users for what ever reason. Both are great tools for feedback for bookclubs. One of our children's librarians uses Shelfari for her bookclubs. Check our her blog at Stiletto Storytime. In the Yourminis startpage I've got my Amazon wish list widget there as well as search widgets for Amazon US and UK. I tried adding the library's catalog widget but it has to be a URL not HTML code. (Note to self--email Paul about having the catalog widget available as a URL) I even added the cover art widget where you can type in the title of a book, movie, or music cd and it will bring up the book cover. You can even search by keyword.
Tab 4 - Photos
I also created separate tabs for photos and videos. The Flickr widget is most awesome. If you have friends in your Flickr network, this is way cool to keep up with what they are adding. You can also do a search for a keyword in the Flickr widget and it will constantly update with the latest on that keyword. Of course I had to create ones with elves, fairies and shelties to test it out. If your friends use a different photosharing service you can use the Slide Show widget instead.
Tab 5 - Videos
You can do keyword video searches in You Tube or Veoh and it will retain that search for you to view each time you use your startpage. I found a video that had giant koi swimming in a pond to Japanese music. More soothing than a fish tank and no clean up!

Whew! After all of that...I still want to go back and look at NetVibes and see all the nifty content they have. That should take oh...another month. Ha Ha!

Thing 25: Letterpop.com - Online Newsletter Tool

2007-09-30T22:06:00.000-05:00

LetterPop.com is an online newsletter creation service. It is similar to other online applications such as Google Docs or Zoho Writer for word processing, in that it allows you to create documents on the fly from any computer that has access to the Internet. Also like them it's free. It draws comparison to MS Publisher but it does not have quite all the customization features that Publisher does. But it offers you the convienience of a basic template creator for newsletters and flyers.

It is free to use with a basic subscription or there are other subscriptions for those who want more features and more space. It also allows you to email your creations to a list you create. You can upload pictures directly into LetterPop or link to your photos stored on your Flickr account. You are limited to 25 photo uploads with a basic subscription. If you want ideas you can see what other members of Letterpop are doing with their newsletters. I can see immediate applications with teachers communicating with parents, businesses advertising products, people writing their annual Christmas letter to all their relatives, and of course libaries communicating programs, resources and services to patrons--instantly via email. Talk about saving stamps and probably getting some great communication back.

Here is the little mockup announcement I created for library programming:
Game Night at Independence
http://letterpop.com/newsletters/?id=62773-4c64f3
Letterpop certainly has it applications.

Thing 24: Zamzar File Conversions

2007-09-30T20:38:00.000-05:00

I took one of my word processing documents (size 7.1 MB) and converted the file to .pdf using the file conversion tool, Zamzar. It was very easy to follow. No complicated instructions needed.

I tested it by sending it to my Yahoo, Google, and MS Outlook mail accounts to see which one would get it the fastest. It took several minutes for them to show up. And the the stats look like this:
1. Yahoo Mail - I sent it to this one first.
2. Google Mail - I sent it to this one second.
3. MS Outlook - I sent it to this one third.
From this little test it looks like that no email provider has an advantage over the other with Zamzar.

It looks especially useful for converting PR fliers for programs into .pdf for distribution.

I've already used it with one library patron. He was desperate to print out a portfolio he had created but the library didn't have the same software he had. He was so impressed he offered to buy me lunch! Needless to say, Zamzar rocks!

Learning 2.1 & Ning Network - The Learning Continues

2007-09-30T18:24:00.000-05:00

Visit Explore ... Discover ... Play!

Well, I have decided to take the plunge and participate in Learning 2.1--the continuation of the Learning 2.0 program that PLCMC started last May (2006). Announced during the May 2007 Technology Summit : Virtual Worlds, Gaming & Beyond, the exploration continues of new Web 2.0 tools but now the project is ongoing and it is the users that are doing the entries themselves.

I begin my Learning 2.1 journey by creating a profile on Explore ...Discover .. Play Ning Network and added my blog to the Learning 2.1 Wiki. Ning is a Web 2.0 tool that allows users to make their own social networks.

LibrarianCollage

2007-09-18T18:53:00.001-05:00

I created a separate header page element and put a photo collage of 5 of my favorite avatars. If you would like to add a separate header for your blog this site will tell you how: Dummies Guide to Google Blogger (Beta): How to add Picture to Beta Blog Header.

Enjoy!

Game Night LAN Party a Smash Hit

2007-07-16T10:20:00.000-05:00

We had a great turnout for our Thursday night Gaming Zone LAN Party for adult gamers ages 18+. For the inaugural appearance at our branch it was a wonderful success. The large banner and the Nintendo Wii brought patrons in the door and then they gravitated towards the XBox, PC Laptops and board games. Within about an hour all of the laptops were full and many were taking turns playing on all the games available. I even learned how to play Blokus, a board game that reminds me of the East Asian game of Go. The objective it capturing territory with your game pieces but you can only allow them to touch by their corners. Thanks to all staff who came out to make this event a success. The next stop on the LAN party tour will be at Steele Creek Library on August 9th, 2007. The next time the LAN party will come back to our branch is on November 8th, 2007.

Library 2.0 Ideas Generator

2006-12-12T19:25:00.000-05:00

While reading the SecondLife Library 2.0 group posting, I came across this from Kathryn Greenhill from the Australian Libraries at Cybrary City (210,70,24).

DavePattern Ah, left his Library 2.0 Ideas Generator in the Australian Libraries Building. This first came out on his website in July. He's now embedded it in a granite monolith. Your avatar can touch it and it will create a random Library 2.0 idea..just for you. My favorite so far is: "Write a poem about the wonders of Michael Stephens and reach Library 2.0 Nirvana overnight." Just...one...more...mouseclick. Enjoy :)

#23 Comments on Learning 2.0

2006-10-05T12:43:00.000-05:00

I must admit that I really enjoyed all of the discovery exercises that were offered in Learning 2.0. The Technology Summit pumped me up to dive into the program. Self-paced learning is one of the hallmarks of a library. Now that I've completed PLCMC's 23 I'll go over to Stephen Abram's 43 things and explore what he mentions.

Everyone I've spoken with really seemed to enjoy adding avatars to their blogs. Whether they used Yahoo! Avatars or Meez.com it was a hit with everyone. This carried over to the Librarian Trading Cards mentioned as part of Thing #6 Flickr 3rd Party Tools.

With Thing #10 Image Generators I got to bring my Librarian Action Hero to life with movie poster! I can see that others enjoyed them too based on the latest entry in Learning 2.0 - The L2 Image Slideshow. I know that many enjoyed Thing # 20 You Tube, Thing #21 Podcasting and Thing #22 Netlibrary but there wasn't as much making them "your own expression" as with the others mentioned.

Now I'd like to take that "avatar happiness" and hopefully apply it to the next generation of Library 2.0 and 3D Online Reference. A personal creative outlet meets service where the patrons are! And with my sharable customized start pages that I discovered as part of Thing #19 Web 2.0 tools I can keep track of all of these cool Learning 2.0 "things" in one place. Keeping track of these tools easily is the key to using them for resources and projects.

One thing that I would like to mention is that in order to complete each of the "23 Things" I found myself exploring while I was at work but posting my blog entries while I was at home so I wouldn't be distracted. For those staff that do not have computers at home, finding time to complete each of the entries was very much a challenge. I was especially concerned for the circulation staff because the majority of the circulation workstations to not have access to the open Internet, only sites on the PLCMC "yes" list through the proxy server.

If we did the project all over I would recommend that we:
1-Allow more time to complete the "23 Things". Some staff I spoke with lost their motivation to complete the project when they fell behind.
2-Put all the websites we are going to explore on the proxy server "yes" list so that circulation staff can access them from their workstations or have open Internet available on those workstations for the duration of the program.
3-Consider offering workshops for the "23 things". Even though some staff thrive on self-paced learning, others prefer workshops where they feel comfortable asking an instructor questions. Some staff felt uncomfortable asking others for help because they didn't want to prevent the helpers from completing their "things" too. Having a classroom setting lets a staff member step away from the day-to-day tasks and be able to focus on learning in an undistracted environment.

At my branch I felt these elements were there but I also want to say that everyone was very encouraging to each other. Anytime someone had a question there were mentors who were there to help. We all shared our successes and urged each other to continue so they could receive their MP3 player too!

If there was ever an incentive program like this in the future I know that I would probably participate. I'm sure the motivation from Learning 2.0 will inspire many other projects for some time to come. Now that we know about so many collabration tools it will hopefully make our jobs easier by not having to recreate the wheel everytime for resources and programming ideas but learn from others who shared through these Web 2.0 Tools.

Now I can go and read and comment on what other participants are saying and do a little sprucing up on my own little blog. :)

#22 Netlibrary : Downloadable eBooks

2006-10-04T15:24:00.000-05:00

In exploring Netlibrary.com I actually found several audiobook titles that I was interested in. I have created my account and added many books to my favorites list. I'll be ready to download them on my MP3 player! This will give me a chance to listen to adult and children's classics and other authors such as Marion Zimmer Bradley, Brian Jacques and Elizabeth Peters that I may not have otherwise read due to time constraints. Our patrons will really enjoy having access to the audiobook collection of ESL and Foreign Language materials and the full text of the Holy Bible. I'll be sure to refer them to Netlibrary.

I deceided to download The Curse of the Pharaohs by Elizabeth Peters from Netlibrary. I chose "Download CD Quality" so that I could transfer it to the MP3 player. It said that it would download in 14 minutes over a cable modem. My file downloaded in about 6 minutes over a DSL modem. This was a 163 MB file with 6 Hours 39 Minutes of playing time. I opened it in Windows MediaPlayer and I was able play the audiobook. One thing I noticed right away is that there is no breakdown by chapter for easy reference. It is just one long audio stream. I had to remember to pause MediaPlayer and not stop it or I'd lose what time the story stopped on. I also tested it by closing out of MediaPlayer and opening it back up and sure enough it went back to the beginning. It does not remember where you stopped.

I hope that the MP3 player will have a way to pause the story even if it's turned off and then resume when it's turned back on again. Also, how is the MP3 player's battery charged and for how long? Would it be advisable to get a charger or is it automatically charged by putting it in a USB port? I hope to find out when I receive it.

#21 Podcasting - Directories and Creation Tools

2006-10-03T18:09:00.000-05:00

Gabcast! Libraries & Technology #1 - Podcasting - Directories and Creation Tools

A verbal reproduction of my blog post about Learning 2.0 "thing" #21 - Podcasting.

Using Podcast.net I came across Talking with Talis and Amazon Wire.

Talking with Talis is hosted by Paul Miller from the UK. The focus is Library 2.0--where the movers and shakers of Web 2.0 and libraries come together to share their thoughts. Amazon Wire is the free podcast from Amazon.com which has interviews with the creators of books, music, and film.

Using the Podcastalley.com directory I found LibVibe. This is podcasts of the latest library headline news. At Yahoo! Podcasts I discovered NPR Books. This lead me to explore all the podcasting options available from NPR. There are a lot to choose from!

I was going to try to post a podcast of my own using Audioblogger.com but it is going away as of Nov. 1, 2006. They did offer other alternatives one of which is Gabcast.com. It does everything that Audioblogger does plus it has a 1-800 number too. It even has a feature where you can conference call a podcast. Great for interviews! So I went and set up an account. The instructions were straightforward and now you can hear this blog post as well as read it.

#20 YouTube : Video - The Mummy - In the Library

2006-10-02T21:47:00.000-05:00

OK, I couldn't help myself. In keeping with the theme of the "librarian action hero" I chose The Library scene from the movie The Mummy (1999) featuring Rachel Weisz as librarian Evelyn Carnahan to add to my blog. Sometimes I feel that all librarians have had days like this! I almost chose Conan The Librarian as a post instead but it didn't have quite the "action hero" mold I was looking for.

It was really interesting to see what others had posted with the tags: library and librarian in YouTube. I really enjoyed the creative use that the folks at ImaginOn did with the clip, Troy Story. But also it seemed that searching for something specific was more difficult. Just typing in "library" brought up videos from inside actual libraries but also had quite a few spoofs like the Silent Library from Japan.

After looking at the site I thought it would be handy to have a library video search feature for the PLCMC family of websites. It would make a nice reference and PR tool. "Find Stars in Your Library!"

#19 Web 2.0 Tools - Start pages : "Pimped Out" Personalized Home Pages

2006-09-27T12:40:00.000-05:00

It was very hard to just pick out "one" Web 2.0 Tool to talk about. I know that I didn't want to choose a tool similar to what we have already covered in the Learning 2.0 project so after looking at many types of resources I deceided that it would be best to look at start pages because it would be nice to have in one place all of these neat "things" we have been talking about. That way I can keep track of many more things that I could put in the sidebar of my blog. You could even create a separate library start page to help with reference questions or programming ideas if you wanted.

The three start page winners mentioned in the SEOmoz's Web 2.0 Awards grabbed my attention. I have been curious to know about what My Yahoo! alternatives were available. I was hard pressed to decide between the first two: Pageflakes.com and Google's Personalized Start Page.

Since I already have a Google account because of Blogger Beta I knew I had to try it out. Google's Content Directory is nicely separated out into category tabs for easy selection. It also lets you add your own modules or feeds. Nice. Although not as snazzy looking as Pageflakes, its ease of use was hard to beat.

Pageflakes has an AJAX start page which is more readable and easier on the eyes. It also has lots of feeds and "flakes" to populate your personal page with. It also organizes its content into categories but via drop down menus.

In both you could add your modules (pageflakes calls modules "flakes") or feeds and drag and drop them how ever you would like in you homepage layout. This is definately something that My Yahoo does not have. You can quicly add your own feed in both Pageflakes and the Google Start Page but Pageflakes doesn't have a way to let you add your own module yet. Google Start Page will let you add one via URL.

I probably use the Google Start Page for work related things and Pageflakes for personal stuff so that I can continue to monitor both for progress. I'm sure that at some point Pageflakes will let you add your own modules too. Overall start pages make a nice one stop shop for all of your personalized content.

#18 Web Based Apps - Writely

2006-09-27T10:12:00.000-05:00

I discovered that Writely is also not supporting Blogger Beta yet so again I had to view my document as HTML, copy and paste the code into a post and do some clean up just like in Zoho Writer. Both are about the same in ease of use. The HTML tab in Writely is handy and only shows the code for the document. I did have to import the image directly into my blog post though and place it in the table in the blog. With Zoho Writer I didn't have to do that. So both have their pros and cons. I'll just be waiting for Blogger Beta support for either one so I can export directly.

Title: Egyptology : search for the tomb of Osiris : being the journal of Miss Emily Sands, November 1926-.
Author: Emily Sands; Ian P Andrew; Nick Harris; Helen Ward; Dugald Steer
Illustrator: Emily Sands; Nick Harris; Ian P Andrew; Helen Ward
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Pub Date: 2004
ISBN: 0763626384

Have you ever wanted to be an archaeologist like Indiana Jones? Then you would enjoy exploring the wonders of Ancient Egypt along with Emily Sands, explorer extraordinaire. Follow along in her journal scrapbook as she searches for the lost tomb of Osiris. The illustrations are very captivating. Every page will inspire you to explore the special features. These include postcards, envelopes, papyrus scrolls, foldouts, maps, treasure samples, minibooks, popups, and even playing pieces for a game of Egyptian Senet which is similar to checkers. Bring your magnifying glass because some of the text is hard to read. Will Miss Sands discover the mysterious tomb? Read and find out!

If you would like other suggestions for reading take a look at Readers Club for adults and teens or Bookhive for young readers (or the young at heart!).

#18 Web Based Apps - Zoho Writer

2006-09-26T15:46:00.000-05:00

I thought I would take the book review that I did for the previous "thing" with wikis and see if I could create it with Zoho Writer and then save as .html code the way I wanted it.

Title:
Egyptology : search for the tomb of Osiris : being the journal of Miss Emily Sands, November 1926-.
Author: Emily Sands; Ian P Andrew; Nick Harris; Helen Ward; Dugald Steer
Illustrator: Emily Sands; Nick Harris; Ian P Andrew; Helen Ward
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Pub Date: 2004
ISBN: 0763626384
Have you ever wanted to be an archaeologist like Indiana Jones? Then you would enjoy exploring the wonders of Ancient Egypt along with Emily Sands, explorer extraordinaire. Follow along in her journal scrapbook as she searches for the lost tomb of Osiris. The illustrations are very captivating. Every page will inspire you to explore the special features. These include postcards, envelopes, papyrus scrolls, foldouts, maps, treasure samples, minibooks, popups, and even playing pieces for a game of Egyptian Senet which is similar to checkers. Bring your magnifying glass because some of the text is hard to read. Will Miss Sands discover the mysterious tomb? Read and find out!
If you would like other suggestions for reading take a look at Readers Club for adults and teens or Bookhive for young readers (or young at heart!).

Once I figured out that I had to right click on the table to adjust
it the way I wanted things went a lot more smoothly. Having a
full feature text editor is really handy. This has so many more
features than the typical blog editor. It uses many of the standard
keyboard shortcuts already known to MS Office users. I did notice
however, that like many web based products that there is a delay
with saving if the Internet is very busy. The automatic save
feature helps in this matter. But otherwise it has many features
that I have come appreciate in a regular word processor. I wish it
had more help features and FAQs. That would have helped in my
struggle with understanding how to use the table feature.

Unfortunately Zoho writer does not support Blogger Beta so I can't publish directly to my blog.
I had to export the document and then copy and paste the source code into a blog post. Then I had to take out a lot of page breaks to get it to look somewhat decent. Oh well. I'm going to try Writely and see if I get better results.

#17 PBWiki - Group Edited Webpage Creation Tool

2006-09-21T15:31:00.000-05:00

I've added the Questing Librarian to the wiki plcmclearning : Favorite Blogs section. I also added a couple of Favorite Restaurants to the wiki as well. Then I experimented with adding a new page linked to the Favorite Books section. It is a book review on Egyptology from the popular "Ologies" series which include Dragonology, Wizardology, and Pirateology. Fairyopolis is similar to the "Ologies" series but is by a different publisher. I have also sent Egyptology and Fairyopolis to the children's book review site Bookhive for addition.

I just did some simple formatting for the book review entry in PBWiki because I'd have to look up how to put the text next to the book cover instead of underneath. It's a handy tool for easy editing of web pages. However, I'd have to consider all the factors of a software tool before I deceided to use it for what ever project I had in mind.

Blogger & Blogger Beta Comments

2006-09-20T08:11:00.000-05:00

According to Blogger Buzz--Blogger beta and regular Blogger users are able to comment on each others blogs again. Hurray!

#16 Wikis - Group Edited Resources

2006-09-19T22:43:00.000-05:00

I could easily see creating wikis for subject guides on topics similar to SJCPL's Subject Guides that we get asked about all the time. Especially for popular topics such as: local information, careers and jobs, geneology and local history, and senior exit projects. The IS File pathfinders on the Staff Intranet would be an excellent candidate for conversion. Also, I'm sure that every branch has staff finding lists for reader's advisory and homework support that would translate well to a wiki. The thing for any group wanting to create a wiki is to deceide--are we all going to create our own wiki on our topic and then link them in another wiki that links back to all of ours OR will there be one centralized library wiki and everyone goes in and adds posts on their topic? And how will we facilitate customer feedback? Will it be something that only librarians will contribute to or will patrons be able to contribute too? Also consider the costs of conversion, especially staff time required to do it.

The Book Lover's wiki looks like something the library already does with the Reader's Club website but with the ability of readers to add comments to a book that has been reviewed.

Library Success : a best practices wiki is a great idea. But like any group project it's only as good as it's contributions. Some areas don't have any entries yet.

The ALA 2006 New Orleans wiki was very easy to follow and understand. Everyone who is a conference participant would want to read the wiki to find out more information and topics of interest. They could also post what discoveries they had to share with others. I could see turning large library events into wikis such as the Novello Festival of Reading.

The Bull Run Library Wiki seemed like an example of a work in progress. It had features that were a cross between a blog and a wiki.

Other wiki examples that I found useful were:
1. The UCONN Library Staff Wiki. After looking at this site I immediately thought of our staff Intranet. If it was a wiki then all staff could post updates directly without having to go though a webmaster.

2. Biz Wiki from Ohio University. This is similar to our Bizling.org website. If conversion was an option, the same things that applied to the subject guides listed above would be factors here. Something else to consider--would it be better to just create a wiki separately as an adjunct to the website? Is there any other information that would be worthwhile adding that isn't already provided by the website?

3. The USC Aiken Gregg-Graniteville Library Wiki is sharp. Everything is so easy to find. I especially how they made finding articles in their online databases intuitive. It's not a cluttered site but everything seems within easy reach. What is difficult for any library homepage is to facilitate the fewest mouse clicks possible but still have the page not appear "busy". Also consider how much accessibility are you willing to give with the site--only have library staff add updates or have it open for all patrons? How will patron comments be presented? Will there be an assigned moderator of comments or will this be allowed to be moderated collectively?

4. The FLICC/Fedlink Environmental Scan Project blew me away with it's information. It's findings should make libraries take notice. A must read for anyone in libraries. Content and accessiblilty to all parts of the project were easy to follow with the outline in the sidebar and in the body of the page.

#15 Library 2.0 - More Than Teen Gaming Night

2006-09-14T14:09:00.000-05:00

There are several Web 2.0 technologies that I can see libraries incorporating with a little help from their vendors. If vendors deceide to not offer them they should at least make their products to where the library itself can add these features. For the library catalog these technology features include: built-in RSS feeds for keyword searches and popular groupings such as new feature films, user tagging with outdisrupting the original subject headers on the collection, and the ability for user commenting and ratings on books and articles. Comments and tags one patron adds will help the next one looking for the same topic. Library vendors could also adopt the features of Amazon.com and Google of interest to patrons. You could have personalized catalog logins where patrons can add these features to their "My Library Catalog". Give them a place to list their favorite titles, authors and genres and be able to share it with others. Library users should be able to use these resources inside or outside the library.

A great example is the Endeca-based NC State catalog. I got a chance to hear about it from from a presentation by Andrew Pace, Head of Systems at NCSU at the Spring 2006 ANCHASL Meeting.They took their old Dynix catalog and dumped it into Endeca. Endeca offers the ability to choose from numerous ways to navigate. It offers reference linking and next generation multisearch. You can limit by document type or browse the the entire collection by call number. It has an automatic citation builder that is available in various styles. It even has automatic spell check similar to Google's "did you mean this" feature. Librarians can create a Q&A on the fly and add to the library FAQ.

If the library offers in-house resources such as websites then these could also have RSS feeds, user access points for the submission of reviews, assignment of keywords (“tagging”), addition of scholarly commentary, and other forms of user participation. A good example of this is the Reader's Club website.

Also the library will want to plan content for the new communication services that are available today. These include: graphics tablets, Ipods & MP3 players, smart phones, PDA's, E-book readers, smart watches, and Blackberries. Patrons will get excited if you have content for their new gadget. Incorporating Web 2.0 technologies in the library will help provide content for these devices. Examples of how libraries are using Web 2.0 tools that I've read about include:

-a public information blog for library news, events & discussion of community needs
-a story-time Podcast for younger patrons
-using Flickr to photoshare library events
-creating a Wiki-style town history where residents can browse a list of historic homes and adding their memories to the public record with a simple Web form
-wikis for genealogists
-wikis for local information
-wikis to pool library information and standards
-blogs for internal library communication--library managers blog, reference blog, branch blog, circulation blog, library teams blog, IT communications with library staff blog, etc.
-An internal library PC and server inventory wiki.
-Voice and Video over IP for digital meetings when travel is difficult
-pushing content via RSS
-content creation resouces for patrons to record podcasts and develop digital videos
-interlibrary loan (ILL) purchase-on-demand from online used-book retailers
-open source wiki software to create a successful subject guide that facilitates customer feedback
-personalization of library web pages
-allowing customers to call impromptu book talks or discussion groups
-offering collaborative online MS Office alternative resources such as Writely and Writeboard, 37 Signals products - Basecamp, Backpack, and Ta-da Lists and Microsoft Office Live
-instant messaging reference services
-downloadable music, video, and audiobook services
-an iPod Shuffle loan program
-podcast of a teen band competition at the library
-podcasts for library classes and grand tours of the library

If we use Web 2.0 technology between library staff first and get comfortable with it then we can use it with our patrons and market the library.

You might say, "Wow, Library 2.0 is is all that and a bag of chips but what about the future?"

I really enjoyed Dr. Wendy Schultz's article To a temporary place in time... the best out of the 5 perspectives in the OCLC Next Space Newsletter article Web 2.0 : Where will the next generation Web take libraries?. I think about what the the Joker said in Batman.."Think about the future, the future, the future..." It will transform and change us but also give us our special place where we can be in that fantasy zen zone for the mind--that place of wonder and exploration as a child--that we are all desperately trying to get back to when the world turned serious and growing up meant putting toys aside. I kind of equate it with moving from childrens resources with pictures and whizbang features like popups gizmos and textures to adult resources with boring text only. Yes it looks serious and authoritative. But who wants to read that? I'd much rather take the Japanese manga approch and have textbooks and manuals in picture format. They claim that learning is so much better. You absorb much more and the information is interesting. And that is really what we want. Information retrieval that is easy, pleasing to the eye, and facinating but with authority and expertise and a librarian guide to lead us to what we want with options--but not too many or we get information overload.

This librarian guide can be seen in person or online in 3D as an avatar in a virtual representation of the library. Each librarian has their subject specialties. When in a branch there is always one librarian that is the "go to" source for a particular topic be it scrapbooking or starting a business or travel tips. Patrons will collect trading cards on their favorite librarians and pass them on to other users. (Psst-Dude..check out this librarian...she pwns. Check her out if you need info on anything!)

But don't stop there! Create the library environment you have always wanted and integrate it with the virtual world. The virtual reality game Second Life has been host to many dual events online and live on location. Check out Jonathan Fildes article : BBC starts to rock online world. I can see the same thing happening in libraries. Library programming can be sent to the online game and show up on a video monitor for all avatars ingame to see. This would also be vice versa. If an event is going on in Second Life, all inside the library could see what is going on. Like satellite broadcasts of an event that has sold out in a stadium. Now those on the outside can see the show after all. No need to fight scalpers for tickets! Hmm..how about the Novello festival in Second Life?

And finally, make the library where you want to be in real life. Take a look at the OCLC Newsletter article Staying in the game! : How to create environments for Boomers and Gamers in your library especially the section Zone in on your users. People play virtual reality games to be in that fantasy zone where they want to live, create, and express themselves. Make it so in the library too. I want a library that partners with private vendors to offer a Starbucks Coffee/ Tea House type environment that everyone wants to be in. I want a community space thats buzzing with programming hipness and sound proof areas for quiet study to reach that "zen" state of lifelong learning. I want good natural lighting, plenty of windows, and comforable chairs. Take that zen feeling and make an enclosed Japanese style tea garden or an outdoor cafe. Have access to porches that open onto an arboretum with picnic benches and electrical outlets on the outside. I want all of that plus an information hub that is second to none. If I want to learn how to paint I can find it--online or with a guidebook and have access to digital tools to create on the spot. If I want to understand how DNA makes the world go round I should be able to find it at home, at work, or wherever I am. If the library doesn't have a book I want, I would like to walk over to a bookmaker machine, type in the ISBN and the machine prints it in 15 minutes--cataloged and ready to check out. Libraries can become the new star attraction that will put a city on the map. Make it something that every visitor will put on their "must see and do" list. Golden Gate Bridge, check, Broadway musical, check, Seattle Public Library, check, Salt Lake City Public Library, check...

So when are we going to have video games for checkout like Blockbuster? Patience young Padawan.

#14 Technorati : Tagging = Blog Marketing & Better Search Results

2006-09-13T15:24:00.000-05:00

I searched Technorati using the keyword "Learning 2.0" and got very different results when I used the limiters of posts, tags, and Blog Directory. Also if you put the phrase in quotes you seem to get more accurate results.

I got 27,452 results from Learning 2.0 (no quotes) in blog posts.
I got 1,282 results using "Learning 2.0" in blog posts.
I got 51 posts tagged Learning 2.0 (no quotes) in tags.
I got 59 posts tagged "Learning 2.0" in tags.
I got 10 blogs about Learning 2.0 (no quotes) sorted by authority in blog directory.
I got 10 blogs about "Learning 2.0" sorted by authority in blog directory.

I'm assuming that "authority" means that someone tagged their blog with Learning 2.0. The tags list seemed to bring up the most matches for the Learning 2.0 project. I enjoyed the Advanced Search screen because it described what was being searched much better.

It was no surprise to me that the most popular blogs were on the topics of technology and news and top videos were hosted on YouTube. I was surprised to see Gregory Maguire's Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West and Carol Rose's Giants, Monsters, and Dragons: An Encyclopedia of Folklore, Legend, and Myth in the Popular Books listing. I know that Wicked inspired a Broadway musical. It's nice to see that fantasy and folklore are so popular.

I don't have to worry about adding HTML code to my blog posts because since Blogger Beta incorporates labels (called categories in other blogging software) and publishes to a RSS/Atom feed Technorati will automatically read them as my tags for my blog in Technorati. Sweet! So I went back and added labels to all of my posts and created a section in my sidebar for my label categories. All of my blog posts have the label PLCMCL2. I have both "Learning 2.0" and "PLCMCL2" in my watchlist. I "claimed" my blog in an earlier post on RSS Feed Search Tools.

Technorati Tag: PLCMCL2

Flickr

2006-09-13T11:23:00.001-05:00

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

Flickr Support for Blogger Beta

2006-09-13T09:37:00.000-05:00

Hurray Flickr now supports Blogger Beta! Check out the article Flickr Support for Blogger in Beta in the Blogger Buzz blog. Now I can post pictures directly from Flickr to my blog!

Now if I could just get the Rollyo Searchbox to work. Hmmm. I guess I'll just have to wait for those improvements. Sigh.

#13 Del.icio.us : Social Bookmarking with Tags

2006-09-12T15:10:00.000-05:00

I have created a Del.icio.us account for the Questing Librarian from my home computer using the Firefox web browser. I have also added PLCMCL2 to my network. Now I can add all those nifty bookmarks that have been piling up and check PLCMCL2's bookmarks too while logged in. I went a step further than just adding a Network Badge. I added a Link Roll which also shows the latest bookmarks I've added to Del.icio.us.

After looking at Del.icio.us I could see the potential for uses by a group. A tagged bookmark list would allow, for instance, staff at a library branch to collectively create a list tagged by topic for easy reference assistance. I used to do a web browser bookmark list for our branch and when we upgraded our computers I was no longer able to update it due to access restrictions. I can think of two ways this could be done with Del.icio.us: 1-If staff all used the same tag for topics then we could pull up the list by tag for homework and reference support or 2-staff could just use a collective account and add bookmarks that way.

I also immediately thought of instructors creating a bookmark list of required reading for a class. Individuals that had accounts could collectively use specific tags for a special interest such as "gaming in libraries" and then everyone in that special interest group that added articles on the topic could collectively see all the articles that used the same tag.

I also noticed when I looked at the PLCMCL2 Del.icio.us list, it seemed that in order to comment you have to have a Del.icio.us account. Over all it looks like a personal web based bookmark list like Yahoo! Bookmarks with the added feature of social searching and linking by tags and users.

#12 Rollyo - Rolling a Customized Search Tool

2006-09-08T21:08:00.000-05:00

I created an account with Rollyo and rolled two custom searches. VideoGamesInStock will look for video games in all major gaming retailers. I created it to look for new releases. I also rolled a second search called GameBooksInStock. This was designed to check all major retailers and publishers of video game tip books.

I tried to add the Rollyo Searchbox to my sidebar but it never loaded properly. The searchbox would show but all of my search engine selections were listed below the drop box as text. You could not select one to do a search. Very strange. You could do a search using what ever was the first search engine you selected in the list and that was it. I'm not sure how to fix the code to make it work right. Hopefully it will be corrected in an update to either Blogger Beta or Rollyo and I can attempt to add it to my blog at a later point.

I also took a look at fellow L2.0 blogger MarkS and his JazzRecordings custom search. Cool Daddy-O! I would post a comment on his blog but since he does not have a beta account and I do I can't post to his blog yet. Blogger beta says that will be available in a later patch. Oh well. Rock on Mark!

I could also see using this for local resource searches very easily.

#11 LibraryThing - Sharing a Personal Book List

2006-09-08T16:22:00.000-05:00

I have added 15 books to my LibraryThing catalog and added a LibraryThing book widget and search tool in my sidebar. The site is very easy to use. I like that there is no extra long account signup process. I could see book clubs using this to share their selections. It is an excellent tool for anyone to keep up with what they are reading. It's so easy to forget that over time one can read many titles and then forget what you've read.

One thing about adding the search tool. I had to keep editing it to fit inside my sidebar. Once it fit though it was good to go. Overall a fun experience.

#10 Librarian Action Hero, Movie Poster & Other Image Generators

2006-09-07T12:36:00.000-05:00

This says "Questing Librarian, forever." Created using an Egyptian Name Generator called Hieroglyphs.net

I created my Questing Librarian Action Hero using a fantasy character generator called HeroMachine.
To get a copy of your creation you must make a screenshot using the Ctrl + PrintScreen keys and paste it into some sort of image editing software such as MS Paint. Then you'll have to crop the picture to get just the image of the hero. Save that image and you're ready to do things with it. Remember to copy and paste the code for your character in some sort of word processor such as Notepad. That way if you want to go back and edit your character in HeroMachine you can just copy and paste the code back into HeroMachine and resume updating your work. I added the speech bubble using a speech bubble generator called Make Your Own Speech Bubble!

I created the movie poster using the Movie Poster Generator from fd's Flickr Toys. It took me a while but I realized that I could not use the title line because it went right over my characters face. So I ended up using one of the taglines for the title line.

There were several other generators that I enjoyed that I just have to share:

I found out that The Questing Librarian's name in elvish from Middle Earth is Andúnë of Dorthonion using the Elvish Name Generator.

QL's fairy name is Fen Saturntree I also found out that:

She is a trouble maker.

She lives in reed marshes and lonely fenland.

She is only seen when the first leaves fall from the trees.

She wears pale pink marshmallow flowers. She has delicate pale pink wings like a cicada.

Find our your fairy name using the Original Fairy Name Generator.

And last but not least I could not pass up using the Jedi Training Generator for a little night school class. Choose where you would like your training to take place and be sure to "Yodify" to get a great response.

May the force be with you!

Happy Blog Day : 5 L2.0 Participant Blogs I'm Reading

2006-09-04T00:15:00.000-05:00

Oooo--This is so hard to deceide which 5 participant blogs I'm reading for Blogday 2006. There are so many that I enjoy. I'll just mention 5 that I have read recently.

I'm reading Library at Lunch and Star Wars Girl because I enjoy the Star Wars references. I'm playing Star Wars : Galaxies at the moment.

The other 3 have things on their blogs that I have on my "to do" list to accomplish. (Plus they just have very nice blogs ;) I want to go to Meez.com and create a moving avatar like in Ian's Other Journal. I would like to follow the example that Salad Days mentioned in their post and create expandable posts in my blog so that each entry doesn't take up too much real estate on the front page. Also, I want to take a deeper look at the website Mediasnackers.com that was mentioned on the Youth Tech blog. So many teens think that even email is only for grown ups or business and is so "old school" already.

#9 RSS Feed Search Tools & "Claiming" My Blog

2006-09-03T13:03:00.000-05:00

I found the Bloglines Search Tool to be the most useful when I am looking for information from feeds I already subscribe to. For example I can put in the search term "blogroll" and see how many folks have commented on the topic. Speaking of blogrolls, I went ahead and added one for the Questing Librarian in the side bar. Sorry it's so long! Everything is so interesting and I don't want to miss out.

For the other search tools I tried the keyword phrases: "learning 2.0", "library 2.0", "web 2.0", and "second life". Feedster has a Google type interface and seemed straightforward to use. It seemed best for specific searches instead of general browsing. Be sure to use Feedster's proper syntax (such as putting quotes around a phrase) and sort in the order you want for the kind of hits you are looking for (date or relavance).

Topix.net is more browser centric, similar to Yahoo. Having the large topic categories at the top of the screen was useful to get an idea of what the site offered. It reminded me of what Google News and Yahoo! News offer but with the ability for readers to comment on articles. I really liked the news channel guide to help me see what was available. There is literally a category for everything under the sun. I still can't believe that there is a category for foie-gras, luther burgers, and turduckens (that's a turkey-duck-chicken put together in a roll for slicing). I guess folks want news for just about anything.

I found Syndic8.com the most confusing. I really started to feel information overload looking at this one. At first it seemed to be targeted more to webmasters that to the normal joe surfer. I had to go to feed categories to start making sense of it. Even then I really had to dig through the categories to find anything useful. Category wise it seemed focused on the investor or business or sports. When I did find the library feeds they were mostly focused on technical services.

I have "claimed" my blog on Technorati.com. It was a very simple process. Now I have a blog search tool that I've added to the Questing Librarian so that readers can search by key word for what ever topic they are interested in on the blog. I can also see who has linked to my blog. Very neat! This seems to carry some of the best features of both a search tool and a browsing directory. The layout was very easy to follow. The popular blog listing made it easy to see what was useful to alot of people. The search box at the top of the home page let you search by keyword if that was simpler for you.

I also tried Google Blogsearch. It was very much like Feedster.com except that it had Google's advanced search features and preferences options. You can sort by relevance or date and also quickly link to just those blogs that have posted for the last hour, 12 hours, day, week, or longer period of time.

Overall I'd use Technorati or Topix to search for feeds if I just want to browse to see what's out there. If I had something specific I was looking for then I'd probably use any of them except Syndic8.com. It was by far the most confusing resourse. I'd only use it if the others didn't yield any results.

#8 RSS Feeds & Newsreaders - Bloglines vs. My Yahoo!

2006-08-31T13:43:00.000-05:00

Ok-I must admit I spent wayyyy to much time exploring Bloglines and adding many blogs to my account. You give an obsessive compulsive organizer an organizing tool and it's so hard to stop! Just one...more...blog!

I have put together a public Bloglines account for the Questing Librarian. I made some of my blog subscriptions private to test if they would show up in the public account. What is nice is that you can select an entire folder to be marked private. Newsreaders give me a chance to look at a large number of resources on one page without having to go to every site. What a time saver! Now I can cancel all those newsletters I get in my email and I check them in the blog. Hurray!

I've had a My Yahoo! account for about a year now. Both Bloglines and My Yahoo! have features that are useful. But I think that My Yahoo! is more useful if you don't have as many blogs to keep up with. It has some very nice content layout customizations.

Sharing blogrolls is something that is a unique feature of Bloglines. Since My Yahoo! also includes personal content (such as links to your email) I think that is why they don't offer this feature.

The nice thing about newsreaders for libraries is that they can keep up with what their peers are doing to get new ideas. Having a fresh injection of creativity from others is so helpful for many things that libraries do.

I'll try not to get so lost in my explorations next time. Newsreaders rule!

#7 3-D Online Reference - 2nd Life, Google Earth & Other Musings

2006-08-27T20:59:00.000-05:00

With all of this online communcation technology it will only be a matter of time before we start seeing 3-D library reference. 2-D reference like NCKnows/Questionpoint seems like online reference on steriods to librarians now, but 3-D reference will include an avatar for both librarian and patron. More and more businesses are creating a 3-D representation of themselves on the web. One of the most dynamic examples of that is in the online game Second Life. A virtual world that is completely created by the players themselves. The game developers just supply the servers and moderate the game. Everything else is done by the players. It costs nothing to download the software for the game onto your computer and create an account with your avatar. But if you want to buy land and put a building on it you will need to upgrade to a premium account which costs $9.95 a month.

Who is creating a virtual representation of themselves in Second Life? Some examples are: CBS News, Wells Fargo, and even Harvard Law School.

The article "Your Second Life is Ready" from the September 2006 issue of Popular Science says it best, "...if I was online banking in SL, I wouldn't have to browse through several static screens of text. I could just walk into a virtual bank, stroll up to a teller, and deposit real-life money the newfangled, old-fashioned way: by talking to a person." (Newitz, p. 76) Other examples of 3-D use include: touring a college campus before you visit in person or visiting virtually your vacation destination to get the best hotel in relation to what you want to do. Clothing stores are setting up shops where you can put your actual measurements on an avatar and try on clothes before you buy.

I know that other services will probably be next. Enter what OPAL and the Alliance Library System are doing with the Second Life Library 2.0 These folks are going where the patrons are. In April 2006 they put out a call for librarians interested in participating in a project to set up a library presence in Second Life. In less than a month, more than two dozen librarians from around the world were meeting at a brand new virtual library to staff the reference desk and discuss collection development, online programming, and library services. The response has only grown, and Second Life citizens are taking advantage of all the library has offer. Our very own Kelly C from ImaginOn is heading up the Virtual Teen Library : Second Life. Go Kelly! The nice thing about Second Life is that it will allow librarians to iron out the kinks of offering this sort of service and troubleshoot problems in a controlled environment.

Not to be outdone, enter Google Earth. This is a 3-D representation of planet Earth taken from satellite photos. Google also released recently a popular 3-D modeling program called SketchUp. Google developers are encouraging folks to use SketchUp to create 3-D layers on top of Google Earth.

In the article, Future Boy: Google moves into virtual worlds Chris Taylor from CNN/Money.com says, "The result could be that we'll soon populate a virtual version of planet Earth instead of the made-from-scratch metaverses like online games or Second Life. The main element Google Earth is missing today is avatars, but at least one observer believes those to be added soon."

A virtual earth..hmmm....something to ponder. Online reference in your PJ's?

Poll - Internet Librarian Conference Oct. 23-25, 2006

2006-08-27T19:52:00.000-05:00

Ok, I guess it's my turn to do a little sample poll. As for myself I will not be able to go to this conference but am eager to see the results that come out of it. The website is www.infotoday.com/il2006 They will also have an IL Conference wiki, and a Conference Blog with "tags" of IL2006 and I@SW2006.

#6 Flickr 3rd Party Tools, Mashups, & Other Photo Sharing Sites

2006-08-25T08:54:00.000-05:00

Welcome to the library! Come inside. There are many resources to discover in your branch.

... See my Tabblo>

I must admit that like Helene I like fd's Flickr Toys selection of third party apps. They seem the most practical to use. The others just seem like a novelty to me. Of course I'm sure that someone will put them to good use and I will be amazed.

It was hard for me to choose just one that was my favorite. I'd have to say the Trading Card Maker and the Captioner are my favorite Flickr tools so far. I wanted to have my very own Harry Potter / Yu-Gi-Oh trading card with a comic book speech balloon but alas my Yahoo! Avatar photo is too small. The speech balloon covered the whole picture! I tried enlarging it but MS Paint could not enlarge the picture without distorting it. Oh well.

Other photo sharing sites that I enjoyed off of other participant blogs are Slide.com from Chris' blog, Photography, ImaginOn, Learning 2.0, and Other Nonsense, Tabblo from Russ' blog, R U Learning, and Bubbleshare featured on Chris Bates' blog, The Relevant Library.

Librarian Trading Card

2006-08-24T14:08:00.000-05:00

I created a Librarian Trading Card using fd's Flickr Toys - Trading Card Maker. My decription was inspired by Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoons. Beep! Beep!

Tagged my Librarian Trading Card for the Flickr librariantradingcard and librariantradingcards clusters. Be sure to consider plurals when adding tags to your photos.

#5 Playing with Flickr - Photo Gallery

2006-08-22T15:16:00.000-05:00

Just made some photos using our branch's digital camera. (Thanks to our KidsBookDiva for showing me how to use a digital camera since I do not own one.) I've created a Flickr Account for the Questing Librarian and uploaded the shots. You can quickly create a Flickr web address alias. Here's how. I also joined the Librararies and Librarians group. It's amazing how many libraries are already using Flickr.

I created an HTML badge for it and added it to the sidebar of this blog. I tried to create a Flash Badge but it didn't want to load. I don't know if that is a problem with Blogger Beta or not so I resorted to the HTML badge.

I also tried to post a photo from PLCMC's "Game Zone" with commentary from Flickr and it said that it was sent to my blog but it has never showed up. I don't know if there is a delay because of network traffic or because of Blogger Beta again. I'll try to send a photo again from Flickr at a later point.

Blogger Beta Account

2006-08-15T15:29:00.000-05:00

Woohoo!
I was able to get a new Beta Blogger Account. I just made the transition.

There was an information box on my dashboard when I logged in underneath my profile. It didn't say anything about being preselected. I just clicked on the link for the information and then Blogger walked me through transfering my account to Beta.

***Note you must make a Google Account before you can begin the transfer process. This does NOT give you a GMail account only a Google Account. It saved a copy of my original template. Then I had to add back all the original code that I had added to my sidebar but it retained all of my posts and all of the links I made. You can also keep or change your template style at that time.

You'll have fun moving parts of your layout by dragging and dropping with a mouse. The layout and the selections are much more intuitive. There is alot more ways to customize your blog. You can add all sorts of categories to any part of your blog including: lists, list links, pictures, text, HTML/JavaScript, Feeds, Labels, and Blog Logos. I'll be spending quite some time just checking out what's available.

The New Page Element is very handy for adding new things to your blog. Just select what you want to add, put in your stuff, and click save. Then the new "thing" becomes a moveable block that you can drag and drop around on your layout.

I hope that others will be able to convert soon. The extra features are very useful.

Created Site Feed for Questing Librarian

2006-08-14T10:31:00.000-05:00

RSS Site Feed

I created a "RSS Site Feed" for the Questing Librarian. You should see the site feed "Chicklet" right under my avatar in the sidebar.

Blogger's site feed help files are extremely useful in walking you through in setting up your site feed. I then added my own feed to my other RSS feed listings in My Yahoo!. My Yahoo! lets me organize the layout of my feeds for easier scanning and reading.

I have yet to play around with the Bloglines Newsreader. I'll compare them in another post.

Yahoo! Avatar Badge

2006-08-10T22:28:00.000-05:00

Yahoo! Avatars

I've had a couple of folks ask if the Yahoo! Avatar could be made into a badge. Yahoo! does give the html code to export the avatar to a blog or web page. It updates everytime you make changes to your avatar. Just log into Yahoo! Avatars and click on "Export Your Avatar" and follow the wizard. Then copy and paste the code into your blog.

#2 Thoughts About Lifelong Learning

2006-08-07T23:15:00.000-05:00

Photo of Auguste Rodin's "The Thinker" taken from Artcyclopedia

After going through the tutorial and going through my notes, I immediately noted that the hardest habit for me is the first one. Setting goals. My problem is that I want to do everything! Technolust is always lurking somewhere in my psyche. Ooo! New gadgets! Wow--look at that! I find my self exploring paths but not having any goal for the end. My obstacles are 1. focusing on getting work done first and 2. making time to do one thing at a time and just focus on it and finish it before moving on to the next item.

Naturally the easiest habit for me would be the last one--play. I like to explore everything! So I guess my goals are to:
1. Complete the "23 things" by October 6th
2. Complete the rest of Stephan Abram's "43 things" at some point--hopefully before the end of the year.
3. Post my discoveries in my blog.

Lastly I have always tried to realize that just because I have learned something today doesn't mean that it won't change too. That is life's only constant. There's always 3.0. I guess life long learning is here to stay.

Also, I appreciate that Helene Blowers has taken the time to keep a finger on the pulse of what's new in the library technology world. For those of us frontline staff that's a welcome time saver. Library Techbytes rocks!

Flickr Badge

2006-08-06T20:43:00.000-05:00

Way cool stuff! Check out how to make a Flickr badge and add to your blog! Click on the design your badge link and follow along with the wizard. Then you can copy and paste your badge code into your blog template and "Presto!" you have a Flickr badge.
Enjoy!

Summer Reading Avatar

2006-08-05T23:14:00.000-05:00

Summer Reading Avatar
Originally uploaded by QuestingLibrarian.

Testing blogging photos from flickr to my blog, The Questing Librarian.