Thing 23 - Reflection

This was a great learning opportunity. While I was using some of the tools that were covered in the 23 Things many others were a new experience. I set up a Facebook account and was contacted by someone I hadn't spoken to in over 25 years which was quite a surprise. Hopefully, I can get more librarians in my library to work through a activity like this so that when a patron talks about Delicious they know that they are not talking about an apple.

Thing 22 - Developing your own 23 things

Staying aware of changing technology is not just a one time activity, but part of daily self-directed education. Just 10 years ago everyone thought that AOL was really great. How many people would say that today? In fact I just read and article on job searching and one comment in the article was that if your email was with AOL they viewed you as being out of touch with current technology. I am currently trying to get a 23 Things program started for the librarians. Unfortunately those that would most benefit are the most reluctant to embrace the opportunity.

Podcasts

I think that the time for podcasts has past. Video cameras are so cheap now (Flip Video cameras for under $100.00) and it is so easy to post videos that listening to people from a static screen seems very old tech. As I was exploring I also found numerous libraries with dead links to the podcasts. Many of the locations that I went too do not appear to be posting new podcasts.

You Tube

There are lots of great videos on YouTube. I actually came across a video about my library from 2007 featuring the prior manager, prior children's librarian, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JXPqNwSAc0



For a fun library video enter library, zombie, and allen county. The book at the end should be on the shelf in every library.

Google Docs

This is a very fun video from and article by Michael Stevens and his All Together Now 12 things activity. It is great to use in explaining how Google Docs can be useful.

Google Docs in Plain English

http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/blog/290000629.html

I have been using Google Docs for sometime and I find it very useful. I don't need to remember to drag along the flash drive so I can access a document. Okay the flash drive isn't very heavy, so it is not really a drag, but you do still need to remember to bring it along.

Wikis

I looked up Ning and LibraryThing in Wikipedia. The information was somewhat sketchy. I found that the founder of LibraryThing contributed to the discussion with suggestions for changes to the page for LibraryThing. The discussion page for Ning has a whole lot of people that in my opinon need to get a life, very long entries that go on and on.

Wikis for libraries are cool. We have used them for collaboration for something. We have just moved our library system rolodex of useful addresses and phone numbers to a wiki so that everyone can add new listing.

LibWorm

I was somewhat disappointed that the only result for my library system was from
2006. This for a library system with 5 libraries in a large city. The relevance of the some of the other search results was disappointing also. For example, I was looking for information or listing of programs for adults on social networking and the 27 results were very limited for the number of libraries that are out there.