Reflections...

I really enjoyed the general idea of the web 2.o training. I think my favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey have been delicious, myspace, flickr, blogging, and the music networks. Although I knew about many of the topics I haven't had the opportunity to try them out until now.

I think that it would have been nice to have a little more flexibility with the schedule. Some weeks it was very easy to fit in time to complete the tasks, others not so easy. While it was nice that it was okay to catch up on a week the next week, occasionally it would have been nice to have been able to go more at my own speed and go quicker when able to.

I think the biggest challenge was just finding/making the time to complete the lessons. While I understand that SIL was approving us for the time to work on this, many of us still had to complete the same duties as normal alongside with these additional duties, which proves to be difficult.

If given the opportunity to participate in another discovery program like this in the future, I would choose to participate. I think that this is a good idea, as we are seeing more and more of our patrons coming into the library with questions re: things that we are unfamiliar with. Even if we don't use these things ourselves.

Gaming

I have played and watched a lot of online games with my children, so I did not find it complicated at all. I did try out several of the games, however, I have not found any that I am really interested in playing. I am not much of an online game player, I would prefer to stick with good ole' board games.

Google Earth

Write a post to your blog and talk about your Google Earth experience? Did you find what you were looking for? What surprised you about the program?

I have used Google Earth, in fact my son had to learn/use it in school. Yes, I was able to quickly and easily "fly" to my destination. Since I have used Google Earth in the past, I am not really surprised about the program.

Avatars & Second Life

Do you already live in Second Life?
If you don’t already live in SL, would you like to live in Second Life?
Why or why not?

No, I do not already live in Second Life, and I have no desires to at this point of my life. I am a very busy person and do not have enough time in my "first" life, much less second life.

By the way, my avatar really doesn't look me, looks pretty ridiculous, in fact, but I couldn't really see spending any more time on this one.

Google Docs and Zoho

I am amazed that I have not heard of Google Docs or Zoho prior to our 2.0 training. It just goes to show you that are are so many more tools that are available out there. I don't know that I will use either on a regular basis at this time, although it is good to know that these are available. I do like the idea of being able to collaborate with others and be able to make changes to one document rather than having multiple documents floating around.

Search Engines

Today I practiced searching using Rollyo, Mamma, and Dogpile. I suppose I like the format of Mamma the best, it just seemed to be the easiest (cleanest format) to look at. For the most part, the searches that I performed on all 3 came up with similar results, so I was not surprised with the results.

Podcasting

Which library podcasts did you listen to?
Do you see podcasting as a useful tool for Sno-Isle Libraries?
Any ideas about which topics our patrons might be interested in hearing?
Do you have any experience with listening to, or creating podcasts?

I listened to Infoblog (Book Expo America) and Uncontrolled Vocabulary (Doing the Wikipedia thing already), although I admit it was difficult for me to get into them and didn't listen to the full podcasts. I felt that I was spending too much time searching for a podcast that I was interested in, and finally settled on these 2. I see that more and more libraries are using podcasts to get information to their users, and I do believe that this could be a useful tool for SIL. I am not sure which topics our patrons would be interested in hearing, and other than this training I do not have any experience with listening to or creating podcasts.

Online Image Generators

Today I played around with the online image generators. I think that this could be a lot of fun once I start to get my online photos organized and can take some time to play around with this some more.

OverDrive Downloads

I have used OverDrive in the past. When my son first got his MP3 player we were excited to see what SIL had to offer. He found a few books he wanted to download however we hoped that the music selections would be better. He did end up downloading several audio books and a few classical songs. Then we also checked out movies to watch on our computer. We enjoyed the IMAX movies.

I thought the selection of titles was okay. I did really like the "staff suggestions", "what's new", and "always available" links. Some of my favorite authors were available, but not all. I did come across an interesting title..."Work Less, Make More". Lol.

del.icio.us/

Today I explored http://del.icio.us/ and compared the results to google. I felt that google results were very "commercial" and I appreciated that the del.icio.us results could be helpful when you want to see what has worked for others. Also, it seems like google has a lot of the same ads that show up over and over again. I was searching for "cheap air fare". Google brought up more travel agencies, etc., where in del.icio.us showed me more websites where I can compare different discount airfare sites (hotwire, expedia, travelocity, priceline, etc.). I also liked that in del.icio.us it tells me how many people have added that link as a favorite and lists them in order by number of users. However, I found that farecast.com was listed as first with 10658 users adding to their favorite list and then was listed again further down the list with 2141 users adding it. I like in google that you can choose to search for web, video, news, or images and I also like that you can see pictures in your search. I still prefer google or other search engines, but will add this to my list of possibilities. Especially for times when I care about what others are interested in or when they can help save me the time of completing lengthy searches on my own.

Wikis

Today I learned about Wikis. I am trying to think of ways this could be used in our jobs in the library, and I admit it is difficult to try to think about another "thing" to do, as busy as we are. I suppose a wiki might be a good idea for a group of people who meet regularly to use. They could post and discuss agendas, discussions from the past meetings, brainstorms, etc.

You Tube, Hulu, and Fancast...

I really enjoy You Tube because there is so much variety. I can search for almost anything and find something. My favorite is the laughing baby-type in Hahahahaha! at You Tube and listen, it is hilarious. Makes me laugh every time. I tried to embed it to here, however, I don't seem to be able to embed just one video, 3 others with the similar subject appear. My other favorite is the classic Sesame Street, No Cookies in the Library.

While I have used You Tube in the past, I have just now found Hulu and Fancast. I think these are both great and am looking forward to exploring these 2 sights a little more with my kids. Fun times.

facebook

Today our "thing" to learn about is social networks. I set up my facebook account. I think that this is a great website if you have time to just sit and chat or network, but I really don't. I do feel a little nervous having my name and info. available for all to see and find...

Just Hanging Around

Just Hanging Around
Originally uploaded by lpembertonlibrary

Monkeys!

Flickr

I am excited to learn about Flickr because I have so many photos to organize!

Music Networks and Streaming Music

I really enjoyed learning about music networks and streaming networks. I set up my account at finetune.com. This is a great place to search and play music! I like that when you search they offer other similar suggestions.

RSS Feeds

I was on vacation during the week of RSS Feed learning, so I am working on catching up now. I am not sure that RSS Feeds is for me on a regular basis. There really are not too many topics that I specifically want to have fed to me regularly, and I feel that by adding things that I am only "somewhat" interested in is only going to add more work to an already jam packed day. Although, I do admit I like the idea of adding one for a favorite band, to see when concerts are scheduled and when tickets go on sale. That might be a good idea for me in my personal life.

Instant Messaging

Today we practiced with Instant Messaging in the library. I have used Yahoo IM before and am amazed at how basic and plain the Google IM is. My experience using an IM is that it is a great idea, and can be very fun. However, I find it difficult to find time to sit and IM when one of my contacts happens to be online at the same time. Also, IM-ing can be much more time consuming than just sending an email. I tend to find emailing more convenient for what I need. Also, as a side note, I recently read an article from someone re: IM-ing and that they prefer the IM to email because there is no log of what was discussed. I find this a scary statement, as you must always be careful and sensitive to privacy when on the computer, regardless.

MS Office Training

Today I attended MS Office training, as we are moving to Office 2007. It will take a little getting used to, of course, but I think that the changes will be beneficial. The fun part will be training 22 Library Pages individually (thankfully I will have assistance and won't have to do all of the training myself!).

Okay, so I have managed to put a picture on my blog and am looking forward to seeing what else I can learn. I saw someone else's post about making a "meez" character (www.meez.com). That looks kind of fun, however, it feels funny doing this all from work. I will see how things go, perhaps in the future you will be able to see meez on my blog!

My blogging journey begins

Here I am, the beginning of my blog journey. I am excited about technology in the future and can't wait to see where this takes me...