Web 2.0 Award Winners

I had a great time with this assignment. I looked at almost everything on that chart. I checked out Google Docs. The video "Google Docs in Plain English" was helpful. There should be one of those for every tool in Web 2.0! Commmoncraft videos are the best. I think Google Docs is easier to use than Zoho Writer, but I didn't see that you could post what you write to a blog. In that way, Zoho Writer is better to use. I took the tour of Lulu which is basically for self-publishing and digital publishing. You can publish photo albums... like of your wedding or other special event. It would be handy for someone who does genealogical research to make "books" for members of a family. Lulu will also sell what you publish on their site and you can make 80% of the profits from what sells. They also have a blog site and a newsletter. Perhaps libraries celebrating a 50th anniversary could publish a book that could be sold to raise funds for the Friends organization.

I checked out all of the food related winners and enjoyed a video of how to make grilled clams and mussels. I am just so impressed with the videos I am seeing on these sites! You could spend all day watching videos.

On Biblio, I searched for an old Uncle Wiggly book that I had read as a child. There were lots of hits. If you are looking for an old book, this is the place to go. I can see why it is a winner.

Zoho Writer

I composed my last blog entry on Zoho Writer. I really prefer using Microsoft Word, but Zoho Writer works OK in a pinch. I like it that you can access it from any computer. My home computer came without Microsoft products on it, so Zoho Writer is an tool I can use. I checked out Google Docs, though, as part of the next exercise and found that it is a little more user friendly. I didn't see that you could upload your doc to your blog, though, and you can do that with Zoho Writer, which is what I did! I will play around with Zoho Writer some more. I have found that the more you use these Web 2.0 tools, the more you find you can do and the better you get doing it! It's like learning to play a musical instrument, I guess.

Using Zoho Writer

 

This was created on Zoho Writer.  I prefer Word but, in a pinch, could use this to create a document.  

PBCLSWiki

I had added my blog to the favorite blogs page and was trying to add a link to my favorite restaurant on the favorite restaurants list(without much success) when I heard this loud buzz start. I thought to myself, OMG! I broke the Wiki!! Then, I realized that it was the fire alarm. While standing out in front of the library waiting for the fire trucks to come, I mentioned to my co-horts that I was having difficulty figuring out how to link the name of my favorite restaurant to its corresponding website. Several people said, "Oh, I'll show you how." But, I was determined to do this on my own! As soon as we were able to get back into the library again ( false alarm), I got back on my computer. I looked again at my blog link and saw that it was the URL that linked the name of my blog to the blog itself. I just copied the restaurant's URL into the proper space and voila! y'all can now click on my restaurant's name and go to the website. I am so proud of myself that my head just might explode!

Wikis

The Wiki in plain English video was great. It explained what a wiki is in a way anyone could understand. I looked at the ALA Wiki and if I were lucky enough to attend ALA 2008, it would be indispensible to the planning of my trip. I particularly liked the Dine-Around Program part where people could sign up to go to various restaurants, assuring an attendee of dinner companionship. There is something called "Twitter" that I keep seeing in my travels around while I've been doing my 23things. From what I gather it is something that you do with your cell phone. I am going to check that out after I complete this assignment.
I think that a Youth Services Program Wiki would be an idea that could work for youth services staff. It could be so helpful when planning programs. Our youth services staff is constantly looking for new and creative ideas that work. I would love to get something like that started because we all have had very successful programs that we want to talk about. A wiki is a fine forum for sharing.

Web 2.0

I am excited about what I'm learning of Web 2.0. The other day I noticed that Amazon.com now has a tag key. Some of the other sites I have visited do too. Everyone is updating and so should we as librarians. I just read an article by Michael Garrett Farrelly in my new issue of Public Libraries. He says that the crassness of reality television is caused by the dissolution of old media. I think we are seeing the dissolution of old technology, but are blessed with the birth of new. It's our duty as librarians to keep up with the new. We can't hang on to the old, as Anderson says in "Away from the Icebergs," "just in case."
I don't see, as Anderson observes in his own library, a decrease in circulation rates in our library system; however, I do believe that we must keep up with patrons demands for more access to everything.
Back in the early 1960's (uh-oh, nowI'm dating myself!), my grandfather heard that there was going to be something called "cable TV" and you could pay to get better reception on your television set. He was scandalized. That one would have to pay for something that everyone could get free just seemed "un-American" to him. He died before the advent of cable, but had he lived, he would have been dragged kicking and screaming into the era of cable subscription. Poor Grandpa!
How lucky I am to live through all these technological advances and work a in a field where I can put them to work for myself and my patrons!! Web 2.0? Bring it on!

Technorati

While this search engine is not my cup of tea, I can see that if you are into reading blogs every day you might want to use Technorati to catch up on your favorites. I happened to explore Technorati the day George Carlin died and got caught up in reading all the blogs about him and his passing. So, it was easy to see that one could find Technorati useful.
I did an advanced search on the library's website and found some references to our computer classes like Mousing Around. I did a tag search for Web 2.0 and got thousands of hits. I looked at videos and photos, blogs, etc. I checked out a blog by John Blyberg from Ann Arbor Library and several nonlibrarian blogs like Techcrunch and Boingboing. I suddenly realized that I had spent over an hour on Technorati. It was an amusing diversion but I can't see me using this tool unless I had time to kill or nothing else more worthwhile to do. There is an awful lot of what I would consided "junk" on there. You have to narrow your tag to get to the good stuff.
I think that if you follow authoritative librarian blogs, you would be better off getting a feeds on Bloglines.

A Tool I Can Actually Use!

I am so impressed with del.icio.us and what I can do with the account I signed up for. (Yep... I got another account!) I really didn't understand what del.icio.us was all about until I watched the youtube demonstration which was informative and helpful.

I do a monthly program for school-aged kids and am constantly looking for science experiments and projects for this program. I have had lots of sites bookmarked as favorites, but there was no way to tag the pages as to the subjects of the experiments, i.e. gravity, solutions, magnets, etc. With del.icio.us, I can tag the pages and go back to see the projects from any computer, not just my desk computer. This is exactly what I've been needing and it has been there all the time, but until I did this Web 2.0 project, I never knew about it. Wow! I am pleased with this week's assignment. Thanks for including del.icio.us in the 23things!

Webfeat

I searched my hometown (a tiny little rural one) in ALL databases. Big mistake. It sent Webfeat into a long grind and it came to a halt. It did that several times. Maybe it was because we had just had an electrical storm and, I heard later, the phones went out. After several tries, it finally came up with several hundred hits. Webfeat searches deeply and thoroughly! There were several hits from magazines to which children had sent handmade pictures and listed their residence as that little rural town. It was interesting to see how many articles there were that mentioned that little town. When I was growing up there, I didn't think anyone even knew it existed!
I find that you get better and narrower results when you don't search in too many databases at one time. Webfeat is handy for looking in more than one, though.

It's a LibraryThing

I took a look around Library Thing and created an account. (At this point, I think I have created at least 5 various accounts to complete my 23 Things. I have a feeling that I will be creating some more, too.) Into my Library Thing catalog I have put titles of books that I plan to read in the future. Some are just recently published and some will be published in the coming months. As I eventually read these books, I will remove titles. As I hear of new books that are coming up, I will add titles. This list will replace the myriad of paper scraps I have in my desk drawer with book titles written on them. (This list is a step in the direction of organization, I guess.)

Now, going back to the thing about the various accounts.... I know that I am supposed to put a link here to my LibraryThing catalog; however, since I wish to remain as anonymous as possible on this blog, I cannot link to my LibraryThing catalog because I used my actual name as my user name. I tried to change my user name and the function is not working. So, please trust that I have a catalog on LibraryThing and it contains at least 5 titles.

Next, I will address how I feel about all of those accounts I've had to create.........

Puzzling Granddoggie!

My creation
Originally uploaded by wearyone

I had a good time with the puzzlemaker in FD Toys. If you want to try it out, the link is:

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/jigsaw.php

Bloglines is the Best!

I am having such a good time with my Bloglines account. I have seven feeds and can check the weather in several cities of my choice. The best thing about it is that there are no distracting adverts and annoying pop-ups. I think RSS is perfect for the busy librarian. One of my feeds has up-to-the-minute reviews of new children's books. While I read the required journals for selection committee meetings, it is handy to know what another review source thinks of a book. There is one book in particular that we will be discussing at this week's meeting and I will mention that PW thinks pretty highly of it (and I know because I read it on Bloglines!).

granddoggie

granddoggie
Originally uploaded by wearyone

Meet Miyagi My Granddoggie!
This is the first photo I uploaded to my Flikr account. I am proud that I figured this all out by myself!!! Go me!!!