Week 9, Thing 23 - CONCLUSION

This was a great experience, even though it was somewhat frustrating at times. There are things that I will continue to use, particularly the wiki for ILL info. As soon as I finish the 23 Things, I can get back to work on that. I also thought the web word processing applications were interesting and very handy for working on things in a couple of different places. Most of the "Things" presented were new to me and made me tax my brain to figure out how they worked. I guess that's the point of the whole exercise. I had particular trouble trying to redo the Librarything widget on my blog. It was there and then poof - it wasn't. I didn't realize it was gone until checking each blog in preparation to finish the exercise. Then when I tried to recreate it, I couldn't. So there's only the url address there.
The timing could have been better - summer is pretty hectic around here. I think with people taking time off and then being somewhat short-staffed when others take off, we're a little stretched for time.
Because I have the dinosaur dial-up at home, I can't see that much of what I learned will benefit me there, but at least I've had a little introduction to what's available and I really appreciate that. Hopefully at some future date, I may spring for high-speed internet at home.
Thanks for a really fun (although sometimes exasperating) learning experience. I think I'd do it again.

Week 9, Thing 22

I explored Overdrive and now I know what to ask my kids for this year at Christmas! I NEED an MP3 Player so I can download lots of "reading" material. The instructions to Overdrive are very detailed so I think even I can figure it out, once I get either high-speed internet at home or an MP3 Player. Unfortunately, I'm still in the dark ages at home and only have dial-up. I am going to take the time to re-read my phone manual because it's supposed to be an MP3 player and I've never felt the need to figure that part of it out. It sure makes better sense to carry around a small object, rather than trying to lug my cd player into every room of the house when I'm trying to clean.

Week 9, Thing 21

Podcasts. I had a little difficulty here. The only one I could actually hear on my computer without downloading something extra was Yahoo podcasts. I located an interesting one called NPR story of the day, which I tried to add to my RSS feed, but I had some trouble doing that also. I actually subscribed to it first in my Yahoo account, but finally remembered to click that little icon and successfully added it to my bloglines account. Thanks for the tutorial and for making me think my way through these things!

Week 9, Thing 20

I tried Youtube and Yahoo video first in the afternoon about 4:00 and I had a little trouble with the flow of the videos. I tried again in the morning, about 9:00 and everything flowed very smoothly - no hangups at all. I didn't care much for Yahoo video because I had to actually download the video instead of just point and click, like on Youtube. (Maybe I was too computer illiterate to figure out how it really worked). I think videos on our website introducing patrons to different areas of the library would be a good idea, as long as they would flow smoothly. If we chose a branch or a section of the library to highlight and changed it periodically, it might spark some interest among our patrons, or even make our facilities inviting to patrons who usually only visit us virtually!
Anyway, being a dedicated recycler, myself, I found a very interesting series of library videos about recycling old computers. I think this is a great idea! Try it for yourself and see what you think. There are actually about 8 chapters to this, but here's chapter 1:

Week 8, Thing 19

Any site from the Web 2.0 Awards list? There are so many to choose from. I like Biblio for library use because you may be able to locate out of print books for patrons or just verify a title exists if you can't find it somewhere else; or for personal use to add to your collection for not much money! My daughter fancies herself as an author and has been working on a novel for about six months now. I'm going to recommend Lulu to her. And I think I prefer Bloglines to Technorati, just because it looks more familiar now. After exploring these social networking websites, I can see how some people spend their entire lives in a dark hole somewhere on the computer. I prefer face-to-face encounters, myself.

Week 8, Think 18

Web apps are great! I think if more people knew about this, the casual user at home could save themselves a lot of money on wordprocessing and spreadsheet programs. I created an account with Google Docs just to play around. I agree that another good thing is that you can access your work wherever you are if you don't have a laptop or carry around a flashdrive.

Week 7, Thing 17 - Sandbox Wiki

Okay, that was fun, and gave me some good examples of wikis at work. I think I will try to create a wiki for collaboration among my peers here for ILL use. As soon as I get enough courage, I'll invite you in to have a look and share some comments and tips!
Okay. It's later again --- I created a wiki for in-house use and it's just barely begun, but I welcome your comments. Visit it at www.illquickref.pbwiki.com. It's private, so if you want to add comments, which I hope you will, just email me and I'll give you the password. I don't want the whole world to see it, since there are only two little bits of info so far. I do want it to be a collaborative effort, though, and grow, so please let me share the password with you.