#23 The end ... farewell, adieu, auf wiedersehn

This has been a fantastic experience. A big thank you to all of those who worked hard to make this opportunity available to us all. And thanks to everyone else from my library service who participated and whose blogs I enjoyed reading along the way.

I've learnt a lot. And I've appreciated the prodding and prompting to get myself out there and learn about the possibilities of Web 2.0 for myself and my work. My favourites along the way: Library Thing, RSS, Podcasts, Flickr. And having the blinds pulled up on the possibilities of doing things in more collaborative ways that involve our library users. I hope that in the next 12 months, I see some of these ideas take shape in our library service.

And I made it to #23 before midnight. Yeah for me!

#6 Mashups ... how did I forget

#19, #20, #21, #22, ... almost there and it's 11.26pm. Oh no, I didn't post for #6!!!! I don't want to see a nasty little white square on my tracking log after all this effort.
So here goes. I've been back and checked out the Mashup award winners and my personal favourite was oSkope, which is a visual browser where you can search and organise different web services.

#22 Audiobooks

Audiobooks are very popular at our library and I like the idea of downloadable books that simply 'expire' when the borrowing period is up. No fines, hurray.

But for myself, I like holding a book in my hand and reading. While I like podcasts, I've not really come to grips with audiobooks. I've tried in the car ... and my mind wanders and I realise I wasn't paying attention at all. I've tried at home, but I leave the room to fetch something or someone needs something and again, I've missed the story. So while this is a great resource, it's probably not one for me at the moment.

#21 Podcasts, Smodcasts

Finally, a topic that isn't entirely new to me. I already enjoy podcasts (mostly bits and pieces from ABC radio that I missed when they first went to air). And I don't have anything tricky, just my laptop and it all works fine.

The library related lectures etc are great too and I specially like the ones that have text as well, so I can listen and follow along. As the evenings get later I find this helps my addled brain...

So podcasts are one of my favourite web 2 things.

#20 You Tube

Imagine advertising Story Time on the tv ... amazing. This is an ad from the Calgary public library. Very nicely done and I enjoyed several viewings. Hope you like it too.

#19 Discovering Web 2.0

So many things to see, so little time ...

Clipmarks

Clipmarks appealed to me. Basically, you can 'clip' the best of your discoveries on the web and post them to your blog, or add to a public file, or build your own searchable file. It struck me because I find I have a fair number of visitors to our library who ask me how to send something they've found to someone else. Or they might want to print just a particular part of a web page. And sometimes it's tricky to help them in just the way they need. So maybe this is the tool that would be help.

There is also something quirky about electronically doing these things. Don't we all have a family member who cuts articles from the paper and sends them via snail mail? What's that old saying about no new ideas?

#18 Zoho

Access from any computer anywhere ... good. Do I need to be able to do this in my life at this time ... not really. It was easy to use though and I think the google spreadsheet idea is really great and could have fantastic office applications. Think booking sheets, attendance sheets etc.

#17 PBWiki

I woz here.

And it only screamed 'go away' at me once, causing amused laughter to erupt from the other room, while I got a serious fright!

#16 Wiki, wiki, wacko

The possibilities are endless really ... but for starters, how about a book review wiki for the State Library's summer reading guide? And maybe the CHRLC ideas committee could be wiki based and then we could all follow along and contribute?

The St. Jose County wiki based subject guides are also food for thought. And yes, it does take a change in mindset to open up your precious prose to the 'improvements' of others.

I quite liked the irony of Library Success: a best practise wiki being log-in only editing because of repeated vandalism. On the one hand you have the ideal, and on the other, the reality.

#15 Library 2.0, Web 2.0

These articles were excellent reading and great food for thought. The ideas that stood out most to me were, in no particular order:

* John Riemer advocating federated searching
* Michael Stephens iceberg warning regarding 'just in case' collections
* John Riemer (again) on using tagging in our catalogues and collaborative metadata along the lines of collaborative cataloguing
* Wendy Schultz' evocative descriptions of Library 3.0 and Library 4.0. My head hurts!

Of all of these, the idea that I'd like to explore further and that I think is within our reach, is reorganising the physical space in our libraries to make more room for people to come, use our resources comfortably and to just be. And looking seriously at our physical collections is definitely a way to do this, that is very do-able.

#14 Technorati

Before searching around this site tonight, I really had no idea what Technorati did or what it was for. I followed the activity suggestions and searched learning 2.0 in the directory and in the tags and the results were quite different ... but neither very satisfying. The tag search returned a lot of very general material, so I can see the importance of considering the tags I decide to use rather than shooting from the hip. The advanced search returned the best results, a series of new blogs I'd not come across yet but which I'm looking forward to returning to. I liked Technorati and I'll return but I'm not quite ready to let the spiders loose yet.

And as an aside, I saw the VALA conference programme via Technorati and doesn't it look fabbo. Helene Blowers is keynote speaker and I expect there will be some good blogs to read in February, when the conference is on in Melbourne.

#13 Del.icio.us

Interesting. Just getting an idea of the various ways people choose to tag compared with the structured and controlled 'libary' way of classification is an eye opener. I can see the advantage too, of overcoming the frustration of not having 'favourites' available at work or alternatively, at home, whichever the case may be. I also found food for thought in some of the sites I found that discussed using this on reference desks and also on having tags sitting alongside subject headings in our library catalogues.

#12 Rollyo

I've been looking at Rollyo tonight and I think for the time being I might move along ... and come back to this at a later stage. I can see an application for it in the various websites I like to keep track of.

#11 Library Thing

I really enjoyed looking around Library Thing ... it's interesting to see how many others have chosen the same titles. I must say however, that I struggled to think of the titles I'd list. There was much peering over my shoulder at the bookshelf behind me for inspiration. In the end, I've gone with some old favourites and some recent reads ... Unfortunately, not all of my choices had covers available. I'm not sure that the coverage for Australian literature is very good.

I've finally got the images to appear on the blog. I didn't understand the 'adding an HTML' element bit. Thank you Rosemary for your help!

#10 Image Generators

Well, this was a bit of fun .... and surprisingly easy. This is a nice alternative to those e-cards that I suppose are very old fashioned and old technology now. At least with these you can customize them for the recipient. I'm feeling a bit sleepy this afternoon, so the cup of coffee at http://www.imagechef.com/ appealed to me.

#8 RSS

Well, it seemed to take me rather a long time, but I managed to create my Bloglines account and then subscribe to some RSS feeds. I chose a couple of blogs, some book reviews and some news.

I'm going to reserve judgement on how it works for me until I've test driven it for a little while. I wonder if this will make it easier for me to keep up with news etc .... or whether I still won't get around to actually reading any of the articles? We'll see.

#5 flickr First Lines Bulletin Board

First Lines Bulletin Board
Originally uploaded by sally b. librarian

I don't have a digital camera, so I decided to roam around on flickr looking for useful library related photos. This one turned up on a search for library displays. 'Great first lines' are provided and then you lift up the flap to see the title and the author. The favourite first line from the librarian who uploaded the photo to flickr was: "Countess Judith kept her husband's head in a box." From "The GleeMaiden" by Hamilton. I'd like to know more ....

I think it is a lovely idea for a simple display; it would be easy enough to jazz up a bit and you only need a bulletin board and some cardboard to make it happen.

It could also be a way of generating some community input if borrowers were invited to add their own favourite first line to the display. That way it could also work as a way of recommending titles from one person to the next ....

Never having looked at flickr before this, I can see how it will be useful for us in our work, and I like the 'sharing' philosophy.

A beginning ...

My first blog with the Learning 2.0 programme ... I'm looking forward to learning new skills and broadening my understanding of how libraries can use new technologies to reach out to more people in our community.