Thing 23: Finished!

Hey I did it! Over the past few weeks, I've learned a lot of new things and got some more experience with some things I already knew about. Probably my two favorite tools were Bloglines and Google Docs. I've been using them on my own and they are really helpful! This project has also allowed me to see firsthand some really exciting and innovative ways that libraries are using new technologies. I consider myself to be a computer person, so I really enjoyed this and would definitely do something like this again if it were offered. I especially liked that I could go at my own pace and do things on my own. Overall, I feel that I have really grown in my knowledge of technology and I feel like I could use most if not all of these tools myself.

Thing 22: Audiobooks

Now that I have an MP3 player, I have really looked forward to using it to listen to audiobooks. I have actually used Overdrive before to find audiobooks through the library's website. I think this is a great way to give patrons access to additional materials that might not be a part of the library's physical collection. As a patron, I like having the opportunity to locate and download audiobooks from home. It kind of stinks that they have a checkout system, so that you can't download a title until someone else is finished with it. It's kind of a let down when you think you've found something and then you get put on a waitlist. Overall, I think this is a great tool that is very convenient.

Thing 21: Podcasts

http://oclspodcast.libsyn.com/index.php?post_category=OCLS%20Children's%20Podstory

I searched for podcasts using yahoo's podcast site. It was really easy to navigate, but I was disappointed to see that as of Oct 31, they are discontinuing the site! Anyway, I found a really interesting podcast series from the Orange County Library System in Orlando, FL in which they podcast stories for children. They record their employees reading stories and other highlights from their storytimes and post them online. I think this is a great was to use podcasting for library purposes. Not only does it allow children to have storytime in their own homes, but parents can get an idea of what storytime is like in a really easy way, which could draw new participants to the library. You can check out this podcast at the link above.

Thing 20: YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXC4OiExico

I've certainly heard of YouTube before, but haven't really used it. I found some interesting and many time relevant stuff. In particular I found a short video about how to write and publish a children's book. I picked this video because I wondered if there was anything on there even halfway relevant to children's librarians and I thought that video was interesting. My only complaint about the site was that I didn't find a way to refine or advance your search, so I ended up going through a lot of irrelevant stuff. There is also a site called TeacherTube, that I'm pretty sure is run by the same company, but it has more educationally relevant stuff. That's also a good site to try.

Thing 19: Web 2.0 Awards List

I ended up checking out a couple of these sites because I couldn't pick just one even after going straight to the winners list rather than the nominees list. I can only imagine how long this would have taken me if I had looked at the long list! First I explored Lulu.com. This site allows users to create books using their own words, pictures, and/or art and to have their work published. I know many scrapbooking companies such as Creative Memories do similar stuff, but this site goes further by making it possible to publish any kind of work. I also checked out feedburner.com, which allows you to publish and publicize your blog so that more users can find it. Both are really cool tools and there's many more I want to browse when I have a chance.

Thing 18: Online Productivity

I tried out Google Docs to learn about online productivity and it was GREAT! I use a lot of different computers between work, home and school, so this is a wonderful tool to allow me to easily create, access, and edit my documents from any computer without keeping up with flash drives or anything like that. This would also be a good to introduce patrons to so that they can use this service as they work on things at the library. This way they can work on things at home or at the library easily. I'm mostly excited about this for my own personal use and will definitely use it in the future.

Thing 17: MD Libraries Sandbox Wiki

http://marylandlibrariessandbox.pbwiki.com/Favorite-Blogs

Well, I successfully added my blog to the favorites blog page. You can see my wonderful link by following the link above. I have read wikis before but never actually participated in on by adding content. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be, though I don't know what I was expecting! It was really just as easy as using a word processing program. As I said in the post for Things 16, I think this is a great tool for libraries to allow patrons become more involved in library services and I'm glad to know first hand that this is a very easy thing to do.

Thing 16: Wikis

When I stated this "thing" I knew about wikis, but I didn't really know of many ways for libraries to use them. However, wikis can be very useful to libraries. One idea I saw was to allow patrons to use wikis to annotate the catalog. This way people can learn more about a book than what the standard catalog provides and can get a better idea if this is the right book for them. Another idea was using wikis for subject guides. I thought this was particularly useful because I've been to plenty of sites with links that are no longer good and it would be great if people could delete old link and add new links on their own. One last way to use wikis that I thought was really cool was to create a community wiki, allowing people to add information about everything from the best mechanic to use to schedules for events and games. You can also subscribe to many wikis so that you can be notified when updates or changes are made. I think this is a really cool way to get patrons personally involved in the services libraries provide rather than merely acting as consumers.

Thing 15: The Future of Libraries

After reading the perspectives on Web 2.0 and the future of libraries, I think these people have some very interesting ideas about where libraries are headed. I definitely agree that we have to make our services available to people where they are, rather than patrons having to come to where we are. However, I think there is a happy medium. I don't think libraries as we know it are completely obselete. I'm 26 years old, putting me in the generation that is into computer in every way. However, I still like to read a good book, a real book with a cover and pages, not an "ebook". I believe research tools and materials have to be more accessible to patrons online. People doing research want their information available right now and they want it up to date. However, I think there will always be pleasure readers out there who want real books. I also think the library offers a great working environment. As a grad student and a mom, I need to do work away from little ones and noise and that is not going to happen at my house. I need a quiet place to go and if the library wasn't available, I don't know where I would go. Overall, as I said, I think there is a happy medium here where we are incorporating new tools and technologies while still maintaining a good physical collection and both will meet patron needs.

Thing 14: Technorati

Technorati was a really good way of searching for blogs and blog posts. You can search for individual posts that have been tagged with a particular subject or you can search for whole blogs related to your topic of interest. This is good because if you only searched for whole blogs, you might miss out on a good individual post on a blog that might not be completely dedicated to that subject. I checked out the top blogs and searches. For the most part the top blogs and top favorited blogs were pretty much the same, just not necessarily in the same order. Most of the topics included news and computer stuff. Top searches included more news searches, parenting, and youtube. About half of the searches were in other languages that I couldn't read, but I think that says a lot about how globally popular this site is. With the rapidly growing number of blogs out there, I think this tool is going to be very useful for libraries if it isn't already. However, it is going to also be very important to educate patrons (especially children and teens) about blogs and make sure they know that information found on blogs may not always be reliable and teach them how to choose reliable blogs.

Thing 13: Del.icio.us

Del.icio.us was a pretty interesting site. I was able to navigate around a bit and read the notes people wrote about the links. Libraries could use this tool to suggest good sites to patrons and to save relevant sites for employee use. Of course, it's also great for people who use a lot of different computers so that they can access their bookmarks from any computer.