Relections on 23 Things

Wow! This is without a doubt the most practical continuous education training that I have ever experienced. I have learned so much by doing. I will immediately continue using LibWorm, Google Reader and Facebook. My library is using Delicious, Twitter, IM, and Wikis, so I will participate in those activities.
I have re-read all of my blog posts, and I can see that I have come a long way. I remember looking ahead a little and feeling trepidation about some upcoming exercise. Once in a while, I asked someone for clarification or a little help, usually one of my kids. Which just illustrates that the up and coming generations are living online. They have not only integrated these technologies, but they are creating them and morphing them into new "things" every day.
The experience of writing in a blog regularly was sort of addictive. I regret that I never took the time to really personalize my blog and add the bells and whistles. I'm not sure I want to give it up. I'll have to think about that. One of the things I have not done as much as I wanted to was read everyone else's posts. I hope to be able to take a little time to do that over the next couple of weeks. I assume that anyone who is going to finish the series will be wrapping it up between now and then.
It's been a great training experience. Thanks, teachers and monitors!

Passing it On

For Thing 22, I have been thinking about who needs to know what around here. We have some sharp librarians who have already integrated 2.0 technology into their lives to keep current and save time doing it. That's my goal, and this program is helping me to get there.
For others, managing email seems to be challenging enough and their perspective is that all this other stuff (23 things) just isn't for me.
I think we could build on what we are already doing and show all the staff how the librarians are doing the blogging for the reader's advisory section on the web page and where to find it. I could probably throw a rock and hit two staff members who don't even know we do that. We are also working with Delicious and Twitter. The process of discussing these things that we already do would help everyone with the vocabulary, to facilitate discussion.
After that, I would like to work with some folks who have time management issues or who feel lost when techie topics are discussed in meetings about blog readers and LibWorm and those "things" that are just really useful professional tools.

Podcasts

We were planning to do some podcasts for book reviews by our adult services team and post them on our website. At the time, our techie advisor informed us that we didn't have the equipment for good quality sound broadcasts, and that what we had tried previously in our organization was not overwhelmingly well received. There was also a bandwidth problem. Podcasts sucked up a lot of it, but video could be parked on YouTube. After listening to some podcasts of book reviews and also watching some video book reviews, we decided that video was the way to go. It's just more interesting looking at someone talking, even if they aren't wearing a funny hat, but even better if they are. Or two people can have a conversation, or show you around the library.
For this assignment, I listened to quite a few more podcasts. Frequently, the sound quality was poor, echoing or tinny. The voices didn't always sound professional. This was disappointing, and generally I stopped listening before it was over. Strangely, I have more tolerance for grainy film, shaky cameras and real people who look a little nervous to be on camera. Is this the influence of YouTube? On the other hand, my experience with audio is NPR and audiobooks, with silky smooth voices and professional actors.
I did like a podcast from Australia. The accents were great, and hearing about issues from people so far away was interesting. My opinion is that there are specific applications or situations that would lend themselves to audio, but I am not inclined to subscribe to a lot of them. I would rather read the content online or watch a video.

Sharing Docs

I can see that Google Docs could be useful. The ability to share and collaborate without a miles-long string of emails is very attractive. I set up my document and emailed its link to my group, who unanimously ignored it. It was just a simple shopping list of things needed, and I encouraged them to look at it and add to it. I was able to get back to it through the email link and add to it, so I think it was working. Since no one even told me that they couldn't get to it, I'm going to assume they didn't try. Not yet, anyway. Things are a little overwhelming around here with Summer Reading Club just ending and all the children's librarians on vacation. I'll give them a little more time, and then show them how it works. Pretty impressive, really.

YouTube is a part of life

I have been watching YouTube videos for at least 3 years--it seems longer--because I have a teenaged son. "Mom! Come look at this!" usually means that I am about to be:

1. disgusted


2. revolted


3. mildly amused


4. amazed


5. entertained


6. informed

My son is older now, and he deigns to admit that I may actually know what's going on in the world, so he will ask me if I've seen whatever--the man who can sing like a girl or mean kitty. Library Ninja is the name chosen by the teens for their page on our library website.

Increasingly, there are videos created by my family and friends there, and I can watch them whenever I want. I was going to refer you to one or two, but after viewing them again, I've had second thoughts. We are using video more on our library website because we can "park it" on YouTube. I know that's not the correct terminology, but in other words, it doesn't drain our capacity.

I prefer videos or vblogs to podcasts for most communication that might lend itself to one or the other. More about that in the podcast blog.

I am out of order with my blog posts. I am waiting for a reaction from some other people before I discuss Google Docs.

Wikis

I think I would have been happier if I had never known about the Discussion and History tabs in Wikipedia. It's just terrifying to see the process revealed. How do we decide that a particular piece of information is a fact? This is especially hard for librarians, I think. We worry so much about credible sources. Of course, we have always issued a disclaimer for any information from Wikipedia. Do editorial boards of venerable reference sources have similar heated discussions? Of course they do. In the end, someone has to make a judgment call about what gets published. Ultimately, the user of the information must look at everything that's out there and make choices about what to accept as fact.
Making wiki pages was pretty easy. I did have trouble trying to title one of my pages "Interests" or "Interests & Hobbies." Each time it would jump to someone else's page who liked scuba diving. Finally, I titled it "Stuff I Like" and I was able to proceed. My pages are under "Debi" if anyone wants to look.

LibWorm is a Keeper

I never have to sit in a meeting again and be clueless when someone says, "Did you hear about that library that took away that 7-year-old's library card?" or something like that. Sometimes those routed journals don't get to your desk for 3-6 months!
I am using Google Reader and feeling very efficient about it, and I do have some professional subscriptions there, but LibWorm really just wraps it up for me. I like the categories, so I can focus primarily on what I do every day and what I am interested in. I like not having to have an account and remember the password. I also like that I will never have to explain to the city's IT department how and why this is job-related.
One of my favorite "things."

LibraryThing

I have the strangest sensation that I have just come down out of a very cluttered attic and I need to brush the cobwebs out of my hair. I set up an account and put in a few books with tags, and set out to explore. The group for Librarians who LibraryThing was good--there was a string going about dealing with patrons and it was pretty funny. Apparently there is a group called I See Dead People's Books, but when I tried to find it, I got 1697 hits. There must be some more powerful search strategies, but I have not found them yet. The tools section offered some good stuff and ways to sort of connect the dots with applications that could be useful. I was surprised to recognize pictures of my favorite authors when I hit the "gallery" tab.
I have heard of some practical ways that libraries are using LibraryThing for the tagging, etc. My impression at this point in time is that I wish I had been in on the ground floor and watched this build, and learned to navigate. I think it would take me a number of hours to really learn what is here and how to get to it.

Digging In

Digg led me to a a good book. I was listening to NPR in the car at lunchtime today, and I heard an interesting discussion with an author. As I was trolling through Digg, I looked at the popular science category, and I found an article from Elle.com about how our brains work to make choices. The article mentions the book, How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer, and I thought, "That's the book they were talking about on the radio." So I clicked over to the library catalog and found a copy of this very book on the shelf, went out and picked it up and checked it out. So NPR gets some credit, but I would not have remembered the title or author's name without having seen it again.
The new diggs looked like a good source of cutting edge stuff in whatever area you might be interested in. I'm sure it's satisfying to participate and vote for things and "bury" things you don't like. Very democratic.

Delicious

I set up an account and imported my favorites, but I don't think there's anything uniquely wonderful there that anyone doesn't already know about.
It is very cool and useful that our reference librarians are all contributing to a Delicious list of great reference websites. We have always shared websites within our library system, and I remember notebooks and note cards in little file boxes. Of course, finding them was sometimes an issue if we weren't all thinking of the same category or subject heading (see previous post). Another problem was that the links would change or disappear after a time.
Is there a way to check currency on your entire list of bookmarks without having to go to each one, one at a time? I didn't look for that on the Delicious site, but maybe there's an app for that?

Tagging is a hot topic for librarians

I have an uncomfortable feeling that a lot of old catalogers are rolling over in their graves. The idea of letting people choose their own tags! Can anarchy and chaos be far behind?
I have always been on the public service side of the library, so I am well acquainted with how people look for things. I have often served as an interpreter, as in, "Let's try this subject heading--or that subject heading."
When our automation system came online, we were so concerned about the subject headings that we placed copies of Sears List of Subject Headings at all OPAC locations. If you are too young, or not into cataloging, this is an 80-year-old resource and guide and was, at the time, a large red book that weighed about 30 lbs. Did anyone EVER look into that book? No. Did they use keyword search? You bet! It wasn't long, in fact, until all of us librarians were using keyword search most of the time.
I have come to the conclusion that it would be added value if people put their own tags on our collection, in addition to the proper librarian-assigned subject headings. People will look for things the way they want to look, and arrange things to their liking, and feel more ownership if we allow them to have some input. The language and our knowledge base are evolving rapidly, and I don't think we can keep pace with it using the old traditional processes.

Am I a twit?

I now have a twitter account. Does that make me a twit? I have learned what a hashtag is, and some other things. I am still challenged by the amazing abbreviated, unpunctuated vocabulary of texting, twitter and IM. It just goes against the grain and all those years of training in English classes to butcher the language on purpose. Reading it is almost as difficult as trying to compose a message that sounds cool. Capitalization, spelling and punctuation rules are not cool. My children enjoy great hilarity at my expense whenever I send them a text message, so I am equally apprehensive about twitter.
I understand that this can be a valuable tool for sending the same message to lots of people at once. A couple of weeks ago, the Jonas Brothers were at the new Dallas Cowboys stadium in Arlington getting ready for a concert. They sent out a tweet to followers of the Jonas Brothers that the first 500 fans to arrive could get t-shirts or something, I forget exactly. It took about 20 minutes for 500+ people to congregate. Pretty amazing.

Don't IM. No one's home.

At our library, we have used IM for admin offices and supervisors for a long time. It's really handy for seeing where everyone is and cryptically discussing things you might not want to commit to email. My buddy list has one problem, and I see this in other applications also. We keep adding names and no one ever takes anyone off. There are seven people on my buddy list who are permanently offline. No, no one's dead! Just retired, moved, etc.
I am amazed by the glossary of terms that was listed in our assignment. Many of these seem to be designed to keep parents in the dark--pretty scary. Oh, well, I guess kids have always done this in one way or another. L8R, D. W.

Ning is pretty nifty

I did like the ALA site and I enjoyed the Open Source song. Who is the guy in the plaid shirt in the background and what is he doing?

The libraries subject yielded quite a few interesting things. I didn't have as much luck with Scrabble. I love to play Scrabble, and my name plate-sign-thingie on my desk is a Scrabble "pew" with the letters that spell my name.

Will you be my friend?

This is something I will keep doing. It's really amazing to see all these people who want to be my friend. I feel like a first grader opening the little Valentine's mailbox at school. Oh, look! There's one with new pictures of the baby! I haven't seen them in who knows when! There are some cool vacation pictures! Who is going to the conference/family reunion/wedding?
When I get over the fun of this, I'll settle down to some professional networking and associations. Looking forward to that, too.

Facebook Finally

Putting together a "face" that I am willing to show the world is one of the more time-consuming and daunting parts of this assignment. A real picture or some sort of image? Do I tell them what kind of music I really like? I haven't thought about my "favorite" this or that in a long time. I'm just busy working a lot and taking care of my family. It feels rather self-indulgent to think about myself, and I'm only making time to do that because it's part of the course work.
Friends--I found my daughter right away and her facebook is a rich source of friends to tap from for my facebook. I found my 19-year-old son. Will he be my friend? I don't know if he wants his mother involved in his online life.
I had a little trouble adding schools. When I click on it, it just refreshes the same screen. I finally decided to type over the top of my first college and add TWU. I think it just substituted that instead of adding.
One odd thing that made me wonder about how facebook works. When I logged in to verify my account, it pops up a short list of suggested friends. So it says, based on our having both attended TWU, would I like to add Kimberly as my friend? This woman goes to church with me, attended the same undergraduate school that I did, and is on my daughter's facebook. Did it pick up the daughter link? I didn't even remember that she went to TWU!
My thing numbers have been off, I know, but I have done everything pretty much in order so far. Sort of mushing together the facebook assignments.

Saving Time is always a good idea

RSS feeds: I really like the concept of being able to see just the new stuff. Wouldn't it be nice if I could do that with most of my professional reading. Oh wait! I can!
I realize that I have to invest a little time up front to find the subscriptions that I need, but after that, these routed copies of various library and news publications --September issue makes it to my desk by January!--can just pass me by. I have been using Google reader for a couple of weeks and checking the new stuff, especially the cartoon, on a regular basis. I like it. I will keep it up. I promise. Cross my heart.

Readers & Followers

So I'm all set up in Google Reader and thinking about the potential exponential levels of complexity--a good reason to learn all the sorting and tagging tricks right away and I am anticipating more of the same in the next Thing--the RSS feeds.
I was excited to see that I have 3 followers, and only two of them are related to me. That's pretty sad in blog world terms, but it seems like an accomplishment, somehow. Hello, followers!
The Common Craft videos are great! Cut to the chase, save me time, and entertain me just a little as well.
As all things computer, there are multiple ways to do everything in social networking. If I put a blog on my Reader, do I show up as a follower? I'm going to look into that next time, and also doing something about my blog profile so that I can be a more interesting follower.
Then it's on to Facebook.

Cartoon Thing 5

I spent way too much time trying to be funny. I'm not, but there are some possibilities here.

The photo in the cartoon below reminds me of one of my favorite old movies, Desk Set with Spencer Tracy and Kathryn Hepburn.





I am realizing that I don't know much about formatting my blog and organizing various elements.

More to learn!

Twins Puzzle

Small Frustrations

I have been too busy to blog lately, and I am trying to catch up with 23 things assignments. First issue--what were all those logins and passwords I was sure I would not forget? Like a lot of people, I had written them down somewhere and then misplaced my list, or it wasn't where I was anyway. So finally, I did have to get an email from blogspot to get me back on track. I tried some of the Flickr fun stuff. The spelling was a lot of fun, but I never got the knack of selecting and saving an entire word. I could save only one letter, and although I left the screen open, the letters continued to scramble and undo all my hard work. Maybe you aren't supposed to be able to do this. The speech balloons look like fun. I'm sure I'll use that at some point. Here's a puzzle thing that looks cute and would be a good gift for puzzle lovers.
Anyway, there are two things I have learned today. People who are really good at this stuff have integrated it into their lives. Almost any task, errand, or interpersonal communication begins online for them. They are fast. And they don't spend a lot of time trying to remember passwords.
Second thing I have learned is that I could easily be sucked into the vortex of creating mosaics or playing Flickr Sudoku--I love Sudoku--and never come up for air.

Mimi's Garden

Have a look at my beautiful granddaughters at www.flickr.com/photos/mimis_garden. This is my first experience with a Flickr account. It was fairly simple to get started. The points that I always agonize over are the privacy issues. How much background information should I provide, if any? I even called my daughter to ask her, and her advice was not much for a Flickr account. I told her I was putting her daughters' picture up and she said they're all over the internet anyway. (She blogs.) And they're only 3 months old. Imagine when they can enter information themselves! I started to say "type" and realized that I have no idea HOW an infant today will be using the technology of the future to share and communicate with the rest of the world in 10, 20, 30 years. There are language issues when we are discussing the future. How do we use words that haven't been created yet?

People Power

In the evolution of how people use and interact with technology, I am amazed to see that people are getting back some of what technology had taken away. We share ideas and pictures of our grandchildren, and organize information in a useful way (to us, maybe not to anyone else). We had left our front porches and our town hall meetings and moved inside, to sit in the air conditioning and watch canned television and play video games alone. Now we are connecting again in different ways. I loved "We are the machine." What a contrast to those old movies that depicted a massive metallic-monster computer with blinking lights taking over the world and telling people what to do. The reality is that we are telling "it" what to do, and the result is as creative, fun, silly, stupid, terrifying and wonderful as humankind can be.
In our library system, we are getting on this roller coaster with blogging and twitter and other tools for communicating with our patrons and reaching them where they are. There will be twists and turns and ups and downs, but this will surely be an exhilarating ride.

Thing 1 is Done

Greetings, fellow 23-things library folks. I'm looking forward to this summer's experience and a lifetime of meaningful electronic dialogue with family, friends, colleagues and library patrons. I know I will enjoy sharing experiences with you about your life and work. (Are those the same for you?)