Reading slump

I have nothing to read right now! How did that happen?? I have several new things on reserve, but they aren't out yet. I just finished the MaryJanice Davidson books, and would really like to find something that funny, but not about vampires (or anything paranormal, really). I am a little tired of fantasy right now. If anyone reading this has any good suggestions, please let me know.

#16: Playing in the Wiki Sandbox

I found this exercise confusing because it didn't seem to work right away. I Twittered about how to do this one, and I found out I was doing it right, I just had to wait for access. It's funny how we expect technology to instantly do what we ask it to do. There is still a human element involved for some of it! Anyway, I got my access granted this morning (thanks, Tammy) and successfully added the link to my blog (it works--I checked.) I added a couple of my favorite things, too. It will be fun to keep checking back to see what other folks add.

#15: Wikis

This is another "thing" that I am not very familiar with. Of course, I have used Wikipedia, but I've never edited it. I find it scary, not interesting, that ANYONE can edit a page. What happens if someone erases all of my hard work? I guess I could go into the recent changes page, and see who the culprit was, but I would still have to re-do any work that person deleted. I think it would cool to start a CML "What I'm Reading Wiki" for either CMLsi or the main webpage. No fancy covers or long blurbs, just a list of what each staff member is reading. It might be useful for program planning too, if several staff from area branches were planning the same program. Perhaps staff gathering books for the Capitol Day teacher presentation could post the titles they are considering. Or, the SRC booklists could be created this way, instead of meetings or a flurry of emails. I will keep thinking about applications for this tool.

#14: Library 2.0

I think I am still having trouble getting my head around this. I think I understand the key ideas, but I'm just not sure what I personally need to do with them. This program is the first step, I'm sure. Learning more about the tools that connect customers to us and to one another and figuring out the best way to integrate them into the library. Some things did stand out to me as I read the resources for this exercise:

1. Get rid of "just in case" collections. I may never be a 2.0 librarian if I have to give up the printed collection. I see the author's point about reference material being available faster on the web, but I believe (perhaps foolishly) that people are always going to want to READ A BOOK. I cannot get rid of all of our fiction titles just because we can get little portable electronic books. Maybe I am not a "trendspotter" (sorry, Michael Stephens), but I just don't see people giving up books for these expensive gadgets. I never intend to.

2. User Education. Boy is this an issue at my location! Everyday, I help people who call themselves "ignorant" about computers. They literally back away from the terminal when I need to show them how to register for cards or for computer time. Many of these people do not know how to use a mouse, but they need to apply for a job online. It's very scary. We do have classes here, and a few people take advantage of them. I've even heard from happy "graduates" who came back in to say thanks. There is an entire generation/population out there who don't like computers. Even though they are fairly easy to use, they fear them. I don't know how we reach all of those users.

3. Trendspotting. I am not good at this at all. I have not read the OCLC documents, although I have heard about them. I've even attended workshops on them (maybe at Staff Development Day???) I just don't have the right mindset for this particular skill. I live in the here-and-now, solving problems as they come up. If this skill is required to get my MLIS in 2.0, I may need to repeat a grade. (I am old enough that I only hold an MLS; I'm missing the "I" that today's fine graduates are getting. Does that make my degree obsolete? I hope not.)

Wow, this is a long post. I guess I had more to say about Library 2.0 than I thought. I hope that means I'm on my way toward becoming a Librarian 2.0.

Thing #13: del.icio.us

This was a pretty handy tool. I can see how it could be used to replace all of our rolodexes and notebooks of information. Very easy to find stuff, too. I LOVE the way HFAR is using it!! I will have to remember it's out there (or assign someone here to create an account for Hilltop reference use and be sure HFAR's is linked). I don't have that many websites that I use for research, so I'm not sure I would use it on my own. I also don't have that many websites or blogs that I monitor, so keeping them linked to my favorites is no big deal. But, it would be nice to be able to take them with me in 1 website instead of having them be computer-specific. I might have to play with it and see if it works for me. But I don't have a laptop, so if I'm not at work or at home, I'm not on the computer anyway. I will certainly pass this one on to my kids, though. They are both in middle school and will soon be working on research papers of their own. What a time saver this will be for them! I'm thinking back to my stacks of barely-legible notes I took for my own research papers. How I wish this had been around when I was in school.

More Twittering

I tried Twitter again today, and it looks like I'm actually talking to people now. I even have a few followers! I'll keep trying it; maybe it will grow on me.

Thing #12: Twitter

https://twitter.com/read2akid

Well, I think this is my Twitter page (hee hee--that makes me think about Bambi's "twitterpated" word). I don't really know what to do with it yet. I probably haven't played with it enough. I did find Joy and Gerald and some other CML folks, but I couldn't tell if I was following the page or not. I was frustrated that I had to type in my password about 8,000 times. I have not had much luck searching Twitter. I was only able to search for contacts through my email (which, oddly enough, was my real work email even though I entered my L&P email on twitter). I am really not sure how I would use Twitter yet. I really don't think that there are that many people who care what I am doing every second of every day. (I would LOVE to make my kids get on here for hourly updates, though.) I will try to fit some more play time in this week.

Thing#11: LibraryThing

http://www.librarything.com/home/read2akid

What fun!! I only added a few of my all-time favorite books so far, but this may take the place of keeping track of the books I have read on my blog. It depends on if LT has really new books or not. I wish this was around a long time ago. I used to write down all of the books I read in a notebook, but that got too hard to keep up with so I quit (okay, I got lazy). But, I did find that when I looked back through that list, I couldn't always remember the book. I love being able to see the covers displayed on LT. (I remember covers better than title names, anyway.)

Thing #10:Image Generators

I had great fun with the ALA mini read poster! I think I need to get more photos on flickr. I'm running out of choices. I found Generator Blog confusing. I need to spend more time playing with it; I just didn't understand the point of that site. But, the flickr toys are a super source of gadgets. I made an inspirational poster. I'll try to post the links below.

http://www.ala.org/ala/productsandpublications/READ_Mini_Posters.cfm

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/ I used the "Motivator" toy for this one.

RSS feed sharing

Here's my blogroll:

http://www.bloglines.com/public/read2akid



That only took 3 attempts. My bloglines screen looked nothing like the screenshot on the L&P blog. I had to stumble around until I found the directions on blogline.

More RSS fun, or not (Thing #9)

I was disappointed that several of my favorite sites do not offer this cool piece of technology. I still have to visit them the old, slow way! After watching the CommonCraft video, I thought it would be a great idea to have lcoal gas prices sent to my bloglines account. But I couldn't find a feed. The best I could do was to link columbusgasprices.com to my favorites list. That seems so...antiquated now. I am amazed at how quickly I adopted a bit of technology that I didn't see a use for until yesterday. I liked the Topix site, but not the Syndic8 one. I liked the way Topix was arranged and when I followed the link from the CML blog site, it took me right to the local page. It took a little bit of playing yesterday to figure out the bloglines add/edit system. But, once I got it, it seemed easy. I did some more searching today for Thing #9. Now that I'm looking for the feed icon, I don't seem to be seeing it on as many websites as I thought I would.

#8 RSS Feeds

This was really neat. I have noticed those icons, but never really knew what they meant. I've been following several co-workers' blogs, and I had wished the participants list had a "updated" notice. Now I have one! Instead of clicking on each blog, I've entered them into my blogline list, and can instantly tell which blog has been updated. Very handy. No more disappointment at loading the blog, and seeing nothing new to read. I know CML is already using RSS feeds to let customers know about new items. I hope customers are taking advantage of this. I routinely show customers the printed lists we produce for movies we've purchased and upcoming book publications. I will make a point to start asking them if they have RSS feeds, too. But, ugh!!!! ANOTHER user name and password!!