thing 23!!!

In this post i will answer the questions posed.

How could you draw on what you have learned in 23 Things to help you in your work?
a lot of the applications that we learned about in 23 things are very helpful in day to day work, delicious for keeping track of webpages, google reader for keeping up to date, igoogle as a one stop shop for this stuff and more generally a greater awareness of applications available on the web.

How could the library use the technologies featured in 23 Things to improve its service?
perhaps by introducing instant messenger technology to the reference service. using blogs and wiki's to keep track of difficult student inquiries and solutions, making library pages not necessarily more interactive but adding audio and visual elements cos we can.


How do you think the 23 Things program could be improved in the future?
for the sake of simplicity direct users to blogger and not wordpress as almost all the applications you asked us to add are google apps and therefore blogger friendly. as blogger itself is a google application it makes sense, particularly as not all participants in this project are very computer savvy.

Do you think you'll keep blogging or keep using any of the other tools you learned about?
I think that i will use a lot of the tools that i learnt about but do not think that i will continue blogging.

thanks it was fun, i learnt somethings!

instant messenger post

I added google talk to my blog and to my igoogle page i've added a few email addresses and invited them for a chat and we will see if my invitation is accepted. I have been using instant messenger programs for years, originally i used the ICQ program and then moved onto MSN. I also use the the chat set up in Gmail from time to time. easy cheap ways to stay in touch with people. I am yet to use it, but my parents are great fans of skype to chat to mates overseas.

I guess the best use of these technologies for libraries would be for instant online reference help. It would cost nothing to set up and give access to librarians for off shore and external students. Library staff could use to skype system to teleconference or instant messenger services to bounce ideas across campus's. all good! Free!

podcasting

I had a look through the suggested links. I listened to a Dr Karl Podcast i found through the ABC site, then i watched some music videos on the http://www.mevio.com/ channel.

library on youtube

i found a fair amount of library related material on youtube, some of it trying to inspire and the rest of it quite funny. Conan the Librarian and Library ninja being amongst my favourites. Youtube is really easy to use and an amazing way to procrastinate. I wish it existed while i was still studying.

pet on wiki

This looks a lot like my brothers dog harry, i put the same photo up on the wiki site. Using all the web2.0 things available to me, i got my brother to take the photo and post on his flickr or photobucket page and then i found and copied the image from google images to post here. the only problem being that there are apparently a lot of australian terriers named harry out there and this may not be the picture he took.

adding images to the wiki page was a lot easier than i thought it would be. I was happy to find that the wikipage is just like a google docs page and it was very easy to navigate.

the slightly hard to write yet unavoidable "what do i think of library2.0" post

libary 2.0, in many ways it has altered the and updated and changed the job of librarian. as i am a new librarian i'm pretty used to this new way of operating. after playing with this 23things blog i have realised that, albeit small, there is slightly more to 2.0 technology than posting hilarious comments on other peoples photos and anonymously slagging off strangers on message boards. the creation and following of links for futher and more indepth information is fun, plus being able to post blatant lies on wikipedia gives one a bloated sense of well being. The online developments of google make it possible to keep track of just about anything just about anywhere, this is pretty handy as i am quite forgetfull. and i'm pretty sure that if i looked hard enough i could find people i went to school with on facebook.

where this leaves web2.0 and the library though i'm not so sure, for all the electronic advancements it still seems to me that a sometimes friendly face at the reference or circulation desk is way more important to the workings of a library and as a pathway to information. for a lot of people computers are still pretty scary. The incorporation these tools into the library service is a good idea and i'm sure to some extent is already happening, but for all the technology available i think that the human element of libraries is what defines the service.

flickr and mash ups

i had a play with montage and the colour generator. both pretty fun, but as i haven't added any of my own pictures i dont think i got the full effect of what flickr can do. here is a link to a mashup deally thingo that i found.

delicious

i had a play with delicious, seems like a good idea, creating an avenue to share collected weblinks, useful for joint research projects or things like that. I managed to add the gadget so hopefully as i find more sites to link to they will show up on the blog.

I think therefore iGoogle

IGoogle, seems to be pretty good, creating a one stop internet spot, no longer will i have to remember the names of websites or URL's. It took me a little while to figure out how to navigate around the page, but one i found the tabs to add gadgets it was suprisingly simple. Also there are seemingly thousands of gadgets that i could add. I quite liked the facebook gadget and the news feeds that i could add, i also found lots of fun things to personalise the page such as Comedy Central's joke of the day and a spider that hangs around on my page keeping me company.

Having easy access to GoogleDocs is a masterstroke too. The only real suggestion that i would have to google for the Igoogle page would be to have easier paths or tabs to other google applications like Gmail and blogger, currently they have to be added like other gadgets but to me it seems like they should be automatic components of the page.

I dont think i want to work for google.

google books and scholar

this is amazing. i found impossible to get books from long departed authors. I can also see other benefits as in a try before you buy system for unknowns. fun. I actually think the limited preview is better than a full view as i would be tempted to try and read the whole thing online, and well, i like actual books. I really like how results are displayed in all languages too. some books i found.

Google scholar i find to be a blessing and a curse, working on the reference desk i find the blessing in quickly specific articles, the curse is when students have found articles by searching scholar and then come to me trying to the find full text. For the most part though i think google scholar is a very good idea, when searched through the VU library page it can be a very effective search tool.

Google docs.

this is a test to see how google docs work.


hey this is cool, i can see some amazing benefits to using this program if you are working away from home of the office or forget to bring a USB to school. from my brief stumblings through the application it seems to have pretty much all the same things that word does and is probably cheaper.. haha
google docs good.

i wrote and then posted the previous bit with google docs. google docs is fun.

google things and addresses

View Larger Map

if it works this is a map of the tiny little country town i lived in. The town is Ordway Colorado USA 81063, population of not much, i lived in two places firstly on Arkansas ave and then for a month or two on Colorado blvd, unfortunately street view is yet to hit the southwest plains of Colorado so i can't show you the front of my creepy old house. Ordway's claims to fame are that I once lived there and Biill Bryson famously mentioned the town in the book The Lost Continent. You can read some of that book and the mention of Ordway here. The mention is all the way down at the start of chapter 21, but if can get that far the description is fairly accurate.




View Larger Map

This is my current neighbourhood, the street view is an amazing tool. When my parents came to visit they used google maps and street view to find their way around. you also get a pretty good look at my backyard with google earth.

reader rss feeds

so i think that i've figured out this game, it seems that i have multiple rss and random site feeds happening as well as linking to a couple of blogs belonging to soldiers battling through the 23 things front.

i can see some good and bad from RSS feeds, firstly the good, if i remember to log into the thing i will become overwhelmed and updated with current and international news and events. Secondly the not so good as i may become overwhelmed and updated with international news and current events and possibly become a fountain of pointless knowledge which i have to expel forthwith to create room for things that i need to know. all of the previous though is moot as i will never remember to log into the thing

facebook

ok, so i joined facebook. i installed the library gifts application, but, i dont have any friends yet so i cant send them. so find me on face book and be my friend.

i also found some library applications which allow searching of the library catalogues directly through facebook, a handy way to combine homework and procrastination.

flicker

i was browsing around flikr and much to my suprise found the account of one of my favourite artists. http://www.flickr.com/photos/15087810@N02/ funny.

my library

i found it. i added some titles, i made a widget. take that ceaser.

http://www.librarything.com/catalog/ben_mcrae

funny image generated

ringbarked it...

also check this link for a cartoon i made
http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/comix.html?comix_id=21099862

another thing off the list

angry librarian

first post

ok, one of the first of the 23 things ben has to. i started a blog.