Reflections

Well, I'm very glad that I signed up for this Discover 2.0. I feel that I learned quite a lot. I had heard of My Space before, but that was it. The rest of it was all new to me.
I think, as a library employee, that these were good tools to learn. The library is already using some of these new technologies and the public is obviously using using these new technologies. So staying current on these new trends makes us more knowledgeable and helps us communicate better with each other and with patrons.

Videos

In honor of the new Indiana Jones movie opening today I have chosen an Indiana Jones themed video to display on my blog.
I rather enjoyed YouTube. I've heard so much about it, but I had I never actually gone to their website before. There are definitely some interesting videos on there. I also enjoyed MetaCafe and blip.tv. Although YouTube was the best.
The library is already utilizing this technology with the One Minute Critic videos. I really enjoy these videos. They encourage creativity(especially on the part on the critics) and they give the viewer new ideas on what to read next.

Microblogging

I think Tumblr or the linkblogs would be more useful, as far as libraries go anyway. With a linkblog, along with some sort of message, you can post videos or link to other websites. The library could post videos--like the One Mintue Critic (of which I am a big fan) or links to other library related websites.
Twitter seemed kind of plain next to Tumblr. But I did find it interesting that Barack Obama has a Twitter account. I think Twitter would be a good way for librarians to keep in touch and communicate with each other.

Podcasting

The podcasting was interesting. I had never really heard of it before. I couldn't access Podcast.met. Podcast Alley brought up a lot of library podcasts, but I couldn't listen to any because, once again, the computer I was on needed to download software before I could listen to it. Yahoo Podcast was not very helpful. I couldn't find very many intersting library podcasts on it.

I had a lot better luck with just going to Google and typing in 'library podcasts.' There were several interesting ones. My favorites were the podcasts of Storytime. There were also podcasts for library newsletters, booktalks for teens, etc... It seems that there no end of things you could do with a podcast and ultimately I think that podcasts would be a good way for the library to reach more people.

Music and Other Audio

I really liked playing around with the music sights. I think I liked IMEEM the best because it had a better selection of songs where you could listen to the full track. I also liked last.fm. What was freat about last.fm was that you could look up a specific artsit and get a bio on them along with 4-5 full tracks of their most downloaded songs. I didn't really like Pandora because you had to register to look around their site. Which really isn't that big of deal, but I like to look around and know what I'm getting myself into before I register for anything.
I thought Internet Archive was pretty interesting. Besides Audio, they also had movies, music and texts. I could read Little Women from snapshots taken of one of the 1869 original copies. That was pretty cool.
The Absolute Sound Effects Archive was pretty fun. I don't know that I would personally use it for anything, but I still liked it.
The Mango website to learn different languages sounds like a really good idea. Unfortunately I couldn't look around too much because the computer I was on needed an Adobe Flash Player upgrade and I don't have the administrator password to do it. But having such a website, where you receive language lessons for free, is really useful. My brother just paid $160 for a subscription to the Rosetta Stone program to learn Spanish. Too bad he didn't know about this website before. =)

Technorati

I must confess that I am not that into blogging, so I kept putting off lesson # 14 because I didn't think Technorati would be that thrilling to me. Well, it wasn't so bad. I liked the Percolator page better than the Popular page. Percolator seemed to have more news stories. The Popular page was just listing the most popular blogs, top searches, etc... I did find it interesting under top searches women were listed as #10. Overall, I did actually find Technorati pretty interesting.

Wikis

Before participating in Discover 2.0 the only wiki I head ever heard of was wikipedia. I had always liked wikipedia--it took a topic and thoroughly, but simply explained it. That was my rather limited view of wikis. I didn't realize how useful they could in business settings, libraries, or just among friends.
Now that my wiki knowledge has broadened (a little bit) there are other wikis that fascinate me. Such as wikibooks--they have cookbooks and recipes on there. I also enjoyed wikihow and wikitravel.

Google Docs

http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=d7kw446_0f6j2htcd


OK, The only way I could figure out how to post my google doc to my blog was to publish it and paste the url. I mostly liked google docs, but I could not get the 'post to blog' button to work for me.

Cool Stuff

So I tried the blog readablity test. The first time I did it my blog read at a college level, now it's at genius level. =) I'm pretty sure it usually says either college or genius.
I also tried the sketchcast. I couldn't quite get it to work, but it was interesting watching other people's sketches.
I really liked the wordshoot. I started out at an easy level and progressed to a harder level. I think I probably played it for about 15-20 minutes.

Library Thing vs. Good Reads

OK, I think this was my favorite exercise so far. I'm constantly looking for good books to read and I had previously found Librarything to be helpful. However, after signing up for Good Reads I think I like them better. I like the fact that it was kind of like Facebook where you could invite all your friends on your email list to join. It seems a bit more interactive to me. I also like the way Good Reads lets you review your book lists and so on. I wish that Good Reads would have the recomendations like Librarything does, but overall I like Good Reads the best.

www.goodreads.com/review/list/992030

www.goodreads.com/user/show/992030

Tagging and Delicious

It took me awhile to figure out how to navigate around delicious--but once I figured it out I really like it. I can see how delicious would be an asset to many professions--like teachers and librarians. I also think it could take forever to sift through all the bookmarked websites to see which ones are actually useful. I would be totally lost. But then again I never fully realized how many millions of websites there are out there.

So, can I see the potential of delicious as a research tool? Sort of. But it is definitely a good way to bookmark your websites and access them anywhere.

Fun with Generators

So playing around with the generators was interesting. To be honest I'm not how much I would actually use it, but it was certainly entertaining. These are a few of my favorite generators:

TV PITCH GENERATOR

"TV is a vast wasteland, but that's going to change. The problem is that a bunch of network suits and hack writers have been copying and pitching each others' bad ideas since TV began. Generator Land suggests a new approach.
With the TV Show Pitch Generator you can generate hundreds of original TV show ideas—starring actors that a rational person would never yolk together. Just sit back in your La-Z-Boy, click the button repeatedly, and enjoy unique and ridiculous TV show pitches."

These are a few of the pitches it came up with:

" a retarded surfing champion with a false leg woos a supreme court judge who only speaks in pig latin. Stars F. Murray Abraham and Lindsey Lohan. Genre: Comedy"

" a super hero who is a former child star is forced to work for a drug lord who runs a chocolate shop. Stars Fred Savage and Jim Backus. Genre: Mini-Series"

"A lounge singer with a magical hat falls in love with a personal shopper with claws for hands. Stars Katherine Helmond and Mary Tyler Moore. Genre: Action"


CHINESE NAME GENERATOR

Here is my name in Chinese:

Sarah 莎拉 - prononciation (PinYin) : shā lā

Of course I also liked the puzzle generator, among others. All in all it was pretty fun.

Social Networking

I don't see a problem with libraries using Facebook and/or Myspace. In fact, I think it is a good idea. Some of the articles I read suggested that maybe teens wouldn't like libraries 'invading' their social networks. I think that is a really weak arguement for not getting involved in social networking. If these teens don't like it, they don't have to click on the profiles. I took a look at some of the different library Myspace pages and I think they have useful information on them, not just for teens, but for any library user.

MEEBO & IM'ING

I guess I would be what is called i 'light' user (big suprise). I've never used instant messaging or any kind of chat room before. I do understand the concept of instant messaging and I think having the little meebo widget for reference questions would be great. Some kid doing their homework and has a question could get their question answered right away.
The very big pro in this would be the instant (or almost instant) answers to a patron's question. No waiting on hold or for a respnse to an email.
Obviously a downside to this is that not every question can be answered instantly, some need to be researched.

Continued thoughts on RSS

OK, I can see this RSS thing might be useful. It is helpful to go to just one website to read my news than having to search all over the internet.

Going to my favorite websites and searching for feeds was the best way to go about it for me. I liked the the Technorati website. It was easy to use and easy to understand. I also like the Google Blog search. I did not like, however, the Topix website. But that was probably because I couldn't figure out how to use it.

As for patrons, I think any geneology feeds would be good. Also, maybe feeds about book reviews, LibraryThing, that type of thing. Those are just a few examples--I think there are any number of topics that would interest patrons.

Thoughts on RSS

I will admit that I am one of those people who had never heard of RSS until yesterday--so it is all very new to me.
I kinda found it dificult to figure out how to add feeds to my blogline--but once I figured it out it was quite fun adding all different kinds of feeds. I can see how RSS would be very useful in a professional capacity. To be honest, I'm not sure how often I would use it myself. I think I need to become more familiar with RSS and play around with it more before I can determine how I would use it.
I did notice that there were a lot of feeds for libraries and book reviews. I think it would be handy in helping me find new books to read.

Puzzler Mashup

Online Jigsaw Puzzle

My favorite mashup (so far) is the Flickr Flash Puzzle Zone. You can upload any picture you want from your desktop, press create puzzle and you get your very own puzzle. For someone who enjoys jigsaw puzzles this is a pretty cool site. Even if you don't do jigsaw puzzles very often it's still fun.

I also like this Flickr mashup--mainly for its irony.

www.rapidmonkey.com/alphalearnr/

"AlphaLearnr
Flickr Mashup which helps children to learn English Alphabet through photos"

"Warning:- photos are searched and displayed dynamically through flickr api. Some content may come up, which may not be suitable for viewing by children. Its advisable that the parent be present with the child when using this service."

Flickr images

ok, what i've learned today... there are a lot of really useless pictures posted on the internet. =)however, there are some spectacular ones that totally make up for the useless ones. These are two of my favorites.




for me, the beach is the ultimate place of peace and calm. i don't care if its raining, stormy or just pure sunshine --- the beach can always relax and calm me. my other favorite place is the forest/mountains. very calming and peaceful--as long as you don't think too hard about what type of wild animals might be out there. but i find trees to also be very peaceful and calming.

thoughts on life long learning habits

OK, so this is my very first blog--be nice. =)

For me, I think the easiest habit is #3-- view problems as challenges. I tend to do that with any problem that presents itself. I'm the type of learner that thrives on challenges and working under pressure. I was the type of student that would begin an 20 page paper 2 days before it was due and still get an A. So habit #3 comes naturally to me.

I suppose the hardest habit for me is habit #1-begin with an end in mind. Part of why I thrive under challenges is because I have a hard time visualizing goals with an end. I tend to focus on what I'm doing right at this very minute and some abstract goal in the near or distant future means nothing to me.