Confessions of an IT nitwit

Instant messaging.

2010-06-15T22:13:00.000-07:00

I was involved with something very close to instant messaging a couple of years ago when I did the Internet-based Family History course offered by CAVAL. There was a time set each week for typed chat between the tutor and students enrolled in the course (usually two or three went on line).
Instant messaging as a means of delivering reference information as demonstrated by the University of North Carolina Library would be a useful addition to the suite of services offered by a large institution, and in tune with today's 'instant' society. It has advantages over the phoned or emailed enquiry in that the interaction allows immediate clarification of the client's requirements if required.
I know that Skype is a service used by several people in the local community who have family overseas. A very effective and economical alternative to phoning.
And today's political debate is an interesting example of a tweitter discussion!

Thank you for the course, Ellen and Mylee and associates.
I hate giving up on the course but because I don't use the Web 2.0 and 2.1 tools I am finding it increasingly hard to bluff my way through. And it isn't really being very honest anyway. For people who have embraced Web 2.0 this would have been an excellent follow-up and extension exercise.
Maybe I'll try and get back to mash-ups one day as that it the only week I really haven't done anything about but for the moment .. back to the circulation desk and sorting out the housebound books ....

On the Wild Side ....

2010-06-15T21:59:00.000-07:00

Everyone who interacts with the Internet will have been subject to scams and phishing attempts. I won't open emails or attachments unless I know the sender (too bad about the useful things I miss...) and have anti-virus software and various firewalls as installed by my computer technician.
I had a message appear on my screen one day saying that my computer was under virus attack and I should download a protective package. Thankfully I remembered about never opening something I hadn't asked for or knew the provenance of and consulted the technician. I got a lecture about how all such messages were avenues to virus infection and I should just ignore them, but at least I hadn't clicked on the attachment and so no harm resulted. It was just after I had downloaded a poem from a site for a client and the suggestion is that that left my computer vulnerable. But it is hard - the poem was the answer to a legitimate reference enquiry.

GoogleDocs is good medicine ....

2010-02-25T21:37:00.000-08:00

I proffer this as evidence that I did create a form in GoogleDocs
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dFhFVjY4UVp5Rl8wVG81VWdGbzctTHc6MA
I was one of those who thought GoogleDocs had great possibilities, not least because of being part of a Regional library in an earlier life. However the one time I was invited to particpate in creating a document via GoogleDocs it didn't work for me. But I still think in theory it is a great application!!
I had a look at the "list of 100 great Google doc tips" and thought the editing tips the most useful. Being able to make changes at the same time and sharing without emailing is at the heart of what makes GoogleDocs really useful. The ability to view various versions over time and if necessary choose "revert to this one" is very practical. And I rather thought I read somewhere that it was possible to colour-code alterations from individuals which would allow one to identify who was making the 'strongest' contributions and who was perhaps altering the underlying philosophy or didn't quite understand the intention of the document. And if I did imagine this it would be a useful refinement ....

IGoogle, IDo!

2010-02-09T21:30:00.000-08:00

I did try to print my screen to show off my IGoogle page but despite doing my best to follow the Internet Centre Manager's instructions nothing happened so back to the verbal approach .... the Tea house theme for the background, plus ABC News, BBC News, a ToDo window and the Sydney Weather Radar (I would have liked to find something closer to home but haven't managed it thus far .....). Actually it looked OK and had the sorts of things that I would find useful when coupled with some of the defaults.
If I was someone who used the Internet a lot, particularly the social uses, the IGoogle would be very useful at the personal level. I don't know that it has as much application in professional usage but the plethora of sources and services available as part of Web 2.0/1 makes such a management tool almost essential for anyone who is asignificant Internet user. As the notes say it is like a private web page. Professionally the widgets would not be appropriate and the social contacts would be much more streamlined so not the same need for a management aid.
I looked briefly at the others mentioned but thought that iGoogle with its blending of social and informational resources would be my choice. Shareoholic looked very useful for managing social links.

Doodling sans pencil ......

2010-01-27T21:17:00.000-08:00

http://www.doodle.com/summary.html?pollId=fxgpn7ywrvsa8kh2">
This is my proof that I did try and set up a Doodle and embed it in my blog and was ready to send an invitation to nswpln@gmail.com. Maybe I will try again later .....
Doodle seemed to me to be a close relative of Google Docs when as an online group one worked out a mutually agreeable document whereas here the group works out a mutually agreeable set of meeting dates. It would be very useful in a large and/or dispersed organisation (e.g. multi-site library).
Google calendar looked very useful and I liked the way that you can have different calendars for different target audiences. Automatic reminders and offline access are a bonus.
I looked at Eventbrite etc. Anyvite seemed to be more directed to the private user and to offer assistance with designing your invitation with various pro formas although you could share your completed invitation and receive RSVPs, etc. Eventful and Eventbrite are more for the big event and more an announcement forum than for creation of invitations/notices. There are also clearer options for bookings and payments. Eventful seemed more used for arts-related events while Eventbrite was more general - even more commercial - in orientation. Eventbrite offered 198 events near Sydney, sorted by location, category and date (today/this week/this month). Eventful didn't show any Sydney events but there were a number from Melbourne.
Of the three Anyvite would be most useful to this library, but is unlikely to be used.

A(nother) Productivity Report .....

2009-12-16T20:53:00.000-08:00

As I don't actually use RSS it may be a little difficult to bluff my way through this week's unit .... I did set up the requuired five feeds last year and at least some of them worked.

The filtering of RSS feeds is a logical next step in the battle to survive the information explosion. RSS feeds themselves were an attempt to do this and putting in filters is the next step in sifting out what might be of use - a sieving of the sieve ...... With the emphasis on social networking which characterizes the Web these days, the sharing of RSS feeds along with everything else makes sense. If a set of sites/information is useful to you then it should be useful to others sharing your interests or professional milieu. And if you share your set with others and have the option on theirs in return, then it is more efficient all round.

I had a look at most of the suggested sites. FeedRinse (what an appropriate name!) seemed the best option in that it allowed different types of filters to be set (whereas FeedSift-filters just used keywords) and the home page had lots of information for the starting user.
I think my own computer probably send me enough reminders and Spreed made my eyes sore - I thought it verged on the gimmicky.
The flexibility of having RSS feeds sent to different destinations also makes sense. For instance Twitter seems to have largely replaced the traditional email for some users so RSS to Twitter would be more useful for them.
I checked for Google alerts today and there were another dozen, mainly to do with Weddin Shire. Somehow I need to establish "Grenfell Public Library" as a string because I got a couple of alerts with the words separated by other terms and hence not relevant.

Of slideshows, screencasting and digital storytelling.

2009-12-10T21:37:00.000-08:00

As someone who has never put together a Powerpoint presentation it's all out of my league but it was interesting to look at the examples. I'm certainly not up to the Adventure!!
I rather liked the Culture Shock stories - a chance to be really creative rather than just dashing off a quick thought to inform someone or sell something, principally one's self , which seems to be what much of the Web is about.
I tried a couple of searches on Slideshare and feel that there is some good information out there. For example searching on "libraries" brought up such useful items as "Non Technical Introduction to CrossRef for Libraries (139 views, 18 downloads) and "Branding for Public Libraries (57 views, 9 downloads). I also experimented with "Alaska" and "Christmas". If slideshows are actually created for a presentation then they will have been put together with some care to meet the requirements of a specific audience and so the content may be of higher quality than some Web resources.
And of course being able to acess a presentation on the Web when you missed the original presentation would be very convenient - and cost-effective for funding authorities as a tempting substitute for sending delegates ...!! The animated versions are more powerful and the "Searching for Articles" from Academic Research would be a very useful piece for those requiring that information.
Slideshows are to the other elements on the Web as CDROMs or cassettes, etc are to books - another format. They become useful when they can be searched by search engines just as the alternate formats in a library are useful when they can be located by the catalogue. Can they contribute to RSS feeds or some other alerting service? - that would add to their usefulness.

By the way, there has been one Google Alert for "Weddin Shire" (the lead story in the local newspaper).

Fascinat-ning ....

2009-12-09T19:02:00.000-08:00

I looked at the four sample nings and were most impressed with them. The first three, directed to the public, were bright and colourful, logically laid out and offered a large amount of content. Mosman Readers was particularly impressive. The more professionally-oriented Library 2.0 ning was not as eye-catching but had the other elements of good organisation and lots of useful content. There seemed to be a degree of consistency in the way they are structured which would make the casual user feel more at home.
One of my concerns with Web 2.0/1 is how to you choose between blogs, wikis and etc and it seems to me that a ning is the answer because it has everything at the one site. And because a significant amount of the content is provided by users in the form of reviews, photos, groups and forum entries it wouldn't take as much upkeep as might first appear. (Not that Grenfell will ever consider having a ning!!!!) I would think that a large library with dedicated IT staff would find a ning a very useful means of communication with its users and professional bodies would benefit from the forums. Nice to have a range of forums emanating from the one site!
I did try to join the library 2.0 ning and as usual it is the little things that beat me - couldn't conceive of how to upload a photo and so wasn't accepted as a member. I would have joined the Rural Libraries group (even though they all looked to be US libraries) as well as the NSW public libraries group. I read through some of the posts for the rural libraries group and found myself very much in sympathy with the views expressed. It looks like small rural libraries face similar issues the world over!

Evaluating ....

2009-12-08T21:54:00.000-08:00

I have set up a Google Alert for "Grenfell Public Library" and "Weddin Shire" this afternoon but will not know any results for several weeks. My guess would be none for the library and a few for Weddin Shire.
I have set up the Feedburner account but don't expect it to discover any action.
And I had a look around both Surveymonkey and Zoomerang, and experimented with creating a two-question survey (but at least they were different types of questions!) on Surveymonkey but didn't send it out of course. The general structure of their surveys is very familar from various State Library surveys .....
Evaluation is the essential final step in any initiative. It is alright to put heaps of effort into maintaing a blog etc but it can only be justified if it is actually being used. Getting online responses is one test but simple objective statistics are the easiest to understand and use in reports to funding authorities and the like.
And a site like Surveymonkey sure takes the hard work out of setting out surveys although one still has to create the congnitive content.

Del.icio.us ... but pavlova is better ....

2009-11-20T17:36:00.000-08:00

But Del.icio.us has been OK too. I managed to set up the account OK, make a bookmark and migrate it to Twitter. With minimal tags bundling was not an option but I did find the relevant section of Del.icio.us. I even clicked on Linkrolls and Tagrolls but wasn't game to actually try and activate one of them. I subscribed to "Iceland + travel" thinking that would be reasonably esoteric but came up with 21,142 bookmarks so cancelled that one post haste. Either the spaces were a problem or else that just sums up how unwieldy Delicious bookmarks can become. Subscribing to "nswlearning2.1" brought up a much more manageable 18 bookmarks. Searching Del.icio.us under a general tag like "libraries" is a waste of time - the more specific one got (e.g. using the maximum four tags) the more useful it might be but limiting the search to a specific user pool would be more efficient.
I don't use Delicious at all, but if I did and was part of a Twitter group sharing the bookmarks to Twitter would be very useful (personally and professionally), and bundling tags would be essential. Bookmarking combined with Twitter alerts would be particularly useful to specialist librarians and researchers.
In the Web 2.0 course I made the following comments about Delicious and in the absence of additional insights repeat them here .... "I think social bookmarking such as Del.icio.us offers could be a great resource for libraries and their clients. Adding to a Favourites list soon makes that so large as to be unusable whereas the grouping/bundling of tags is a logical and easy way of managing links to multiple sites.
"The fact that the bookmarks are public means that a del.icio.us account becomes an online virtual-world equivalent to the old subject card catalogue. Library members can access a range of sites which come with the library's implicit recommendation as a reliable site sorted according to broad subject labels.
"In a regional/joint library situation different libraries/individuals could be assigned to different subject areas so that the burden of setting up what is akin to a subject index was shared. Or maybe something like the old Subject Specialisation Scheme but instead of collecting and managing books in a subject area libraries collect and 'manage' sites in a subject area, making access to them available through social bookmarking. I guess even now smaller libraries can 'piggyback' on the published tags of larger libraries, e.g. the Sutherland Shire Libraries tag cloud.
"A Library Journal article on the advantages of social bookmarking and tagging pointed to advantages for both patrons and staff. For patrons there was a greater accessibility to resources. Using the tags as links one can do all one's research from one's own home computer. As well having publicly-defined tags means that local terminology can be incorporated, terms that have been used in locallly-set assignments, also terms from other languages. The inherent risk of substandard as opposed to nonstandard tag terms could be overcome by having tags that broadly conform with the Library of Congress subject headings and would be entered by the library, tags that are judged by the library staff to be of local relevance and tags generated by users. Library staff could use Del.icio.us to add links to items of particular local relevance and resources for local students' assignment topics.
"For staff social bookmarking makes creating subject guides easier. Looking at what other people have bookmarked facilitates the task. No-one can find even a percentage of the useful sites in a subject area but sharing discoveries is of benefit to all, library staff as well as users. Bookmarking and 'bundling' also provides reference staff with a set of useful sites they can turn to immediately just as they would have looked to the index of an encyclopedia set in an earlier age. Once some librarians had card indexes of good sites but with the number of sites ballooning exponentially this is no longer a viable option. It is likely that users will also advise of sites they have found useful and they can be incoporated after checking to the benefit of all."
I am most unlikely to ever use Del.icio.us outside of this course but I can remember being quite struck by its potential when I first encountered it in the Web 2.0 course.

Just Twittering on ......

2009-11-19T21:00:00.000-08:00

I have opened a Twitter account but have protected it. (I assume the process is the important part of the exercise.) I included my blog address and I've published one Tweet. I've set up Mylee and Ellen as people to follow (sorry, ladies but who else ...)
My Twitter name is .. itnitwit of course.
I'm not fussed on micro-blogging - it would appear very time-consuming and the compressed language would be off-putting to older clients. However the flexibility of being able to tweet using a mobile phone as well as a computer is attractive and I gather Twitter provides updates in real time while Facebook only provides alerts to updates. (What a comment on our 'thirty second society' that Twitter has such tremensdous popularity ...)
In the library context ... Twitter is being used and obviously successfully. Professionals use it as an alerting service, e.g. Mylee - a bit like a human RSS feed with the advantages of a professional judgement of relevance and contact with all those serendipitous discoveries in sources no-one else has located to set up a feed from. And libraries use it to communicate with their client base, the aforementioned Sunshine Coast Library Service being a good example. They follow 36 names and have 142 followers and 141 tweets published, so the medium is being used.
Twitter could also be useful for quick contacts between professionals working on the same project at diferent sites. Direct messaging is an efficient approach.
Libraries need to choose just one social networking system. I don't feel I know enough about them to choose between Twitter and Facebook and MySpace and .... And they must accept that any of them carry considerable potential for abuse if only from individuals overly-focussed on checking for their next message

Twitter - it's for the birds!

2009-11-17T20:27:00.000-08:00

I began by browsing Twitter using 'libraries' and 'librarians' as search terms . It seemed to me on the basis of the Tweets I looked at that the Tweets fell into four main categories: i) personal, which contained the search term but no information of significance outside of a defined friendship or work group, e.g. "Acquisition tasks are a lot trickier than I thought they would be . Oh, the challenge :)". Sorry, but to me that was pretty much a waste of time. ii) advertisements, which may well be useful but I thought there might be more efficient ways of communicating to potential users, e.g. "8 great #MooTools libraries for web designs" with a link to a company web page. iii) alerts to much longer articles on the web, which might be of use but perhaps there would be a more effective alert service such as an RSS feed. iv) (semi?)professional comments such as "I wonder if any libraries make donations to Wikipedia part of their collection budget .. going to suggest that where I work". But a Tweet like that seemed to me to belong more in a wiki or other profession-based network. More effective was "Forthcoming events @Boroondara Librarties for children and parents" plus a link to the library website.

I experimented with "diabetes" and "Central Asia travel" as optional topics. With respect to "diabetes" the first Tweet provided a website and "i think i died" - how useful a Tweet is that?? The second, "Pregnancy problems gestational diabetes", provided a link to a web site but wasn't much more than an ad for a brand of test strips. You'd do better with a subject search in a reputable medical database. The third was a reply to someone else's Tweet saying "My wife has type 1 diabetes" - on par with the first.

"Central Asia travel" produced four identical "I travel often far and near (list of continents/regions)" and one other Tweet ,"Tien-Shan Travel - your local expert in Central Asia - blog" and a link to a tour itinerary, which at least is useful (it looked a good tour actually ...) but you would get the same result with "Central Asia tours trek*" in a search engine.

By this stage I was ready to dismiss Twitter as a great potential time-waster for limited results but .... I looked at the Twitter entries of the Sunshine Coast Libraries and was much more impressed. That library uses Twitter as an alert service for patrons. It's most recent Tweet was "Last chance to purchase ticket for an evening with Judy Nunn tomorrow night" and there were also notices for other author talks, invitations to book launches and a link to the library's eNewsletter.

Tweeting takes up a lot of time and a library would need to consider very seriously why they are setting it up and what they want/can get out of it before making the investment. The Sunshine Coast Libraries have a clearly defined purpose and scope in Tweeting and that makes it work.

Like Phoenix rising ....

2009-11-10T16:48:00.000-08:00

ITnitwit resurfaces from technological inertia to tackle Web 2.1 ......
She would like to claim persistence in using a variety of Web 2.0 tools since completing last year's course but that would be a lie. She hasn't blogged at all but did go into a few other 2.0 course member blogs and leave comments.
There are of course a myriad of blogs she could have looked at, both professional and recreational, but she hasn't. What does she like about blogging? Well, apparently not enough to bestir her into participating in them, but she does appreciate their simplicity to use and the variety of elements that can be included. She still thinks that blogs work best for information dispersal ('vertical') and that wikis are better for communication between professionals - where sharing information is the prelude to creating new information ('horizontal').
She tried very hard to update her blog using a couple of templates from two of the third party sites, but without success (she did inadvertently end up with one design as her desktop wallpaper which was a bit unfortunate - she managed to get rid of it in the end ...). The colibri floral design was particularly appealing. However she was a bit comforted by reading in the comments below that template on the site that about half of those trying to download it failed and they got the same error message that she did ....
So she just changed to a new blogspot template, and added a couple of facts and a picture downloaded from Clip Art to her profile.

Fanfare puh-leese

2008-05-11T21:54:00.000-07:00

Good afternoon, all.
A final conundrum with RSS feeds ... when I tried to create a subscription to Bloglines from Your Tutor I was assured no feeds could be detected but an update just occurred to my errant Internet Explorer feed from Your Tutor .....??????
I have just made a minor edit on the Wikipedia entry for Grenfell, New South Wales (added 'cyclist Reggie "IronMan" McNamara' to the paragraph mentioning tennis player Jan Lehane and cricketer Stan McCabe) and made two suggestions on the related talk page - well, actually set up a related talk page and then made two suggestions.
I never did get round to loading photos onto Flickr but I feel now is the right time to consider myself as having met all the basic requirements of the course and completed a few of the Adventure options.
So, Adieu and a big thank you to all involved in the Web 2.0 course from Itnitwit.

The end of the (RSS) feed-ing frenzy .....

2008-05-11T18:39:00.001-07:00

Good morning, all.
I enjoyed Ellen's comment that I seemed to be having a "very interesting time exploring RSS" - what a broad application that word 'interesting' can have ....
The good news is that on the third attempt I got feeds to appear in Bloglines - was easy once I included the vital step of setting up a "Sub with Bloglines" in Favourites. I set up the following feeds

ABS Blog for Librarians (10) (0)
FOLK AUSTRALIA (10) (0)
NEWS.com.au | Africa (10) (0)
Powerhouse Museum - Photo of the Day (10) (0)
Tag: Diabetes - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) (10)

I tried to set up a feed to the Lonely Planet podcast and videocast but got an 'unspecified error' message so maybe this hardware could not cope with that.
RSS feeds are certainly a great timesaver at an individual level and would be very relevant in a specialist library or in professional development.
I can't see me using RSS feeds in my work unless I got a sudden urge to become more involved in the theory of the profession and needed to be au fait with professional material and posts.
I must confess I didn't really go hunting other library blogs ....

I tried very hard to set up a news feed to this post. There are items showing up but I don't know whether it will automatically update as I would have thought it should .. Anyway I tried!! (the story of my involvement in this course ..!!!)

Stewing with RSS feeds

2008-05-05T18:21:00.000-07:00

My instinct was that RSS feeds would be bad news and what do they say about trusting one's instincts?!!
I have the account in Bloglines - that was an easy entree - and have managed to get the feed from the Powerhouse Museum's picture of the day - has turned up for twenty days. But I don't really know why - I click on 'subscribe' but am not asked to put in a destination so I can't conceive how the connection occurs unless the fact that I have an open Bloglines account is enough. But I suspect it is just within the computer, not going through Bloglines because when I look at my feeds on Bloglines it says I have one feed but I can't open it from there .. and I presume I should be able to?? But on the other hand I set up the initial feed on the CTC computer but it is showing up on the library computer which suggests it isn't just within the computer ... So if what I did was right it is very easy but it just seems to be too easy .... (But I am ITnitwit!!!!!)
I still have to find four more sites from which to set up feeds. But the general comments ... I can see RSS feeds being wonderful time savers for individuals and for specialist libraries who could nominate a single figure number of really useful websites/blogs. No more having to trawl those sites at regular intervals checking for the new material. But for the generalist library RSS feeds would be most useful for staff tapping into relevant professional sites rather than as a service for clients as it would be very hard to know which sites to connect to. They would also be a useful topic for a small group instruction module, providing a real service and again positioning the library as relevant and 'techno-savvy'. (I'm not sure how much the CTC manager knows about RSS feeds ....)
As someone else commented, it was hard to find suitable sites from which to set up feeds. I tried a few way-out things like African cooking and Iceland looking at websites rather than blogs but I assume if you click on the RSS logo (on the menu bar, not within the window) and it says no feeds detected, you can't set up feeds. I found an RSS logo on the diabetes section of healthinsite.gov.au/topics but coudn't get the feed to work. Also I couldn't get a feed set up from Annabel Crabbe's blog on the Herald site. When I clicked on the RSS icon the screen went back to general news. So all in all not quite an unmitigated disaster but not a real success either ....

Getting 'thingy' about LibraryThing

2008-05-05T17:36:00.000-07:00

Good morning, all.
I doubt that anyone will follow it up but I did include the following in a recent Library Lines column in the local newspaper .....

Last week as part of THAT course I ......and discovered LibraryThing ...
LibraryThing (http://www.librarything.com/) is ideal for people who love reading books AND love doing things on their computer. I would describe it as a cross between a huge library catalogue (contains over 25 million books) and a humungous book club. LibrayThing is an online sevice to help people catalogue their books easily and because everyone catalogues together, LibraryThing also connects people with the same books, comes up with suggestions for what to read next, and so forth. There are a large number of groups you can join, and at 'Talk' contribute to various conversations on book-related themes. Not surprisingly the largest group numerically is "Librarians who Library Thing" and my favourite topic in their Group Talks is "Funny Requests from Patrons" - it's a scream!
Click on any title and you will find ecommendations of similar books, member reviews and current related conversation topics.
LibraryThing uses the profile of the books you have entered to suggest books you might like to read (and even ones you wouldn't!). Once you have entered your books you can search them, sort them and add subject 'tags' or labels, also rate them, e.g. 4 stars, and write reviews.
Why not explore LibraryThing for yourself ..."

Social networking and all that

2008-04-27T23:32:00.000-07:00

Good evening...
I have looked at each of the examples of social networking in action and I can see that these institutions are using MySpace etc to great effect. Their sites are eye-catching, informative and provide lots of opportunities for members to interact with the site which is so much the expectation of contemporary culture, or at least youth culture.
I was particularly interested with the local Government Communities of Practice example which is much 'bigger' than libraries but could offer great potential for enhancing the social fabric. The East Renfrewshire Council example was also interesting because it was simpler and therefore more accessible to me than some of the others, impressive though they are. I could see something like it as being only just out of reach of this library.
It could be just that I have been toiling over this course for five hours today but the different applications - blogs, wikis, social networks - are starting to merge together in my mind. They all seem to involve networking in the sense of sharing ideas and inviting interaction and where does one out-perform another? I guess these social networking sites have the advantage of already having a high profile in the cyber-world - even I have heard of MySpace and FaceBook although I had never visited them before today. And the sample sites are so comprehensive with pictures, blogs, videos and podcasts, posts, links that perhaps they incorporate individual elements that we have previously looked at like wikis and blogs and videos - encompass the lot.
For libraries who have staff with the expertise and time to maintain sites like these, a page in MySpace would be great for client marketing and interaction. For one of the earlier applications - I forget which - I thought no-one would be likely to find the library's entry, but that wouldn't be such an issue on MySpace. For networking at the professional level I think you would use a wiki or a more closed environment like that.
But the course asked about possibilities for my library using social networking and they don't look good. Apart from the veracity of that user name, I can't imagine myself ever having time to manage such a site, bearing in mind that a poorly maintained and presented site is as much a 'put-off' as a well-constructed, attractive and informative site is a 'come-on'. I note that the NewsGrist article suggested that at least for that institution the maintenance of a presence in MySpace was effective in increasing interest, usage and interaction and that managing time is based on balancing competing priorities and not always doing the existing tasks because they have always been there. A modest blog might be a better spec than the current printed Newsletter. But the latter takes about five hours once every six weeks - an effective MySpace page would take a lot more than that!!

Sharing documents. a.k.a. instant correction service...

2008-04-27T21:54:00.000-07:00

Good afternoon.
I've created a very fictitious document and hopefully sent it to nswpln. I don't want it back (!!) but I can quite see how the exchange of versions back and forth
would be very useful. Oriana, I hope you don't collapse when you receive something entitled 'Contract between the State Library ..." - I didn't know whether I should 'Invite Collaboration" or just click 'Share' and I did try to send it under the title of "Week 11 Web 2.0 course exercise" but it rather looks like it went with the document title - sorry about that ....
Such document construction would be ideal in a regional library situation or where there are dispersed sites of a library when creating something to go over the name of the one institution. I can also see such document sharing being handy for producing strategic plans and similar policy documents at a Zone or regional level. Instead of a draft document being tabled and taken away and read for the next meeting, and then variations voted on and them taken away and written in to produce a final document to be tabled at a third meeting, a document that has been read, amended and agreed to should only need the one tabling. Even doing editing by ricocheting emails is pretty inefficient as explained in the Plain English video. Also such a method means more people can be involved in the production of such documents (not just a two/three person sub-committee) which should improve their quality on the one hand and their acceptability on the other.
This sort of document preparation or at least document drafting would be effective meeting preparation, requiring participants to really think about the issues involved and come with thoughtful reactions to share. I would see concurrent document editing and associated communication explaining why changes were made.

(S)mash - ups!

2008-04-27T18:42:00.000-07:00

Good morning, all.
Mashups are fun! Being more creatorati that technorati downloading the photo was an issue but using the Bighugelabs to create a poster was easy. A little more flexibility in positioning the lettering would be nice .... Now, will I be able to download it to the blog ....
This was not actually my choice of image but the image I had in mind, a group of some eighty people at a library function all waving their arms in the air, to be labelled "Locals Love their Library", was not in fact in the camera. So I decided the process was the important thing .....

Mashups would be an absolute boon for promotional and marketing activities within the library. My immediate thought was of a suite of promotional material including posters, bookmarks, calendars, postcards, letterheads using the one image as the uniting element. Quick to do, professional looking, uniquely local. They would also be useful in creating award certificates.
There is also plenty of scope for using mashups in local history. For example a series of scenes and images of primary documents tracing the route of a local explorer. The "London: a life in maps" example could be replicated in the local town or a survey of local agricultural history - the local history librarian could work with the local museum on such a project. They are being lost as the older farming families move away or die out but there would still be enough local farm families with historical farming photos that could be used for such a project.
For the techno-savvy librarian running small-group courses in something like using mash-ups would be a very popular initiative, particularly in school vacations -a useful service and also an effective marketing strategy, demonstrating the library as relevant, up-to-date and generally 'cool'. Even the CTC manager here had never heard of mashups.

By the way, to anyone monitoring this, I did answer a question on Yahoo!7Answers a couple of weeks ago - a very basic question about what states made up Great Britain in the cold war period. I also wrote up LibraryThing in last week's Library Lines column in the local newspaper.

Podcasts

2008-04-15T16:54:00.000-07:00

As I looked at a few podcasts I thought of Stephen Fry and his concern that he miss a favourite programme .... Quite a few of them seemed to me to be the equivalent of the VCR recording-the-movie-for-later-viewing for radio.
On my library website you can't even upload a photo so using things like podcasts are but a dream... However, in a dream world .... I wondered whether podcasts would be easier to produce than videos as they are sound only. In which case they might be better than video broadcasts for some of the 'talking head' events like author visits or interviews, and could be incorporated in any news section on a library's web site/blog/wiki.
The ABC podcasts are just selected programmes from the last week - more useful for individuals who miss a programme or specalist libraries who can keep an eye on casts from a narrow subject area and would have clients looking within that subject area.
It seemed to me that apart from a general resource in reference work (equal in value to any other information source) and library news/marketing contexts, podcasts have two main uses:
- summary information on resources (inhouse and other)produced for single/narrow-interest users by a specialist library on a regular basis - weekly? monthly?. The podcasts provided by the National Library of Medicine in the U.S. are akin to this - a weekly update by the Director highlighting health issues and accompanying information from Medline Plus, lasting c.5 minutes.
- book reviews and reader assistance. The example I liked best was "Bookstacks Quick and Simple" from the Library Success Wiki. Very colourful site, well set-out with short book reviews (c.3 minutes), a new one posted each day but all indexed and accessible by genre. There are also book talks written by students which should appeal to the younger brigade. It would not take too much time to podcast such a review regularly within a library website, say three times a week, and although not being able to see the book cover is a disadvantage, it would require less input than a video (and once you've seen the cover what else is there to show on a videoed book review anyway!).
Pierce Country Library has podcast five book reviews, and that seems to be the use most libraries are choosing.
Orange County Library has a considerable library of podcasts under three general headings - Children's Podcasts, Teen Podcasts and Events Podcasts. Under the latter were a number of "Meet the Author" talks which were basically ads for forthcoming author visits with information and a brief comment on the author and their work - like a radio ad/notice. Included in the Children's Podcasts were read short stories, and notices about upcoming programmes, e.g. "Gross Out Fun" is a one minute long podcast including an introduction to "How to Eat Fried Worms" and an invitation to 'Grossology", a children's library event.
Dryden Middle School has thirteen podcasts available consisting of addresses and musical performances presented at the school. These could be of interest to members and the community and are a way of the institution selling itself to its community as a happening place, something libraries strive for as well.
I was struck by the range of library produced podcasts, from the short and simple "Bookstacks Quick and Simple" to the very learned podcasts of the National Library of Medicine. (Obviously in terms of the different target audiences of course.)
The Online Education Database suggests that podcasts could have a role in professional development and ongoing study for librarians.
Alas, as far as this library is concerned the best I could do would be to mention the existence of podcasts and a couple of web sites with high interest items (like the ABC site) in the Library Lines. I could set up a link from our web site to something like the ABC site but too many links become cumbersome, and I don't think I'm up to having hierarchical links like Cleveland or Sutherland!!

To 'slam' or not to 'slam' .....

2008-04-14T16:14:00.000-07:00

On the basis of a fairly brief look in Yahoo!7 Answers much of the material is rubbish - the questions are insincere and the answers aren't much better. Perhaps the fact that I looked under the Environment and Health categories skewed the results. Most questions in Environment were more platforms for expressing an opinion.
WikiAnswers had a much higher standard of questions and answers.
"Slamming the boards" certainly showcases the quality of library reference services - the quality of the answers stood out like a beacon and no wonder they regularly received 'best answer' accolades - much more detailed, referenced, with referrals to further information sources whereas many of the other answers were only a sentence based on the respondent's 'knowledge'. The little asides like "your library is a great resource for all" and (my favourite) "we {i.e. librarians} eat questions for breakfast" are a good marketing ploy in reminding viewers of the existence and relevance to them of libraries.
However I won't be out 'slamming the boards' because I simply don't have time - need to answer local reference questions first. Reference librarians in bigger libraries might like to do the odd one as time permits - the 'whatever you can do on one day per month' is a good idea - as a professional activity, for personal satisfaction or even just in case some Australians might have questions out there and so be accessible for the message. I can't imgine any of my locals using an answer board to hear the pro-library messages/see the evidence of library relevance and quality and the 'serve for the general good' theory fails to convince in the face of other pressures
Local ratings ... I guess clients vote with their feet (which is damning when one's circulation and visitor statistics are heading south ....) I haven't had much success in getting members to rate returned fiction books with a 'smiley' or 'frown' face label and that's a pretty basic collection evaluation measure. As far as reference answers go I just rely on the 'Now does that answer your question?" feedback request. The annual plea for feedback on "How could the library more effectively meet your needs?" service has garnered responses ranging rom six to nil in the five years it has been conducted. So .. are they happy? apathetic? resigned? Search me !!!

Shorter but sweeter..

2008-04-13T23:59:00.000-07:00

I won't worry about the Adventure of setting up an account on LibraryThing - I haven't got time to read let alone keep track of it - but can I recommend you click on Groups, locate "Librarians who Library Thing" and select the talk topic "Funny Requests from Patrons"? Guaranteed to lift your mood!!!
My reaction to LibraryThing is that it is amazing, a cross between Libraries Australia and an infinitely large reading club. But I get this picture of people sitting in front of a computer screen typing away instead of actually reading books -surely you would need a lot of time to do both .... On the other hand, the reader assistance potential is huge. I think I will alert library patrons to its existence through the Library Lines column and leave them to to pursue it if they wish.

I'm Literati, not Technorati ...

2008-04-13T23:08:00.000-07:00

..and I'll prose on at length to prove it!
To start with "bookmobile" brought up the same number of hits on both Simple and Advanced Search, and "nswpln2008" brought up nothing on either, so I checked the comments back on the home webpage for hints.
And logic kicked in - of course a keyword search was going to bring up the same results at both. Using the tag search option, "bookmobile" at Advanced Search brought up 33 compared with 534 at Basic Search. The first hit at Advanced Search was posted 17 days ago and has an Authority rating (an index of popularity) of 36 and the second most recent 46 days ago with 0 Authority. Which compares with 2 days ago with an Authority of 46 and 5 days ago with an Authority of 147 for the first two hits at Simple Search. Which would seem to indicate that many people do not bother with tagging. The first hit at Advanced Seach was 17th at Simple Search and the second not in the top 20 so if you only looked at the first page or so of results they would likely be missed.
"nswpln2008" would be used as a tag only for the images loaded on Flickr as part of this course so logical that it was only relevant when searching for photos and hence at Simple Search. I tried the course URL at the second Advanced Search option and just got an error message, but I would have expected hits there.
I tried "library manag*" at both Simple and Advanced Search and got 29 hits at Simple Search and nothing at Advanced Search until I got rid of the truncation and used "library manager" - got 2 then.
Advanced Search is most useful when you are looking for things relating to a URL. Tag searching is not nearly as efficient as keyword searching and you can narrow your search to posts/blogs/photos/videos there as well.

Del.icio.us?? well. maybe ...

2008-04-13T19:23:00.000-07:00

Good morning, all...
I have set up an account on del.icio.us - - and didn't find it hard except are the buttons on the register screen the same as the extensions referred to in the course notes as optional? I hope so because I didn't include them. Achieving a link proved impossible, particularly when the CTC manager couldn't do it either - maybe you have to have a few items bookmarked?
I wasn't sure whether I was supposed to actually bookmark something .. maybe if I get time... I think that social bookmarking such as del.icio.us offers could be a great resource for libraries and their clients. As the "Social Bookmarking in Plain English" video says adding to a Favourites list soon makes that so large as to be unusable whereas the grouping/bundling of the tags is a logical and easy way of managing links to multiple sites.
The fact that the bookmarks are public means that a del.icio.us account becomes an online virtual-world equivalent to the old subject card catalogue. Library members can access a range of sites which come with the library's implicit recommendation as a reliable site sorted according to broad subject labels.
In a regional/joint library situation different libraries/individuals could be assigned to different subject areas so that the burden of setting up what is akin to a subject index was shared. Or maybe something like the old Subject Specialization Scheme but instead of collecting and managing books in a subject area libraries collect and 'manage' sites in a subject area, making access to them available through social bookmarking. I guess even now smaller libraries can 'piggyback' on the published tags of larger libraries e.g. the Sutherland Shire Libraries tag cloud.
There is also the marketing aspect of using something like del.icio.us as far as the YA sector is concerned. It is attuned to how they think and operate.
Lists v. tag clouds. The tag cloud is more attractive somehow, even if the list is more precise with its numerical basis. I will immediately be labelled as sexist but I wondered whether there was a relationship with the masculine/feminine thought style thing - analytical v. creative ..... recognising that these are thought styles rather than gender specific..... (does that get me off the hook???)
I found a really good article on Libraries and del.icio.us setting out some of the advtantages of social bookmarking and tagging - http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA476.403.html - (if I was really on top of this course this would be showing up as a link!!!)and it suggested three key things:
A. improves accessibility of library materials. (Although you would need to define library materials as including entry points to online information). Using the tags as links one could do all one's research from one's own home computer. As well having publicly-defined tags means that local terminology can be incorporated, terms that have been used in locally-set assignments, also terms from other languages. The drawback of using publicly-generated tags is the same as with wikis - potential vandalism and substandard as opposed to nonstandard terms - but when they are entered with sincerity they would make searching much more efficient,easy and welcoming, particularly for the educationally-challenged and minority groups. A compromise would be to have both - tags that broadly conform with the Library of Congress subject headings and would be entered by the library, tags that are judged by library staff to be of local relevance and tags generated by users.
Library staff can use del.icio.us to add links to items of particular local relevance and resources for local students' assignment topics.
B. introduces patrons to new tools. Not so sure about this one, but it means patrons can use the new tools they already enjoy in a library context. And this is going to help maintain the relevance of libraries as an information source. Otherwise libraries may fall out of the information loop for many people.
C. makes creating subject guides easier for staff. Looking at what other people have bookmarked facilitates the task. No-one can find even a percentage of the useful sites in a subject area but sharing discoveries is to the benefit of all, libray staff as well as users. Bookmarking and 'bundling' also provides reference staff with a set of useful sites they can turn to immediately just as they would have looked to the index of an encyclopedia set in an earlier age. I have heard of librarians who had card indexes of good sites but with the number of sites ballooning exponentially this is no longer a viable option. For example the cited National Library of Australia AskNow Librarians example. It is likely that users will also advise of sites they have found useful that can be incorporated after checking to the benefit of all.
P.S. I have taken advice and the link is article ... I hope!!

(More than) a few thoughts on videos ...

2008-04-06T18:07:00.000-07:00

I've just noticed the last post was on 1st April .. now why do I see that as significant ...
Those online videos:
"lego" - considerable overlap between YouTube and Google
"Liverpool plains" - the first video on both YouTube and Google was the same, of grain harvesting on the Liverpool Plains in NSW. YouTube pointed to the challenges of effective tagging - there followed about twenty videos featuring a singer at the barfly Liverpool. In contrast Google followed with a lot of Mormom Church videos that didn't appear on YouTube. Maybe there is an option for Google searching of tags? Otherwise you would bring up a lot of irrelavnt items .....
"Kogarah" - considerable overlap of content. YouTube had a video of a Kogarah High music recital in the library which is good local advertisement for both the library and the local high school. There were also several videos on the Kogarah bed races which would be a good local history resource in future years and also useful for Council/tourist promotion.

Putting in "Mosman Library" brought up nothing on YouTube and a series of "{Media personality or author} at Mosman Library" videos of 40 mins to 1 hour duration on Google. (Too long for YouTube.) In theory these videos would be a very attractve addition to a blogged Library Newsletter. However at that length only the really keen are going to watch them right through (and they would have attended the real thing at the library!) and while individually they are useful archive/library history items, in aggregate they are too much the same thing (unless one of the speakers was really controversial) and I can't see a lot of longterm usefulness. So you would be back to editing a 'teaser' and that really seems to equal a lot of work relative to the value .....

"We love our NJ libraries". This video is a reaching out to minority groups who might not otherwise hear the library gospel. It is short, well put-together and the backing soundtrack would attract a particular age demographic. It obeys the imperative of going out to meet with your target market where they are but I wonder how many YouTube browsers would search under 'library/ies'. That said, a worthy endeavour ...
"QandANJ: Now your library is open late night too!" The parallels with Maccas should strike a chord, particularly with American viewers, but the same reservation applies. It would be a good video to have shown on local TV or in cinemas or somewhere where people would be watching already.

I looked at few other videos recoverable under the term 'libraries' .... (time prevented further exploration ...)
(YouTube)"Tasty Choices @ Your Library": compares the range of services at the McCracken County Public Library with the appetising menu at a high-class diner (something very appealing to Americans with their culture of dining out)- 'succulent videos', 'flavoursome Internet usage', 'a fine selection of books' .. you get the idea. Meanwhile waitresses/library staff pile up goodies in front of the diners and the final shot shows a Guest check with 'FREE' in big letters. A genuinely witty video, well-produced and making one good point. I think it would work IF people found and viewed it.
(Google)"About get it loud in libraries" (what the people say about live music in libraries). This chronicles a live music event in a U.S. library. A cross-section of members give their opinion on such events (all favourable of course) interspersed or paralleled with views of the setting up process and ending with a sample of the performance. This is an attempt to break down stereotypes. It would be an excellent discussion starter at a seminar, staff meeting or similar professional event as well as a useful contribuition to a wiki.
"Secondary Libraries: becoming integral to school life". I can't imagine it being viewed by the general public but perhaps a useful professional tool.

As mentioned above tagging can be a problem. So can using 'Related Videos' as a location aid! Two supposedly related videos I found were "Marian the Librarian", a romantic spoof with lots of obligatiory stereotypical allusions, and "Amul Butter - Library - Advertisement" which as the title suggests is a straight advertisement for a brand of butter set in a library, very poorly shot and feeding every library stereotype there is.

Exploring:
A. "Olive Riley returns to Broken Hill". A teaser for a longer 56 min video presumably focussing on Olive Riley's memories of Broken Hill. It is only an advertisement/alerting product as Olive says very little and the main content is Olive reliving past events by dancing around an empty hall. Human interest but hardly informative.
B. "State Library of Queensland time lapse construction video 3". Speeded up sequence of shots showing contruction progress going for 2 minutes. It was hard to see, there was no voice-over offering any information and I can see why it has rating of 0.
C. "PLCMC new employee orientation". Videos are useful for training purposes as seeing something done is always a better instruction method than describing how something is done. And I guess the cosy scenes of employees doing things for people is more appealing than a written handout and would help a new employee feel and see themselves as a participant. However this video is for the most part a talking head setting out a vision statement about the goals and standards of the institution and if I was a new employee I would feel the 'boss' could say that to me personally rather than just sitting me down to a video .... Videos as instructional agents work best with specific tasks, either task sequencing or method skills rather than the vision thing.
D. "Reference and research assistance". Useful as part of an orientation programme for new members, particularly younger members for whom visual as opposed to written communication is more familiar. It is well done but even here the head of a major speaker is cut in half for a long sequence - quality of production is often an issue. But taking suffcient time/using professionals is expensive and is the cost outweighed by the benefits?....
E."William Allen White Awards Book Review: anonymous book reviews". Two children wearing masks talk about a book in turn. Gimmicky, but children would like it if only because of the masks and the reviewers being of their age. And it would be very easy to shoot - potential for library viewing and for advertising in local schools, maybe prior to Summer Reading Club?
F. "Art Express 2007". Videos really shine where the content relates to visual material. The sort of information contained here could not be communicated as well in written or even sequential pictorial form. So short videos relating to exhibitions housed in a library are a really good idea, and really multiply the usefulness and validity of such exhibitions.

In summary .... short, well-produced (or as far as possible when economics are taken into account) videos have a real and growing use in Library News blogs.
professional level videos are very useful as discussion starters at professional events and for staff training when they set out specific methodologies to which return visits may be needed. I think that viewing a short video about the State Library could be very useful preparation for staff coming to that one-day Orientation to the State Library programme for new public library staff (the name of which escapes me at the moment) because it would give them some familiarity with the layout of the building and the expectations they can bring with them so that not everything is new to be absorbed on the day.
a direction to a video (or even embedding a video link in your reply) is as legitimate a response to a reference enquiry as a bibliography or data from a book or even database. (Although how a reference librarian could ever have time to search through and evaluate videos is beyond me ...!)
videos are a very useful addition to local history collections as seeing something is always more meaningful than reading about something, and also you can see the interviewee relating to an object and being stimulated by it.
a video might be a good way of reporting for State Library Development grants or even Local Priority Projects expenditure - particularly building projects.

My very first 'Adventure' .......

2008-04-01T15:47:00.000-07:00

My, my, an IT Nitwit pasting a YouTube video in a blog!!!!!!!!
Thank goodness for a helpful CTC assistant who said Don't click on Insert Video but Do click on Edit HTML. Which seems Irish to me but it worked!

Just Image-in (I hope)

2008-04-01T15:27:00.000-07:00

It's an image showing the potential role of 'library dogs'. I mentioned them before in the 'From a Flickr to a Flame ... out' post - the usefuness of such animals to encourage reluctant readers to actually read to a non-critical, always appreciative auidence. And the magnetic appeal of an animal to get children into a library in the first place ...

I fumbled around trying to do this and it was easy this time to transfer the image so maybe I mis-wrote down the address last time - this time I 'copied' and 'pasted' withn the Blogger's phot upload too. Alas, I don't really know what I did so the acid test now will be to try and retrace my steps....

Good luck to anyone still tryng to upload from Flickr.

Those Wicked Wikis.....

2008-03-24T22:16:00.000-07:00

Greetings.
I must confess that when I read of some of the problems people had with RSS feeds I put Week 4 in the 'too hard' basket and moved on to Week 5 and wikis. I hope to come back to Week 4 later ...
I found the most amazing thing about wikis to be that the German equivalent of wikipedia is regarded as superior to the 'proper' encyclopedia in terms of the quality of its content. I would have worried about the content of wikis being open to vandalism or at best inaccurate input, particularly when one reflects on the level of vandalism in the real world, unless access with editing rights is very closely controlled. I can see that wikis are a very democratic form of information sharing and in line with current social attitudes of equality of rights, freedom of expression, etc, etc. And I must confess that despite my reservations as to the quality of the information I do use Wikipedia as an information source to answer client enquiries. I am reassured by hearing that Wikipedia employs a small army of people to vet entries .....
With reference to any three of the cited wikis ....
A. The Book Lovers Wiki. This is essentially a collection of submitted reviews indexed by genre. I see it was operated in 2006 but not 2007 - it would be interesting to know what prompted the library to change tack. Maybe it was recognised that having the review attached to the item record is more useful to patrons than in a separate wiki. So the wiki is now more a piece of local literary history or as the front page puts it, "'a snap shot in time' of what our club members read during the summer [of 2006]". Reading between the lines, the desire to experiment with a new technology seemed to be at least partly the motivation to etablish the wiki.
Such a wiki is useful as a gimmick and as a way of getting together a number of tagged reviews without a lot of labour on the part of library staff. However if the defining quality of a wiki is interaction and ease of editing existing material, one wonders how a wiki is better than an ordinary website that allows postings as there isn't - or shouldn't be - the need to edit reviews, i,e, opinions, posted by others.
Wikis shine where the knowledge to be communicated keeps changing, is refined through mutiple inputs and is cumulative - the value of the sum of the content is more than of the individual components, not I would have thought the case with collected independent reviews.
B. Mint Museums Wiki. The initiators define a wiki as 'a type of website that allows you, the user, to add or edit the content of the website' - a collaborative information resource. So the wiki both provides information from the Museum about particular collections and exhibitions and enables others - "curators, educators, docents and other users" - to add their expertise and knowledge to those bones. Thus those contributing to the wiki would be a community of interest and people with genuine knowledge to share and likely to 'spark off' one another. So the sum of the content is more than the individual components as it includes reactions to earlier posts. The wiki is password-protected and such a subject area is likely to attract only genuine contributors anyway. I noted there were 503 revisions of one page so the wiki is obviously valued (used by a large number of people!) and active .....
C. The Full Library Success. This is described as "a one-stop shop for great ideas and information for all types of librarians" and as such should be a great professional resource for librarians. Editing now requires submission of an email address because of vandalism but that is not an onerous control on content - though pointing to one of the issues with wikis. Having a parallel discussion page where people can post opinions and reactions about a topic seems like a good idea, and likely to reduce unnecessary editing without stifling input. Warnings that "personal attacks" and copyright infringements will be deleted may be pre-emptive strikes or may point to problems that have occurred. The warning against using the wiki for advertising points to another potential issue that I haven't seen raised elsewhere. A quick look at a sample revisions page showed that a considerable number of edits were reversed by the wiki manager suggesting either that freedom of expression can be abused or a conflict between the democratic ideals of a wiki and the vision of the wiki manager ......
I looked at the WikiNorthia site and while this is obviously at an embryonic stage has great potential. However it might need a full-time manager and hence lie outside the library sphere .. unless a Local History Librarian was able to assume responsibility. I thought about how it compared with a blog like Southern Tablelands History Matters and felt the wiki would have more uneven content in terms of quality but cover a much wider cross-section of information inviting as it does content under the broadest of headings as opposed to comment/reaction to posted material. So the wiki has greater potential to attract and store information.
Also the sample intranet procedures manual would be great for a really big library or one operating from multiple sites like some university libraries - templates or standards for input would be easy to manage, input would be accurate because by the on-the-ground practitioners, and the manual would always be up-to-date.

I always was stronger on theory than practice .... the required input to the NSW learning 2.0 wiki has been made. Not without problems - like the window warning me that if I left the site no-one would be able to use it for a time (I envisaged crashing the whole thing) and putting my name instead of "Guest" - I didn't expect that bit to appear onscreen. But once I realised that you just typed on despite what was already there being in html language it was quite easy. I commend the two video tutorials too - particularly the Wikis in Plain English may be very basic but that is just what an IT Nitwit needs!

From a Flickr to a Flame ...out

2008-03-18T15:50:00.001-07:00

I provide this as evidence that I spent about an hour trying to upload an image from Flickr ... Hence the reference to 'flameout ....'!!
It was of a child reading to an adult with a dog listening in - useful example of the value of a pet/therapy animal as a target audience for a non-confident reader. And another argument in favour of a library 'pet' .. I once knew a library dog which rejoiced in the name of Gumbles and was probably the most petted dog in town!
Actually the first challenge in this exercise was to find a Flickr photo with the magic 'blog this' button - this was not my first choice by a long way!
Good luck to anyone else who is finding this exercise 'sticky' - the local CTC manager had never uploaded from Flickr so there wasn't much help available!

Some more thoughts on those sample blogs .....

2008-03-17T20:22:00.000-07:00

On reflection perhaps I was meant to say a little more about the sample blogs so ....
A. Southern Tableslands History Matters: A very attractively presented and informative blog, although it challenged my concept of what a blog is - I would have described this as an active and growing information website rather than a blog which to me is a more personal document (but one aim of this course is probably to sweep away misconceptions ....). If interactivity is characteristic of blogs the authors may be disappointed by the small number of comments posted. The entries show a lot of care and research in contrast with the informal (verging on slapdash ) presentation of some blogs. It is certainly a quality information source, and the clear authorship allows for verification of any issues.
B. Sutherland Shire Library News: an online library newsletter with a huge number of links. As there is a near total lack of reactions posted it would be interesting to know the number of hits, particularly in view of the amount of time maintaining the blog must take. But it is a very good way of keeping members up-to-date with library events and presenting a professional and vibrant face to the community. I noted the use of FlickR to host additional photos.
C. Alternative Teen Services: a professsional discussion forum, with a huge amount of resource material for professionals - the 'main despatch' sums it up. That comments are being posted indicates the service is being used. A very useful way of enabling professionals to interact - I suspect blogs achieve most interaction in the horizontal plain if you see what I mean - between equals rather than informer/informees.
D. ACT Public Library Blog: like the second example, an online library newsletter with more frequent postings (daily?) but less ambitious in content - shorter entries and minimal pictures. Contains local library news and a few quirky items from the wider library world, with the option to email the posting to a friend but not to post comments. The many labels make locating related articles very easy. I presume the hope is that members might check the blog daily as they would open their daily newspaper or look at their favourite news site. This is probably less labour-intensive than Sutherland Shire's blog but still represents a big commitment in time and labour. But like any web-located information service it is ,much more immediate than any print offering can ever be!

I don't know whether this much content was necessary but at least it has given me the chance to practice adding to a log. I have done the preliminary reading/viewing on FlickR - the next challenge is to find and upload that photo/s! (and to successfully publish this .....)

The first 'toe in the water' .....

2008-03-13T15:46:00.000-07:00

Good morning, all ...
I feel that this is an historic moment - the very first blog posting of an IT nitwit. I'm not sure whether to thank the State Library's Web.2 training programme or not .... No, seriously, thank you (or should that be thanx?) for clear instructions that even I could follow.
Progress to date. I listened to Stephen Fry and thought his presentaton gave a whole new dimension to the term NOW generation. I watched the set short video on Web 2.0 - in fact I had to watch it three times because of the speed with which the key ideas were delivered, very much in keeping with an audience accustomed to the 30 second grab. To me the content was a case of style over substance, relying on technology to communicate but superficial, consisting of a set of bold statements wthout analysis or assessment.
However looking at the sample blogs this week was a pleasant surprise. Without ever having actually seen a blog before I had a preconceived attitude based on the personal blog concept which to me is narcissism gone mad. But now I recognize that a blog as an online forum or discussion zone like the Alternative Teen Services example or regular information service like the Southern Tablelands History Matters site has considerable professional potential. My immediate reaction to the Alternative Teen Services blog was how useful something similar would be in the Regional or Co-operative Library setup where it would be akin to an ongoing staff meeting allowing the immedate exchange of information, insights and concerns without the constraints of travel (both time and expense), time and the old 'brightest-idea-on-the-way-home' phenomena. However involvement in multile blogs would be impractical due to the time factor, risking the substitution of professional development, even personal enjoyment, for provision of service.
Some thoughts on Learning 2.0 .... At last I have an understanding of 2.0 as a context - a second stage in the IT information revolution. At my age and stage (approaching retirement) and in my work context (a small rural library) I may never use it but at least I'll have a basic understanding of key aspects of it and familiarity with the terminology, some appreciation of its applications, and can be happy to know I 'dipped my toe in the information revolution water' to the extent of posting a blog! But I suspect first and foremost doing (attempting?) the course involves for me satisfying personal curisoty and confronting a challenge - after all I'm someone who doesn't own a mobile phone and has never played a CD!!!
Lifelong learning meets personal needs but has most practical value where the work context, both in terms of expectations, task parameters and available technologies/tools is changing. And this is very true of librarianship!
Good luck to anyone else doing the course who may read this .....