Thing #21 - Podcasts

My nephews make podcasts all the time and I always thought you had to be a techie genius to do that. You don't! I enjoyed this exercise and really liked NPR's podcasts selection of podcasts regarding election issues. Podcastalley was a good site especially to search for sports podcasts and I added a few to bloglines. Through bloglines all my rss feeds are in one place and I can easily check them out without searching around all the sites.

Thing #20 - YouTube

YouTube is too cool! Libraries could use YouTube for all kinds of things like promoting programs, events and exhibits. I loved searching YouTube for scenes from old movies. Like Stripes...

Thing #19 - Web 2.0 Tools

Web 2.0 awards is a great site. There are over 200 award sites listed in 41 different categories. The category I focused on was City Guides and Reviews and my favorite site was www.Yelp.com. I bookmarked this site and will definitely refer to it often. It allows you to select a city (approximately 100 cities across the country) and read reviews on topics ranging from restaurants to pet care to religious organizations to automotive service....you get the picture. It's a good site to check things out in Phoenix and also a great tool if you are travelling to another city. Anyway Web 2.0 awards is worth checking out, maybe someday libraries will be added to the awards categories.

Thing #18 - Web based apps

Google docs was easy to sign up for and easy to use. As technologically lame as I am, I was easily able to create a test document and upload an image titled "breakfast of champions".

Thing #17 - PBWiki

I edited the favorite movie page.

Thing #16 - What's in a wiki?

How I wish there were wiki's in ancient times, like when I was in school doing projects and papers collaboratively with other students. Evidently, they are quick to build and they definitely afford all users the ability to easily edit, change or rewrite the stuff you are collectively dealing with. The Booklovers Reading Club wiki linked to the Princeton Public Library was cool. Wiki's are a natural for book clubs, especially when members are homebound or not able to physically get together. The ALA 2006 New Orleans wiki was very informative. There is a link to fundamentals of editing which helped me understand that process and also a very good link to help you understand the 3 types of hyperlinks. Finally, the Library Success wiki is a great place for libraries to share success stories and collectively develop best practices in our industry.

Thing #15 - Library 2.0

Like it or not the new digital lifestyle is here....and it's not going away. Shared network spaces will continue to bring more people and collective intelligence together to drive education, research and entertainment. Library 2.0 seems a natural evolution to me as we continue the tansition from issuing printed material to helping customers find information wherever they are. Collaboration in this development on an open programmable web will help libraries, big and small to advance as rapidly as is going to be necessary to continue to be meaningful to our digital age customers. Having said this, I must add that my favorite aspect of a library is the physical nature of the library community where living human beings have a place to go for their own personal discovery and may do so at their own pace.