Week 9: Thing # 21, Podcasts

I did a few searches in Yahoo Podcasts to see how easy it would be to locate podcasts that I was interested in. I tried a very specific search for a medical condition and had pretty good results. The results included ten or so podcasts, but they were all relevant to the search and looked useful. Most of the podcasts gave instructions and suggestions on how to handle the medical situation.
The second search was broader, using "art schools". The results were not really relevant. One was for a teacher named Art. I did find a childrens book review site called "Book Voyages" that I really liked. I listened to the podcast about the young adult book The Geography of Girlhood by Kirsten Smith. Most of the podcast was of Ms. Smith discussing the book and reading from it before and audience. I really enjoyed listening to her talk about the book.
Looking at Yahoo Podcast website, I realized that it will be discontinued in October. I tried Podcast.net and was able to search directly for Book Voyages and add it to my RSS feeds.
I also looked at the podcast information on the Merlin site. The book readings, interviews and LibVibe were all very cool uses of podcasts. I linked to LibVibe, and I'm listening to the latest news while typing this. Definitely a fun, and informational, podcast.

My creation

My creation,
originally uploaded by nickcdbj.

Made with fd's Flickr Toys from bighugelabs.com

Week 3: Thing # 6 Flickr Mashups

I was finally able to find a Flickr mashup that would create a mosaic for me from my photos. Bighugelabs.com has various Flickr tools, one of which is a mosaic maker. It was very easy to request that the mosaic be from my Flickr account, and that it be made from photos with a particular tag. The size and shape of the mosaic is also selected. I followed the directions and had the mosaic posted to my Flickr account. I was pretty happy with the results, especially since it took me so long to figure out how to get there!

Week 8: #19: Web 2.0 Awards, Instant Bull

I looked at a number of sites on the Web 2.0 awards short list of winners. The site that I selected to explore is Instant Bull, a business site that pulls together links to many sites with business news. At the top of the page is a search box for stock quotes. I put in McCormicks for the spice company, not knowing the ticker symbol, and the box gave me a selection of possible companies to choose from. The result was a "buzz matrix" that showed which message boards had information about the stock and how long ago the message was posted. On the left were links to pertinent messages.
Instant Bull also provides links to news sites like Bloomberg, blogs, weblinks to popular sites like technorati, and finance message boards. The site tries to bundle a lot of financial links into one package. It is geared more toward someone who follows the stock market on the web, instead of someone used to using the high cost services like Value Line. It is a fun site if you like to follow financial message boards and blogs. It is worth considering for inclusion in a list of business websites if a public library has a customer base that follows the stock market.

Week 8: Thing #18, Google Docs

Hi! I opened the Google Docs account, and now I'm trying it out. I love the idea of sharing documents on a site so that they can be edited and reviewed by different people. Actually, from a public library standpoint, the ability to save a document to a website is great. So many times we have customers using public computers who do not have a disc or flashdrive to save their work. Maybe it will be a viable option to steer some customers to Google Docs or Zoho. Then they can access their documents later or email them directly to where they need to go.

Some of the other features like the calendar or slide presentation feature would be great for people who are working from home or are away from their workplace. These same features would work well for volunteer organizations. Volunteers are often involved in many activities, from work to other organizations, and being able to pool information through these web apps may streamline organization.

I'm going to try to post this to my blog ... We'll see if it works!

Week 7: Thing #17 Sandbox Wiki

I had a little trouble with creating the link for the blog in PB Wiki. I finally got the page linked, though. In the process, I thing I created a new page that may be lost or erased somewhere in the wiki. Actually, I went back to the Favorite Blogs page, and I did see the page listed under recent activity. I think I finally got a link to work on the marylandlibrariessandbox blogs here page. Whew! That took some work! I even added a little to a wiki entry. It was fun to try out this program, and it was easy once you learn how to get around.

Week 7: Thing # 16 Wikis

My only previous knowledge of wikis came from using Wikipedia. This encyclopedia is a great help to a reference librarian, even with the caution that comes from knowing that it is not an authoritative source. For this assignment, I enjoyed looking at wikis that were used for subject guides and book reviews. Using a wiki for patron book reviews seems like a great way to get them involved in the library, while providing a service for other users.
The wikis used for conferences or meetings really provide on the spot information for the participants. What's great about those wikis is that the information is provided by participants who may not be organizers of the meeting. They may have great tips that would otherwise not be available to all the participants without the platform provided by the wiki.
The drawback of wikis is the opportunity for misinformation. If a library uses a wiki, I would think that there would have to be individuals who would have to keep track of the postings to try to minimize problems.