Welcome all book lovers

A blog for those who love books and all things in print, oh and the Minnesota Vikings too.




Powered By Blogger

Monday, March 31, 2008

Thing 18--U-tube

I spent about an hour looking through the various videos on U-tube. To be honest what I have used it for in the past it to look up the American Idol's performances that I have missed the week before. Personally, I don't think I will use it much more than that except for watching various news items I may have missed. I can see how it could be useful for libraries to post tours or promotional info but there is so much extra stuff that one has be aware of or try to steer clear of. I thought the following college library tour was well done.

Friday, March 28, 2008

Thing 17--ELM productivity tools

I found that this tool had a lot of interesting information. It could be very helpful for anyone who is doing research. Like a lot of other people I was not able to set up the RSS feed for the Student InfoTrac. I did search a lot of the newspaper and information sites and signed up for an account in NET library. I know they offer NET library at our library but I have never looked into it. It was nice to learn a bit more about it so I can help patrons more if they have questions.

Friday, March 21, 2008

Thing 16--Student tools--Assignement Calculator

I am saving Thing 15 (Online games) for the end. But I did like thing 16, the U of M assignment calculator and the research project calculator are very interesting and could be very helpful for kids. I know some of the projects kids have assigned can be very daunting but these calculators really break it down so the assignment may not appear so intimidating and may help them realize that if they are really organized they can finish it. As my kids get older I may even use it with them. A link on the library's teen page would be very appropriate and very helpful for some kids.

Monday, March 17, 2008

Thing 14--LibraryThing

I just created an account on LibraryThing and added my five books. I currently have an account with Goodreads.com which is similiar. I really like Good Reads and find that it is kind of like a myspace for people who read. It doesn't have the cataloging component that LibraryThing has but I mainly use it to keep track of what I read with a short review and a list of what I want to read in the future. I could see how libraries would like to use Librarything. It displayed quite nicely on my blog and I believe it would create interest in the titles which were listed. I don't think it would replace paper bookmarks but it would be a nice feature.

Thing 13--Productivity tools

I thought these productivity tools were kind of fun. I have both a google account and a yahoo account so I personalized my home page for both of them. I have an MSN account so I should try and personalize that also. I really like both the google and yahoo home pages--its nice to see news updates, new e-mails, weather etc. on one page. I did try some of the other tools. The countdown calendar was fun and I did create a ta-da list. But I really don't spend enough time on the computer to justify using some of these tools, at least personally. I am not going to make a grocery list on-line when I can just write one up. Then again, I could see how it would be helpful in a work environment if you have to share tasks with others--that's were backpack could come in handy.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Thing 12--Social Media Sites

I just spent some time looking through Digg, Reddit, Newsville etc. These sites can be really addicting. I like news sites anyway, I go to MSNBC many times a day, and these sites can be just as informative. Because people are promoting what they like I am seeing stories that I wouldn't probably notice on other news sites. The no editors rule makes it feel like the wild west of the internet to me. Most of the other groups I belong to have moderators and it is surprising the number of times they have to step in and settle down the participants from getting to personal, carried away with language etc. I am sure the conversations on these sites get very interesting to say the least.

Thing 11: Tagging and del.icio.us

Del.icio.us is a fun site. I cruised around and found some interesting sites--like a relatives web page and a list of really good Sci-fi to read. I don't read sci-fi but I found one from the list that I checked out. I have tried to export my favorites too so I will be curious to see if that worked. I don't know how many times I have lost favorites on my personal pc so it would be great to have them at another source where I could access them from different computers. I also tagged a few things so I can go look for them again if I wish.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Thing 10-Wiki's

Well what do I say, I don't like wiki's. I think they can be really helpful for an organization like our library. Our use of the wiki for our staff page appears to be working really well. That being said, I don't feel educated enough myself to change anything on it. It is probably something that if I worked with it more I would be more comfortable with it. But even the format doesn't appeal to me for some reason.

I have used Wikopedia quite frequently but I would never use it as my final source. It is just too hard to know if the information is truly factual.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Thing 9-Easy to Collaborate

I found this thing frustrating--not because the tools themselves were difficult but I had a hard time accessing them. I finally was able to edit the document in Google Docs which was kind of fun. I enjoyed seeing what others had written and it didn't seem to difficult to do. I never did find the sample document in Zoho Writer to edit but I played around with one of my own documents to see how it would work. I really do not have a need to use these types of programs in my work but I could see how they could be helpful to those who needed them.