Thing 18- Oh the possibilities!

Youtube is a site that I have been fairly familiar with for quite some time. A lot of my friends use this site to look up music videos or funny clips/videos made by random people. I find it very cool but at the same time frightening at how vast and out there this video phenomenon is. Some of the videos on Youtube are useful and tasteful but there are a growing amount of videos that may not be so much and there is not much of a limit as to what can be posted and who can see it. I can remember when there was a controversy of a group of teenage girls who plotted to gang up and beat a "friend" of theirs while filming it- to put it on Youtube! It's just ridiculous when you look at the cyber world that way. In general though, Youtube is a nice resource and is important for us who are serving the public, and maybe more directly the younger generation of public to know of this website. I posted a random video from Youtube that has a very good point made in a funny way on my blog. Enjoy!

Thing 17

These tools are actually located on our library website to be utilized by those who have a membership with the library. They are used mainly by patrons up in the reference and youth services depts. and I have not had much experience with patrons using the ELM tools out at the West Duluth branch. Most of my knowledge and experience with ELM, besides with "thing 17" , was in high school and then in college for the research projects I completed during those times. I find that is important for the libraries as well as schools to offer these programs for free for students/patrons for the programs may be too expensive and therefore not an option for most otherwise. This tool is user-friendly and very useful for all.

Thing 16 - Why didn't I think of this?

Now that my main focus will again become my school career, I find that this tool would be amazing in helping me organize my scheduled projects and such. Unfortunately my time at the library is drawing to a close but I feel that there must be a reason for it and good things are yet to come. I really like the U of M Assignment Calculator in that you give it the date your assignment is due, what you must complete, and then the program sets out your schedule for you so that you can pace yourself. Now the hard part is to actually get yourself to follow the schedule....hmm. Procrastination tends to produce my best work... Anyhow, I think this is a great tool for students and it is good for workers to be informed and ready to assist with this.

Thing 15- Gamin!

I thought this "thing" was a nice change of pace. It was fun to go through the different games and see what people are interested in and are playing. I am not really a fan of games but this was pretty fun to take a peak through these. I would have to say the pirate game was my favorite. It actually really brought my back to when I was younger-for the pirates look just like the Lego pirates I had! I don't know that besides opening our eyes to public interest that this "thing" would be much use in my day to day work.

Thing 14

LibraryThing would be useful for the patrons to share favorites and get suggestions from others if we were to have this application on our website. It would be very interesting and useful if we were able to offer this service and would then be able to get ideas about certain books that sound really great or sound more like it's not worth the effort. I use a similar application on my Facebook page where I have the books that I am currently reading, those I've read, and the ones I would like to get around to reading. You have the same options with LibraryThing and can also take things a step further by giving the book a rating/review. Useful in library setting and also among friends.

Thing 13

I logged on to my yahoo email account and decided to experiment "thing 13" on my homepage. I wanted to see if I could jazz it up a bit, which is exactly what I did! I was able to change the background to a fierce leopard print... ha ha. Besides allowing you to personalize your page you are also able to add and delete items of interest to you. For example, I was able to add a Facebook application to my page which then gives a shortcut to that specific website. This would not be necessary for my job, but I suppose nice to utilize in my free time. The calendar I used was through MSN or my hotmail account. It would be useful for work but in my opinion would take up too much time to fill out. I would much rather shoot for the old fashioned route of just writing important dates down in my planner. It is much more accessible for me at any time I may need to look at it. Also my cell phone has the capability you to post reminders in the calender for yourself, which is also very useful. If I had a laptop this may be of great use to me. I did find both of these applications to be enjoyable to explore.

Thing 12

I really like this idea! It gives the power to the public in what they think is interesting/important. You are able to give your input/opinion as to what is something you like and what other's may like. I mainly looked over Reddit and found this site to be very user-friendly and interesting. It had all sorts of topics and genres of news. You could read an article on the current presidency and then read a funny pet story. If you feel a certain article was irrelevant then you can vote that way. These tools would be handy for a reference librarian which was referenced in the description for they provide the public with the most up to date information on many varying subjects. It is also just nice for those who prefer to be in the "know".

Thing 11

Del. icio.us is an interesting title and the way it's laid out is also interesting although once I looked up how the name came to be it made more sense. I think that having this available allows those who view a lot of different websites and need to remember specific spots in a website a very orderly way of keeping track. Again, this would not be useful for me in my occupation at this very time but once I get back to school I think that this tool and many others here in "23 things" would make life a lot easier and organized.

Thing Ten

I love the website wikipedia and I did learn through this "Thing" that you can edit/add information to some of the pages. I think that this website would be useful for research/homework but I wonder if the credibility and accuracy of the information is suffice/correct. I found the altering of the of the document to be somewhat of a pain for you had to register and only then could you add something. I understand that this was done to further your learning experience but I got the gist from the video. So useful to some, but I didn't find it to be so.

Thing Nine

This assignment was slightly different! I don't believe the "founding fathers" would appreciate us altering and making light of this very important, serious document... but it is fun all the same! Between Google doc and Zoho writer I definitely prefer Google doc I found it to be easier to alter things in this program and was familiar with it previously so that could explain my favoritism. I suppose these programs would be convenient for a group of students working on a paper or project for you could proofread and correct clearly while stating name and date, keeping it orderly. This would not be something that would currently be useful to me in my work setting.

Thing Eight

I used Picture trail and found it to be very quick and easy to set up not only an account but to download photos and create a slide show as well. I only had a few photos to post of my cousin's horse and my cat but it is a start anyhow. It would be really nice to use this program to download and store all my photos but I would rather be able to set them as private. To me it is somewhat creepy that anyone can view the pictures. Overall I enjoyed the set up and feel that this program may be useful for library websites for those who set those up.

Thing Seven

I grew up using computers in some format since elementary school. We would have a day where we would go down to the computer lab and play the ever wonderful Oregon Trail. As I grew we expanded our computer skills with going down to the school library and doing research on school projects via the Internet. I really began to be exposed in more depth to computers in 6th grade on up where we had keyboarding class. Learning all the new things that computers could do was fascinating and fun for everyone. So when it comes to instant messaging, email, text messaging, and the blog-like phenomenons Facebook/Myspace I am all too familiar. Although I hadn't done much instant messaging in some time, it is now an added feature to Facebook and so I have found myself bantering back forth with friends every now and again. I know that some find technology in general and especially the stuff the "young" people do intimidating or impractical, but they are much like the subjects we are learning of throughout "23 Things"; once you learn them, you may be addicted! Text messaging is useful in situations where you just need to let someone know something quickly like, " I'm here!" This is just a more convenient way (in my humble opinion) of communicating at times. The only thing I am not too familiar with would be the web conferencing. I tried to view a conference but it seems there are only designated days to view them and I currently do not have the luxury of internet at home so I just have to try again.

I think out of all the technological options discussed in Thing 7, the email is one of the most important for our work setting. We use it as a means to communicate within our library and to the outer branches. It is fast, easy and allows you the option of multi-tasking. We use this multiple times throughout the day to communicate to one another or to a large group of staff.

Thing Six

I liked having all the options permitted with the online image generator. It has quite a few features that would be helpful in setting up reading programs or creating displays. An example that I thought of could be for a display of the Harry Potter series. You could create a trading card for all of the characters in the book; include a picture, name off interests and hobbies and such of each. It could add a little fun while educating the potential reader on who's who in Harry Potter. The calender option provides you with a way to personalize while organizing yours/coworkers' office space. All in all, very easy to comprehend and apply to personal life along with finding occupational uses.

Thing Five

Wow, there are some interesting options for utilizing the Flickr even further. I enjoyed Flickr Color Pickr but I don't know how much I would use this tool. To be honest I do not spend/like to spend very much time on the computer or Internet and actually currently don't have Internet at home so most of the tools like the ones displayed in "thing 5" would not be what I would do with my own limited Internet use.

I did however really enjoy "Spell with Flickr". I would like to use for a profile or to print off words I create and put them in a journal. I don't know how useful this would be for what my assignments are at the library but it might be of good use to someone creating displays for the library depts. or something.

Thing 4

Flickr is a program I have heard of but never explored and I find it to be wonderful! I love that we can view all of these photographs taken by professionals and not so professionals; it opens a whole new world. Searching through the photos is a very easy process and there is an amazing abundance of pictures. I searched for a few different topics some library related and then some personal interests. I found a really cool unique little library photograph: --------------------------->>

Caption under photo, "The Tulare County Free Library. Originally, this was Dickerson Library. All of the buildings at Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park have been beautifully restored."

The photograph was taken by: "Matt (mistergoletta)".

It is hard to see but the sign on the front of the library says, "Tulare County Free Library". What I find so great about this photograph is the quaint size of the library! Can you imagine the limited collection?

I would find Flickr to be a very useful tool more for my personal use than for what I do at the library. I'd get a lot of use out of posting photographs taken of nature or pictures that are more public appropriate. As far as I understand though you can also use Flickr for organizing your personal/non-public pictures, which would be convenient. I do not have specific tasks that would require me to use such a program, but per say if I were one working on the library website this program would work great in keeping all the photos needed in one specific place and allow you to keep things organized.

Thing Three Cont'd

Okay so I feel that I might have been a bit harsh in my last post and did not really cover any of the required topics.
Things I do like about RSS: I find it convenient to able access sites I am interested in, and being able to access my co-workers blogs and receive updates is very cool. It is an easy way of seeing how far along everyone is. I couldn't really see myself using this on my own for leisure purposes but it would be helpful if I were working on an ongoing project for school such as research paper. I could have sites relevant to the subject all displayed or save certain articles.
I found it easiest to find feeds by just browsing through the most used and choosing ones that pertained to me. I did think it was somewhat difficult to figure out how to add specific URLs because the directions didn't quite make sense at first. Overall it was pretty user-friendly and useful if used in the right context.

Thing Three

I have to be honest in saying that I don't find RSS feeds to be useful or beneficiary in any way. If I wanted to read up on something I would do so by pulling up the website. I am beginning to feel that we as a society are growing pathetically lazy. Everything is becoming more and more impersonal and thoughtless. I find this frustrating.

Thing Two

I am reluctant to say that I have never heard of the increasing use of technology within the libraries to be Library 2.0. Not to say that I haven't been exposed or even utilizing it but did not know that it had a title.
I find it to be interesting how the blog "11 Reasons Why Library 2.0 Exists and Matters" does address the underlying and constant struggle that I believe a lot of libraries undergo that is the balance of the emerging technology and the strain to maintain the original definition of what a library is and provides. Libraries used to be filled with more of the educational films, newspapers, books of all genres, and card catalogs. Now patrons have the ability to look up their desired items via computer catalog/online at home, download books onto MP3 players, are able to check out all the newest DVDs, and so on. Although technology opens endless possibilities, I think a big part of a libraries charm for me is being in the shelves searching for a great book and being able to physically open them up, as to listening to them on my MP3 player.
I have grown up through the ever changing times of technology, but actually enjoy doing things the "old fashioned way" such as mailing my letters instead of emailing. After a while things tend to seem so impersonal.

Thing One

I found the initial set up for the "23 Things On a Stick" to be quite user friendly and frankly, pretty easy. I was given step-by-step instructions and it was quick to set up. I like how we have the ability to personalize our blogs with pictures and different backgrounds.

To be completely honest, I am somewhat skeptical as to how useful this will be in my everyday life and how interesting I will find it, but I am willing to delve into the unknown. I have heard from multiple co-workers that this is fun, informative, and useful in the library setting. So here goes nothing!

First entry

This is the very first entry to my blog. This is going to be an amazing adventure!