Thing #15

This was a very insightful exercise all about wikis. It is basically a site that emphasizes collaboration between students, teachers, or any groups of people in any kind of setting. It seems the most user friendly of all sites we have studied and is the only one that can be modified by each user, so everyone has an opinion and can express it if dedired. It includes a broad range of people so can be used quite effectively in connecting the community to the library. Within the library, it could be used as a great source to enhance the online catalog as a subject guide by the patrons or even post reviews by the users. In the classroom, students could collaborate with each other quite effectively and teachers could use this as an excellent source to eliminate that never ending lost homework excuse. Reaching out to the community by posting newsworthy information to the people via wiki would be a real asset to the library's reputation as well.
I think this is a very viable tool for a large population of people.

Thing # 14

I read three articles, but my favorite two were Away fron Icebergs and Librarians 2.0 Manifesto. Away from Icebergs gave the three points that we will need to let go of in this century if we are to succeed as librarians. First, is the 'just in case collection'. That would eliminate the pack rats among us that can't stand to part with anything because 'you never know...' Our collection is becoming too easily accessible to attain to keep and store anymore in the traditional sense. Next, we need to eliminate the barriers that exist between the patron and the information they need ~ not bore them with extensive research methods. Our next challenge is to place our library services and the content in the user's preferred environment ~ go to them, not wait for them to come to us because the web is too easily attainable to not be utilized. Finally, he concludes by saying that we need to be ready to adapt if we are going to face the challenges before us because we are in real danger if we refuse to do so.
The other article I liked was the Librarians 2.0 Manifesto which was really just an optimistic list of reminders for the librarian affirming the changing times of the library and how we must adapt and be flexible to these changes. Our attitude must be openminded, creative, supportive, professional and positive. I was amazed at the responses to this article from all over the world ~ Denmark, South America, etc. Excellent reminder of what we need to strive for everyday in our profession.

Thing #13

I was never able to download the Del.icio.us podcast tutorial after four attempts. However, I did watch the Furl and Ma.gnolia social bookmarking sites. I am just amazed at anything and everything you can find out there if you search and spend enough time researching. It really doesn't matter what subject matter or what idea you might have, someone will have an opinion or an experience about that and make reference to it ~ it is overwhelming. The subject matter is endless both personally and as educators. This is truly a community of assistants when you need them for anything you need !!

Thing # 12

I have tried unsuccessfully three times to open up a myspace account. I keep getting the message that a technical error has occurred and it will be reported to technical services, so I am going to continue my assignments and come back to see if this can be resolved at a later date.

Thing # 11

This exercise was very interesting in that it dealt directly with books and people who loves reading. I found it particularly refreshing to see such a site that connects the two and will love to spend more time searching books I find intriguing and see how others feel about them as well. The website I came up with is http://www.librarything.com/widget.php.

Thing #10

First of all, I looked at the four generator sites listed. The comic strip generator was probably my least favorite next to the happy face generator. I especially liked the custom sign layout because when you scrolled over the tabs listed, a sample image of the template would appear which I found very helpful in choosing several sites to look at in greater detail. I really liked the glitz and glamour that could be generated in this site which could attract alot of attention to upcoming events in the library. The support ribbon generator was quite informative and could be useful when needing ribbons, etc. to recognize special days throughout the year. There were several sites that were not available when I clicked on them, however. But, my most favorite was the image chef. I loved playing with the various designs, colors and images to produce pictures that I eventually posted to my blog - much to my surprise. It was very easy and fun to use. This would be fun to use in advertising upcoming events at school, in the library, social news in the school, etc. This website is saved on my desktop and is file:///Users/teacher/Desktop/ImageChef.webarchive.

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