#17 Web 2.0

I felt most of these articles focused too much on technology and ignored the value of human contact/service. Although we do need to keep up with changing technologies, I believe that, at least for our community, the customer service we give is valued by our patrons. I see this in CAF, when someone comes to us for reader's advisory instead of using the databases and I've also noticed it in Borrower Services, where the other day there was a line-up whilst the self-checks sat empty. This is not meant to knock the electronic services we offer. On another given day, I'm sure that the reverse could be equally true. I feel that we need to offer both, so that all the needs of our various patrons can be met. Rick Anderson may have noticed a 55% drop in circulation but we have experienced the opposite, with circing our 1 millionth item a month earlier than last year. Rick's opinion is definitely based on his own experiences, with desiring to move away from what he calls a "just in case" collection. One of the comments I hear the most from students is that they need a print resource - teacher's orders!

#16 Technorati

I find Technorati easy to use but I was really surprised when I compared a search with Google and Google Blog Search. I tried searching for word searches, as I use them as one of the printable activities in Reading Buddies. Technorati only had 4 results, compared to 166,000,000 for Google and 59,491,638 for Google Blog Search. I hate to admit it, but I am definitely a google girl!

#15 Tagging and Delicious

I thought Delicious was great. I found it easy to use (except getting the little icons on my browser). I don't think I'm as interested in the social aspects of it, but having the information organized by tags worked nicely. The only problem I had with this exercise was that the link to Several Habits of the wildly successful Delicious users didn't work.

#14 Online Image Generators

OOPS, I forgot to blog about the online generators! What fun. I created a lego mini-me, complete with bling which was tons of fun but had a hard time saving it. Then Carol mentioned the cool text site so I went there http://cooltext.com/Render-Result?RenderID=442254615 and had fun creating a register now sign. This is something that I'll have to play around with more, as the amount of options are incredible.

#13 Library Thing

Wow! I think this is probably the most fun (and useful) "thing" I've learned yet. I can see so many uses - keeping track of books I've read (I am terrible with titles), listing ones I'd like to read when I have more time, maybe even getting some new ideas for Battle books! Definitely a keeper. http://www.librarything.com/catalog/barbwilson60

#12 Twitter

Well, another new experience. I have officially tweeted! http://twitter.com/neerumley I don't think this is something that I will keep after this experience, but you never know. I am hoping that clicking on follow for other people means the same thing as signing up to be friends with them. That might be a question that I need to fire off to Elaine, if I can find the spot where I'm supposed to do that. I think it's the 25 things page - I really need to get the hang of multiple windows being open! One thing I've learned is that I don't like a lot of visual distraction - hence the lack of open windows. Anyways, I'm signed up to follow 11 people/organizations, mainly authors or book review sites, with the exception of Fanshawe College - home of my middle child. There is talk of community college staff going on strike, so it would be nice to get the heads up on that.

Thing #11 - Finding Feeds

I preferred Technorati for its clear format and easy-to-use browse the directory feature. Sometimes I think these directories are a victim of their own success - they grow so huge that they become overwhelming. For example, beside books it says 3079. I can't imagine visiting even a fraction of those feeds to see if they are worthwhile. I found Syndic8 very slow to load, but perhaps that was just my bad timing. Library weblogs was very cool, with blogs from libraries and librarians from all over the world. I could definitely kill a few hours visiting countries that interest me!