Here is a slideshow of my photos on flickr. As you can see, I take way too many black & white photos, and way too many of bridges, too. :-) The account really needs to be updated - the pictures are all at least a few years old.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Thoughts about wikis
After learning about wikis this week in class, it is neat to think of all the different ways to use them. Whenever I had previously heard the term "wiki," I only thought of Wikipedia. But the list of wikis that was provided to us was pretty cool to check out in order to see the different organizations that are using wikis to share information and get people involved through editing and content contribution.
As mentioned in my discussion board post for class this week, there seem to be both positives and negatives associated with wikis. What worries me is that if you have a wiki for important information (such as a medical wiki), then anyone has the ability to edit content on the site, and who's to say that it's necessarily accurate? Though, as someone else mentioned in class, hopefully people using wikis to look up information would just use them as a starting point and then also refer to other (possibly more reputable) sources such as reference books or hospital/organizational websites.
After learning about the different uses of wikis (and viewing the commoncraft how-to-wiki video), I created a wiki for my friends and I to use as a planning base for our upcoming vacation. I think other possible uses of wikis could include similar things not related to library or educational organizations, such as: parents using wikis to plan things like parties for kids, sporting event banquets and fundraisers, family reunions, kids talking about their favorite books or writing fan fiction (I'm thinking Harry Potter and Twilight wikis here), etc.
As mentioned in my discussion board post for class this week, there seem to be both positives and negatives associated with wikis. What worries me is that if you have a wiki for important information (such as a medical wiki), then anyone has the ability to edit content on the site, and who's to say that it's necessarily accurate? Though, as someone else mentioned in class, hopefully people using wikis to look up information would just use them as a starting point and then also refer to other (possibly more reputable) sources such as reference books or hospital/organizational websites.
After learning about the different uses of wikis (and viewing the commoncraft how-to-wiki video), I created a wiki for my friends and I to use as a planning base for our upcoming vacation. I think other possible uses of wikis could include similar things not related to library or educational organizations, such as: parents using wikis to plan things like parties for kids, sporting event banquets and fundraisers, family reunions, kids talking about their favorite books or writing fan fiction (I'm thinking Harry Potter and Twilight wikis here), etc.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
LibraryThing & Rollyo
I first heard about LibraryThing from some students in my grad school classes. A few of them are kind of addicted to it and asked me to sign up to check it out. So I did. And I added two books. And I never logged back in....until this class, when I finally had time (and reason) to explore it. Actually, it does seem like a pretty neat thing. Tagging books seems like a nice idea too, though time consuming, so I haven't done any of that yet. The friend who originally got me to sign up is a tagging hound, but she enjoys it and it probably helps her find more books that suit her interests. I like that you can add other people as friends and view each other's bookshelves -- it might also help you find books that you might like to read if you see that someone else has already read them. I'd really like to start using LibraryThing on a regular basis to keep track of the books I own or have read, so I'm glad that it was included in this course.
When I did the Rollyo exercise, it seemed like a cool concept, but I'm not sure how often I would actually use it. Since I'm taking a trip to San Diego this July, I added links to a bunch of information on the city, some attractions, visitors guides, the page for the hotel I'm staying at, etc. Rollyo could be pretty neat, since it allows you to search just the sites you want for information you need, but I almost think I would rather just save the sites to a favorites menu and go through them one-by-one than search them all together. Rollyo can be useful if you're looking for a particular item or specific information but you're not sure which site it might belong to -- if you've included it in the Rollyo search engine you've built, it would be easy to search for it and find it. But, a downfall of this would be if you have too many sites saved to the Rollyo search engine, you might have to still sort through pages of search results to find the exact information you're looking for. It was fun to try out the program, but I think I'll stick with my favorites menu for now.
When I did the Rollyo exercise, it seemed like a cool concept, but I'm not sure how often I would actually use it. Since I'm taking a trip to San Diego this July, I added links to a bunch of information on the city, some attractions, visitors guides, the page for the hotel I'm staying at, etc. Rollyo could be pretty neat, since it allows you to search just the sites you want for information you need, but I almost think I would rather just save the sites to a favorites menu and go through them one-by-one than search them all together. Rollyo can be useful if you're looking for a particular item or specific information but you're not sure which site it might belong to -- if you've included it in the Rollyo search engine you've built, it would be easy to search for it and find it. But, a downfall of this would be if you have too many sites saved to the Rollyo search engine, you might have to still sort through pages of search results to find the exact information you're looking for. It was fun to try out the program, but I think I'll stick with my favorites menu for now.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Using Google Blog Search and Bloglines
Yikes....
Google Blog Search sounded like a neat thing, until I tried to use it. At first, I found it a little (dare I say) underwhelming? I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting off the bat, but the intial search results weren't it. Maybe I wasn't using the right search terms, but I found it frustrating to get matches that weren't what I was looking for. A lot of the matches, though they contained my keywords, weren't relevent. It was hard for me to find storytime ideas, which I'll be needing soon. And Google's supposed to have all the answers, right? ;) Finally I just started searching with different terms, such as "youth services", etc. Those netted better results, and turned me into a bit of a Google Blog Search believer. After a while, it became fun to see what I could find.
I saved a few blogs to my Bloglines account, and hopefully I'll find time to read them. They did look promising and interesting. Bloglines itself seems like a nice, useful site. The cool thing about it is that all updates for blogs you're following are right there on one site. This is much better than saving individual blogs to a favorites menu -- and forgetting to check them. :-) The concept of logging into one site to see all updates to blogs you're following is very nice and really would save time over checking individual sites.
Honestly though, I'm unsure how much time I'll have to really get into the blogs and keep up with them at this time, but I am really hoping that sometime soon I can devote an hour or so a day to reading udpates on some of these blogs, as they do look like they would be both interesting and useful. This activity was fun to see what was out there and to see how many other public libraries and individuals keep blogs that might be of use to others, and not just everyday diary/journal types of blogs, which are what my friends and I keep.
Google Blog Search sounded like a neat thing, until I tried to use it. At first, I found it a little (dare I say) underwhelming? I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting off the bat, but the intial search results weren't it. Maybe I wasn't using the right search terms, but I found it frustrating to get matches that weren't what I was looking for. A lot of the matches, though they contained my keywords, weren't relevent. It was hard for me to find storytime ideas, which I'll be needing soon. And Google's supposed to have all the answers, right? ;) Finally I just started searching with different terms, such as "youth services", etc. Those netted better results, and turned me into a bit of a Google Blog Search believer. After a while, it became fun to see what I could find.
I saved a few blogs to my Bloglines account, and hopefully I'll find time to read them. They did look promising and interesting. Bloglines itself seems like a nice, useful site. The cool thing about it is that all updates for blogs you're following are right there on one site. This is much better than saving individual blogs to a favorites menu -- and forgetting to check them. :-) The concept of logging into one site to see all updates to blogs you're following is very nice and really would save time over checking individual sites.
Honestly though, I'm unsure how much time I'll have to really get into the blogs and keep up with them at this time, but I am really hoping that sometime soon I can devote an hour or so a day to reading udpates on some of these blogs, as they do look like they would be both interesting and useful. This activity was fun to see what was out there and to see how many other public libraries and individuals keep blogs that might be of use to others, and not just everyday diary/journal types of blogs, which are what my friends and I keep.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
First post in a new blog
This is the first blog I've ever created on Blogger (unless you count two posts made to a class blog last semester), though I do have an online journal on LiveJournal, which I post to whenever I remember. :) Some friends also have journals on LJ, and I enjoy reading their posts as it keeps me up to date with what's going on in their lives, especially since they all live out-of-state and most of us don't have the opportunity to talk to each other on a regular basis.
While I'm already familiar with some of the programs being covered in this course, what I'm really looking forward to is earning more about those that I'm unfamiliar with, mostly because a lot of them are mentioned by classmates in my masters program and I always wonder how they know about all these cool things and why I always feel so out of the loop.
I do have both Myspace and Facebook accounts, but I find myself using Facebook a lot more. I think the applications are better and the interface is easier to navigate. I also have a Flickr account but haven't updated it with new photos in quite a long time.
Right now I'm feeling quite stressed because of the two new courses I started this week for my masters program and a new job position I accepted at New Lenox as a Youth Services Librarian (although I won't start until mid-February). Add this course to the mix, and it's really turning out to be an interesting few weeks. However, I have already found that every day I look forward to logging onto the GSU courseware and checking out the new postings on the discussion board -- this course is a nice (FUN!!) break from my other classes, and I can't wait to learn more.
While I'm already familiar with some of the programs being covered in this course, what I'm really looking forward to is earning more about those that I'm unfamiliar with, mostly because a lot of them are mentioned by classmates in my masters program and I always wonder how they know about all these cool things and why I always feel so out of the loop.
I do have both Myspace and Facebook accounts, but I find myself using Facebook a lot more. I think the applications are better and the interface is easier to navigate. I also have a Flickr account but haven't updated it with new photos in quite a long time.
Right now I'm feeling quite stressed because of the two new courses I started this week for my masters program and a new job position I accepted at New Lenox as a Youth Services Librarian (although I won't start until mid-February). Add this course to the mix, and it's really turning out to be an interesting few weeks. However, I have already found that every day I look forward to logging onto the GSU courseware and checking out the new postings on the discussion board -- this course is a nice (FUN!!) break from my other classes, and I can't wait to learn more.
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