The 23rd Thing

Well, here we are at the end of 23 Things. The time has really flown by, and as I look back over my blog posts I am amazed at how much we covered (and discovered). To keep this one simple and organized, I am going to use libraryjoy’s prompts:

1. What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?

• RSS (once I got the hang of it)
• Google docs – I am using these like crazy now
• CML’s Power Tools
• Twitter (a surprise favorite – I didn’t think I’d be interested in it at all!)

2. How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

• The program has served to remind me that exploring new technologies and trends is, in fact, work-related and is certainly a large part of the daily on-the-job learning I do. It has also made me realize that lifelong goals can be quite small and simple (ie. exploring twitter or leaving a post or comment on a blog). I think the exercises in this program have also enabled me to see learning/discovery opportunities more readily and encouraged me to apply these to what we at the library do or to what I myself do in my daily work.

3. Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?

• Yes – that I actually like blogging! Before beginning Learn & Play I had never considered that I might have anything to post on a blog. But, it’s amazing all the things you come up with once you get started.
• I also feel I’ve gotten to know some of CML’s staff better (through blogging and twitter).

4. What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

• Hmmm, it was really done quite well! The Learn & Play team listened to staff when we said we needed more time. The right balance was struck in offering staff encouragement/reminders/updates without overkill or making us feel bombarded.
• Maybe next time there could be more “featured participants”. This seems to have become a trend over the last week or two, and I really like it. In the future, maybe that can be incorporated throughout the entire program. The videos that the Learn & Play team have done with various participants have enabled me to check out some of the many staff blogs with the bonus of being able to put a face to the post.

5. If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you participate?

• Yes, I would definitely participate in something like this again.

Podcasting: Thing #21

I particularly like the idea of podcasts for news, social commentary, and interviews. I subscribed to a couple of podcasts with my Bloglines account. Starting out w/just a couple to see how I like them: The Mr. Nice Guy Show and The Amateur Traveler Podcast.

I had a hard time with the podcast directories. For example, when I looked at the “Storytelling” category on Podfeed, the podcasts were actually about legal matters (which is actually quite ironic!). However, I did better with PodcastAlley. I searched both “library” and “libraries” and found quite a few library systems who podcast in order to stay connected with their communities. One podcast that looks to have interesting info is the TeenLibrarian Podcast. I think I’ll subscribe to it also.

As far as suggestions for what CML could do with podcasting, I think it would be really cool to podcast our author visits. This seems like a great way to share conversations between authors, readers, and library staff. If podcasting is as easy as it appears, this extra feature could deliver something very unique to our customers without too much expended effort on our part.

Power Tools

I was scrolling through the Power Tools page looking for something to blog about for Thing #19, and I noticed that OCLC’s World Cat is promoted here. Good! World Cat makes such great information available and I think it’s an often-overlooked resource.

A couple of posts back I wrote about the new ways that OCLC plans on incorporating Web 2.0 technologies into their database. Things like tagging, reviews, list creation and list sharing to name a few. These are definitely “power tools” because they are giving over some of the power to the user, and with that power the user is able to put these web sites to work for himself.

I’d like to see CML apply some of these power tools and widgets in the near future. Customers (and staff) would certainly make use of tagging, reviews, and lists. Having a “currently checked-out” widget would be fun as well as useful–sort of an extra reminder of what materials you have checked out!

Anyway, since World Cat wasn’t a new discovery for me, I am exploring TechCrunch for Thing #19. Wow, there are blog posts about a ton of tech things that I am not familiar with! But, I think I will start subscribing to its blog feeds. I could learn more about Web 2.0, and I like the humor within the posts. Like this one, about the top Google searches during the Presidential Debates. Or, this one, which uses twitter feeds to illustrate the destruction of Bloglines!

backtracking to bloglines

Thanks to my frustration with Thing 8, I postponed Thing 9. But, I begrudgingly logged back into my bloglines account just now to set up a few library-related news feeds (and encountered more frustration!). The pages take forever to load and twice it froze up. The layout is just awful. I hate to harp on aesthetics-I would be willing to overlook the lack thereof if-IF- the content and functionality were there. Anyway, that’s not the purpose of this post, so let me move on.

Apparently, when I opened my bloglines account I inadvertently subscribed to a bunch of library feeds automatically. So, I checked out a couple of them and one of them led me to the post below about Google scanning newspapers. I clicked into a feed called Resource Shelf and saw a link at the top for “related feeds”. That took me to a page of feeds and I chose a couple more to subscribe to: Librarian’s Internet Index and Research Buzz.

I think it makes sense for libraries to receive feeds from other libraries in order to be aware of and keep up on trends. I also think it would be a good form of “communication” between libraries throughout a community or region. CML could monitor feeds from other Ohio libraries or other library systems that serve similar populations.

Subscribing to news feeds could also make a valuable contribution to one’s professional development or increase networking opportunities.

So, the moral of this post is that news feeds are great tools, bloglines is not.

Bloglines, Schmoglines

OK, I get the potential perk of having a bloglines account, but this was WAY frustrating to use! The lovely Joy added this caveat to the post introducing Thing #8: P.S.: Once you tackle this discovery exercise, you’ve conquered the most difficult one of the whole 23! Whew!  

Well, you can say that again! In theory, Thing 8 seemed very straightforward, and the recommended tutorial was easy to follow and well-done. However, once I set up my bloglines account, things began to go awry. The process of subscribing wasn’t very user-friendly, and the instructions bloglines offered were too vague. I muddled through it and eventually got a few subscriptions added. Then I decided to go ahead and make my bloglines public. Now, I do not consider myself a tech wizard, nor am I an amateur; but, this was a completely haphazard process and now that it’s done I’m not even exactly sure how I did it. When I came across Joy’s screenshot, I thought I would be in the clear, but it looked nothing like my account–I didn’t have the necessary Share Tab!

So, in the spirit of Learn & Play, I asked a co-worker for help. He hadn’t yet done Thing 8, but he said he was a blogger and seemed tech-savvy. He was great and I really appreciated his help, but unfortunately I think I turned him against bloglines too! In the midst of our frustration, he showed me Google Reader. Wow! That seemed so much more simple and clear. And, since I already have a gmail account, I think this might be a better fit for me. Oh well, play and learn, right?

Oh, and for what it’s worth, here is my labor-intensive public bloglines account: www.bloglines.com/public/katiesweb