Do you want to be a librarian?

YouTube

I have used this site many times when trying to catch a news story that I missed. I looked at the most viewed videos and latest videos but did not see too many I would be interested in. I liked how they had a categories page. Maybe a library website could have a categories page for people to click on and get the resources that are available in that category (databases, books, magazines,etc).

The video above is an old film on becoming a librarian. I thought it was interesting. It shows how much has changed (computers, etc) and how much has stayed the same.

Podcasts

I have been listening to podcasts for about a year now. I listen to Bill Maher, The Ricky Gervais podcast (the most downloaded podcast) and This American Life. I have gotten them all from iTunes. I like to listen to them on my iPod at lunch or in the car to and from work. They are free which is great! This is a good alternative to talk radio. Also whenever I plug my iPod into my computer iTunes automatically downloads them so I do not have to search. I found some interesting book review podcasts. The New York Times does one. This can be a great tool.

elizabeth

Elizabeth Martin is at work doing her TechTrek exercise. It is Thursday and it is raining. It is the kind of weather that makes you want to go to sleep. I look forward to watching The Office tonight and the return of Scrubs.

Zoho Writer

I tried using Zoho Writer. It had some of the same features as Microsoft Word. It took a little getting used to. I don't think it will replace Microsoft Word anytime soon. This is the universal tool for word processing. I did see the publish to the blog feature and above is how it came out on the blog. I played around with several different features so I may have done something wrong along the way. I had never heard of these tools so I definitely will remember that there is an alternative to Word. Tech Trek is almost over. I am looking forward to the MP3 player :)

Vote for Cocky

Vote for Cocky for mascot of the year

http://www.capitalonebowl.com/

Dogster

Dottie has a Dogster page! Here is a Halloween photo. She is too cute.

Wiki

I think that using a wiki as a tool for collaboration and information gathering is useful. I have looked at several wiki's while doing research on YA services. Wikipedia is a tricky one because you cannot always trust the information. I have found when using Google that many times this is the first web site to come up with information.When deciding whether or not to use this information is on a case by case basis for my own personal use. At work I do not use this as a resource but sometimes will scroll down the page and see what sources they used in finding information. Sometimes these are good sites for information and sometimes not. I tell patrons to be careful using wikipedia because of this.
I think it is great when different libraries can collaborate on a particular topic by using a wiki to add information about what they do at their library and what works and what doesn't. I prefer this to the listservs.

Social Networking - good or bad?

I have both a myspace and a facebook page. I have some friends who only do one of them so I have both to keep in touch. I find it a convenient way to get in touch with old friends and to communicate with current ones. I did not have my page private at first and got some strange and unwanted requests. My page is private now so that only my friends can see my page. I especially like to change the song and background to my page and to add pictures.
I do think that it can be used as a tool to prey on the vulnerable. I am aware of the safety precautions one should take with such a tool but I am afraid many others are not and could be taken advantage of. Myspace has gotten somewhat of a bad rap for this and have tried to put in more safety features.
I have looked at many library myspace pages and can see that they can be used as a way to get information out about the library out to its patrons. I have also seen that many of the friends on these myspace pages are authors trying to promote their books. I am still going back and forth on doing one for the teens here (I already have a blog). Many of the "teens" that show up to my programs are not 14 and over so they would not be allowed to have a myspace page. We'll see!

Flickr

I have used Flickr many times and think it is a great way to share photos. Here is a photo taken from the SC Teen institute that I went to last week put on by the State Library. It is from a flickr account. I learned alot of great ideas and information on serving teens in the library. The speakers were inspiring. Here is a picture of one of the speakers. Michele Gorman is the teen librarian at the ImaginOn library in Charlotte. Flickr is a great way to share information with the public. (she is the one standing in the orange top)

Technorati

The results were different by searching for Library 2.0 in tag search and blog directory. The Tag search brought up results that were more narrowed down. The blog directory brought different blogs that talked about libraries but you did not see from the results where it mentioned the library 2.0 information. I thought it was nice that it had an advanced search option. I found many interesting blogs written by all kinds of different people. I found one written by John Cusack who is one of my favorite actors. I will use this to search blogs again.
The constantly updated topics page was fun too.

Del.icio.us

Hello again!

Well, I tried several times to watch the tutorial on del.icio.us but it never worked. I played around on it however and I think it is an interesting tool. I do enjoy having bookmarks. I liked how you could search it as well. It is much easier if you want to be able to access your bookmarks from anywhere.