And so, the end is near....

Well, that's it folks.  I have completed the Web 2.0 training.  This has been a great opportunity to learn about some of the technologies that are out there and peek our heads over our little boxes and challenge ourselves to explore and think how we may be able to incorporate them into our own lives and our workplaces.  I know I will use Blogger quite a lot.  Not keen on Twitter at all.  Will use Facebook infrequently as I have in the past.  It has certainly increased my tech vocabulary.  While it took a lot longer to complete than it should have, all in all it has been a very good thing to do.  Hopefully our libraries in Western Australia will go forth and embrace this new way of communicating with the people. 

Here's looking to the future and whatever it may bring.

Geocaching

I have a brother and sister in law who are hooked on geocaching and they go near and far in the quest to discover these hidden gems.  If you have the time and inclination it is a great way to expand your boundaries and travel to areas far off the beaten track.  Another friend is sometimes stumped by the 'cryptic' clues and sends around an email asking for any ideas to help solve the location puzzle.

 When reading through the information on this section I kept thinking about what a fantastic tool this could be to promote Mandurah.  The tourism operators could use it to bring tourists close to their premises.  The City (or the Peel region) could use it to promote community buildings (libraries, museum) , services, history.  Schools could use it to teach a variety of subjects, eg: history, social studies, geology.  The following link had a great idea about teaching students the history of their area by each cache containing historical information in a sealed test tube, this combined with a worksheet could make for a fun learning activity.  A real information treasure hunt.
http://spotlight.macfound.org/featured-stories/entry/chicago-public-library-helps-teens-find-history/ 

Wouldn't it be great for the City of Mandurah - or the Peel region to market a geocaching 'hunt' as part of a regional promotional tool.

Podcasting

I have only briefly had anything to do with podcasting and that has been during the basic interent classes that I teach when I briefly show my students how to surf around the ABC website and amaze them with technology. That you can actually listen to radio or tv stations that have been recorded.  Isn't modern technology brilliant.  Other than that I have had no real interest or need to think about podcasts and what it has to offer.  During this Web 2.0 training has made me think about what may be out there.  Having a little search, I have found that there is an assortment in the travel field - which is something that is of a personal interest to me and I know I will use these in the future.  Thinking about the library. They are already widely used by the library community for conferences.We could possibly use podcasts for training purposes.  How about recording our author talks so people who can't make it along are still afforded the chance to hear these speakers?  Story time and/or rhyme time online?  A wonderful way to advertise to a growing clientelle. Such as at this link http://lib.asu.edu/librarychannel/2011/06/22/libminute032_funthings2/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheLibraryChannel+%28The+Library+Channel%29&utm_content=FeedBurner

Embed

http://youtu.be/d0hw5lw6CNQ

Online video - Youtube

I do like Youtube although it is yet another time consuming space to play in.  When I was putting together my "Magic" school holiday activity I began using books from the library.  Mostly pretty well laid out and easy to follow.  One trick I just could not understand.  So I looked it up on Youtube and was finally able to master it.  I actually use Youtube quite often for information or instruction.  You should check out the 'quick' way to fold a shirt.  Brilliant.  Then fun for all the family to see who can do it the fastest and neatest.  There are useful ideas on science experiments, craft activities, always cute or interesting baby and animal clips and an endless array of everything you had never even dreamed of.  Can it be used in a library?  Like the video clip I have embedded, it can be useful for spreading knowledge between libraries around the globe. 

Facebook & Twitter

Facebook
I initially signed up for Facebook a while ago to try to follow my grown up children who were always discussing photos that they had posted or things that they had been doing etc.  They always knew what each sibling or cousin had been up to ALL the time.  I would phone to let them know about something and they already knew because the first one I spoke to had facebooked it for the others.  I felt I was missing out on the photos, no one seems to sit and share an old fashioned photo album anymore.  I am not so fussed about the 'having' to know everything about everybody all the time.  I initially thought it would be a wonderful thing to be able to put my many, many photos onto facebook, so any one could access them if they were interested.  I began well, but that initial burst of interest and enthusiasm has waned somewhat.  I actually believe, now that I have learnt about Blogging that I will blog in future, as that actually marries up images with text which will actually suit my purposes better.
Libraries need to have a Facebook page linked to the COM website.  Maybe the City of Mandurah should also embrace this technology as it would be a useful tool in the events, tourism, youth and marketing areas.  We must have a presence in the cyber world.

Twitter
What you normally hear of twitter is the very frivilous rantings of celebrities, which do not interest me at all.  It is interesting to note that lately a lot of tv programmes have incorporated twitter into their communications/promotions, including news and current affairs programmes.  Is this reaching out and including the younger multi-technical generation? 
I have found some very interesting sites that I know I will follow eg. travel, I am just not so sure that I need to twitter about my activities.
While I don't believe I will use it in a personal/private (I use the term loosely) capacity, I can see it being a useful tool in libraries.  Sending out information on new titles, events and happenings and other relevant library material.  Brilliant idea.  We must be in the space where people are and there are many, many people in twitter.

Delicious

This is a very handy tool. While I was studying I kept coming across some very interesting sites with inspirational ideas that could be useful in our libraries.  I emailed the links to the people who I thought may have been interested in them as that was the only way of passing on the relevant address.  While I also emailed it to myself, that means I have to either mark it as a favourite on my computer, or trawl through old emails looking for the link.  Delicious is obviously a far better way of storing and sourcing these links for both yourself and also others who may be interested in the same sort of information.

Library Thing

I
found this very easy to sign up for and use.  It has been a great addition to the Mandurah Library online catalogue, which, when searching for an item brings up  similar genre titles, provides information and links by either author, title or tags.  Very easy to click links and discover a myriad of further reading items.

Wiki Part IV

A wiki is a good tool for discussing things in a library environment. I am trying to weigh up if it would be better than a Blog site.  The point of difference is that a wiki can be edited by anyone, so you could lose the ‘history’ of the conversation string.  Therefore a blog site may be a better option.  What worries me is that you have to log in to all these different sites.  At least we check emails regularly and they are directed to the people who should be reading them, they just are not the correct forum for a group discussion.

The Best Egytpian photo competition?

Well, perhaps not the best photo ever taken, but different.  Oh it was hot as well.  Similarities are quite striking aren't they, except I still have my nose.  The Sphinx is only on the site of the Great Pyramids of Giza because it was a pile of ugly dirt and they didn't know what to do with it so they carved the beast with the head of the Pharaoh and the body of a lion.

Wiki Pt 3: Antioch University and staff training wiki

This wiki has detailed JIGS or procedures for training staff members on front desk duties.  While currrently all our procedures are available to all staff through the T drive and can be read and edited by all staff, you do have to know what the procedure might be labelled in order to locate it easily in the system.

By placing all procedures specific to the job in one place has its advantages for training and referring to in the future.

I wonder if privacy may be an issue with this form of technology, but then who would care what the procedure for scanning at the Mandurah Libraries would be.

Wiki Pt 2: SJCPL Subject guides

First I liked this, then I didn't, then I did.  Confused yet? 

Firstly I thought it was going to give me great lists of authors in different genres, and it sort of did in the History related mystery section with images of book titles.

Then I looked at Arts and Entertainment and it is all about local events, galleries,  museums, movies and bars. I guess I was expecting it to have relevant books on those subjects.  It did have a comprehensive list of the magazines that the library has on those fields.  I think the info on the page was very relevant to the local community and therefore not a bad thing to have on the site. The same thing with the Gardening page, no books. I would have liked to see the library collection somehow linked to those particular pages.

Very interesting area on writing your own diaries and journals with links to other sites for further information. 

Great section on Genealogy which includes help sheets for the databases that the library subscribe to.  Many links to useful sites and general how to information.

The Business page has direct links to the library catalogue from where you can reserve a book as well as links to journals and databases.

All in all a very good, informative Wiki.  This wiki was only able to be edited by librarians.  I wonder if that is a good thing or a bad thing.

Wiki Pt 1: Twilight Wiki

Wow.  I use Wikipaedia quite a bit so am used to what the site looks like.  Pretty boring really.  I was so surprised to see this Wiki which is colourful, interesting and alive.  Interesting that it has links to other TV shows and movie wikis that would have the same target audience as Twilight. The countdown to the upcoming movie release.  Lots of information on both the characters, actors and the books.  Moving images and clips to watch.  I can see that there would be a whole community of Twilight fans who would return again and again to blog or chat in the IRC channel room.  There is a lesson here on how to make a site vibrant, informative and interesting.

I also had a peek at Wookieepedia which was far less engaging.

RSS Feeds

Well, it seems that I have been using RSS Feeds into my Hotmail account for several years without even knowing what I had been doing.  So while the title of this weeks lesson looked a tad frightening it was a very easy lesson.  I have added some of the suggested sites that were in this weeks lesson.  I have also added a former workmates blog.  She is exactly the same age as I am.  Both born on the same day on other sides of the world.  We job shared, each working half a week and working together every Satruday.  Another thing we shared was a love of adventurous travel with both of us enjoying the back packing type of holiday.  She has recently sold up everything, left work and has just begun a life journey that is beginning in South America.  She has emailed me with her blog address and I am very much looking forward to following her journey.  There have already been some mishaps and they have only just begun.  J

Use of Flickr in Libraries

Flickr is a photo storage site.  Libraries, local museums and historical societies could use Flickr as a storage device and also a promotional tool.

Albums could be set up for various activites, events and historical images.

[http://www.flickr.com/photos/beebe_library/3808436641/]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/beebe_library/3808436641

I have spent some time searching for an image and have found it very frustrating not to have been able to locate one that is free to use.  The above link shows a young girl holding a craft item that she has made during a holiday programme.  The links to the instructions for uploading an image using flickr seem to be out of date as when I tried to  follow these demos/instructions I was looking at different screens to the ones depicted in the 'lessons'.  I found it very frustrating to use and wonder if it would be of much use other than as a strorage device for your own images to which you would have full access.

Oh the pain

What I learnt on my recent annual leave, is that travel is not at all fun when you get ill.  Lucky it was only a short break.  Met a nice doctor on Langkawi who trained in Adelaide before heading home to Malaysia.

Web 2.0 Training

Well here I am blogging on my own blog site instead of adding to everyone else's.  What I hope to learn from Web 2.0 training is how to more fully utilise the web technology that I already participate in and learn something of some of the web content/sites that I have only heard about.  The trap in doing this is a little like visiting a particular clip on You Tube.  Then being enticed to view another one, then another, until hours have passed.  It is all very interesting yet also very time consuming/addictive.
I love the fact that we all still learn something every day, well we usually learn more than 1 thing a day.  Learning does not have to be in a class room,  I have learnt far more since leaving the class room.  Life's experiences, both good and bad ensure that we are continually learning during our entire lives.  We learn at work, at play and quite often from people we come across during social gatherings. 
I recently found myself in need of a blog that contained information from families who's brain injured newborn babies had received 'Cooling treatment'.  The medical treatment is still in its infancy and having never heard of it, I required as much information on the subject that I could find.  As well as providing me with real life stories and outcomes, it also provided me with a network of people who had been in the same situation who were able to provide support and comfort, even though many of them are on the other side of the world.  Isn't the Internet wonderful!
The library where I work has recently begun it's own staff blog. (clever library) This allows staff at both branches to communicate on a range of subjects allowing a host of opinions and ideas to flow on a range of subjects.  As our website is managed by our corporate entity it does not allow us the freedom of adding day to day information as easily as a blog site will.  I wonder if we will be allowed to freedom to blog what we feel we need or will it still have to be approved by the all controlling marketing department.  Perhaps it will be possible to add a blog on what groups are hiring our rooms as a form of promoting them to the community.  What activities and events are coming up in the future.  Book discussion groups.  The applications are endless.
Libraries do have to be in the 'space' where people are.  With more and more people using technology like myspace, twitter, facebook, blogs and so on, we must also have a presence in those spaces.  We must understand how they work and utilise them to our advantage.