Thursday, February 7, 2008

Final Thoughts

When I made my first post back in November, I knew very little about Web 2.0. Today, I feel I've come a long way. At times I was frazzled with all of the information, but I kept at it and constantly asked my co-workers for assistance. There were also times I felt that I learned more from them then I did from the actual readings for the various "things".

There were a few things about Library 2.0 that I thought could've been improved upon. For example, it was frusterating when I couldn't access the excel sheet because someone else was using it. There were many times that I couldn't look at certain sites because they were blocked or wouldn't come up for whatever reasons. There was a ton of reading, some of which was very interesting, but not enough visually. For instance, the use of You Tube videos when explaining a particular term was extremely helpful. I loved the video that described tagging. I was having the hardest time understanding this concept until I watched the video. That put it all into perspective for me.

Other than that, I liked that we were able to work at our own pace but I still felt really pressed for time. Having this take place over the holidays wasn't such a good idea in my opinion. It was difficult to find the time during a normal work week to work on this. After some holiday leave, I really felt overwhelmed coming back and having all of these blogs hanging over me. I never thought I'd catch up.

Will I participate in another adventure like this? Absolutley. I just think it needs to be thought out a little more. After looking over several of the blogs, I believe everyone did a great job and put a lot of thought and time into Library 2.0.

My 2.0 Experience

I have mixed emotions about my experiences with Library 2.0. First, I'd like to thank my co-workers for all of their suggestions, thoughts and insights. I couldn't have done it without your help!



I was really excited to get started in this adventure at the beginning. I was interested in learning more about Web 2.0 and thought this was a great place to start. After the first couple of weeks though, I wasn't sure how I felt about it. There was a lot of reading that went along with each thing, but that wasn't what I didn't like. It seemed that we were expected to have prior knowledge regarding many of the terms that were used and researched. For instance, I had no idea what a blog or a wiki was to begin with. I felt like I was lost right from the start! The info. that was given just didn't do the job for me personally. There were times when a You Tube video was included in our activities and that was great. I am a visual learner.



Still, I feel I learned quite a lot in my Library 2.0 experience. There was surely a lot of thought that went into this and the information was useful. I'm very proud of myself for getting this far because I felt very overwhelmed with all of the info. and I began to dread the thought of having to blog on each activity.



I'm glad I stuck with it because I think I'll use this information in the near future!

Rollyo

This site reminded me of others we have explored, especially bloglines. It's the same idea of grouping your favorite sites together for a quicker search. I wasn't all that impressed because it wasn't really a new idea. I searched other people's search rolls and found some interseting web sites but I chose not to create one myself. I know I wouldn't use it, much like I haven't gone to my bloglines account since it's been activated.

However, I can see how this may be beneficial to information specialists who have specific sites they visit to answer patron inquiries. Still, it could be just as easy, if not easier, to just put the sites under their Favorites.

Saturday, February 2, 2008

LibraryThing

I've checked out this site a few times trying to get ideas on the next book I should read. It's a cool site for those who are really avid readers and interested in others opinions on various books. Now that I've created an account, I see that there is much more to LibraryThing than book reviews. There are book groups, loads of information on the books themselves and suggestions for other books that I may enjoy. It's really an enjoyable and informative site that I will probably visit often!


http://www.librarything.com/catalog/EWallace

Online Image Generators

This was fun! I found so many neat images but just had a hard time finding something clever to say with the image. I never knew anything like this existed. Now that I know it's there, I may take advantage of it when e-mailing friends or for just something fun to do. Here is the link to the image I created at imagegenerator:


http://www.imagegenerator.net/image/81682/Think-for-yourself-.jpg

Podcasts and Libraries

I couldn't open many of the podcasts examples on the discovery excercises but I did enjoy checking out the podcasts on the Denver Public Library web site. I love the idea of having children's books available for little ears to listen to. Still, it is much more fun for children to actually be able to take part in storytimes at the library. This is a great way to get information out to the public. It's another resource that is out there if you know it's available and know how to use it!

Podcasts

There are a ton of podcasts out there. It seems that there is a podcast relating to just about everything - just as there are blogs. I subscribed to a couple of the news podcasts because I like to be updated and this is a great and super easy way to check out current events and entertainment news!