curiosity - play it

I used our old friend sloganizer to name my post this week. I think it did a rather brillant job considering all the playing we have been doing in PP. Curiosity can be a great thing, once you give yourself permission to play with it. Previously to PP I would have almost never tried out something I was not familiar with, but now that Go2Web20 looks like a delicious box of chocolates!

Thank you PP coordinators and fellow players for this great opportunity for library and personal enrichment!

Mashups

I added one of my fav "green" shopping outlets to our PP map, at least I think I did; it's not showing up yet. It is interesting viewing all the great combos people have mashed together. Here is an idea for our library website which could be located with our catalog and interlibrary loan info. "Looking for an item that's not in our catalog, or that's checked out already and you need it today? Check out these other area businesses!" The mashup could combine a city map with pushpins for local new and used bookstores and video stores, like our PP type of mashup.

YouTube

So many videos...so little time! Wow, you could spend hours looking at these videos. One just leads to another. I loved what the libraries did with the contests and I think it is great that Ask?Away is planning on doing one this fall. How exciting to see what creative minds will come up with!

Screencasting is Cool!

Hey, this screencasting is cool! I can see where libraries could really add value to their websites, by using screencasts to "show" folks how to use all the cool stuff that is available. The only trouble I had making my screencast was finding the X to turn off the recorder when I was finished, thus several seconds of "dead air" at the end. I didn't use a script, but I can definitely see that you would want to use one for the best results. Who knew such cool software was available for free and so easy to use. Thank you P.P.P. for showing it to us!

Podcasting- Take two

Hey this podcasting was fun! I used the opportunity to see how I sound in Spanish. I am a very new Spanish language learner...I decided not to press my luck and went with my "second take!" :)
I think the uses of podcasting are just about limitless! I like the idea that some of my colleagues have of personalizing library websites with bios, reader's advisories, etc. Gabcast certainly is user friendly.

Facebook & MySpace

I have somewhat of a sordid history with MySapce. Oh no, not THAT sordid. A couple of years ago I was helping a patron with the site, so I set up an account for myself as a sort of demo. Well my highly social children saw MOM on Myspace and thought it was an absolute hoot! A year or so later when I finally got a cell phone, my daughter Katie programed the message "I love MySpace" as the start up message on my cell phone. It's still there as I have no idea how to get rid of it. LOL I don't remember how to get into my MySpace account...acutally I didn't even try. But, for the heck of it, I set up a Facebook account yesterday. So I have a couple of friends already and my daughter Jaime uploaded some pictures for me to share. I had a comment on one of the picutres from a niece already. I think I will keep my status at "Today I am doing this for a class" so as not to freak out my kids too much.

I looked at several other MySpace pages from the libraries listed and although they seem great, a lot of the parts I don't really understand how they got there. :(
I can see where a young adult librarian, or an older "young at heart" and "tech savy" librarian can really make an inviting site for young adults. There was some talk about having one of our part-time circulation people setting up a page for us. If you happen to know "Steve" you could believe he would have a truly interesting MySpace! If the task were up to me, I'm afraid it would not be so cool...what's the word? I liked how the libraries advertised their upcoming YA events. I think that could really reach a market that the local paper might not. Maybe I'll talk to Steve...

Remember the Milk - Jott it?

Well sometimes I like to make to do lists and then check off things as I get them accomplished. But some of these lists have gotten misplaced before they were used. I can see where Remember the Milk could help with that aspect for sure. Also, the collaboration feature would be a big advantage for a group project. Members of the group could see what is done and what needs to still get done. Maybe you would have to "claim" a task somehow so two people aren't trying to work on the same thing at the same time?

I think for anyone who uses their cell phone a lot, Jott, would come in very handy to add items to their Remember the Milk list or to send the info to their email, etc.

I guess both things would have many uses, but I think I would have to train myself to remember to use them at first!

The 43 Things Zeitgeist Goals was fun. It was interesting to immediately see the thousands of people who have my same goal and what they had very recently said about it.