Casting Pods and Tubing You (or me or someone else...)

I first discovered the wonderful world of podcasts a couple of years ago through iTunes when I got my iPod. I don't listen to podcasts very much because I find I don't take things in as much when I'm just listening things compared to when I watch or read. That said, I still think they're a great medium for sharing information of whatever kind (lectures, languages, news, debates, comedy etc.) and being able to set up a feed to get the latest episodes is brilliantly convenient! When I first got my iPod I had a feed for a travel podcast 'Dom Joly vs. the Planet', where the comedian was challenged by Sunday Time's Readers to do crazy sports around the world. It was hilarious! So far I haven't listened to anything too academic but having just had a browse of iTunesU there are some temptingly interesting lectures out there...

YouTube is an old favourite of mine! I use it mainly for the music videos on there but sometimes also to watch clips of films or comedy acts. It really is a treasure trove! I don't think I've ever seen anything serious on YouTube but I've heard there are serious videos out there. I've never had the inclination or the equipment to post a video but it seems easy enough, which is why I can see how it could work promoting services in the library sphere, whether it be a tour of the library itself or step by step instructions on how to search for library items on the catalogue etc. I think visual learners could benefit hugely from video instructions rather than the traditional talk or leaflet.

I had a little gander around YouTube and came across this video 'Tour the Library' by the Harper College Library, which I thought was a great example of a library using YouTube to promote its services. It's good quality and combines a bit of humour with the essential information without being too cheesy. I think they pull it off - do you...?

Yum...that was Delicious!

First things first, please excuse the terrible title of this post - it's Friday afternoon and my brain can't do any better than this!

This week's task of exploring the world of social bookmarking was completely new to me and I wasn't sure what to expect when it came to how it worked and it's potential usefulness to me. However, my initial reservations soon disappeared as I set up my Delicious page and began to appreciate the value of social bookmarking services.

I had no trouble with setting up my Delicious account as it all seemed fairly intuitive and soon set about bookmarking and tagging some of the websites I regularly look at like the news (international and local) the weather, the 23 Things Oxford page and PubMed. I also obediently bookmarked this blog and tagged it 'Ox23' so that anybody who's interested/participating in the '23 Things Oxford' programme can find it easily.

As far as exploring networks went, I had a look at the History Faculty Library's and Phil Bradley's Delicious pages and added them to my network, as well as subscribing to Phil Bradley's page by RSS feed.

I can see myself continuing to use Delicious in the future because of the convenience of being able to access my bookmarks wherever I happen to find myself. I think that tagging is also a great idea because of the way in which it makes relevant information much easier to find and I like the idea of networks and people collaborating all around the world. The word 'folksonomy' is pretty cool too!

Picture perfect...

This week's things were to do with storing and editing your photos on the web. Setting up a Flickr account was easy enough, although having to create yet another user name and password for the Yahoo ID was a tad annoying. One of the thing's I've realised I like about the other applications we've used to far on '23 Things' is that they're all connected to Google, so you only need to sign in once to access everything - that suits me very well!

Anyway...I've saved photos on the web before but not using Flickr. I tend to put my photos on Facebook so I can share them easily with my friends who all spend ridiculous amounts of time lurking on Facebook. I've also got a few saved on Snapfish, which is an 'online digital printing service' I've used in the past to print a selection of my digital photos. But this task was all about Flickr so I dutifully set up an account, uploaded a few photos and had a little mess around, tagging photos, adding descriptions and what not...

But Picnik is where it's at! I've used similar sorts of programmes in the past but it's always fun to try out new editing tools. I added some frames to a couple of pictures and turned myself neon among other things - very exciting! I am very impressed with the kind of things you can do on Picnik for free. I'll definitely use it again!





Brutus, the Snow Cat...

Me neon-ified...





My little angel in a frame...

Feeding frenzy...

So...week 3 has been all about RSS feeds and they have certainly lived up to their name - they really are simple! (Really Simple Syndication - get it?!) I found setting up my Google Reader account very easy and have no doubt spent far more time than I really should have exploring the wonderful world of blogging.

I've been following some of the other '23 things' participants' blogs right from the beginning so they were immediately added to my Reader. I've also subscribed to a selection of library related blogs, my friend's blog from her year abroad in Russia and a couple of fun blogs too.

I like things to be organised so I decided to manage my subscriptions by creating 3 folders in the left hand sidebar; one for '23 Things' blogs, one with the fantastically original name 'Library Stuff' for, you guessed it, library stuff! and one unimaginatively named 'personal' for everything else.

This is what my amazing Google Reader page looks like:

Stunning, isn't it?! I have to say I am slightly saddened that there's no customising options beyond folder creating. I think the Reader needs more colour but that's probably just me & my obsession with customising everything in sight!

Also I should mention that in my messing around with the settings on Google Reader I discovered (under the deceptive title 'Goodies') that I could add my Reader to my iGoogle page so I can see updated blogs at a glance - very useful.

I'll round off this post by leaving a few words of wisdom from a blog I've newly discovered called 'A Librarian's Guide to Etiquette'...

Office supplies, Hoarding

Hoard office supplies in your desk and filing cabinets. Some day you may find yourself needing to dispose of a patron's body and all that library mailing tape and bubble wrap will come in handy. Just remember, it takes A LOT of paper clips stuffed in a person's pockets to make them sink to the bottom of the river.

Tissues at the reference desk, Supplying

Do not keep toilet paper at the reference desk. It's tacky. Toilet paper is for use at the toilet. The reference desk can be bad, but it's no toilet. Class things up a bit by buying a generic box of Kleenex. The ones in the floral box. If you really want to show the patrons that you care, splurge and get the ones with lotion. Are you crafty?
Crochet a Kleenex-cozy to keep those tissues warm and comfortable. Just be sure to color coordinate it with your library's decor. Nothing ruins a good nose-blow like a mismatched tissue-box cover.

Monograph, On calling a book a

If you want to sound like a library scientist, use the word monograph instead of the word book. The word book is very pedestrian, and shows little understanding of the complexities of our great profession.

Entering into the blogosphere...

I've had quite a lot of fun setting up my blog this week. This isn't the first blog I've ever had - I had a Xanga blog many moons ago, which wasn't very successful mainly because I lead a boring life and never had anything of interest to say! That said, I still had one faithful anonymous follower!

It's also been really interesting reading some of the other '23 Things' blogs that are out there. It's great to see the range of people who are taking part and their differing perspectives on things. I love the fact that we're all different : )

I think blogs are a brilliant idea and can definitely have the potential to serve a good purpose but I do wonder how much specific library blogs are looked at by readers. Here at the Health Care Libraries we currently just have the website, which has a newsfeed (that readers can subscribe to) detailing the latest library information. I wonder whether a Health Care Libraries blog would catch on with our readers...

The joys of iGoogle...

When I first heard about start pages like iGoogle, I have to confess, I wasn't convinced about them. Internet sites I regularly want to visit like BBC news and weather are listed at the side in my 'Favorites' on Internet Explorer and this system has been working well for me for years. However...I am now a total convert to iGoogle! It's just so convenient having gadgets and feeds from websites I frequently visit all on one page. No more faffing around in the 'Favorites' bar for me! And, of course, I love anything that can be customised...

So on my iGoogle here's what I've added:

• Time & date - set to GMT


• BBC News - World Edition


• BBC Weather - set to Oxford


• Dictionary.com


• Wikipedia


• Google Map Search


• Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day


• Train Journey Planner


• Babylon Translation Tool


• Tetris (I couldn't resist!)


• And last but by no means least...Facebook!
  

Here are a couple of screenshots of what it looks like -

There are so many gadgets you can add it would be very easy to get a bit carried away. I have 11, which is definitely the limit I think!

Starting out in the land of Web 2.0...

As soon as I heard about 23 Things Oxford the geeky side of me got quite excited. I've grown up with the internet and use it a lot but things are constantly changing on the web and I know there's still so much I can learn! I've had a blog before, go on Facebook far too much and know all about Flickr, but I've never set up an RSS feed and don't really know what widgets or wikis are, so I'm looking forward to finding out more. I hope that by participating in 23 Things Oxford I can learn new ways of getting the most out of the internet and discover how to use these tools to benefit the Health Care Libraries...