Blog Shmog! by Erica

An ongoing adventure…

ericajohnston7 — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 21:03:47 +0000

I thought I already completed my final blog. Ooops!

I’ve been reviewing Social Networking God, and I have to say again that I like the categorization of sites:

I noticed that the site has Friendster listed. I thought Friendster bit it, like, 8 years ago! Hmmm. I did look at it, and it looks different–more like a blog or a MySpace site with less attitude. I’m not joining it again, however.

Ooooh…But there’s Coastr, “the social guide to beer”. If I was going on a trip, I might consult this site for pub recommendations. Hey, there’s San Francisco’s Toronado! It’s one of the “Most Popular” beer joints, according to Coastr. Can you tell I like beer?

I also browsed MyDogSpace (hahaha), to see what was up. Dogs have their own profiles, and send messages to other dog “friends”. Pretty wacky! I’m not sure I’d recommend using this site (as if you were considering it): The page design’s not very organized. And, you have to scroll down a lot. I hate that.

What I would recommend, however, is Internet radio! Check out the links (on SNG’s “Media”) for stations!

Thanks, Bill, Catherine, et al., for a fun workshop/tutorial on the 2-dot-ohhhh!

Yay! Podcasts! Vintage video!

ericajohnston7 — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 20:58:51 +0000

I love my subscription to Garagepunk.com through iTunes: I get weekly radio shows (garage- and surf-rock productions) to listen to on my computer and/or iPod!

YouTube is addictive: Once you find what you’re looking for, it offers you related search items. I love watching old ’70s commercials and old rock’n'roll videos (Blondie has some good ones).

Final comment: I had no idea CCCL was producing podcasts of children’s stories. Vodcasts of programs–like instructional arts and crafts or popular speakers–would be an excellent addition to the podcasts!

Ning Thing

ericajohnston7 — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 20:51:30 +0000

I’d never heard of Ning! So, I didn’t have enough time to get too crazy on Ning, but I liked what I saw. I liked that it’s kind of an “aggregate” of networks. In browsing the library 2.0 networks, it seems that everyone’s kind of on the same page, as far as getting reluctant co-workers hip to the technologies. I think that these networks are handy for us public library peeps to share resources and ideas.

RSS Feeds

ericajohnston7 — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 02:10:03 +0000

Thanks to the snazzy RSS feature on ccclib.org, I have been alerted to the “Peter and the Wolf” marionette performance on August 12.

While I kind of understood how RSS worked, I’d never explored the Library’s RSS page, which is something I’d recommend to patrons. I do subscribe to a feed that works for podcasts, through iTunes.

At first I was confused about RSS through Bloglines: I thought that I’d receive an email about upcoming stuff; I didn’t realize that I had to log in to Bloglines.

Chatty, chatty!

ericajohnston7 — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 22:08:30 +0000

IMing is fun and all, but I’m a little freaked out about it! If anyone can initiate a chat using the type of widget we used on the Web 2.0 blog, how do you discourage unsavory characters? Maybe a type of “registration” would occur before use? I’m just thinking about inappropriate comments that get sent as e-mail reference questions, etc.

However, it would be cool to use the chat feature for intra-library stuff (non-urgent shelf-checks, etc.). Perhaps StaffNet would have a use for it? And it would be cool to put something like this on the library’s website, for readers’ advisory/recommendations, or something.

I looked to see how other libraries are using the chat feature:

L-net is Oregon’s online library reference service http://www.oregonlibraries.net/
I liked how this university website’s chat page shows the librarians who might be providing the online help http://www.earlham.edu/~libr/content/contact/chat.html

Neat! But still freaky…

Google Docs

ericajohnston7 — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 01:11:33 +0000

Very cool that patrons can save their documents online this way. I liked how the spreadsheet functions are very similar to Excel. Yay, Google, for making free stuff like this!

Waaaa!

ericajohnston7 — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 21:13:58 +0000

So, now I have a Flickr account to add on to my Photobucket and Picasa photo-sharing websites accounts. I think I may even have a Shutterfly or Snapfish account, too. It’s hard to believe there are so many of them. I just wish everyone would use the same one!

Here’s my photostream, featuring arts and crafts @ ESL!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28758677@N03/?saved=1

Del.icio.us

ericajohnston7 — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:49:19 +0000

I forgot I already had an account that I started last year, at Bill’s suggestion! I was subbing at WCL, when Bill suggested that I try it out. It’s pretty helpful when you’re searching for obscure stuff, because you can see what other del.icio.us users are recommending…

I’m bookmarking craft blogs (’cause I’m a crafts freak), and I’ll post them on Blog Shmog! too.

Oh, and I’ll be finishing the Flickr stuff soon. Promise.

Wiki wiki wiki!

ericajohnston7 — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 01:55:58 +0000

I’ve finally posted my review of What is the What after some technical difficulties. It took me a few days to figure out that Firefox won’t open the link to the Wiki instructions. Duh! And then there was the network error on the site…Whee!

Helping young adults find the right book…

ericajohnston7 — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 00:16:36 +0000

I found a blog, by “Edi, an African American school librarian in Indianapolis hoping to improve the literacy of students of color”. Her homepage, Crazy Quilts, is interesting, as it examines black issues in literature, essays, movies, etc., but I’m excited about the booklists she created–very helpful for those of us who haven’t read many multicultural, teen-appropriate books, but would still like to be able to recommend some. She’s made lists for 2007 and 2008.