#11 A Thing about LibraryThing

LibraryThing is an interesting tool if you want to catalog your collection AND want to be part of a social network discussing books. I'm a member of a mystery book discussion listserv and I have trouble keeping up with those ongoing discussions.

I wondered if there was also a DVDThing or a MusicThing out there and Googled DVDThing. There was an ongoing discussion on the LibraryThing site about that very thing. Some of the posters were enthusiastic about it and wanted something that had all the qualities of LibraryThing. Others felt that LibraryThing should stick to books.

My link to LibraryThing is in the right hand column of this blog.

#10: Image Generators - Bead Art, Wordle, Map Maker

Well, this lesson was quite an eye-opener!





I'm really surprised that the lawyers - the Disney lawyers, in particular- haven't gone after this Comic Strip image generator.






Using the Dummies art at SignGenerator.org- I created this book-that-never-was.

Lydia San Marco- beaded version (http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/beads.php). Kinda looks like she's looking through a thick screen door, doesn't it?

This is the Wordle (http://wordle.net/) I created for this blog. This is my favorite of the bunch and is highly addictive as you can see by my creations on the Wordle site.

Places I visited as a child or teen

The blue states are the ones I visited or lived in.

#9 Exploring RSS Search Tools

The questions posed in this exercise were:

• Which method of finding feeds did you find easiest to use? Feedster wasn't one of them. When I couldn't access it, I Googled it and found this: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/blog_search_feedster_quietly_dies.php That article mentioned some other feed finders to try. So, I moved on down the list. Syndic8 was a disappointment. Topix was good in that it defaulted to items of local interest - though: How did "IT" know?
• Which Search tool was the easiest for you? I found Bloglines' search tool to be the easiest for me to use. It was basically one stop shopping. I could add new sites to my public Blogline account right there.
• Which was more confusing? Apart from the confusion with the dead Feedster- Sydic8 was the most confusing and least helpful.
• What kind of useful feeds did you find in your travels? The hurricane and weather feeds will be helpful. There's not much out there for useful ILL blogs. A lot of non-librarians use the service and either praise or express disappointment in it. Gratifyingly, praise is in the vast majority of the posts.
• Or what kind of unusual ones did you find? Well, there is "Captain ILL". (Example: http://captainill.blogspot.com/2008/04/interlibrary-loan-of-day_24.html) who for some reason chooses to post in other languages very once in a while.
• What other tools or ways did you find to locate newsfeeds? Ummmm. I have been using Google Alerts for a while now to find search the web to find items on "Interlibrary Loan" and on "Jacksonville Public Library". It doesn't always give me THIS "Jacksonville Public Library" and "Interlibrary Loan" gets me A LOT of posts on ILL customers use of the service. Google Alerts sends me an e-mail with links to items it finds on websites and in blogs.

Here's my take on RSS-dom. My FeedReader alerts me whenever new stuff comes in. Google Alerts does the same thing, though it does it once a day or once every couple of days. Bloglines will be another site I will need to remember to go to in order to access the posts. They all have a huge advantage over doing searches on a topic or remembering to check a site for an update. Now- the problem! Some of the websites I need to check up on do not- for whatever reason- "work" with RSS. Very ironic in one case since one of them is exploring new, innovative ways to use Interlibrary Loan!

#8- RSS and newsreaders

http://www.bloglines.com/public/Cambie is my public Blogline account link.
I've been working with RSS readers since January 2007 when I found out that the ILLiad Customer Service Interface was going to add an RSS component in the next upgrade. At the time, the OCLC Help Desk pointed me to newsreaders that required me to download software to my desktop and then have to upgrade to newer versions. Bloglines is a lot easier and accessible from any computer. That's a big plus. Now, to the questions at hand:

What do you like about RSS and newsreaders?
The convenience. As the video in the training pointed out- it comes to you so you don't have to access the websites to get the information you want.
How do you think you might be able to use this technology in your work or personal life?
I see me using this more in my work life. My work is so tied to computers that my off-time is usually off-line. I can see entries from Library Journal that I'm interested in. Wall Street Journal runs a column on recommended books. Many of them are no longer in print so there will be ILL requests from all across the country for the few libraries that still have these books on their shelves. It's good to get forewarning. There are some ILL-related blogs that I don't access on a frequent basis. This will help me keep up with those blogs.
How can libraries use RSS or take advantage of this new technology?
At JPL, we already are. If you use ILL, you can get notifications that your book has come in via RSS. JPL also has other RSS feeds available:http://jpl.coj.net/res/rssfeeds/index.html They help keep customers informed about new services and library programming.

#7 The Technology Blog Rant

There is just much, too much out there and this course hasn't even scratched the surface of everything that's out there! Definitely TMI! When I look at the blogs done by others in the library field that just go on and on and realize how much time they've spend on them, I wonder how anything gets done. It's all fascinating but it's also a bit overwhelming. I wonder how the Internet can maintain this rate of growth and also wondering what's new around the corner.

I'm very impressed by the blogs that others at JPL have done and frustrated that mine is so plain by comparison and -since- I am in the middle of a project, it's also frustrating that it'll just have to stay that way. It's also a bit irksome that I can't get my pictures from Webshots to Blogspot- though it looks like others are doing it. I'm currently updating information in our ILLiad database and tagging all the libraries that lend to us for free. There's 50 typed pages of them. I have to stop now and then to give my eyes and my fingers a rest.

Whew!

#6 More Flickr Fun- Spell with Flickr

I was really intrigued with the Spell with Flickr API. I tried to display what was created on this blog using then word I typed (books!) but Blogger wouldn't show the images. Frustrating. I thought the Flickr Color Picker was interesting. Again- couldn't find out if this was something I could download and share.

I was also intrigued by http://flickrvision.com/. This site shows a map and flashes pictures as they are loaded on in each location. It's fascinating to watch what's being posted in near-realtime throughout the world.

ILLiad Conference artwork

I was startled to see this on Flickr.

ILLiad artwork
Originally uploaded by Atlas Systems

I attended the 2008 ILLiad Conference in Virginia Beach last year and was at the Art Center where this was created. The person who took this picture has moved on from an ILL job to a job at EBSCO. I'm having a "Wait a minute! How did I miss this!" moment.

I chose this picture because I was at this conference and think this piece of artwork was very cleverly done. This is a certainly a more attractive logo than the one Atlas is currently using for its ILLiad product!