SOA Workshop: Demystifying Web 2.0 in Your Archives/Library

Cancelled, will be rescheduled for spring.

The Society of Ohio Archivists fall workshops and strategic planning session will be November 1-2, 2007.

All events are at the Holiday Inn, French Quarter, located at 10630 Fremont Pike (US20 @ I-75 exit 193), Perrysburg, Ohio. See http://www.hifq.com/ for information on hotel rates. Lunch is included with all sessions.

Friday, Nov. 2: WIKIS, BLOGS, FLICKR, ZOHO, AND MORE: DEMYSTIFYING WEB 2.0 IN YOUR ARCHIVES/LIBRARY
9-4:30 (Registration begins at 8:30); $35 SOA Members/ $45 Non-members

We may have heard about blogs, wikis, social networking, photo sharing, and folksonomies, but what is Web 2.0 and why do archivists and librarians need to know about it? This workshop will explore the opportunities and challenges that Web 2.0 offers to archivists and librarians and offer simple tips on how you can implement Web 2.0 tools in your institution. Familiarity with the Web is a plus, but technical expertise is not required for this workshop.

Sessions include:
* Exploring Libraries (…And Our Users) In The Web 2.0 Realm (Brian Gray, Case Western Reserve University)
* Second Life 101 (Laura Solomon, Cleveland Public Library)
* Archives 2.0: A Survey of Library, Archives, and Museum Projects Using Web 2.0 (Kiffany Francis, Cleveland State University)
* Web 2.0: Getting Your Archives/Library on Board (Janet Carleton (yours truly, and all because of this learning project!), Ohio University & Whitney Townsend, University of Michigan)

Also offered:
Thursday, Nov. 1: SOA STRATEGIC PLANNING SESSION
10-5 (Registration begins at 9:45); Free, Pre-registration Required.

Friday, Nov. 2: ARCHIVES 101 WORKSHOP
9-5: (Registration begins at 8:30); $30 SOA Members/ $40 Non-members
Sponsored by the Ohio Historical Records Advisory Board (OHRAB)

For More Information: Visit http://www.ohioarchivists.org/ for more info and to register online. Contact: Erik Mayer Program Co-Chair at 614-764-6072 or mayere -at- oclc.org.

Ways for Web 2.0 Startups to Commit Legal Suicide

Check out the 9/20 WebWare column "Legal Suicide for Web 2.0 start-ups: A beginner's guide"

In it Rafe Needleman says:
"I got an email from Fred von Lohmann of the Electronic Frontier Foundation yesterday. It began, "Half the companies you blog about have copyright or privacy legal issues simmering just under the surface. Since most of them are thinly capitalized, when they get into trouble, they're likely to call EFF for legal advice. Several already have."

I called von Lohmann right away, since I've had a nagging feeling for months that too many of the interesting products I've been seeing were legally shaky. So I talked with him to come up with this list: 9 Fun Ways Web 2.0 Startups Can Commit Legal Suicide."

Professional Opportunities Blogs

From the WSS-L Listserv (Women's Studies Section of the ACRL division of ALA) a crop of very helpful blogs!

A Library Writer's Blog should "help librarians identify publishing and presentation opportunities in library & information science, as well as other related fields"

Beyond the Job offers "news and ideas on how to further your library career."

Dolores' List of CFPs (Calls for Papers) lists calls for papers and presentations in Library and Information Science, Instructional Design, and Women's & Gender Studies.

"Addy Will Know"

A New Song For The Modern Librarian
by indie pop band SNMNMNM.

Flickr and Slide Shows

Turns out that one can also create flickr slide shows, but only through third party add-ons (with Picasa it's done within the application). There are several out there--I chose slideflickr to create this one. It was very simple--just enter a user name and a couple of clicks later code is generated. Then paste the code into your blog or Web site.

Picasa and Slide Shows

Picasa now allows you to embed slide shows in your blog...check out this one of historical images of Ohio University and Athens sports women. Images courtesy Ohio University Archives and Peggy Pruitt.

5000 Web 2.0 apps

SimpleSpark.com has created a 333-second long video showing the logos of 5000 browser-based applications! SimpleSpark is a searchable and browsable catalog of Web apps.

I Hate Good Byes!

Assignment #23 Is this really the end? Or just the beginning ...

This is the last assignment of the Ohio University Libraries' summer of 23 Things. It was a lot of fun! I had some small experience with Web 2.0, but for this I worked at trying things I had not yet tried. I would love to participate in another of these sort of things, or help with a Web 2.0 learning blog.

I think my favs were del.icio.us and LibraryThing. I will definitely continue using them.

And thanks to all the folks who helped with this! You were great.

Facebook.....MySpace.....LinkedIn

Assignment #22 Face-to-Face Space: Social Networking Communities

I joined Facebook a couple of years ago after hearing an OU speaker on a technology panel held here in the library. The speaker espoused all staff joining Facebook as outreach--just part of the job at an academic institution. As Women's Studies bibliographer, Facebook has helped me keep in touch with Women's Studies students and various student groups working on women's issues. It has been effective for me and I would recommend it to other library folk. I also belong to several library interest groups.

Recently I joined the LinkedIn business network and am having fun with it. I've invited both OU and colleagues from the archival community to join. A newer feature in LinkedIn is "groups," --I need to explore that further.

I don't know that I'll ever join MySpace...it's way too UGLY and bandwidth-intensive for me (remember I'm on dial-up at home). But really it's the general ugliness and bad usability of most of the pages and interface that keeps me away.

Jazzing up your Audio

Assignment #21 Podcasts, Shmodcasts!

Podcasts can be a great way to listen to audio content that you might not otherwise have access to. Your local public radio station canceled jazz programing? You can still listen to Jazz Profiles with Nancy Wilson by downloading the podcast of the show from the NPR podcast directory. Listen to it on your computer, or carry it with you on your portable MP3 player/iPod. Plus many new car stereos play MP3s. (Note: Don't try to download a podcast without a broadband connection....one 45 min. Jazz Profiles episode is 25 MB.)

There are many places to find podcasts. Try searching on a subject you are interested in and the word podcast. For example I searched Google on the words "dog training" and "podcast" and found several. There are also many metasites and services (such as iTunes and PodcastAlley) where one can find a large assortment.

Ashes, Snow, and YouTube

Assignment #20 You too can YouTube

Many of us in the Libraries Learning 2.0 have already embedded a YouTube video, and, have favorites as evidenced by our OULibrarieslearn Wiki. However, in order to complete this assignment, I feel I must suffer the hardship of going back the well and find another video to add here. :)

It is extremely easy to to embed or link to individual YouTube videos, and much interesting is there. But of course one must filter judiciously. I would like to see the OU Libraries add more content.

Below is a presentation from the TED conference about the Ashes and Snow visual art project by wildlife photographer Gregory Colbert. The video is long but very cool. Still images and other moving images can also be seen on the Ashes and Snow Web site. Mr. Colbert reminds us during the TED talk that none of his images are altered--they are what he saw through the camera.

Newbie's Guides from Webware

The Newbie's Guides from Webware are a good resource for brief capsule-type intros. Subjects so far are Facebook, Google Reader, flickr, and Twitter. Enjoy!

Squidoo

Assignment #19 Discovering Web 2.0 tools

As directed, I browsed the Web 2.0 Awards looking for "one thing" to explore further. I had a bit of a hard time choosing--many of the winning entries were sites/apps that we have already explored in Learning 2.0--others I already use.

I finally picked Squidoo as I had seen it mentioned a few places but had no idea what it was about. I wandered around the site for some time trying to figure it out. I did not find the design intuitive. The part that piqued my interest was mention of donations to charity. As I'm always looking to help Harlequin Haven Great Dane Rescue, I thought I'd pursue that angle. It took me a couple more visits before I got a better handle, but I still don't understand all the aspects of it. It appears to be be a site where one can promote their business or hobby or charity without having to have Web site or blog of their own. I've begun creating a "lens" (that's what they call these subject guide pages) for the Dane Rescue--you can see my feeble attempt here.

Google Notebook

One of my favorite Web 2.0 apps is Google Notebook. One way to use it is with a Firefox extension that resides in my bottom browser bar until I need it, then it pops out (see pop up screenshot below).



One can type or paste text in or, select a portion of a Web page and it will "clip" that piece, along with the formatting and images. Also with the Firefox extension, selecting a potion of a page, and right clicking then selecting "Note this" will create a note without any additonal clicking or pasting! Notebooks are shareable too.

I use Notebook primarily to collect and organize upcoming events for my Athens women's events blog. It works far better than saving the info to a text file and emailing it to myself. I can drag and drop notes and sections. I love it! (Below is a screen shot of the full browser page rather than pop-up)



Oh and it's also available as a widget for your customized iGoogle page!

Web-based Appppppppppppps

Assignment #18 Web-based Apps: They're not just for desktops anymore

I already use Google Calendar and got Dale set up for one too. I signed up for 30 Boxes months ago but never did anything with it. I do use Google Calendar because it's easy to do so from one's Gmail account. Last year I set up Google Docs & Spreadsheets thinking that the Dane Rescue could use it, as it's trey cool, but all of these "Web-based Productivity Applications" suffer the same flaw for rural users--difficult to use over dial-up. I'm sure if I lived where I had access to broadband, I would use them more!

Lolcat Translator

Here is something we all need in our quest to view and create lolcats-- Speak lolcat: Lolcat Translator! Simply type in English and the translator will turn it into lolcat speak. Then using a lolcat creation Web utility (like lolcat builder) you can cap away. :)

Readin' & 2.0

Assignment #15 On Library 2.0 & Web 2.0 ...

The assigned reading from Next Space: The OCLC Newsletter, No. 2: 2006. "Web 2.0: Where will the next generation Web take libraries?" offers perspectives from 5 different practitioners. Two particularly resonated for me, both relating to the on-line user experience. As one who has been interested in on-line accessibility and usability for a long time, these two are singin' my song.

In "Away from the 'icebergs'," the "Reliance on user education" section says "We need to focus our efforts...on eliminating the barriers that exist between patrons and the information they need, so they can spend as little time as possible wrestling with lousy search interfaces and as much time as possible actually reading and learning....if our services can’t be used without training, then it’s the services that need to be fixed—not our patrons."

A number of points in the piece "To better bibliographic services"
particularly the section "Expose, expand, extend metadata using Web 2.0." We've got to get away from our siloed hard-to-use library catalogs and work to pull in the highly-usable portions that provide a rich browsing/finding experience for patrons such as book covers, reviews, and compressing many records for the same item into one.

PB & J Wiki 4 U & Me

Assignment #17 Playing Around with Wikis

I visited the OULibrariesLearn wiki and added to the lists of favorites: blogs, books, videos, and a library photo. Pretty easy--easier still if you know some HTML and can toggle to "source" and clean up formatting errors.

Wiki-Wiki-Woo

Assignment #16 So what’s in a wiki?

I like Wikis. However blogs have spoiled me. Blogs are sooooo easy to create and maintain. However, blogs are not so good for collaborative resources and for info that is going to be fairly static. (But it's still true that blogs have spoiled me.) I took a look at the wikis listed under this assignment's discovery exercise. Oddly enough, according to the Bull Run Library wiki, it belongs to a patron, rather than library staff.

Last year Chad helped me set one up to use as a workspace for a short-lived university task group. I liked it much better that what the TF had been using--BlackBoard.

I especially find valuable wikis that have been created by institutions during digitization projects. An example is the Confluence wiki for the Indiana University Digital Library Program.

I am a fan of Wikipedia for pop culture. I use it to find out the background on fiction series, what book is next, and what is the deal on the Foreigner Universe.

Copyright, Fair Use, & YouTube

Below is a cool ten minute YouTube video on fair use that you may have already seen--but definitely worth while! It uses snippets of animated Disney characters to illustrate fair use. It's directed by Eric Faden out of Stanford University's Fair Use Project Documentary Film Program.

Another really great resource on copyright and fair use is American University's Center for Social Media Copyright & Fair Use Site. They also have streaming video illustrations of fair use, aimed more at professionals and filmmakers.

Here's a July 9 post from Jonathan Bailey on the Blog Herald "Copyright Risks in Embedding YouTube Clips." It includes 5 steps for "Taking Precautions." And here's a response to that post from the Electronic Freedom Foundation "YouTube Embedding and Copyright" that says "Well, the news really isn't that dire. In fact, I'd say bloggers are generally pretty safe on this score."

A Fair(y) Use Tale directed by Eric Faden

T-T-T-T-Technorati

Assignment #14 Getting not-so-technical with Technorati

I've registered with Technorati and "claimed" my blog(s). I've also looked through the results of searching the "oulibraries" tag. There I found many of this group's flickr photos, including mine. :)

Still in that search, under the "Blogs" tab I find only this blog--how did I manage that? Is that what other folks see too? I must investigate further!

If I read Using Technorati Tags correctly, just by using the Blogger platform, making my blog "public," and creating tags for the posts, I'm in. I don't have to do anything further, Technorati will pick up my tags.

Finally... del.icio.us

Assignment #13 Tagging, folksomonies & social bookmarking in Del.icio.us

I've been ignoring del.icio.us for quite some time now...it just didn't look like something I'd need. In these days of good search engines and Google search form in my Firefox toolbar, I just don't have a lot of bookmarks (unlike 10 years ago). Also, the sites that I use most everyday I have saved in my Firefox tabs so they open everytime I boot up Firefox. Plus I'm not on a lot of computers--just my office PCs and my laptop at home. (The same reason I don't need an iPod--I stream my favorite music where I sit.)

But now I've bitten the bullet and set up my del.icio.us account. It was quite simple to register, export my bookmarks from Firefox from my work desktop, then import them to del.icio.us. It was also very simple to add the del.icio.us functionality to Firefox. It took me a bit to figure out that I shouldn't put commas between the tags, but other than that I imported and tagged just under 200 bookmarks in an hour or so. Now that I've done it, I think it will be quite useful. :)

ROLLYO to my Soul

Assignment #12 Roll Your Own Search Engine with ROLLYO

I wasn't really inspired to create a search engine as I have my frequently-used reference sites bookmarked and I search databases within them--things that I doubted a ROLLYO search would find. So I got lazy and asked my sweetie for help. As Dale is obsessed with audio, I figured he would have some reputable sites that he could suggest. He got me started, then it was kinda fun adding the different sites to be searched, and real fun when it worked!

Select...archive.digi.audioSearch The Web

So immediately above is my roll-your-own search created with ROLLYO on the subject of digital audio archiving. Try the sample search of "gold CD" after picking archive.digi.audio (short name due to character limit) from the drop down search box to put it through its paces.


I am a diehard Firefox fan, so I was especially pleased to see that it was very simple to add my newly-created search to the search box that resides in Firefox's tool bar.

I DO love LibraryThing!

Assignment #11 A Thing About LibraryThing

Well, I now see that I should have read ahead and seen that we would be covering LibraryThing--if I had I would have held off making my July 3 post showing off a LibraryThing widget designed for blogs. And I probably would have waited on creating my own library in LibraryThing. Previously the library I was working with was that of the OU Women's Center. Kiffany, Whitney, Char, and I worked on setting it up. Now Marlene at the Women's Center enters the donated books as she gets them in.

Last week, prior to seeing the assignment, I set up a library for myself. I hadn't done it previously because I don't keep books, except for a few reference works. I borrow from friends and libraries, or if I do buy a book, I pass it on after reading it (usually to a library).

However, lately I've taken to reading a lot of escapist fiction works that are parts of series, and I'm having trouble keeping track of which books in the series I've already read, and which I want to read next. So that is the purpose of my LibraryThing library.

This one is a tag cloud....



This one shows random book covers....



Go to http://www.librarything.com/thingology/2007/07/my-library-of-congress-talk.php to see a Library of Congress talk by the LibraryThing Guy.

Bead Art from fd's flickr toys

Assignment #10 Play Around with Image Generators

At left is my Great Dane Dori, adopted from Harlequin Haven Great Dane Rescue. You may have seen her in my initial post about flickr. She is my youngest and smallest Dane--in fact we call her a "teacup" Dane because she is so small and delicate.

I created this version of Dori's flickr image with Bead Art from fd's flickr toys. There are four choices for the beads--I used the "disc" option.

LibraryThing Widget

Scroll down in this post for a LibraryThing widget showing three random books in the Ohio University Women's Center library. LibraryThing is a very cool and powerful database for free (up to 200 books, after that a very small fee). Just create an account, then start adding your books. The easiest way is just keying in the ISBN--the database finds the other metadata and a cover image if available. There are also social networking aspects to try too. Check it out!

In the widget the book covers link to Amazon; the titles link to the book record in LibraryThing; and the authors link to the author record in LibraryThing.



And in this widget, you can search the library from here!

Higher Paw-er by Mozart Dane

Higher Paw-er by Mozart Dane,
originally uploaded by hhdane_mom.

This gorgeous 16" x 20" acrylic on canvas painting was created by Mozart, painting with his paws. Mozart paints to bring awareness to the plight of dogs in puppy mills and to raise funds to care for the homeless dogs at Harlequin Haven Great Dane Rescue. Mozart will be featured in a gallery show in December at the Mac Worthington Gallery on the Short North in Columbus, Ohio.

Feeds...I have no problem finding 'em

Assignment #9 Finding Feeds

I have more trouble keeping my feeds to a manageable amount and the Firefox browser makes it super easy to add feeds (and I hear IE 7 makes it easy too). I mainly find new feeds by following links from articles from news and technology sites and other subject blogs. If I think I'll want to read more from that blog I merely click on the RSS icon in the Firefox location bar next to the URL. That puts me right into BlogLines subscription page for that feed. Then if after a week or so, I don't like what I'm seeing post-wise, I simply delete the feed in BlogLines. What could be simpler?

Life with BlogLines

Assignment #8 Make Life "Really Simple" with RSS and a Newsreader

A year or so ago Chad did a demo of BlogLines in some library staff meeting, so I signed right up and have been a daily reader ever since. Right now I'm subscribed to 60+ feeds; that number has remained fairly constant as I regularly sign up for new and ditch ones I don't like. Some I rarely read, while others I read at least twice a day.

Through BlogLines I read Post and Wired stories; digitization and technology news; the latest Unshelved and Mutts comics; and find out about local happenings at ARTS/West and the Wire.

Today I exported my feed subscriptions from BlogLines and imported them into Google Reader just to try it out. The main problem with Google Reader for me, is that I read most of my feeds at home, and my access at home is through dial-up. Google is really made more for those with broadband, IMHO. Here is a good guide: Newbie's Guide to Google Reader.

BlogBackupOnline

I took a quick look at PC World's 100 Blogs We Love and spied BlogBackupOnline (https://www.blogbackuponline.com/). It looked easy and free so I signed up. I didn't want to worry about losing my blog if Blogger had a failure or if I accidentally deleted it. (Deleting ones own blog by mistake seems to happen fairly frequently by the number of questions asking how to get it back (you can't) on the WordPress help forums.)

BBO was as easy to use as it looked, and is currently free. It also did a better job and was more robust than I anticipated. I added all four of my blogs to be backed up. BBO crawls each blog for a "full" back up when added for the first time, then daily backs up any changes, including comments, using your blog's RSS feed. It even allows you to upload your blog to another provider (say, if you wanted to move your blog from Blogger to WordPress). I signed up yesterday and today it did as promised and ran the daily back up. So far so good!

Margaret Boyd, Picasa, Gmail, and flickr, Oh My!

Margaret Boyd,
originally uploaded by hhdane_mom.

Assignment #6 More Flickr Fun

Oh boy! Picasa, Gmail, and flickr all working together! I found a post that explained how to send your photos from Picasa to flickr by emailing the images within Picasa using its Email button. It just so happened that I used my Gmail account to do it, but I had a choice of using my work account. Whatever is in the body of the email serves as the flickr tags, while the title of the email serves as the image title.

Margaret Boyd was the first female graduate of Ohio University, in 1873. Photo courtesy Boyd Family Collection, Mahn Center for Archives and Special Collections, Ohio University Libraries, Athens, Ohio

This image, though I'm guessing at the date of creation, is old enough to be teetering on the brink of being in the Public Domain. Since we don't know who took the photo it would fall into the category of unpublished anonymous and pseudonymous works or work made for hire (corporate authorship). In this category works are under copyright for 120 years from date of creation, so only works created before 1887 are in the Public Domain (in 2007). If we knew the creator of the photo, it would fall into the category of unpublished work which remains under copyright for the life of the author + 70 years--only works from authors who died before 1937 are in the Public Domain (in 2007). As you might now guess, unpublished works have a different schedule for entering the Public Domain. A wonderful reference on this is Peter Hirtle's page. Note that although I'm treating the image as PD, I'm still crediting/citing the repository.

Dori from flickr to You

Dori,
originally uploaded by hhdane_mom.

So now I'm experimenting with posting my images from flickr to Blogger. It's fairly easy too, but as flickr is not a Google product it took a couple of extra steps more than my Picasa to Blogger posting.

This is my youngest Dane, Dori.

eBay Widgets

Assignment #7 Blog About Technology

This is an eBay widget--it is very easy to create one to keep track of specific items or searches. This one is from my off-work life and shows the current sale items that I have on eBay for the Great Dane Rescue. On the work side of things, many archivists and special collections librarians use eBay as a means to procure new acquisitions in their collecting areas.

The eBay To Go page has a simple wizard to create one. Mouse over to see basic info, click for more details.

Seven and 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners

Assignment #2 Lifelong Learning

OK, better late than never, I viewed the Flash movie this AM. I did take notes and I'm torn between which of the 7 1/2 are my personal hardest and easiest.

7 ½ Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners

• Habit 1: Begin with the end in mind
• Habit 2: Accept responsibility for your own learning
• Habit 3: View problems as challenges
• Habit 4: Have confidence in yourself as a competent, effective learner
• Habit 5: Create your own learning toolbox
• Habit 6: Use technology to your advantage
• Habit 7: Teach/mentor others
• Habit 7 ½: Play

Probably #6 is my easiest as I definitely enjoy using technology to my advantage, and enjoy experimenting and learning new software and techniques. However, there is also technology/hardware out there that I don't use as it doesn't seem to be something I need. Take iPods for example--I'm either in front of my computer at work or in front of my computer at home. Either place I stream the music I like to listen to. No need to purchase (key word) an iPod then purchase the music and take the time to futz with it. BUT I still want that MP3 player that is our prize because it's FREE and quite versatile.

Probably #2 is my hardest: Accept responsibility for your own learning. I really enjoy learning new things and I've done a fair amount of on-line learning, but I hate certain parts of the process and don't want to do them. Class discussion whether F2F, in a blog, or in a forum I HATE and find it very hard to make myself do that piece. I'm having that problem with the shareable metadata course I'm taking. The instructors want us to comment on every little thing in the forum. :(

Picasa and Blogger

This is an experiment to see how the Picasa/Blogger interface works. Picasa is the Google desktop image management and Web sharing application. I use Picasa everyday to manage and search for my images both at home and at work.

At work I use Picasa to work with large numbers of images kept on the file server. At home I use it for images of the items I sell on eBay as a representative of the Great Dane Rescue. (You may say why not just use the thumbnail feature in Windows Explorer, but most of my images are large high res ones and the Windows "solution" doesn't work for them.)

Anyway, I found the Picasa/Blogger interface to work well and was quite easy! From Picasa select an image then just click on the Blogger button! After a log in screen it puts you right into Blogger and there you select which blog to add the image to, then compose the post.

Here's a photo I really like of my partner Dale and his dog Gidget sitting on our front steps in autumn 2005. Unfortunately Gidget is no longer with us.

Starting off Behind

Assignment #3 Create a Blog in 3 Steps
Assignment #4 Register Your Blog

Yes, I have set up my Blogger Learning 2.0 blog (on WordPress I already had a blog of my own plus my sister's and partner's that I administer), but no I have yet to begin the assignments. I'm finishing up an on-line course in shareable metadata. Once that's done, I'll take off on this thing. :)

flickr-ed

Assignment #5 Discover Flickr

Yes, I've finally been flickr-ed. So far I just have a few images of my pets up. I don't own a working camera or camera phone so I'm not "ate up" with digital images of my own.

Digital Da Vinci Codes: Thousands of Leonardo's Papers Go Online

Nicole Martinelli 06.21.07
Wired News

I just love Life Hacker!

I just love Life Hacker! Here's a recent post "13 book hacks for the library crowd"
http://lifehacker.com/software/hack-attack/13-book-hacks-for-the-library-crowd-269953.php

Fun, Fun!

We are all starting out on a great and fun adventure! More to come.....