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.