Thing 7 - Communication Tools

Email is great - it's a great tool to facilitate communication both within the library and with the outside world. I do really dislike, however, when it is used exclusively within the library INSTEAD of face-to-face communication. Sometimes a phone call or a visit to another desk *is* the best form of communication. But on the whole, email has been a great boost to productivity. It's a way to shoot off a message/ask a question when someone is unavailable in person, it's a way to create a "paper trail" so you don't lose track of something. It's one of the great inventions of the twentieth century!

My problem with email is that I'm on a couple of VERY active lists, and the amount of posts I receive each day is staggering. I could just delete them, but I do get useful information and I hate to just delete unread. So I'm running way, way behind and several times a day I have to scroll through my messages looking for things from "real people." I'm trying very hard to catch up but am also trying to batch the email reading so I'm not constantly turning to it. 

I didn't know a whole lot about IM before reading the "how it works" article, so obviously I've never tried it. The only library application of it that I'm aware of is IM reference service. I think we'd like to try that here once our staffing is improved.<

I also haven't tried text messaging (my cell phone plan does not include it) but I certainly have seen friends use it. It seems a bit cumbersome to me - having to hit number buttons multiple times to get to a particular letter - but I know that people can do it really quickly. I think my library is much more likely to implement IM before doing much with texting.

I've done quite a bit of web conferencing. Some - probably most - has worked really well. Being able to see live demos of a product or get training on an application and at the same time be able to ask your specific questions of someone who really understands the application is invaluable. It's a way we can train many, many more people than we could possibly send to a conference out of town or out of state. But, when web conferencing doesn't work, it's dramatic! There was one notable webinar where about a dozen of our staff people had been freed up to attend, and the Internet connections were soooo sloooow that our screens were about 20 minutes behind what the presenter was talking about! It was a session we had all been really looking forward to - and our library had paid a lot for the webinar - and it was totally useless. When it works, it's absolutely wonderful. When it doesn't, it's pretty frustrating.

Thing 6 - Image generators

Trading card
Originally uploaded by Pointer7

Well, this is WAY fun! I can think of more personal uses than library right now. I'll have to think about that.

Thing 5 - Playing around

The "Spell with Flickr" mashup is fun. And so is Flickr Sudoku (I'm going to email that to my Sudoku-addicted friends!). Flappr is also fun - I'm not sure there's a really useful purpose to it, though.

I think that Flickr photo-sharing can be really wonderful in personal settings. I can also see that being able to house and share photos could be good to add to a blog. For example, we're going to be doing some remodeling at my library and this would be a great way to house the photos so people can see the process and the progress.

Tropical Snowman

Tropical Snowman
Originally uploaded by Pointer7

Here's one of the photos I uploaded to my new Flickr account. Isn't he cute?

Thing 4 - Flickr

I've heard a lot about people using Flickr and I think I looked around the site a couple summers ago, but this is the first time I've taken a little more time to explore. I looked at the photos that were uploaded on my birthday, and then I looked for photos from the Lake District in England, where I was a couple summers ago. Some people are truly amazing photographers! I like that this is a way to protect photographs from fire, computer crashes, etc. So I may need to look into this for my photos at home. I've had a digital camera for a little over a year and have uploaded lots of photos to my computer but haven't printed many yet. Flickr would be a good backup mechanism.

Next day.....well, trying to upload the photo didn't work well. I asked a coworker who blogged that she was finally able to do it with someone else's help, and that worked....sort of. The photo I was trying to do just showed up as a big white blank spot in my blog. And I tried another one of the same person's shots and had the same result. So for some reason she doesn't want anyone to be able to use her photos, I guess. They weren't labeled in any way. So I've looked for another photo (taken by "GA music maker") and was able to get it to display.

Here's the link:

And here's the relevant part of the instructions for why the first photo I wanted wouldn't work:

The things I wanted to paste in above - the link and the instructions - show down below but not in line with the rest of the text. Sigh. I'm going to publish this and go on.

Son of Thing 3 - RSS

Yep - pretty easy to read quickly through blogs using a reader. So I really should have figured this out before!!!!!!!!

Thing 3 - RSS

The problem that I have with blogs is that I forget/don't have time to go back and read them. So RSS should be a great help for that - right?? Now I just need to really MAKE time to check my Bloglines account. I had set this up after a workshop last summer and it was indeed very easy. And there are so many blogs out there on such an incredible variety of topics that it would be pretty easy to spend nearly all your time reading blogs! Not such a great thing in the workplace! 

But I did add some that I had bookmarked in my browser and I will make a point of trying to stay caught up. I have some others bookmarked on another computer that I'll look at and probably add to Bloglines.

As far as which tool was easier, when I set up the Bloglines account last summer, I did a little exploring and did find interesting blogs. But what I think will work better for me is rather than searching for blogs, I need to take note of blogs that I come across other ways - journal articles, listserv emails, websites, etc. - and follow through that way.

OK - off now to check Bloglines!

Thing 2 - Library 2.0

Well, this is both overwhelming and exciting! Where will we find the time? Stephen Abram is right in saying that we find time for things that are important to us, but sometimes that's a bit simplistic. Right now I have a little time to work on this - creating a blog, reading & watching the Library 2.0 info - and last week I didn't. No extra time, no matter how important I might have thought this is. But if we make learning about emerging technologies and envisioning the possibilities a priority, then at some point they will happen. It just can't always be at the "when-I-can-get-around-to-it" part of our to do lists.

I looked at the comments-enabled feature of Hennepin County's catalog. What a great addition! What a way to get people to "buy in" to the importance of libraries. I have no idea if that type of feature is in development for our automation system, but I hope so.

One of these articles talked a lot about staff participation and involvement in these ongoing changes. "We trust our staff and we know that when we expect the best of people that is usually what we get." Again, the "buy in" factor is vital to the success of Library 2.0-like tools. If most, if not all, staff don't believe this kind of change is even desirable, not to mention essential, then a lot of changes are doomed. In my library, we've been dealing with difficult budget situations for so long and the staff is stretched so thin, it's hard to muster up enthusiasm and energy for working out how to implement change. But if we can do so, it *is* invigorating to embark on something new. I don't know how we get beyond cynicism. If the workload were not so overwhelming, then there's more space for contemplating change and service improvements. This is pretty rambling and perhaps more negative than I intend. But it's kinda what I'm thinking about these possibilities.

What I'm looking forward to in the program? Direction. Possibilities. Ideas. 

It *is* exciting.

Thing 1 - Blog & Avatar

This is not something that I ever expected to do, as I don't feel a need to share my life on the Internet. On the other hand, I've found blogs I enjoy reading, so perhaps turn about is fair play!

One of the things we're really lacking at my library is time to learn and learn about new things, so this program, which mandates some learning time, will be great. Setting up the blog was very easy and took only a few minutes. I've been to workshops previously where we set up blogs, so I did know that it wasn't difficult. 

So, creating the avatar was fun! It's a lot like playing paper dolls, but with the instant computer-y gratification of seeing changes immediately implemented. I didn't realize there were all those choices available - fun outfits, subtle changes in things like eyeglass colors (!!), backgrounds and even pets (but no springer spaniels! :(  ). Very cool. I can see how these things (blogs, avatars, etc.) can become addictive time-suckers!