the 28th thing

in my previous post i mentioned that i'd like to get a new lesson at the first of each month. but beyond that i'm stumped. that's why i want it to be pushed out to me monthly. i know there are things out there i should know about, and i can try to read all the things i put in my bloglines, but i may very well miss something absolutely unmissable. that's why i liked 27things, and i'd like the 28th thing to be a heads up about the things i'm probably missing out on right this minute.

it's over it's over it's over (sing it like elvis)

How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?

i like to learn. i don't think that's been changed by 27things. i'm a librarian, and when asked why i'm a librarian, my reply is "i didn't know what i wanted to learn about so i learned about something that will help me learn about anything." it was really nice to have a structured path for a little while, and to share the experience with folks around me. i like that it didn't have to be approved by a supervisor, didn't require time away from the work location, was paced to the individual (and continues to be so, since it's not going anywhere).

What were your favorite Learning 2.0 discoveries or exercises?

i was glad to have a reason to refresh my attention to my six year old personal blog while embarking on a corollary 27things blog. librarything made me happy, and i'm looking forward to having some time to add more to that, as a friend just needed a booklist i'd compiled. wouldn't a link be easier than an attachment? the cluster lead LA started a cluster wiki so we can post information for staff there. i love youtube but i already loved youtube. the web 2.0 awards garnered me an excellent resource.

Did anything surprise you?

i was surprised by the sense of panic i felt upon initially reading most of the 27things. there were a couple i'd already done, which were fine, but i really thought at each new thing "i can't do that!" i think i'd have been completely paralyzed by the project if i were a novice.

Was there enough help available when you needed it?

yes, but i was fortunate to only need help once or twice.

What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?

i liked the earlier lessons being pushed out to staff email. i know we could see them at any time, and that our bloglines accounts would show us the new lessons each week, but for many staff, working part time, checking email is all that is manageable, not logging in to several different accounts each shift "just to check." i'd like that to continue, as well, maybe a lesson at the first of each month, just to keep us on our toes.

Would you like to see similar training opportunities as new library-relevant technologies emerge?

yes please.

And, last one, if you could go back in time and tell yourself to either participate in the program or skip it, what would you do?

i'd participate again. and now i'm through, i'm going back to other staff to encourage them to give it a go.

the whole reason i'm here

i would love to use downloadable audiobooks. but the ones kcls has don't work with ipods yet, so i can't. that's a big reason i'm so enthusiastic about the learning 2.0 thing, the mp3 player awarded upon completion.

see, i don't really "get" audiobooks, not like lots of folks seem to. i don't have much of a commute, and i don't process aural information nearly as well as i do written. so i couldn't justify to myself buying another mp3 player when i don't use my ipod as much as i should. but put it in the context of professional development, and i'm there!

i was surprised and delighted to find several titles by authors i enjoy actually available through overdrive right this minute. jennifer crusie, michael connelly, robert parker. i also enjoy the advanced search where i can select mystery and limit to overdrive audio book and available copies and get a list of what i can download now.

when the service was launched, many of the titles were unavailable due to use, i'm so happy to see copies available for many things. i suppose this is a sign the service is well used and continues to be supported, which is always good. i'll be counting the days till i can join our users in enjoying this service

invasion of the body snatchers

now we're all pod people. i, like lots of folks, originally thought podcasts were exclusive to the ipod. after getting an ipod for my birthday, i still didn't want them because i thought i would have to pay for them (i'm perfectly happy to spend dozens of hours copying hundreds of CDs, but i draw the line at shelling out a nickel).

so i was delighted to learn, with the advent of learning 2.0, that podcasts are free for all, can be played by clicking on them, and are generally not as scary as we thought!

i couldn't get itunes to open this afternoon, so i just did searches with podcast.net, podcast alley, and yahoo podcasts. i had no luck at all finding library oriented podcasts that interested me (i'd just feel inadequate knowing exactly how far ahead of kcls this or that system might be on this topic). but i typed in david sedaris and found one worthwhile in each of them. i added bowl of cheese, irrational public radio, and one cunningly titled david sedaris.

rick the teen librarian at shoreline has done some podcasts of book reviews by teens on the shoreline teen advisory board blog, and that's pretty darn cool. i think other branches could try that, and there could be staff book reviews podcasted through the good reads section of the website. there are dozens of ways they could be employed. perhaps we should form a committee.

oh thank heaven

another thing i've done before! i've sat for hours watching 80s music videos on youtube. and cat videos. and alan davies talking about cats.

i love youtube. i can get lost in it, going from one thing to another, kind of like when i was a kid getting lost in the world book. i've seen lots of cool clips, sent by friends or the american libraries direct email, that sort of thing. and once i'm in, i may never get out. here's one i positively adored.



seems kcls could use this for a variety of things. live press releases. broadcasts of events like groundbreakings and building openings. clips of events like author readings. training modules for staff. i'd like to see them all. how soon can we start?

it's 5 o'clock somewhere

for the web 2.0 awards "thing," the first item i clicked on was fun stuff and boy did i pick a winner. i even went back to browse around a few other categories such as books, games, health, organization, retail, travel, and video just to make sure.

there were things i'd seen before and things that were brand new to me, but nothing caught my attention quite like cocktailbuilder. i used to use barbug for my "this is what i've got, what can i make?" needs, but cocktailbuilder does it far more elegantly.

type in the items you have on hand (alcohols, mixers, fruit) and it populates a list of drink names you can make with what you have, as well as other drinks you could make if you had one more thing, two more things, etc. and here's what really got me: IT REMEMBERS YOUR LIST. i closed out and went on the desk and came back and returned and it still had my list on there. i don't know if it's an IP thing or what, but i loved it. i'm going straight home and entering a true list of everything in the house. you can delete items from the list when you run out, and it will change the list of what you can make accordingly, without having to click refresh or submit or anything.

in addition to this function, you can search recipes, suggest recipes, make a list of a few cocktails to print a menu, and submit your own concoctions for inclusion. all of it happens on one screen, fading in ghostily and automatically. it's just plain groovalicious.

i may be the only person who's happy to have a reason to have the computer on for a party, but this could really be fun.

where the future is being made...today

i miss dr. bunsen honeydew sometimes. but how cool is it that there is a muppet wiki?

google labs is cool. i looked at google trends as david suggested and entered "cat videos." i was delighted to see that seattle is the number 9 place where this search is entered. hee.

i looked at google music trends and learned that of the top 20 songs, five are by linkin park. i don't think i'd know linkin park if they appeared on my front porch. i'm not sure how they gather the information but it seems to be drawn from instant messenger or something (which kind of freaks me out a bit). it says "what google talk users are listening to" so maybe it's just what's playing on the computer when they are chatting rather than what they are discussing in their chat windows. msn messenger does that too. it was nice to see snow patrol and the fray on the list.

it's nice that google is getting into the feed reader game too with google reader, i'm a great fan of one stop shopping and if i could have my google home page have my feeds and my news and all that other stuff all together i'd be a happy camper. until something new and shiny came along, that is.

i'm delighted to live in a city that has google transit available, and i feel guilty that its trip planner surpasses that of metro. i typed in the airport abbreviation and my home zip and it gave me routes and a map instantly, much more comprehensibly than metro. yay and sigh.

zoho zoho a pirate's life for me

today i learned all about online software. well not all about it, i don't suppose, but i visited google docs and zoho and messed about a little bit and here i am.

first things first: i LOVE free things! free things are cool! i can't figure out why i didn't know about this stuff before! i mean, i just bought a computer and i agonized far too long about whether i needed the full office suite or not, and now i find out i didn't need ANY of it! rats rats rats.

i was pleased to learn that i preferred zoho over google docs. i'm sure google docs will take over the world, but zoho has more programs, and behaved better when i pasted in some text and monkeyed with it. it looks like it even has a version of publisher! neither one would change my font to suit me, but maybe i was going too fast.

library dude commented on the kcls27things blog that it's a good way to convert a word document to pdf, which is brilliant. i will have to check to see if it goes the other way as well. i could really get behind that idea.

the possibilities for a group to work on a document collaboratively are wonderful, it makes me want to get on another committee right away to try it out.

long ago in another life, i was frustrated by having to haul around floppy disks with me wherever i went, and never knowing what computer had my stuff saved on it, and having to do work at different workstations, and so on and so forth. i was thrilled with the advent of the zip disk, to which i consolidated dozens of floppies, and then the flash drive, to which i consolidated several zip disks. somewhere in there, during the era of the floppies, i used an "online hard drive" but that predates high speed access so it was mostly annoying. and it was only storage, so you couldn't play with things or enjoy the luxury of constant autosaving (which is also lifesaving).

so these are great and i can see myself using them.