And in Conclusion...

No more Play to Learn? Usually I'm playing or teaching so it seems I have that play part down. I found that the required tasks were manageable. I was disappointed to read that people were working on their blogs at home because they did not feel as though they had time at work to do them. The point of this exercise was to learn new tricks at work. Other library systems seemed to have conveyed to the staff the importance of this program as legitimate training. Did we drop the ball globally or on a local level was there lack of support or are staff overworked? I feel strongly that everything we learn enhances our work experience and has potential to benefit our patrons. Just operating with the same vocabulary to navigate MySpace and Twitter and the rest will help us, even if we never go back to those Web sites again. I enjoy facilitating progress and change and if that's ultimately what this exercise does for LCLS, then I'm glad we did it. I would participate in a similar program on another occasion.

I hope that we will be able to use many of the technologies we have explored during this Play to Learn process. Certainly podcasts and videos have applications for our programming. Book discussions, genealogy, and crafting programs could all be delivered or enhanced through technology. Subject guides, bibliographic instruction, and library tours are also fair game for technological improvement. What I hope and require of us is that we remember many patrons are not as technologically savvy as we are (and we have not always been this way, ourselves). We do not serve the machines, they serve us.

On the Download

YouTube is fun. I have used it for personal enjoyment as well as for reference. One time a patron was looking for an example of the bluegrass playing style of Grandpa Jones (later of Hee Haw fame). Sure enough, I found an old b&w clip on YouTube. When Dreamgirls was released and Jennifer Hudson was receiving so much publicity, I was curious about whether YouYube had clips from the original Broadway production. Having grown up an hour from Manhattan, our television stations were NY stations and we had commercials for Broadway shows. I found the commercials that ran all the time for Dreamgirls as well as Jennifer Holliday's Tony Awards performance, which still gives me chills.

For the Professional Collection blog I enjoy posting YouTube videos that are educational or amusing in a library-related way.

I played around with Podcast Alley because I wanted to add Goodnight Burbank to this blog but I could not get it to work for me. As far as downloading audio, I haven't done much, but the last time I went to Mexico I did prep with some Spanish and I loaded a book for the plane.

This is my selection for my YouTube posting here:

Week 9

Let me lead with this...I admire Google. Google technology is incredible. The maps, the Froogle, the cute thematic way they do the name, all of it. I also admire the massive data mining venture that Google has turned into, which in turn, has turned into a monstrous money machine. I find it creepy as all get out, but impressive. That said...I'm a YAHOO! librarian. I recognize that data is mined every time I click around in amazon.com, too, but that is a commercial site and I view it as the price of doing business. Plus, I'm not always logged into my own account when I'm checking on materials. Additionally, I often look up materials for work and if I am logged into my account, the data amazon.com has mined is quite diverse. Back to Google...CREEPY...I attended the SWFLN workshop offered by Google on all of the fabulous features of Google. Fabulous, yes, and CREEPY. The targeted marketing that means I'm not bombarded with junk also means that the algorithm that has been developed to profile me is pretty spot on. I search Disney World and they know it, keep it, and work with it. Google also scans gmail and targets ads to that. I can see the logistical upside to online office apps, but the creepy privacy issues really bother me. I also don't like not storing the originals on a computer I don't control. How is that different from work and our shared drives or our H: drives? Maybe because at least here IT, such as it is, is local and ostensibly is on our team. For me, creepy does not outweigh convenience and I don't have any needs that make me want to give give Google any more information than I already do. I will, however, give Google a big thumbs up for MyMap and to public radio station KPBS in San Diego for their innovative use of it during its recent fire coverage. Read the NPR story here.


Web 2.0 - I chose to play with Pandora , "Radio from the Music Genome Project." This Web site won 1st place in the music category. I have been using Last.fm (2nd place) for some time and like it very much so I thought I'd check out the the winner. I like Last.fm and now Pandora because the music I enjoy is a little more specialized that what something like Yahoo's Launchcast would typically play. While Pandora was determining my preferences, one of the songs presented was from an album I actually own. I felt right at home.

What Worth a Wiki?

Wikis cause great controversy and I would like to go on record as saying that I recognize that all wikis are not the same, not all wikis are problematic, and even "the wiki" (we all know to what I refer) has a place. One of the purposes of supporting librarianship as a highly skilled profession is to allow us continue foster an environment in which we provide mediated information exchanges between patrons and sources. Some wikis are produced by libraries themselves. A little while ago I encountered the subject guides of the St. Joseph County Public Library. I was so impressed by them I looked to see if there was a way we could do something similar, either electronically or on paper. I later discovered that Michael Stephens was the library's technology librarian wizard at that time. All roads lead to Michael. Anyway...the SJCPL Subject Guides are really awesome and I would love to implement something like them here. Here is a very interesting article from ALA TechSource about some of these issues. Click here.

It's Delightful...It's Delovely...It's Del.icio.us

I don't use it. I recognize that Del.icio.us is useful. At work I have my personal bookmarks and TelRef bookmarks saved on my H: drive and exported to all of the stations where I sit. I have a couple of favorites on my home laptops, but so far I have not wished for a full range of bookmarks at home. If I want to look something up, and my reference books (yes, I am a librarian with a ready reference collection at home) I can usually find what I want by going to sites that I know by memory or by initiating a fresh search. If we did not have the shared drives, etc. at work I am sure I would employ Del.icio.us or a similar system for my work-related resources.

Technorati is a neat name and a helpful resource. The problem with the vast amount of information that is out there is that there is always the fear that you are missing something. I am fond of quoting, "the man with one watch knows what time it is, the man with two is never sure." We are always chasing information and always in danger of missing something, finding contradictory information, or finding opinions rather than information. Blogs can be that mix of information and opinion that provide the insight you seek or make your head explode. Technorati can help you find the topics of interest to you, whatsoever they might be.

I have read these Web 2.0 articles before. OCLC NextSpace replaced the the OCLC Newsletter. I enjoy Michael Stephens. His blog is linked on the Professional Collection blog, In the Know for those of you who want to keep up with him and some of the other big names in Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 land. Our profession has always evolved and will continue to evolve and there will always be those who think that we are moving too far from our foundations and others who believe that our mission should be to go where the information needs are. Bibliographic instruction changes as the methods of recording, retrieving, and conveying information does. As the services we offer change, so must our enhancements. The difference now is that we have more methods of discussing our challenges and sharing our ideas. We don't need to rely solely upon 2 conferences a year, a couple of journals, and correspondence between well-connected peers. We don't even need to exchange email. We have blogs, Web pages, virtual reality, and any number of social networks. Libraries have always faced similar issues of budget cuts, new media, homeless vs. tax payers, growing pains, etc. The difference is now our kiss and cry area is global. I'm all a-Twitter.

Social Applications

MySpace is certainly the best known social networking site with Facebook a close second. The use by libraries to reach teens is a fun possibility. Many libraries are using social networking tools to obtain and retain patrons whose interests are beyond the traditional offerings of public libraries. Every day we encounter new opportunities for shaping the evolution of the public library. Seeing where technology is already implemented out in the world and then determining what else we can do with it is very exciting. Florida's Ask-A-Librarian has a MySpace page, for example, and we are part of that service. I would love to see LCLS develop a serious e-presence. P.S. Tom is a Libra. His page is filled with comments from people who don't know him but want to. They are faux socializing, reaching out to a seemingly accessible person who has a automated program that "friends" them upon joining MySpace and who, himself, has millions of friends. That word seems devalued in this context.

Billiard Game: After numerous attempts and numerous losses I won this match when the computer sunk the 8 ball. I'll take it. Steve Mizerak of the computerized pool table I am not. I'll stick to a real pool table. Generally, I like computer games and video games. I play the simple variety like Bejeweled as well as more complex like Myst. I also have 3 different video platforms at home and games of all types. I have never joined an online game although technically Second Life is considered a massive multiplayer online role playing game (mmorpg) and I volunteer reference for Alliance Library System. There are certainly applications for libraries in Second Life, but the technical aspects of the software prevent our patrons and staff from accessing Second Life via LCLS computers at our current standards.

Week 5

The above image was created using a sketch generator. The original photo was taken from the front car of the monorail at Disney World. Riding in the front car with the pilot is super awesome! My street sign was also created with an image generator.

I have looked at LibraryThing before and find it interesting conceptually. The hand scanners that could be implemented in a used bookstore or book sale to help me control my "vast holdings" of 1950s and '60s cocktail party books and 1960s and '70s fondue and hors d'oeuvres books would really be about the gadget more than anything else. I don't truly need to catalog my books. Even though I maintain 4 blogs, I am rather a private person and don't want my collections out there for the world to see. So I would not ever place my personal book inventory online. I also like to control the amount of unnecessary information that I place out in the electronic world. Even if I were to delete my account, I'm sure that information is still out there. As for the potential of LibraryThing as a readers' advisory tool...well, there are limitations in the software of the Web site as well as in the tagging by the users. In general, I prefer to use NoveList and lists generated by librarians as more authoritative.

Rollyo is something that I had never looked at prior to today. I can see how it would be appealing to have one-stop shopping for all of your basic Internet needs however I like to poke around. I like having favorites but I also like happenstance. Stumbling upon a new site because I searched for something and then clicked and clicked has led to some of my most fun discoveries for work and pleasure. One potential danger of streamlining the Internet process to a handcrafted set of sites, databases, and searches is that we might tend to become very limited (authoritative, but limited) in what we offer as results. I guess I have not yet felt that I have needed to organize my reference tools with Rollyo or something similar.

RSS Feeds

Back in March when I launched the blog, In the Know, for the Professional Collection I made sure to include an RSS feed because the primary purpose of that blog was and continues to be to keep LCLS staff aware of new materials arriving into the Professional Collection. If one were to subscribe to the blog via the RSS feed, every time I update the blog the subscriber would receive that information. What a perfect system!

As I mentioned in my post about my goal, a group of us are involved in a online book discussion group. An RSS feed also would keep a subscriber current on posts there. If we were to have a public book discussion online, patrons might like to subscribe through an RSS feeder to be alerted when new posts had been made.

I check in on several blogs and Web sites on a daily basis (sometimes several times daily) but I have chosen not to register with any aggregator because I enjoy the thrill of clicking on a site and finding new content. In rereading that sentence I find that it would be difficult for it to sound more geeky, but it's true. I have my favorites saved in folders and I spin through them or there are groups of them linked through my other blogs. I guess I like the journey as much as the destination.

Librarian Trading Card

Using the Trading Card Maker was fun!

Flickr

Flickr is one of those technologies that make me a little nervous and yet I also find amazing. I believe that we are all responsible for ourselves and should be self-censoring with the ability to make judgments about the information we choose to reveal to the world. We have developed into a society that displays both voyeuristic and exhibitionist tendencies. Our televisions are packed with reality shows and online YouTube's slogan is "Broadcast Yourself." Little kids and their grandparents have MySpace pages that are chock full of personal information. So it is no surprise that we might like to have a Flickr account and post for the world every photo we take when we also have blogs to record every thought we think. Our "personal" lives are not so personal once unleashed to the Web along with various bits of data that can be put together from our screennames, hobbies, zodiac signs, and even the tags of our pictures. In some ways, I think it's creepy how much information I could have about people because of their penchants for posting their lives online through blogs and related Flickr accounts. There's a difference between peeping in windows and walking naked down the street and expecting people not to look and we are witnessing more and more naked parades. I'm not saying that parades are bad, but we need to be careful...perhaps liberally apply sunscreen.

I enjoy seeing what libraries are doing with Flickr. It's a great tool to use for sharing ideas, success stories, happy occasions, etc. I did not open a Flickr account. I understand the concept and use but at this point, I prefer to use Google Picasa so that I can share photos easily, but control access.

Goal

I feel very comfortable with technology and am generally able to figure things out on my own but I am not opposed to looking at manuals or books as needed. My goal for this program is to expand upon my base of preexisting knowledge of Web 2.0 technologies to determine what practical applications, if any, I may make to my work in the library. For example, a group of library friends and I have already been experimenting with a book discussion blog. We are curious about the feasibility of having a book discussion blog open to the public. Additionally, through this Play to Learn experience, I hope to investigate the application of podcasts to library programming. Perhaps I will find additional other activities to pursue that will enhance how I learn, how I teach, and how I imagine the future of librarianship.

7 1/2 Habits

Of all of the habits the most difficult one for me is to view problems as challenges (#3). I like for things to go smoothly and I want to be successful immediately. I become frustrated when I understand something conceptually and am unable to put it into action as seamlessly as I would like. Recently I made a quilt, only my second one, and the corners turned out poorly even though I knew, in concept, how they should have been. I can definitely appreciate the skill involved in deft needlework. In general, I believe that if I can research something enough, I can learn it and I have the skills to be an effective learner (#4). I can make goals for myself (#1), find out how to do something (#2), and obtain whatever is necessary (#5) to make it happen.

I created 3 other blogs before this one and needed to learn how to do that. I attended a workshop, read a book, have consulted with a colleague on occasion, use online resources when necessary, and puzzle it out on my own (#5). When I learn new tricks, I teach my blogging co-workers (#7).

Finally, there is no person who knows me who would deny that I play! I have gadgets and gizmos galore (#6). I firmly believe in work hard play hard.

Ainsworth Rand Spofford

I collect Library and Librarian of Congress memorabilia. I have letters and documents signed by 5 Librarians of Congress going back to Ainsworth Spofford. Spofford is my total fav! I'm not sure if it is his name or that he was appointed by Lincoln that makes him seem nifty. I always say that my cubicle is on Librarian Blvd. but I am really on the corner of Librarian Blvd. and Spofford's Alley.

Here's a little Spofford bio from the Library of Congress Web site:

When it became apparent that Librarian Stephenson was going to resign, Assistant Librarian Spofford began to gather political endorsements for the job, and on December 31, 1864, President Lincoln appointed Ainsworth Rand Spofford to be the sixth Librarian of Congress. In 1896, on the eve of the move into the Library's first separate building, the leaders of the American Library Association made it clear that they hoped the 71-year old Spofford would step aside in favor of a younger and more progressive professional library administrator. On June 30, 1897, Pres. William McKinley nominated John Russell Young to be Librarian of Congress; the next day, Young named Spofford as Chief Assistant Librarian, an important job which Spofford held until his death. Ainsworth Rand Spofford was born in Gilmanton, New Hampshire, on September 12, 1825; he died on August 11, 1908, and is buried in Rock Creek Cemetery, Washington, DC. -www.loc.gov