Thing #46 -- WebJunction Minnesota

Every once in a while I go to WebJunction Minnesota and poke around. I usually find something useful that I thing I should explore more in depth, but don't have the time right at the moment. Then it falls off my radar... This time it might stick because I found courses for which I have an immediate need.

While I have been involved in web design and development for more than a decade now, I've realized that I need a stronger grounding in using XML. In fact, several of the things I would like to accomplish over the coming 6 months to a year require knowing how to use style sheets to output XML files in various formats. I've looked at some books and searched around on the web, but was very pleased to see a course on WJMN covering XML style sheets. I will definitely take this course sometime this summer. And perhaps, after taking one, I will be more likely to keep WJMN on my radar.

Thing #42 -- Music 2.0

I've been a heavy iTunes user for years. When our home DVD/CD player started having trouble reading CDs we imported all our music into iTunes and loaded it onto an iPod which is hooked up to our home audio system. This lets us combine our CDs and purchased downloads in one place. We never listen to actual CDs anymore.

I also began listening to internet radio at least 5 years ago (probably longer). I've used Live365, iTunes radio, and other services that no longer exist. When I got my iPod the MPR Radio app (which streams their 3 stations plus Radio Heartland) was one of the first I put on it. My husband introduced me to last.fm a few months ago, when he sent me a link to a station he made. I like the way it lets you follow chains of connections between artists to discover some you might like but didn't know about. Also the ability to create a station based on a particular artist or genre/tag.

I big problem with listening to internet radio for me, especially at work, is buffering. It's hard to enjoy music when you only hear it a few seconds at a time! I think the campus network gives lower priority to streaming radio than other applications.

One type of music I like is what I call "contemporary classical"--not the big orchestral symphony stuff, but things composed during the second half of the 20th century or later. Here is a station built with the 'minimalism' tag.




Even with all these options, I don't know if broadcast radio will go away. I still listen to it, especially when I'm driving. Even so, the internet has had a positive impact on my broadcast listening. I love online playlists! If I'm driving and hear a song I like but don't know, I make a note of the time it played. Later, I'll look it up on the radio's web site. And now that I am familiar with sites like last.fm, I can use them to find more of that artist's music to decide if I really like them or it was just that one song.

Thing #41 -- Mashup your Life

I joined FriendFeed (as DeborahWK--same as Twitter) several Things ago, and subscribed to the feeds of several people I know. I mostly monitor it the same way I monitor my other web 2.0 sites, by a gadget on my iGoogle home page. Which makes me wondor sometimes if FriendFeed isn't therefore rather redundant--what's the point of having a feed to update me with information I can see in my other gadgets on the same page? One major drawback, as far as I'm concerned, is the fact that FriendFeed can't pull in my status updates from Facebook. Therefore, people who follow me (admittedly not very many at this point) are missing a large part of my online life. After searching through several online forums I discovered this is a common problem for Facebook/FriendFeed users. Even so, I'll continue to use it for the time being, primarily for professional networking/development. Most of my personal online interaction still happens through Facebook.

My library began using Digsby for our IM reference service in the middle of the past semester. We have a Facebook account and one of the librarians received a chat reference query while she was logged in. It made us realize that since Trillian (our IM software at the time) couldn't monitor our Facebook account, we were potentially missing out on assisting users. Digsby solved that problem for us, aggregating all the chat services we use in one place. Another advantage to Digsby is it allows us to create chat widgets to place on pages of our web site where students might be looking for help.

Thing #35 -- Books 2.0

As an academic librarian, I don't get much chance to help people find books to read just because they want to--mostly they're looking for books for class assignments. Those students who are looking for books for pleasure are thrown off by the fact that all our fiction isn't in one place like at their public library, and they don't want to browse huge chunks of the P call number range to find a book. (Or sometimes they want audio books to listen too as they drive home for vacations. We don't have any of those.) This is changing, though. We're trying to foster "extracurricular" reading on campus by beginning a browsing collection. A small portion of the book budget is now dedicated to purchasing books for pleasure reading, and these books are shelved in a prominent place at the entrance to the main stacks area. No confusing LC call numbers, instead it's alphabetical by author. I'm interested to see how much that collection will be used once students really discover it.

Our library also has a collection of juvenile books. These are to support the Education department, but they are also used by students, faculty, and staff with children. I was interested if the sites listed for this Thing under Children's Books would be useful for the Children's Literature Guide I maintain for the Education department. I already link to International Children's Digital Library, and was disappointed to see Lookybook no longer online.

I spent a lot of time looking around BookCrossing to if any books had been released near me, and viewing the histories of books that had several entries. I will definitely keep this site in mind the next time I have books I no longer want to keep. I also looked at BookStumpers. This site would have been useful a couple of years ago when I tried, unsuccessfully, to discover the name of a book a friend remembered from her childhood.

Thing #34 -- Online Answer Sites

I'm familiar with Slam the Boards, as I participated for several months when it first started. Primarily I answered questions on Yahoo! Answers, but I also did a few on WikiAnswers and Askville. During one session I focused on song lyrics questions, which are easy to answer using Google. I would also look for and answer questions related to the Twin Cities (travel, restaurants, etc.) or subjects in which I have expertise. In my answers I always made sure to include the fact that I was a librarian. It's been close to a year since I've participated, however. I began doing more virtual reference at my library, and with that and my regular reference desk hours I didn't feel I had any more time to devote to reference outside. And online answer sites do take a lot of time. The hardest thing for me wasn't answering the questions, it was finding suitable questions to respond to. Even filtering by specific subjects or keywords still left a lot of questions to browse through. I didn't feel comfortable answering any dealing with relationships or medical matters. Or the open ended questions that didn't really have an answer. I wonder if the people asking those view online answer sites as a type of social network--they're just looking to have a conversation with other people.

In a way, that's part of the appeal of these sites--they're the online equivalent of asking around when you want to know something. Studies have shown that's what people tend to do first, rather than turning to "experts" or researching for themselves. Even though they are asking an anonymous community rather than friends and family, they are still drawn to online answer sites over more traditional, library-based methods. Other qualities that make the sites bigger draws over reference librarians for some people are their easy availability, 24/7, and the ability for people to remain anonymous if they choose.

The other type of question I avoided were ones that appeared to be homework assignments. As an academic librarian, my philosophy is to be more concerned with teaching students how to find information for themselves, rather than simply giving it to them. This is often the type of encounter I'll have at the reference desk, but it's probably not the type of answer most online questioners are looking for.

Thing #33 -- Travel 2.0

At this point in my life I don't travel very much, and when I do it's usually to known places rather than new ones. I also tend to not pay a lot of attention to other people's reviews--it's hard to know what their criteria for judging are, or how similar those criteria are to mine. So I was a little skeptical about spending a lot of time exploring the sites listed for this Thing. But I can see the appeal they would have for other people.

Several of the mashup sites interested me, however. I like the focus of Green Routes, and can see myself using it to find places to visit on "travels" close to home. With my interest in food and wine, 2 other sites interested me: Wines and Times, because I have enjoyed visiting many wineries in the past, and My Kugelhopf for its focus on food and enjoyable writing. And the next time I do take a trip I'll have to remember MapVivo (provided it's still around in this quickly changing 2.0 world!). It would be fun to use to map out a trip, as well as to share it with friends and family afterwards.

How does any of this fit into my (academic) library? I don't think it does. We hardly ever get travel-related questions at reference, and have removed most of the non-academic related pages of links from our web site, figuring students have other places they are more likely to look for that kind of information than the library.

Thing #31 -- More Twitter

Keeping up with news and finding things out quickly is what I've ended up using Twitter the most for. It was via the #cil2009 hashtag on Twitter that I discovered the Computers in Libraries day 2 keynote was being streamed live and was able to watch it. Tweets from MPR were how I found out about several developments in the Coleman-Franken recount trial shortly after they happened. And a chance viewing of trending topics is how I discovered that Skype (finally!) was releasing a native app for the iPhone/iPod Touch the following day.

I use a variety of Twitter methods. I don't use the Twitter web site very often--it's slow to load and doesn't always draw the screen formatted properly. I tried both TwitterFon and Twitterrific on my iPod Touch, and preferred TwitterFon. It's the main way I read tweets, but I don't post that way very often, preferring a full keyboard to the mini on-screen one. I also installed TwitterGadget on my iGoogle page, which I use primarily for sending my tweets. These 2 applications meet my needs, so I haven't explored a desktop Twitter client. The only one I considered was TweetDeck, primarily for it's ability to update my Facebook status with my tweets and vice versa. (I discovered this feature from a friend I follow, who mentioned it in a tweet.)

To be honest, I use Twitter more than I thought I would. I'm probably somewhere between the Dumping and Conversing stages. Since I don't have many followers, I often feel my tweets are just a one-sided conversation into the ether, but I have had a few actual conversations. And most of what I follow I do for news or entertainment--I haven't felt the need to reply to anything I've read. Perhaps more interaction will come if I stick with it.

Thing #27 -- Twitter

I'd heard of Twitter before, but didn't know much about it before this Thing. I did join, and choose a few people (or organizations) to follow. These are primarily for news (NPR, Star Tribune) or fun (James Lileks, The Onion) or MPR's Bob Collins who is both. I also added mnmorethings. If Twitter is at all useful to me, and I'm not convinced that it is, it will be for doing this kind of following. Very few of my friends or colleagues are on Twitter, so it doesn't work as a method to communicate with them. Since most of them are on Facebook that will probably remain the main way I connect with them online.

Since the ACRL conference is going on now, I wondered if following ACRL or tweets that have the #acrl2009 hashtag would be worthwhile. There are many people using Twitter to live blog ACRL sessions, and I could kind of follow what was going on, especially if I concentrated on just one or two people. I'll have to stick with it a bit longer to see if I learn anything useful, however.

As far as library uses for Twitter go, I don't see an application for them at my library yet. We've been talking about a library blog, or other more social ways to share library news, but haven't done anything except a Facebook page. Once we get our blog going perhaps we'll look into using Twitter to help spread our news.

I thought this would be a good post to share a video I came across several weeks ago. It's John Cleese's Twitter--The Movie from his blog, Cleeseblog.com.

Thing # 26 -- Ning (again)

I joined the 23 Things on a Stick Ning as part of Thing 21 in Round 1, but since it came so late in the Things I didn't use it once I joined. I joined 2 other Ning networks. The first was for the Midwest Library Technology Conference 2008 and the second was a closed network used for planning an event. In both cases, use of Ning fizzled out fairly quickly. The technology conference Ning was valuable as a way for presenters to post materials, but it never generated much discussion related to the presentations. The other network suffered from the same lack of use. We discovered email was a more efficient way to discuss and resolve issues.

The 23 Things on a Stick Ning seems to be more active, unless it's just all a result of doing Thing 26! I did explore the groups without finding one that interested me. Most of them seem more relevant to public librarians than academic ones. To fulfill this Thing I uploaded a video and contributed to a discussion. I already added the Ning badge back in Thing #21.

Thing #21 -- More with Social Networks

There are 2 library related online communities I'm a member of: Blended Librarian and WebJunction Minnesota. I tried to take a look at Ning, but they're having technical problems right now. Guess I'll have to join the 23 Things on a Stick Ning later. Several years ago one of my cousins set up an online network for my extended family on my mother's side. We use it to keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, share photos, and even collect family recipes. I'm familiar with Flixster, my sister often challenges me to their quizzes using their Facebook app. She's much more into pop culture than I am, and she always wins. For the most part I prefer to do my socializing in person rather than online. I'm more likely to join an online group when I already know some of the people there.

Well, Ning is finally back up and I joined the 23 Things community there. Here's my badge:

View my page on 23 Things on a Stick

Thing #20 -- Facebook / MySpace

I joined Facebook in the fall, mostly out of curiousity. I had heard a lot about it and wanted to see for myself. After I created my account I discovered my siblings in other states are also on it and it's now one of the ways we keep in touch. I'm currently on a couple of groups related to my library. For this thing I looked briefly at some of the suggested Facebook groups, but didn't join any. I plan to take a closer look at them later (when I'm not hurrying to finish the rest of the Things) and will probably join at least one.

I chose Facebook because it appeared to offer more security than MySpace--you have more control over who can see information about you. The layout in Facebook seems cleaner to me and the ads aren't as obtrusive.

Thing #2 -- Library 2.0

Note to the reader: The following will be a series of perhaps disjointed thoughts on the subject of Library 2.0. As a colleague said to me, "It's just a blog," so I may not tie them together in a nice narrative structure.

I've been familiar with concept of Library 2.0 since 2006 when I ran into it at Computers in Libraries. For me, at least, the mindset changes are the most easy to do and apply to my work. I'm fairly open to change and looking for ways to try new things. And since I haven't been in the profession that long (10 years--so the Internet has always been a part of my library career) I don't feel myself completely ruled by traditional library orthodoxy, whether it's library "silos" or the MARC record.

Where I do stumble is in making the time to educate myself about the variety of L2 tools and resources out there. Or in taking the time to learn the necessary technical skills to implement some of the cool stuff. While I have some computer programming experience and am capable of learning the skills necessary, it's hard to justify (to myself and my superiors) taking the time. Unlike Stephen Abram, I was hired to be a "Reference Librarian" not "VP of Innovation" and while L2 is important, sometimes other more boring parts of my job have to take precedence. I still have to staff the reference desk and teach library instruction classes.

Still, there are some L2 changes happening in my library. We've been providing IM reference for just over a year, and brought a customized version of the Assignment Calculator online last spring. Several of us has Facebook account (although we don't always use them). When our building was remodeled a few years ago we made sure to include several group study rooms with tables, whiteboards, and network connections for laptops. There is enough room at the computers in our reference area for 2-3 people to sit around each computer, if they want to work together.

For me personally, I'm most interested in things like mashups or AJAX applications --ways to tinker around with how information is delivered. I've begun playing around with a Google Maps application, for example. However, sometimes I'll run up against the wall of lacking tech support for implementation. It also occurs to me that the move away from desktop applications and towards web apps is bringing us full circle. Or maybe spiraling up to a higher plane. In the early days there were servers to run the applications and dedicated client workstations to access them. Now, our desktop machines are kind of like bulked up clients, connecting to the larger "server" that is the web.

To a certain extent I feel that the ideas behind Library 2.0 aren't that new, or that big a deal. However, I can see the value in naming it and creating a "buzz" around it. It certainly raises the visibility of the concept and thus perhaps makes those who might be more afraid/resistant to change sit up and take notice of what's going on in the world around them. And that maybe they'd better get on board. Look at the number of librarians signed up for "23 Things." By reading some of their blogs there are many who are new to the whole 2.0 thing, but willing to try to learn and change. This may not have happened if they were just left to themselves, without the 23 Things initiative to get them going. Of course, there are also a lot of blogs that were started and have gone nowhere.

I like this line from John Blyberg's blog: "but whatever IT is, it IS." Guess I'd better get going and explore the rest of the Things.