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The Virtual Library Branch

Whoopee!! I made it to 10. I downloaded an e-audio book at the Reader Services desk (I don't have a pc at home), and it was fairly straigthforward. I downloaded from the North Suburban Digital Consortium and I found it much easier than using Netlibrary (which I had done previously). This process may become mainstream when they get the process more friendly to the end-user, but there is a ways to go.

See you on Staff Day!

Google Tools - Online Productivity

I created a document in Google and it was really simple, just like Word. I can see where this would help people working on projects from home and for those who don't want to buy Microsoft office.

Wikis

I got on to the "10 things wiki" and put my two cents in. I have used Wikipedia but I don't take it as gospel. I'm not sure that "radical trust" has a place on a library webpage, just that small percentage of a chance that someone might put out some "misinformation" (accidentally or intentionally) make me nervous. The library webpage has the feel of an authoritative voice and people look to the library's webpage for answers. I was looking up a location in Ireland on Wikipedia once and someone had replaced words in the article with male and female anatomical parts and other inappropriate words. Since I didn't know what to replace the inappropriate words with I emailed Wikipedia and they corrected it fairly quickly and sent me a thank you.

Podcasting

I listened to some podcasts today and it was fun. I didn't get the hang of volume control though and hurt my eardrums a bit. I subscribed to Booktalks -- Quick and Easy and the Denver Public Library children's books podcasts. The Booktalks podcast is a synopsis of books, and the Denver PL podcasts reads a children's book. Listening to a children's book was fun and it would be nice if Skokie could do that. I also subscribed to a few NPR podcasts so now I can keep up with my favorite radio programs.

Social Bookmarking

I went to del.icio.us and posted a site and it was easy. I don't think I'd use it much as an individual, but posting as an organization like a library could be interesting. Good library tags could be: public records; consumers; hard to find books; buy books; catatlogs . . .

Flick r and Photo Sharing

I went with Pam Weinberg on a "Words" weekend in New York State, and it was a fun and beautiful weekend. I went to this weekend armed with a digital camera lent to me from the library and take a look at the picture on the top right of this blog! I can hardly believe that is me rubbing elbows with Will Shortz, Ira Glass, and Bob Mankoff. You can also find pictures of our weekend on Flick r. I can definitely see the usefulness of Flick r and photo sharing.