Twitter

I'm not on board with Twitter - I don't feel the need to follow anyone & I'm not quite self absorbed enough to record my every thought. If I want information I'll usually go a website or one of the blogs I follow. Perhaps it's a generational thing..... Anyways, I get enough unwanted stuff just thru' my facebook account. I'm trying to streamline & simplify my life not clutter it up even more.

LibraryThing

Library Thing is quite simple to navigate. I've not used it before for reader's advisory but I wonder if it would be more user friendly for customers than novelist? - & perhaps more interesting given the social networking side of it & the opportunity to read comments from other readers.
I've not used LibraryThing myself. A couple of years ago I joined Shelfari - altho' it's been so long since I used it that I couldn't remember my password when I recently tried to sign in. Maybe I should join LibraryThing!

Online Productivity Tools

I found Google Docs to be a really useful app & easy to get the hang of. This is one thing I'm likely to use. (I have to say that I still like my daytimer on paper). I can see myself using google docs with my team of community volunteers. It will make it much simpler to edit things were working on together.
The other thing I appreciate is how easy my documents will be to access. Instead of saving to a stick or emailing to myself at another location I can access from any computer & not just my own desktop.

flickr/youtube

I spent an enjoyable half hour viewing pictures of the uk on flickr. I'm heading their tomorrow so it was great to get a preview of some of the places I'll be. Many of them were taken by someone who shares my maiden name - maybe we're related!

I was surprised to see how many people post picture of their babies & children for all the world to see. No way I'd do that.

Remember "My Cubicle" - popular a few years ago - a parody of the James Blunt song "You're Beautiful"? There are lots of versions on youtube - I sent one to my son when he got his first job in a cube. He wasn't amused.

cpl 2.0 Really Simple Syndication

What the heck is RSS? I didn't have a clue but now I do. I can see myself spending way too much time on my bloglines page instead of doing the truly useful things in life such as ironing. It was pretty easy to set up an RSS feed. I couldn't find an rss icon on my favourite blog - small dead animals - but cutting and pasting the url into bloglines seemed to work.

cpl 2.0 Google

I often go to Google More when presenting Introduction to Internet programs. I like to demonstrate the usefulness of the Reference section in Google Directory. There is a wealth of information here.

- Encyclopedias - such as Britannica Online, World Book, How Stuff Works
- Style Guides - for help with report writing, citations, bibliographies
- Ask an Expert - provides links to online help from the Library of Congress, Internet Public Library, Text a Librarian

There are dictionaries, almanacs, biographies & many other useful links, even a site called Knots which tells you everything you need to know about tieing your shoes, necktie or fishing line.

cpl 2.0 facebook

Facebook can be a timewaster if you let it be. I think it's useful for keeping up with friends and family.

cpl 2.0 Wikipedia

I actually found it a bit difficult to find an article that needed editing. I must be a generalist & not an expert:) If I'd spent more time scouring Wikipedia I'm sure I could have found something but I try to keep my work at work, not at home, & there's only so much time ...

What I did was to add a bit of information to the Saddle Ridge community wiki. As I live there, I know a little bit about it. What struck me was how easy it was to do. I could have written anything!! Who would know if it was correct or not? Best not to write that term paper using Wikipedia!

cpl 2.0 Delicious

I think of Delicious as a world wide list of favourites - I occasionally while away the time checking out whats new and popular. I also like searching the genealogy sites to see if anyone else is working on my family members. Also, I enjoy the travel sites people have bookmarked - especially places I'm going to be visiting. I've gotten some great ideas that way.

There are a lot of advantages to tagging over using formalized subject headings - it's much more accessible, anyone can add a tag & it's free! I do find, however, that it can be a cumbersome way to search, requiring much clicking, while someone patiently hovers over me at the info desk. (Perhaps I just need more practice) I'm thinking of one search I did recently for Alberta wetlands. I eventually found the government site I wanted at the bottom of the page. I hate to say the "g" word, but when I googled Alberta wetlands the site I was looking for was the first one on the list.
Delicious is a tool in our tool belt but it's not the only way to go.

A note to IT - I think we can lose the dots.

web 2.0 @cpl

m intrigued by the number of blogs that inhabit cyberspace. Altho' there are several that I follIow, and enjoy reading, I've never had the urge to blog myself - journaling is more my style.