The last thinging in thing land

Which thing/s I found most useful.
The things I found most useful were Twitter, SlideShare, Diigo and Zotero. I enjoy blogging but I was already familiar with the form. I don't wish to touch Facebook or wiki-whateverer, even with a 20 foot barge pole ever again, but it was useful knowing what they are all about and why they exist.

Which thing/s I most enjoyed doing.

Pretty much the things I found most useful. I might say that I am impressed with Zotero and Endnote web. If only I had known of them as a student!

Which thing/s I have persisted with.

Yep, same things as noted above.

Whether I think web 2.0 in general has a role in the future of libraries.

I certainly think it does. Facebook, however much I hate it with a passion, will always be a fantastic way to give access to our patrons (who all use the blessed thing). Twitter have found annoying with the library updates coming through, so I ...shock, horror, 'unfollowed' it, but perhaps others are more forgiving of it than me. Obviously, the more academically focused tools will be useful to our patrons and to the library staff. Overall, I think the potential that is there and is yet to be tapped is very exciting.

Thus, I sign off very much satisfied with the Warwick 23 things program.

The end of all possible thinging

I had a looked over my blog and I am confident that I have 'done' all the thinging up to thing 22. I wait in with baited breath for thing 23, the best of all possible things. I have taken the opportunity to look back on the things and just at the moment the 'things' I keep thinging with are:

Zotero (I will be a student soon)
Diigo (Though I do find it slightly annoying)
Twitter
G-docs/g-stuff in general (though I used that before)
Firefox (because its just better)

Still lets see what things are to come...

More thinging with the office of doom

This week was very interesting. I have been familiar with Wiki-type media for some time and have used various wikis (including to my great shame -pedia) in the past. I have never edited one as I have little knowledge to add, or am not an expert in any field. I need not rant about the inherent horribleness of wikipedia, but is it fun to so I will. As a cataloguer a quick look at wikipedia can (i.e. it is possible) give me just enough cursory knowledge to proceed to classify a book, though I always have lingering doubts. If I want something substantive I use actual resources as discovered by reputable search tools rather than just a Google and the Wiki. I might (as radical as this is) look in the book or books, or a bibliography, or a library catalogue, or an index. But for the quick fix, the tabloid view, the hardly referenced, ad hoc, junk food form of information wikipedia will do... maybe. As for other uses of wikis I can see considerable benefits for collaboration, information exchange and such like.

I have used Google Docs fairly extensively almost as soon as I had Google account. I have found it extremely useful not having important documents confined to one PC, or have many drafts or old versions of the same document cluttering my computers, this particularly applies to my CV and other docs that need continual updates. I would recommend Google docs for the ability to collaborate on documents and for the easy conversion of these documents into PDFs, .docs and so on.

SlideShare is something that I am very impressed with as well. I do not see immediate use for the tools on SlideShare but I can see the great potential for it uses, as already demonstrated by its use in 23 Things blogs.

Thinging for this week a complete success. Though I might add my disapprobation at the instruction sheets. They are often as clear as mud to follow, particularly for beginners. I often get through with trail and error and ignore the sheets.

More thinging with pictures of things from Flickr

photo by Jametiks.

Were we thinking of library refurbishment? Just an idea, eh. No... oh well, I tried.

Seriously though, Flickr is another of the social media that I have strenuously avoided til now, which is why I am on the 23 things course. All of these things are great as far as they go and have their application for the library. I suppose marketing and promotion are where these media are most at home. As a private individual I can also see the advantage of sharing photos through Flickr rather than exchanging CDs, DVDs etc.

Creative Commons is very interesting and I found this the most fascinating aspect. It goes to show that intellectual property is very much more fictional than other forms of property. The 'rebellion' against copyright for intellectual content demonstrates to some extent the absurd nature intellectual property. People still 'produce' the content without the demand for money. Attribution is key of course and using the content within the scope of permission. Justice demands that we do not break copyright lawfully imposed. But still, I'm glad to know that 'free' content is available and profit and self interest are not the dominate motives in the production of the content.

YouTube

Ah the happy (or is that unhappy) hours spent on YouTube. I think this is a powerful tool and a great danger as with all social media. Still I think the benefits of YouTube outweigh any negative aspects and they are fairly self-evident, as YouTube EDU demonstrates.

More thinging with references

I had never used Diigo before today. I think that the potential is quite amazing. The ability to annotate a webpage and keep a record of the first thoughts seems very powerful. I am interested to know how such a thing would work on a blog entry. I presume the best way to preserve the information is to open the blog entry into a separate window/tab and then save and annotate that. I noticed that the highlight and capture function didn't seem to work as on PDF documents opened on the page, but one could save the link. I haven't even scratched the surface of what Diigo might be able to do. I already use X-marks pretty well, so my bookmarks can be transferred from machine to machine, but a really like the additional functionality of highlighting and capturing.

I looked at Endnote web and found its slowness frustrating, but I gather it may be a technical hitch. Thus I intend to come back to it at a later date and try it out again.

Zotero I really liked as well. This tool is very much research focused and I found it interesting that it can harvest metadata from the websites that are compatible with it. I searched for books on the Millennium OPAC and could create citations straight up. I found that certain websites sites couldn't be harvested and I needed to input the metadata manually, which is very much tedious and I think potentially problematic for users.

A very much informative session of thinging this week. I will certainly have recourse to these resources in the future.

More reflections on thinging with 23 Things

I approached 23 things with a healthy degree of skepticism. Partly, this was because of all the 'Things' that were to be covered by the course most of them I already used or had strenuously avoided. Additionally, there is a certain amount of 'sameness' to all these Web 2.0 technologies. They deliver the same or similar services for the end of internet socialisation. Most of the interfaces and protocols are very much the same and so it seemed that once you had used one you could use them all.

However, I have found the 'things' for each week extremely interesting and discovered the potential for some of them. Of all the technologies I am most impressed with Twitter. It was much to my surprise as well. I had heard said of Twitter that it was essentially a place to vent all your passing fads and fancies. To indulge yourself in how interesting your own life and interests are. I had also the impression that it was chaotic. An endless stream of drivel delivered 24 hours a day to be absorbed as mindlessly as it was created. Hence my allusions to the mythical nymph Echo, who was only able to repeat that which another spoke onto her and failed to win the love of Narcissus who is only in love with himself. This I am happy to say is not the case, or at least it need not be. The level of control which you have (based on those you follow) over the material that pops up means that meaningful, relevant material can and is flagged up. Only last week I discovered, thanks to Emma, the #Savelibraries initiative to try to prevent the odious fellow in charge of the treasury butchering our local libraries. In addition, I discovered cataloguers and articles relevant to current issues in the field. In this sense, Twitter has opened doors to information I would otherwise be ignorant of.

The other technologies which I was new to were Facebook and Doodle. Although I have been encouraged to Facebook by people for as long as I can remember since it was available for use by all (2006? or around then). I have never signed up and I believe I never will. I do not need to create a cyber-me. Telephones, letters and emails allow me to contact who I want. And frankly I don't want to have my life exposed to scrutiny. I do agree though that institutional facebook pages are a handy way to post up-to-date information on the institution and as a space for interaction between patron and user.

Doodle on the other hand I found very useful. Though the interface is a bit clunky I have subsequently used it to arrange social meetings with my friends, much to my boozey satisfaction.

I don't think I will ever go back to using IE as my default browser... ever! Even if Bill Gates himself ritually disembowels himself as a blood sacrifice to the almighty cyber-god on the alter of a IBM for the secret formula to perfect internet browsing. Still. Firefox isn't perfect and there are still some things that only IE can do. (Raaah!!!)

Overall, then it has been illuminating to explore these technologies. I don't see anything intimidating about them and I will probably continue to make use of them, just not as unconsciously as I once did. I look forward to the next episode of thinging in a world of things!

More unthinging with faceless Facebook

I could not bring myself to sign into Facebook even after looking over the potential benefits. From a professional point of view, I am simply not happy to have both my private life and my 'public' life mixed up. In all honesty there is nothing to be ashamed about when it comes to my private life. I think the bifurcation our lives into work/leisure is a great shame. It splits our personalities and destroys the sense of vocation in the conduct of our lives. We essentially 'buy' leisure so we can live our 'real' life at home.

However, I am unsure if the merging of professional/social life through social networking is the solution to this issue. Once more I find there is the danger of staring intently at our 'Cyber' image, without really living in the world. Of being obsessed with online 'friends' and in fact becoming isolated, atomistic and unsocial in the world of social networking. I am all for being personal, communitarian and vocational in our professional lives. For our work to reflect a real sense of our person, of our being true artists (or artisans). Nevertheless, I do not wish to become self-obsessed and dwell in the unholy trinity of me, myself and I.

But what apart from this? Do I condemn social networking and all it can do for libraries? I don't think so. Though the dangers may be latent, yet the benefits seem clear. The library is able to publicise itself in a way that it could never have done in the pre-Web 2.0 era. Information about the library can be delivered to patrons where they are at. I would imagine that nearly all the students would have a Facebook account so to be able to 'bring the library to them' is very powerful. I was amazed that over 2000 people had registered their approval of the library Facebook page.

I am glad that I took the time to look at Facebook. I remain a critic but I understand the benefits and the good it does in peoples lives.