Final Comments

It's been a long road to get to the end of these quests. I'm glad I was able to do it and I appreciate the opportunity given to us. It was fun to watch YouTube on work time!

It seems like a long road because I had some difficulties in getting to all the quests: They started when I was on two weeks of vacation, so right away I was two weeks behind. Then I didn't have any headphones. This doesn't sound like much of an impediment, does it? But without headphones I couldn't even watch the initial video we were supposed to watch. Of course, I could have just watched it with the sound audible on my computer in the work room, but then I would have disturbed everyone else in the room, which I didn't think was fair.

The quests also came at the beginning of the school year, when I am most involved in my child's schooling and PTA activities. Time I might have spent on the quests on my own time could not be done because my time was already committed.

The quests also fell during evaluation time. I take my evaluations very seriously and it takes me a long time to complete them--more time taken away from available time to finish the quests.

So I was very grateful for the extra week to get the quests done. It would have been extremely difficult for me to finish last week.

Having the opportunity to take part in TechTrek 2.0 was great. However, learning about these things is only a small part of having library 2.0 become a part of CCPL. It doesn't matter how much you learn about, if you don't have the hardware for staff to adequately handle these quests, they can't be taken advantage of. And CCPL does not have adequate hardware. No matter how many websites, applications, and software we are recommended to explore, we're only as good as the hardware we have. This system does not have enough computers. Period. And many that we do have cannot adequately handle a number of the things we were asked to do.

Let's do the quests again for the rest of the people who didn't have the opportunity to take part this time. It's a valuable experience. I learned a lot. Thank you.

Comments on Quest 12 Part Two

Listening to podcasts was not the most fun part of the quests in Tech Trek. I'm not a big fan of talk radio or even NPR. Podcasts remind me of talk radio, so I really didn't care for it. Also, I compare them to blogging (which I compared to the Tower of Babel in a previous post). Why should I care what Joe Schmoe chooses to post in a podcast? Just because he can do it doesn't mean he has anything to say worth hearing.

That being said, I did look for book review and library podcasts. The most interesting one I found was Rachel's Reviews. But, again, I don't really care what Rachel has to say. I'd rather read reviews from someone interesting. You may have to listen to a lot of podcasts before you find anything worthwhile. I have better things to do with my time.

I have no interest in making my own podcast.

Comments on Quest 12 Part One

I love YouTube! I have been searching it for weeks during my lunch time, finding videos of my favorite music. It has been great. However, I don't care about any videos posted by Joe Schmoe. It's just like blogs--why should I care what the average joe says? You waste a lot of time trying to find one good video.

One way it could be used by the library is to create a video, such as the one Steven Schwengel did, showing how to use something at the library (Steven's was how to access our databases from our web site), and then direct patrons to that video.

Here's a video I thought was interesting:



This video expresses exactly how I feel about public libraries, and how I felt about public libraries before I became a librarian.



Unfortunately, I was trying to watch it in the middle of the afternoon--not the smartest time to watch one of these videos. I had to let it play and then replay it; otherwise, I didn't have the patience. (This is a real drawback to seeing some of these things.)

Comments on Quest 11

The more you use these things, the easier it seems to get to use them. I was able to publish from Google Docs into my blog, although I couldn't figure out how to include a title.

Please look at my last blog post for my comments on Question 11.

I couldn't get into Zoho Writer, so I'm composing in Google Docs. Both applications seem easy to use.

With Zoho Sheets, I finally have a way to view our branch's schedule at home. At home I have MS Word, but not MS Excel, which is how the schedule is composed. I was able to import my template Excel document into Zoho Sheets, modify it, and export the revised version as an Excel document. It's great!

I can see how Zoho Show would be a useful tool for outreach. For instance, I am interested in promoting our databases to homeschooling groups, but it is difficult to get a group to come to the library. If I could have a Zoho Show which I originally created in PowerPoint, then with instructions on accessing Zoho, homeschoolers would be able to access my presentation and learn about the advantages of using our databases, and how to easily access them. An entire group could view the promotional materials even when they don't have PowerPoint. Of course, there may be other ways to do such a presentation, such as on YouTube.

The whole idea of having this software available at no cost for access by anyone who creates an account is freeing and equalizing. I don't want to spend the money for the entire MS Office suite, but I always felt at a disadvantage when I wasn't able to access the schedule at home to check for various information. I no longer have to feel that way.

Comments on Quest 10

Lots of fun things.

I've been invited using Evite previously, so was familiar with the site. The features like party planning look very useful.

Slideroll looks like fun, but I think it's more versatile to use Flickr.

Dogster and Catster: Social networking for pets??? Get out!!!

Artpad is fun. You don't have to worry about going outside the lines. In some ways, it's a step up from MS Paint. I love that you can save and send your painting. I tried to post a link to my painting here, but it didn't work. Maybe I'll explore when I have more time.

The generator blog looks like great fun, with lots of new things to explore.

Comments on Quest 9

Before I explored wikis in this quest, I didn't think they had a place in libraries. As a reference librarian, I deplore the use of Wikipedia as a reference source. In my view, reference answers should come from authoritative, reliable sources, and I still don't think Wikipedia qualifies as such.

However, after exploring the suggested wikis in the discovery exercise, I can now see a use for wikis in libraries. Using a wiki to share program ideas is an excellent use of wikis, for example. A training wiki is also an excellent use. I still don't think they are good reference sources, though.

Comments on Quest 8

I looked at all of the social networking sites in the Discovery Exercise - bebo, friendster, Linkedin, facebook, and myspace.com. Myspace.com and bebo won the day as being the easiest to nagivate through, but perhaps only because the others required a login to do more than minimal searching.

I wouldn't consider creating an account on any of them, at least not at this point in my life. My life is full enough without monitoring one of these accounts. Maybe I'm just too old. Besides, it gives me the creeps to think of people viewing my profile and I don't know anything about them. It's like being in a house at night with the windows open and the lights on, so that everyone can see in, but you can't see out. If I did sign up, my space would definitely be private.

There are plenty of problems in these social networking sites. The first and foremost is that people can be whatever they want to be, and can (and do) hide behind a false profile. It is naive if people think that all of the users are over 14 (13? whatever the minimum age is). It is also disturbing to me to see the "friends" of the members of MySpace. Friends? How trivializing to the real meaning of "friends."

As for libraries using MySpace, I know that many have created profiles, thinking it is a perfect way to relate to teens. I simply don't believe that any teens go to the library or even to the library's website because they discovered a MySpace page from the library. It is ludicrous to me that a library's profile shows as male or female, age 15 (or whatever).

Here at CCPL, if the decision has been made to use MySpace profiles, blogs, etc. to reach out to teens, why not have it promoted at our official web site? Links at least to the blogs would be nice.

I know that I sound old fashioned. But just because new trends such as social networking exist, does that mean they're appropriate for library use? I'm not convinced.

Comments on Quest 7

Flickr is amazing. So many things you can do with it--organize your photos, share them with others, and make a number of things with your photos, to name a few. I was concerned about security, but you can limit who views your photos, which is a wonderful feature.

I do have issues with using Flickr to publicly post photos from library events, unless permission is obtained from the people in the photos. (This goes for named or unnamed people.) I think we particularly have to be careful with children's faces. It could be one of those lawsuits waiting to happen.

Here are some links to some photos I found interesting:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/beckyprn777/359485639/ - The Ravenel Bridge at sunset.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alexvalentine/275606720/ - Johnstown, PA. See why it flooded so easily when the dam above the city broke in 1889?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ozoni11/74914788/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/piedmont_fossil/1843727905/ - Even old photos can be included.

Quest 6 Part Two Comments

I was not impressed by Technorati.

I didn't find the advanced search any more helpful than the regular search. I thought it was a good feature that you were able to do one search and then get results in each of the tabs (Posts, Blogs, Videos, Photos).

When I searched for Library 2.0, I got many unrelated results. It made no difference if I put it in quotes. I got much better results when I searched for Library2.o (no space).

I explored popular blogs and blog searches, but didn't really find anything interesting or surprising. Should I have?

The whole life of the blogosphere is a mystery to me. Why do people care so much about what other people think? Most of what is written does not seem worth reading, let alone writing. The blogosphere is a bit of a "Tower of Babel" where everyone is shouting at each other, but so many people don't even understand what the other person is saying. What value does that have? It's just a chance for people to mouth off, like I'm doing now.