Thing 9 - Social Bookmarking

I actually already had an account with Delicious prior to reading about social bookmarking as part of 23 Things. However, I signed up out of curiosity not too long ago but after creating my account and saving several bookmarks, I have never gone back to use it. It is not a site/service that I feel is very useful for me personally, and I doubt I would ever use it regularly. To me, it is nice to have, in case I am ever at a strange computer and need quick access to a site, I could easily login to Delicious to find what I need. But the reality is that I don't foresee this happening very often. I could see library patrons finding social bookmarking helpful if they come to the library to use the public computers, that way they can easily access their favorite sites from any computers that they use.

Thing 8 - Tagging

Prior to the 23 Things exercise, I knew what tags were but have not had much experience using them. I do think that they are very useful and certainly have their own place in the web world now. I don't think that they are meant to replace subject headings, but they certainly can complement them. I don't think there's anything wrong with having more ways to access information so if this keyword style of connecting data helps users find what they need, then it's a great thing. I don't have any actual experience with tagging in an OPAC system, I am trying to imagine how that would work and if it would be a good thing. It is definitely not something that I would discourage.

Thing 7 - IM

Instant messaging - thing 7 - is not something that is new to me at all. I've previously used Yahoo and Live instant messaging services, and once worked in a job where we were expected to have live IM open all day for quick intra-office communicating. In my personal life, I currently utilize IM'ing only occasionally. It is one way that I can reach my husband at the office (he and his colleagues also use it as a form of communicating at work), so I have the Live IM app downloaded on my iPhone so that if I need to speak with my husband during his work day, I can quickly open that app and be in touch with him. Personally, I don't feel that IM can replace texting, which is what I use more commonly than IM'ing.

I do have some exposure to reference service via IM. I once spent a day at the UNT Wilson Library ref desk as part of an assignment for school. They offer reference services via IM although it is only when they have someone "available" via IM so it seems like a spotty service to me. The ref desk staffer that I was observing signed into the reference IM about halfway into our day. One user did contact him via IM and he was able to successfully assist them. It seems like it would be a good idea but it needs a little more consistency, at least in the case of that library. There are long periods of time, from what I can tell, where no one is available via IM, but there is ref desk staff there to assist people, they're just not signed into their instant messaging account.

Thing 6 - Digg

Digg was a new site that I discovered through the 23 Things project. I took some time to review the website, and created an account. I don't know that I will personally use it very often, it does not seem to fit any need that I have, although I can see how others might find it useful or interesting. But analyzing it from a different perspective, I considered how Digg compared to a library. And actually Digg is very similar to a library when I stopped to think about it. A library reviews information sources, obtains those that seem popular, have good reviews, and that they think their patrons will be interested in, so that the patrons can use the library to then search through those information sources for what they need. Digg similarly collects data and news, uses user reviews to rank those items, and users can come to that one location and select from what Digg has already collected. Digg's approach to news should not change the way that the public views news but it might. I would think that it should be understood that the news stories are ranked by other users and therefore do not reflect actual importance of news. However, it certainly cannot be said that all of the public will understand this fact naturally, so in some cases it may occur that the public has a distorted understanding of what news is important.

Thing 5 - Twitter

For thing 5, I set up an account with Twitter. I have previously steered clear of tweeting simply because I didn't see the point. However, after watching a couple of videos on Twitter and how it can be used for news updates as well as business functionality I do see how it could be useful for some people. Trying to think of how it could be useful to libraries is a bit more of a stretch for me. I do see that library users may want or need to use Twitter. As far as the library itself tweeting, I guess it could be a handy tool for sending out updates regarding news and events at the library. It would first be necessary to establish a "fan" base to receive these tweets that a library sends out. However, as a part of this exercise, I did find the FPL on Twitter and became a follower. I'll admit I was surprised to see that there were 101 followers, and so it does seem that there is a genuine use/need for the library to have a Twitter account. Despite my misgivings that Twitter is not very popular or useful, I did like reading the history of the FPL's past tweets and while I may not be a total convert, I'm willing to continue to follow it on Twitter and perhaps I'll continue to be surprised by it.

Thing 4 - Picture Sharing

I already have a personal account on several of the common picture sharing sites, including Flickr, Photobucket and Shutterfly and am very familiar with navigating these sites and using them. So for this exercise of learning about picturing sharing sites, I chose to go to some of the links to various library photo sharing sites to look at it from a professional angle. Across the board, I will say that I am impressed at all of the libraries for venturing into this world. However, some of them definitely do it better than others. The one that I was most impressed with was the Alexandrian Public Library in Mount Vernon, IN. They seemed to have photos of every event in their library, big and small, and the photos were all organized into clearly labeled albums/sets. By contrast, the Marathon library photos were also well organized, however there were much fewer of them, and they definitely did not seem to represent all of the events or photographable moments at that library. So while that library seems to be trying to enter into the photo sharing world,they clearly need to better integrate either photo taking or photo sharing as part of their regular tasks.

Thing 3 - RSS Feeds

I must admit that I've previously been a bit fuzzy on exactly what RSS Feeds are and how they work. After the tutorial on this, I definitely have a better understanding and feel comfortable using the RSS Feed options in both Internet Explorer and Outlook. However, similar to the readers/aggregators I'm not sure that this is a service that will be all that helpful to me personally. I typically don't follow alot of news, choosing to seek out specific sites and pieces of information based on the situation. But I do see how it could be extremely useful to me in the future, as I develop professionally and need to follow more news feeds. It is definitely a handy tool at bringing the information to the user, rather than the user having to seek information. At this point in my life though, I don't feel it would be much of a timesaver. For example, if I go in search of news I do waste time looking for the news that could have been saved had an RSS feed delivered it to me directly. However, because I don't religiously follow any news at this point, I feel that if I subscribed to a feed I would spend just as much time receiving, reviewing and deleting news which I don't want.

I definitely can see how this type of tool can be useful to some people. Additionally, in the world of librarianship I think RSS feeds pose amazing possibilities for providing information to patrons. Rather than having to come to the library to search databases or even log into the library's electronic resources, instead information can be delivered directly to the interested patrons.

Thing 2

'Readers' occupy the #2 spot on the 23 Things list, and so I learned how to use Google Reader as a part of this exercise. The site is relatively simple to use and reminds me of a standard web-based email account setup as far as page orientation. Adding a new subscription is quite easy and they can be organized within your account in a series of folders, again, similar to email folders. So overall, I believe the usability of this reader is easy and user friendly. However, as far as usefulness, I haven't quite made up my mind as to how useful I feel this tool will really be to me. It seems to me that it would be just as easy to use a browser bookmark as opposed to adding something to Google Reader. I think if I were someone who had a large number of subscriptions to sites, especially blogs, then it might be more useful, especially to keep these organized. But as someone who is just venturing into the world of blogs, I don't think I'm going to incorporate Google Reader into daily use at this point.

Hello

As a new member of the Youth Services team at the Frisco Public Library, I'm starting this blog as part of 23 Things. The creation of this blog is 'Thing 1.' I look forward to sharing Things 2-23!