# 23 (Week 9) Is this really the end? Or is it just the beginneing....

I really really hope it is the end. This has been an interesting exercise, but I can't say I exactly enjoyed it, as I felt pressured by time constraints. I felt I didn't really get the time to play with anything I enjoyed. I got sick of having to sign up to so many sites, and remember all those usernames and passwords. There were a lot of things that seemed pointless and I wouldn't use again: eg technorati, tagging. I did think some things were quite good, and either I would use them myself (such as RSS feeds, googledocs or zohowriter) or I could see a use for them on a library site (eg wikis, podcasts). I do feel more confident now helping patrons at the learn.net

# 22 (Week 9) ebooks

I'm trying to finish my learning 2.0 by next week, as I will be having a bit of a break after that. I've watched the introduction to netlibrary, and have been having a play in e-books.com. I read an exerpt from Deepak Chopra's book, Life After Death. Project Gutenburg is easy to navigate, but of course all the books are old and classics, because they can only add books whose copyright has expired. You can download from the main site, or mirror sites, whereby you are downloading from somewhere closer, like Sydney University, or you can download peer to peer. I wouldn't really use ebooks as I'd rather read from a printed page than a computer screen. Maybe this new wireless electronic book reader that Amazon have released would be easier to read. They say it has a digital ink screen.

# 21 (Week 9) Podcasts

Getting nearer to the end! This one has taken me quite a while. I explored the suggested resources, and found podcastalley.com quite easy to use. Found some interesting podcasts on science. I had forgotten how to add RSS feeds, so had to do a refresher on that. Added some feeds to my bloglines account, then added some straight onto my blog. Actually found it easier to add them straight to my blog. I think podcasts would be quite useful on our library website. We could have podcast of book reviews, or children reading stories.

#20 (Week 9) Discovering YouTube

Yay I'm up to Thing 20!! I played around with a few other video sites, couldn't always get them to work. Then explored Youtube. I chose the bird video first, because I thought it was cute and I like Pixar short films. Then I did a search for library, and found the zombie clip, so I added that too. It was apparently an entry in a competition there. It's really simple adding a video to your blog (if I can do it!) There certainly is a lot of rubbish on these sites though, some quite unsavoury. You certainly have to be careful what you look at. I found links to library sites, particularly one that helped you find a library anywhere in New Zealand.

Thing 17 social networking

Today I've got time to work on social networking from the learn.net computers, so I'm coming back to #17. I found Myspace best for searching music. Did a search for Evermore and am listening to them while I write my blog. I found some great photos of them, but would have to sign up to upload them, so just looked. Had a play on Facebook, found my daughter and some of my neices, as well as other library staff. Will definitely sign up for Facebook, so I'll be able to keep up with my daughter while she's in the UK. Had a look at Hennepin County Library site. It's good how you can chat with the librarian, add comments, give feedback online, as well as the usual things like search the catalogue, find out opening hours, etc.

#19 Discovering Web 2.0 tools

Galaxiki is the science fiction & fantasy galaxy that anyone can edit. Join the community, get your own solar system & help to build a new online world. A fantastic place for science fiction and fantasy lovers. You can choose "Beam me up" or "use a wormhole" to visit distant areas of the universe. You can read about other solar systems, the orbits of the planets, and whether there is any life on them or their moons. You can buy a star or gift one to someone else. Cool!

#18 Online productivity tools

I'm leaving Social Networking for the minute, as I can't access MySpace or Facebook from the staff computers. I'll go back and do that when I have time to do it from home. So for now I've skipped ahead to online tools. I signed up for both Zoho writer and Googledocs, and had a play around in both. Kept forgetting my username in Zoho writer, 'cos it wouldn't let me use my usual one. Zoho writer has maybe more cool features than Googledocs, but I quite like Googledocs, as I use Gmail, and it saves using yet another site. They're both very good tools, so you can save your documents online, and access them anywhere.