Thing 23

Thing 23

Huzzah! I have reached the end and ahead of schedule.

I am glad that I have made the effort to complete all the things, though it has been far more time-consuming than I ever imagined and I know that I have barely scratched the surface with many of the applications I've been introduced to. I know that I would have to engage more with Twitter and LinkedIn to get the full benefit of them, but I really can't see what use to put them too. I know with the latter it is mainly a case of needing a critical mass of people I know to use it, but I have other, more useful, ways of contacting them.

• The form in Google Docs is really useful and I had only been on the receiving end of them before.
  
• We seem to be getting a lot of hits on our facebook page, so I need to have a real think about how to make it better and work out how to add gadgets to it (I notice other Libraries have boxes for Copac and WorldCat searches on their Facebook pages - how does one do that?)
• Ideally, I would probably connect my Google Reader page through to iGoogle if they were set up for feeds I want in perpetuity, rather than just for 23 Things. I'd also want fewer gadgets - less clutter if I were using iGoogle every day. At the same time, I'd want to centre my web focus in one place, so I guess it would be a case of working out what I would actually use - something you can't know until you try. I worry with linking all the applications about privacy though, knowing that Googlemail reads what you write and targets the sidebar advertising in relation to it. One could end up putting pretty much all one's life out into the public domain without realising that way.
  
• I guess that means that realising how easy it can be to add gadgets to connect pages together has been the most useful lesson and the one I wish to investigate more in the workplace.

Thank you to the organisers of 23 Things for giving us this opportunity to explore with direction through the mass of web 2.0 technologies. But can anyone tell me how to use Twitter for the Library, PLEASE?

Thing 13

Thing 13

As I am still listening to the Waldstein, I am skipping ahead to Thing 13. I have actually used YouTube today and I'm happy that I can do Things 11 and 12 pretty quickly next Thursday, when I next have the opportunity to be in the office. So I am skipping ahead to Facebook, as I am pretty comfortable with this.

So, Lincoln Library has a fan page - must get it added to the Web 2.0 Directory. This was actually set up for us by one our students who had emailed us to ask for one and we didn't do anything about it, as the Librarian does not use Facebook and was concerned that if I left and she had a wait for a replacement, it would be yet another thing to update and maintain. (We are a two person Library). When the student left, he handed over the administration of the page to me. It contains some truly lovely photos of the Library and details of the term-time opening hours and links to our recently updated website, which now enables them to do anything they might need to or to find out how to do it (we hope). I'd like to be able to transfer some of this onto the facebook page, but I'm not sure how to go about it or whether it's worth the effort as I doubt once they've become fans that members actually look at the page and as notifications don't reach newsfeeds from fan pages, there's not much chance of them noticing if I do.

I would be keen to see what other Libraries' experience is though and to learn from them.