... discovered Podcasts....YAY!

I really enjoyed learning more about podcasts... I've come across them before when I signed up for one for my son - it was an author he enjoyed, Tommy Donbavand.  However, after the first podcast, the future podcasts (whilst still advertised on the website) were no longer being sent out, so it was a bit disappointing. 
However, I learned lots on the '60 second science' podcasts - what a clever idea, just enough time to get the interesting facts out but they end before the yawns and zzzzzzzzzz start!  (Science was never my thang!)
I thought the podcasts of seminars were also excellent - you can now hear all the info from a speaker at a seminar without being in the same room/city/state/country, great idea with lots of uses.
If our library was to use podcasting and more importantly, REGULARLY UPDATE the podcasts, I think the members of the public would become used to them, expect them, rely on them and so we could utilise them for promoting the library's services or upcoming events, eg we could provide a podcast with background information and excerpts from the books of upcoming visiting authors. 
Overall, pretty impressed with the usefulness of podcasting, slightly more than Twitter (!)

... had fun with online video, You Tube

Watched some interesting and useful youtube videos which makes a change from the ones I normally receive in emails... interesting? yes! useful? err, NO! I liked the Library of the future in plain english video, it sounds exactly like the model for the future of the public library where I work.
Library of the future in plain English

I checked out the Curtin Uni youtube site and although I thought their vids were good, it was interesting to look at the 'viewed' figures for each one. I would have thought Uni students were of the generation who would utilise youtube so maybe it isn't a great method of the Uni getting information 'out there' after all? Considering the age range of the patrons of our library, I wouldn't have thought it would have a huge benefit then? If you look at the type of content on the most watched youtube vids, I guess youtube is mostly used for entertainment so a library vid would be well at the bottom of the viewing list of many?!! Who knows?!

I chose the following youtube vid as it is entertaining (!) rather than useful. It is part of a successful ad campaign in the UK for 'Compare the market' car insurance involving meerkats.  After several popular ads, they brought out an ad containing the previous ads' bloopers!  .... if you're unsure what a meerkat has to do with car insurance, check this out:

... reluctantly found Twitter

Can think of a coupla names for Twitter, one is Twitty but won't mention the other.  I can't quite get the gist of it.... why does it exist?  I get it, but I don't GET IT if you know what I mean.... it seems to be just another method of this lcd screen sucking me in for hours at a time and achieving... well, what?  Sorry, tad cynical this morning, not a technologically minded mood this morning obv!

My twitter name is KyliePep so if anyone would like to follow me, feel free.  I cannot guarantee a fun-filled uproariously funny journey, but hey, c'est la vie!  I do have an odd follower already, called Kid Kasio.    Maybe Twitter would be more exciting if I had a few followers?
"Twitter is an interactive tool and as such the more you use it, the more you will understand it" according to Swan Libraries, I think this must be true as am struggling a wee bit with its relevance to life in general at the mo.

I did a search for 'library' and did find the following interesting snippet:

Empty library!



I cannot see much use for Twitter within our library.  We do have alot of older patrons and whilst we are actively trying to attract the younger generation, not sure how Twitter would help with this.  It seems to me that there is so much going on in Twitter that library tweets would just get swallowed up and lost. 

I think that wikis would work well in our library - we could provide info on events in the library and our patrons could respond and suggest further ideas.

... rediscovered Facebook

Yes, we are covering Facebook in this course.  I've had a Facebook account for a few years now but only rarely use it.  I mainly use it at home to discover what my 15 y.o. son is up to as verbal communciation seems to elude him most of the time.  When he removes me as a friend it's time to ask the BIG QUESTIONS!  I also find it useful for uploading video which is too big to email for my parents in the UK to watch. 

Library use?  It's hard to envisage the way most people use their private Facebook in a work context.  This is probably because I only have friends and their crazy antics on mine!  Definitely not work related...!  So, if we had a library Facebook page, what could we do that we cannot currently do with the website and library notice boards???  Having trouble thinking of an advantage but then it is still Monday morning.... I will dwell on this further...!

... played with LibraryThing

And I must say, we played very well together, no fights, hissyfits, nuffink.  OK, so I've made a start (albeit very small) on adding books to LibraryThing, very easy to join, ditto adding books.  Not sure what tags to put on so have just left most of them blank for now.  Here's the link to my catalogue:

Kylie's LibraryThing

Doesn't make for very interesting reading but I will work on it, one day....! 

I've currently got this really rubbish MS Word doc listing all the books I've read especially my fave authors with brief reviews ('great!' 'crap!' etc etc) and it is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO unsophisticated compared to what I can do with LT.

Managed to add the LT widget too so more pwitty pictures on my blog now, sweeeet!

So, that's week 6 in the bag, wonder what I'll discover about Facebook that I don't already know?  REALLY hoping to find something I can amaze Ben (15 y.o.) with...

Just finishing up with another pic of Lloyd Cole for no reason other that I can as I know how now...

... learned about Delicious and tagging

OK, so the first thing to say is that on the net you can tag without getting arrested AND there is the fact that you don't have to buy aerosol cans and get painty-different-coloured-fingers... so it's all good!  The 2nd thing to report is that Delicious is NOT after all one of those (yawnnn!!) recipe websites, lol, can't believe I thought that's what it probably was (having never actually bothered to find out for sure).  Just shows how wrong you can be, because unlike those dodgy recipe websites (y'know, spend $50 on ingredients and end up with something resembling Eton Mess when it was supposed to be a cake/casserole/omelette..! :-)) I actually signed up for my ymail account, (now have a gmail and a ymail, cool!) and set up my Delicious thingybob and already have tagged (paint-free fingers type) a few websites and will do many many many more as I find the time.  Hope to convert all my favourites one day... 

my delicious thingybob is here

Anyway, I think Delicious would be heaps better in our library too as our 'Favourites' are getting a bit off-track - we do have folders but sometimes it's hard to accurately name a folder to reflect the heaps of websites within it.  Tags would defo make searching for useful websites easier, once we've all had training.  I want to lock myself away for a week and stick all the good stuff in Delicious... sad I know....  Also the 3rd good thing is I've found out the names of a few blogs so I've been able to follow more people around (not stalking, following, honest!) and the 4th GREAT thing is I am not waaaaaay behind everyone else as I first suspected... PHEW!  Right, onwards and upwards cos I really wanna do the Librarything thingy now... Kylie
PS I didn't do that Wiki thingy as I'm not planning on going camping anytime soon and I'm allergic to tents (haha only kidding!)  Glad I didn't now as everyone appears to have lost their wikis whereas mine is still where I last put him....!

OK, ahem, I have discovered I do actually HAVE to do a wiki and so after putting said wiki in wrong wiki spot I think I have now managed to put my wiki in the wright wiki spot.. please can anyone correct me if I'm wrong??!!

... discovered wikis!

AHA!  I now know what a wiki is and sure, they're another great idea that I don't know how we lived without until now (:-P) 
All of a sudden I'm finding all these ways to put my ten cents in all over the world on ANY subject I like!  Ah, the power! 
I checked out a wiki of the NSW Readers Advisory and found a couple of helpful hints for our library, especially different ideas for Library Lovers Day. 
Got bored on the first page of the Twilight saga wiki (who really cares that 'Jane is a vampire (who) ...  has a rather slim and androgynous figure', I mean, who, really? She is merely a FICTIONAL character!) 
Checked out the Games and Public Libraries wiki but the colours were so hard on the eyes (white type on black with the occasional fluoro green...?  really??!!)  I found it hard to look for more than 3 lines at a time - DOH!
I think a wiki for the staff at our library would be a great move - a one-stop-shop for all the staff's wonderful, creative ideas to come together, regardless of whether part-time, casual or which library they're based in... BUT DEFO WITH AN 'EYE-FRIENDLY' COLOUR SCHEME!  lol!

... learned about RSS feeds - at long last!!

Yes!  I finally understand (mostly) what those little orange icons are!  I had lots of fun adding new feeds to my reader... I was disappointed at not finding a daily comic strip feed for Gary Larson's 'The Far Side' but I guess that's OK as it is no longer published... oh hum.
I did however add the following:  a daily horoscope for a daily LOL... (the first one I subscribed to gave me my horoscope for 31.12.2008 - would not update so I ended up learning how to remove useless feeds - bonus!)
a daily Perth weather feed... a Mandurah Mail (local newspaper) feed as my copy of the mail usually gets attacked by the retic before I have chance to read it... a news feed for the local UK newspaper where my parents live (I'll now be able to tell THEM what's happening in their part of the world!... and a really cool feed from Lloyd Cole's website giving me updates on him (and if you don't know who Lloyd Cole is, shame on you!!!!!)  Here's a clue...

I do worry though about the privacy side of all this stuff, not to mention the TIME INVOLVED.... OMG it's past lunchtime already!  Off to visit the pantry and fridge...

...learned about Flickr - cool!

So, I thought Flicker was just a horse and it probably still is, however I now know about the Flickr (spelling mistake Flickr that is) which has very little to do with horses other than the zillion pics that will appear if you search for 'horse'.  Anyway, I like the idea of protecting your photos in case of HDD crash etc and also the fact that some embarrassing photos do not need to be for the world's perusal.  PHEW!  I think the TAGS will work very well too if I want to find a particular pic but OMG!  The work involved in creating all of this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Might have to ask for a month's leave to fix up my Flickr...!
I've had fun searching Flickr for great pics and would love to imbed one of my faves here but they are all copyright, so here's a link to my fave instead:

I'm booooooored By Anne Makaske

It's a pic of an Airedale Terrier who is bored after spending the morning running and playing already, he thinks his owner is booooring...!

I really liked the idea by Wellington City Libraries in NZ of having pics of the library by patrons etc, I think it would be great if we could have something similar in our library but maybe expand the subject matter to Mandurah, not just the library.

... have my first follower!!!

Yes, I do!!!  I have discovered that you can follow yourself!  Not sure how this works exactly but at least I no longer look like Billy NoMates with zero followers AND this is my 3rd blog today... yes I am getting the hang of this however whilst I do actually SEE the reasoning behind blogs, well, useful ones anyway, I cannot quite figure out who on earth would want to read THIS??  My hero, Victor Meldrew perhaps?

...made my first blog

Unfortunately this ISN'T it as I forgot to put it in my first real blog, oh well, getting more practice then aren't I?  2 blogs in one day, pretty good me thinks.

am in BIG trouble...!

So, here I am, it's a public holiday and I find myself NOT chilling out in front of the TV NOR relaxing with a rather cheeky glass of red, NO not me... I've been sooo naughty I'm surprised Santa even came to our house last year (last week).  Yes, I've been bad, very very bad and thus I find myself waffling away to a screen as I am currently on Week 2 of a 10 week program which I believe needs to be complete in 4 weeks time (6.2.2011) ... how did those weeks disappear so quickly?  One minute I'm starting my 'blog training' and then, BAM, I seem to have lost about 5 weeks... OOPS told you I was bad... its a good job no-one else needs to read this.... WHAT DO YOU MEAN EVERYONE CAN READ THIS???!!!!  Ahem. Well, as I was saying, 'Today, I... am in big trouble...!'