1) I think Burger King has the best hamburgers. In fact, I once ate a raw crawdad on a dare to "win" a BK coupon.
2) When I was 17, I fell in love with the girl who lived next door to me and ended up getting in a fist fight with her boyfriend in my front yard (her parents and my parents had to pull us apart).
3) I have been to Europe four times and have visited a total of eight countries over there (Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Liechtenstein, Italy, Malta, Hungary and Ukraine).
4) My favorite movie of all time is Conan the Barbarian.
5) My favorite rock band is Black Sabbath.
6) I am of Welsh, German, Italian, Scottish and English ancestry.
7) The most beautiful place I've ever been drunk in is the Hula Moons Bar & Grill at the Grand Wailea Hotel in Wailea, Maui, Hawaii.
8) My 20 year high school reunion is this weekend.
9) I'm working on two novels. One is a horror comedy and the other is a dark medieval fantasy. Both are so offensive to the average person's sensibilites that the publication of either in my lifetime will be nothing short of miraculous.
10) I would like to get a PhD in ancient history but I don't want to quit my job here to go to grad school. Any suggestions?
Monday, November 24, 2008
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
DONE!!!
My favorite Learn & Play discoveries were/are Bloglines (w/RSS feeds), LibraryThing and a site I found through the Web 2.0 Tool Box, Stumble Upon. I also found Twitter, YouTube and a few of the Online Productivity Tools to be of some value (for their work related utility and/or entertainment value). The remaining "things" (especially del.icio.us) I was not so hip to, but time (and possible continuing experimentation) will tell.
How has this experience affected my life long learning goals? Well, it's encouraged me to be a bit more daring with new technological discoveries and not be so backward when it comes to developing web applications. These exercises have stirred my curiosity and prompted me to look into websites from home that I, honestly, never would have bothered with (or even known about) had it not been for Learn & Play.
The biggest unexpected outcome/surprise take away from my L&P experience was/is my enthusiasm for the family tree builder at myheritage.com . I spent a lot of time working on this and will no doubt spend lots more time on it in the future. This is yet another website that I discovered through the Web 2.0 Tool Box. Also, I found a neato Random Dungeon Generator through a Flickr 3rd party link (yes, I am a D&D geek).
As for things that maybe should have been done differently, I only have a couple suggestions. First, the program should have been LONGER (perhaps a full calendar year). I really think that participating staff would have got so much more out of this experience if they hadn't have felt so RUSHED! Second, maybe the program should have focused a bit more on day to day practical applications in a working library environment (I know, I know, the second word is "PLAY", afterall...). What I mean is, throw in a little something that deals with what a typical customer may expect from public service staff out in a branch (a very concrete example would be anything ipod related...I know we don't deal with this stuff now, but I get the feeling we're going to have to at some point in the not-so-distant future).
Yes, I would participate if another Learn & Plan came about (AND the organizers were mindful of my suggestions in the above paragraph!).
It's been interesting!
Out
How has this experience affected my life long learning goals? Well, it's encouraged me to be a bit more daring with new technological discoveries and not be so backward when it comes to developing web applications. These exercises have stirred my curiosity and prompted me to look into websites from home that I, honestly, never would have bothered with (or even known about) had it not been for Learn & Play.
The biggest unexpected outcome/surprise take away from my L&P experience was/is my enthusiasm for the family tree builder at myheritage.com . I spent a lot of time working on this and will no doubt spend lots more time on it in the future. This is yet another website that I discovered through the Web 2.0 Tool Box. Also, I found a neato Random Dungeon Generator through a Flickr 3rd party link (yes, I am a D&D geek).
As for things that maybe should have been done differently, I only have a couple suggestions. First, the program should have been LONGER (perhaps a full calendar year). I really think that participating staff would have got so much more out of this experience if they hadn't have felt so RUSHED! Second, maybe the program should have focused a bit more on day to day practical applications in a working library environment (I know, I know, the second word is "PLAY", afterall...). What I mean is, throw in a little something that deals with what a typical customer may expect from public service staff out in a branch (a very concrete example would be anything ipod related...I know we don't deal with this stuff now, but I get the feeling we're going to have to at some point in the not-so-distant future).
Yes, I would participate if another Learn & Plan came about (AND the organizers were mindful of my suggestions in the above paragraph!).
It's been interesting!
Out
Monday, November 17, 2008
MOLDI
I messed around a bit over on the MOLDI website (Mid-Ohio Library Digital Initiative). I browsed through some of the e-book and audio book titles and experimented with checkout procedures, just to get a feel for how the whole thing works.
Honestly, I'm not a big fan of the whole digital media movement. I don't think that a person should have to have access to some sort of gadget at all hours of the day just to read a damn book...however, I have a creeping suspicion that all readers of print media will be forced to go digital by the powers that be (publishers, libraries) in the near future. Of course, consumers could resist this trend en masse, but I know that most people will just go with the flow instead of actually exerting any effort to take a stand on anything. You know, it's that whole "give me convenience or give me death" mentality.
Honestly, I'm not a big fan of the whole digital media movement. I don't think that a person should have to have access to some sort of gadget at all hours of the day just to read a damn book...however, I have a creeping suspicion that all readers of print media will be forced to go digital by the powers that be (publishers, libraries) in the near future. Of course, consumers could resist this trend en masse, but I know that most people will just go with the flow instead of actually exerting any effort to take a stand on anything. You know, it's that whole "give me convenience or give me death" mentality.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Podcasts
I found lots of fun podcast stuff by going through podfeed.net . I ended up adding an RSS feed for Kryptographik to my Bloglines account. Kryptographik features reviews of science fiction, horror and dark fantasy literature.
Podcasts would be a great resource for CML customers who want information about library programs and/or policies and procedures (you know, save them the trouble of making a phone call!). However, the casts would have to be EASY TO ACCESS (from library AND home PCs) and instructions would have to be VERY LUCID. Remember (and I know there are many within our organization who DON'T want to talk about this!) a VERY LARGE percentage of our customer base still have problems correctly using the self checkout machines and Aquabrowser...we must be patient while the public (and many staff people) get used to the whole concept of podcasts!
Podcasts would be a great resource for CML customers who want information about library programs and/or policies and procedures (you know, save them the trouble of making a phone call!). However, the casts would have to be EASY TO ACCESS (from library AND home PCs) and instructions would have to be VERY LUCID. Remember (and I know there are many within our organization who DON'T want to talk about this!) a VERY LARGE percentage of our customer base still have problems correctly using the self checkout machines and Aquabrowser...we must be patient while the public (and many staff people) get used to the whole concept of podcasts!
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
YouTube
I experienced YouTube for the first time yesterday. I spent a few minutes watching a video of a Battle of Hastings (1066 AD) reinactment (I'm a big medieval history freak). I think it was actually filmed on location.
For the remainder of that lunch hour, I watched videos of rock band performances. I caught clips of Black Flag, Orange Goblin and Venom. Now, I'm a big Black Flag (Rollins & co.) fan and I followed their career pretty closely, but even I was stunned by the amount of footage of their early 80s performances that's still floating around out there. I'm amazed that this stuff has shown up all these years later.
The site is easy to use. Just type a keyword into the search field (after selecting the appropriate tab, "videos", "channels", or "communities") and be overwhelmed by the number of results that pop up. You can find some really obscure stuff there! The videos play quickly and most have decent sound quality.
I also clicked on "communities" and typed "columbus library" into the search field and CML's web channel popped up. This is a great tool for customers and staff (though I think that staff should have their own private channel featuring things like tutorials in the vein of those presented by Gerald and Joy throughout Learn & Play).
YouTube is a lot of fun, but unfortunately it's not of much use to me at home because I still use dial up and the videos take forever to play! Hence, I'll just have to access it from here at work!
For the remainder of that lunch hour, I watched videos of rock band performances. I caught clips of Black Flag, Orange Goblin and Venom. Now, I'm a big Black Flag (Rollins & co.) fan and I followed their career pretty closely, but even I was stunned by the amount of footage of their early 80s performances that's still floating around out there. I'm amazed that this stuff has shown up all these years later.
The site is easy to use. Just type a keyword into the search field (after selecting the appropriate tab, "videos", "channels", or "communities") and be overwhelmed by the number of results that pop up. You can find some really obscure stuff there! The videos play quickly and most have decent sound quality.
I also clicked on "communities" and typed "columbus library" into the search field and CML's web channel popped up. This is a great tool for customers and staff (though I think that staff should have their own private channel featuring things like tutorials in the vein of those presented by Gerald and Joy throughout Learn & Play).
YouTube is a lot of fun, but unfortunately it's not of much use to me at home because I still use dial up and the videos take forever to play! Hence, I'll just have to access it from here at work!
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Web 2.0 Tools
I skimmed through the offerings over in the Power Tool Box. I'm already familiar with several of these from earlier exercises. Of all the remaining tools in the box, however, only one struck me as interesting/fun (that exception being Stumble Upon). Not that Stumble Upon serves that much of a practical purpose, but I've already experienced hours of enjoyment "stumbling" from one interesting webpage to another (you basically list your interests and Stumble Upon leads you to relevant sites that you can rate, comment upon, send links from, etc....you can also see profiles of folks who have similar interests to your own).
If nothing else, this whole Learn & Play experience has taught me that I am a creature of habit who needs a lot of time to "warm up" to new concepts and processes. However, once I have time to "mess around" with something I quickly get the hang of it and once I become familiar with it additional (more practical?) uses may occur to me. :)
If nothing else, this whole Learn & Play experience has taught me that I am a creature of habit who needs a lot of time to "warm up" to new concepts and processes. However, once I have time to "mess around" with something I quickly get the hang of it and once I become familiar with it additional (more practical?) uses may occur to me. :)
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Web 2.0
I checked out some of the Web 2.0 Award nominee sites (followed the "short list" link in the Discovery Exercise instructions for Thing #18).
I've been having a lot of fun creating a family tree at myheritage.com (it's free to join). You can add photos of (and add/edit information about) relatives appearing on the tree. There are lots of other features and functions @ My Heritage, I just haven't had time to try them all out yet!
I'm not so sure that this site would be of much use in a CML context, but I'm certain there are many other Web 2.0 award nominees that could be useful for work related tasks. I'll leave any comments on that subject here after I've explored a few more of these sites.
Out,
H.
I've been having a lot of fun creating a family tree at myheritage.com (it's free to join). You can add photos of (and add/edit information about) relatives appearing on the tree. There are lots of other features and functions @ My Heritage, I just haven't had time to try them all out yet!
I'm not so sure that this site would be of much use in a CML context, but I'm certain there are many other Web 2.0 award nominees that could be useful for work related tasks. I'll leave any comments on that subject here after I've explored a few more of these sites.
Out,
H.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
