It's true, the last of the series. I never thought I'd make it, much less enjoy myself along the way. It's certainly been an eye opener & hopefully I'll be able to introduce more & more of the things I've learned into my professional activities as time goes on.
So now we have social networking & the possibility of expanding our contacts seemingly infinitely. Maybe I can find a whole world of sad people also interested in the obscure art of medieval widget construction. As for the Second Life Library Project, that's truly mindblowing. I thought it was disturbing enough that I dream about work, now I have the possibility of actually entering an alternate library reality!
Seriously though, social networking will become a fundamental feature of our professional life. It will enable us to network as never before. The mind boggles at the ideas that will flow from peers around the world who face similar challenges in radically different ways. Sharing our experiences & floating suggestions can only enhance the service we provide. The interaction it will facilitate between us & our clients & between our clients will also make us a social hub.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
The penultimate blog
The online versions of productivity software represent a huge leap forward in facilitating group interaction. Even on a personal level, it means that I will be able to collaborate with friends around the world in writing articles, without the usual tedious back & forthing of emails & routing from A to B to C. Not only is it a great timesaver, it's also free. What more could I ask?
Within the library, as we have a number of sites & there are generally projects that staff are cooperating on who are not in close proximity, Google docs will make everything so much simpler & easy to coordinate.
I've transferred a travel diary I've been working on to Google docs (& shared it with nswpln@gmail.com) It needs a lot of work & I would like my brother, who is overseas, to be able to make ongoing suggestions & my wife, from her computer at uni. to be able to edit my more blatant lies & jog my memory. She wrote half the original diary, but I've exercised poetic license in my transcription.
Here's a little picture from the diary to relieve the tedium of my drivellings.
Within the library, as we have a number of sites & there are generally projects that staff are cooperating on who are not in close proximity, Google docs will make everything so much simpler & easy to coordinate.
I've transferred a travel diary I've been working on to Google docs (& shared it with nswpln@gmail.com) It needs a lot of work & I would like my brother, who is overseas, to be able to make ongoing suggestions & my wife, from her computer at uni. to be able to edit my more blatant lies & jog my memory. She wrote half the original diary, but I've exercised poetic license in my transcription.
Here's a little picture from the diary to relieve the tedium of my drivellings.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Mashups
Another interesting development with great potential for libraries in creating reference resources.
My library has just been commended in the National Trust Heritage awards for its recently developed picture database. This could be made into an even better site by adding in voice threads to bring various pictures to life & enhance the oral history of the area.
The video explaining Voicethread put me in mind of Hell, which I envision as an eternity of looking at people's old photos while listening to their interminably tedious recollections. However, I'm sure our local history voicethreads wouldn't be like that!
The Starviewer was wonderful, although I'd have to give some thought as to the technique could be applied in a public library. I can see uni. staff having a lot of fun with it in creating resources for students through their library services.
The British Library's 'London:a life in maps' is v. interesting, but I wonder if we have the staff resources to put something like that together, it must take a lot of work.
My library has just been commended in the National Trust Heritage awards for its recently developed picture database. This could be made into an even better site by adding in voice threads to bring various pictures to life & enhance the oral history of the area.
The video explaining Voicethread put me in mind of Hell, which I envision as an eternity of looking at people's old photos while listening to their interminably tedious recollections. However, I'm sure our local history voicethreads wouldn't be like that!
The Starviewer was wonderful, although I'd have to give some thought as to the technique could be applied in a public library. I can see uni. staff having a lot of fun with it in creating resources for students through their library services.
The British Library's 'London:a life in maps' is v. interesting, but I wonder if we have the staff resources to put something like that together, it must take a lot of work.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)