Librarians Do Lady Gaga

CPL 2.0: The End.

We have come to the end of our CPL 2.0 training! I had a great time with this training project, and I particularly enjoyed making this blog. Our assignment for the last week was to fill in an evaluation on SurveyMonkey... but in order to do so I had to delete my computer's cookies as another staff member had already filled out the same survey on my terminal. So I learned how to do that! 327 of my fellow library workers also participated in this training, which is an amazing feat. Good work everyone!

CPL 2.0: Twitter

I've used Twitter for about three years now. I moved back to Calgary after finishing university, and almost all of my university friends joined the site. I found it really nice to join the site and get daily updates from my friends, who I'd moved away from. It is very similar to what Facebook's new news feed, but without the photos and videos and annoying Farmville/Pirate adventure/whatever updates.

Now, I still tweet from my personal account (http://twitter.com/kalo3,) and I also tweet for the library that I work at (http://twitter.com/fishcreeklib.) My personal account is protected so that I need to approve your account in order for you to see my tweets and get them in your list. The library's account is not protected, so anyone can follow me, and it's been interesting to see the kind of account that has started to follow me. Some of them are local people or organizations in the area, a few of them are library twitter pages, and a few of them are randoms who have started following me because they're interested in something I'm tweeting about.

So here is this week's question:

• What kind of information is being posted by the library accounts above? What kind of information should libraries post?

CPL's accounts are posting a real variety of information: information about contests, big events, library programs, volunteer opportunities, blog entries and other information from the CPL homepage, etc. And this is exactly the kind of information that we should be posting about. I also tweet from time to time about changes in the physical Fish Creek library itself - if we're moving some collections, or have new displays, and our big game boards. I try to tweet at least three times a day, to stay current and relevant (or re-tweet from another CPL twitter accounts.) If you aren't active about the account, and only have one tweet or so each week, it's not enough to build up your followers, or have them want to keep following your account.

I've also re-tweeted a few of KonaDawg's tweets. (http://twitter.com/KonaDawg.) Kona is one of the dogs that comes to Fish Creek's Story Pals program to help reluctant youth readers. Lee, who is Kona's owner, runs his twitter account for him, as Kona probably hasn't mastered typing quite yet, even though he's great to read to ;)

Cake Wrecks Book Cakes!

Look at that beautiful tree stump... err... cake? It's a cake! Made to look like the Giving Tree from the book of the same name, the Giving Tree is one of my most favourite children's books. The above cake was featured on Cake Wrecks, a blog about, well, ugly cakes. But they sometimes feature beautiful cakes like the one above.

Here is the post about "Sweet Reading Cakes"

http://ht.ly/1M7am

And here is Cake Wrecks main blog site:

http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/

CPL 2.0: LibraryThing

I'd never used LibraryThing prior to today's exploration, but it wasn't difficult to navigate at all.

LibraryThing does have a number of very practical applications. I keep a list on my laptop at home of the books that I read. I've only been doing it for about two and a half years, but it's really neat to look back at the end of the year at everything you've read - I often forget about many books (particularly if they're library books and I'm not reminded of their existence by having them on my shelves at home.)

I also thought that the "local" area of the site was really neat, and could be excellent if the library and local bookstores added their events to the site.

In the end, although it's kind of neat, it's not a site that I need to join.

Also, if I can be nit-picky and critical for just one moment, I would say that they need to update their logo, because it looks very outdated.

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So... we only have TWO MORE WEEKS of the CPL 2.0 project! I've decided already that I'm going to keep the blog, and I am excited about my future in blogging!

I am the library cat

From I can has cheezburger:

http://icanhascheezburger.com/2010/05/12/funny-pictures-i-am-the-library-cat/

CPL 2.0: Online Productivity Tools

I already use Google Docs and Google Calendar so this week's assignment was really simple for me! On the calendar, I have three personal calendars that I can choose to either see or not (one is for work, one for personal, and for my U of C classes.) I also share my calendar with three close friends, and I am part of a shared calendar for a project that I'm working on.

Here is this week's question:

• Do you see free online tools like these eventually replacing expensive software like MS Office?

I think it would be fantastic for these free online tools to replace traditional software. Think, for example, about the iPad. Most owners of the iPad will probably not bother with downloading Pages or Word for Mac, if they need to create a doc they'll do it online.

One thing that I think is absolutely necessary is for these products to be compatible with each other. Not everyone will have the same software, and in order for them to be useful for collaborative work or any doc that will need to be shared, it's important that they work with each other.

Cutting libraries in a recession...

(Image: CuttingLibraries, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from daniel_solis's photostream)

(The image on Daniel's Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/daniel_solis/4520024767/)

(via BoingBoing: http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/05/cutting-libraries-in.html)

CPL 2.0: Flickr and YouTube

I am familiar with both of these sites. I have a Flickr account, but haven't used it for about a year now. I signed up for an account and posted some photos on Flickr instead of my usual Facebook so that people that I know without a Facebook account could easily view them (and yes, I know that you can share your Facebook albums with folks without an account.)

Here is the question for this week:

Comment on Flickr and YouTube. Were they user-friendly?

I find both of these sites very user friendly. I particularly appreciate the fact that even though they both have a lot to offer, neither of them have very cluttered designs. Or maybe I just really like websites that have white wallpaper backgrounds? I took the "Magical Feature Tour" on Flickr, and afterwards did a search for "greyhounds" as I'm thinking about adopting one. It's great that you can search photos, groups or people and then sort the results that you return. The only complaint that I have with Flickr are the giant advertisements, but I suppose they've got to make money some how.

Oh - another Flickr complaint (so I guess I have two compaints... so picky!) is that it's a Yahoo! venture. Why can't everything be under the Google umbrella? It's just so much more convenient.

YouTube is also very user friendly, and again, I think that it boils down to simplicity. It's a bit hard to look at these sites with fresh eyes and have a unbiased opinion. YouTube recently had a makeover to de-clutter the site and I think it was for the better.

Now go look at this picture of an adorable greyhound:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/courtneyjade/2253858599/