Ducks

The duck family visited our side of the pond early this morning. The babies have grown so much it is difficult to tell them from the parents!

A New Mission

This morning, watching the pond, I decided to start keeping a diary of what I saw. Thus, I'm resurrecting this blog with a new outlook.

http://www.bloglines.com/myblogs_display?sub=2765756&site=9545782

Week 8 - Mashups and API

It was hard to find a favorite mashup, what with wading through all the fluff and soft porn sites. The one that struck me the most was Weather Bonk. I looked at it because I thought it would be fun to look at weather predictions, radar, traffic, panoramas and live webcams all at once. Lo and behold, Weather Bonk read my settings at NOAA and took me directly to the greater Boston Area. Scary, huh?

Much of the latter half of this course has provoked a lot of thought about privacy. Between the LibrarianInBlack's post about Google and the latest news about Yahoo's privacy issues, I've worried about all the sites I've signed up for in this course. Before creating too much more for my library, I plan to investigate each venue for privacy concerns. Thanks, Gabe, for the list of sites.

Week 7 - Podcasting and Online Hosted Video

I have used YouTube before to view podcasts sent to me for fun and to view the podcasts that were part of this course (of course!) In my experience, YouTube use is a great time sink unless you know exactly which video you are searching for. The organization and search capabilities aren't great.

Speaking as a hospital and research librarian, I don't foresee much use in our library for podcasts we create. Our users want specific information quickly and easily and want to ask a person. Sometimes reading a simple sign is asking too much!

I do see a future potential for using existing podcasts to reinforce learning. I plan to offer a class or two on Web 2.0 technology and will supplement the material with links to podcasts they can refer to before or after.

Here is my try at posting a video:


No Cookies in the Library.

It worked!

Week 6: Online Photo Sharing

It was great to have a week to remember how to access my photos. I'd signed up for Picasa about a year ago to organize, edit and send some photos from my camera, but hadn't given it much thought lately -- way too busy. I used Picasa because I already had photos in there. In addition I read just this week that the ethernet baddies (spam, viruses, etc.) were getting to people through Yahoo's peripheral services, so that put me off Flickr. The personal questions they asked put me off. Why do they need that info unless they are planning to use it for nefarious purposes? Although if it is just advertising on the site, I can live with that.

After my experience trying to send things to my blog and Facebook I think I will try Flickr instead. You cannot send a photo directly to Facebook from Picasa, and sending to the blog wasn't very straightforward or easy.

I learned a lot this week despite not having to do that much actual work. I'd never explored or understood the power of online photo sharing sites.

Past and Present

This photo was taken a couple of years ago at a memorial service for Rosanne Labree, a former director.
Pictured in it are many of our past and present employees and volunteers.