Evaluation, Conclusion, Looking back, What have I learned?

The experience of this online tutorial was very new and exhilarating, and I am very grateful for it because the timing was perfect. I had felt "left out" from a lot of these Web 2.0 developments, even though I knew theoretically what they were about and had a vague idea of what was do-able.
But reading about these developments in CILIP journals and newspapers is different from actually using the applications themselves.

The tutorial has covered a large amount of subjects, which I have sorted below alphabetically, by description. Specific applications in round brackets.

***************************************
Blogging (Blogger/Blogspot, LiveJournal)
Cloud = web-based application, to be accessed online
Cloud = random display of tags, size of each tag defined by frequency of tag-use
Feed reader (Google Reader)
Feed reader for audio & video (Podcasts)
Feed readers for Podcasts (Podcatcher)
Gadget = see Widget
Photo editing (Picnik)
Podcatcher (iTunes)
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) = web feed format that provides the full text of web content together with links to the original source
Sharing bookmarks / Social bookmarking (Delicious)
Sharing documents / Office 2.0 (Google Docs, Think Free)
Sharing photos (Picasa Web Album, Flickr)
Sharing videos (YouTube)
Social networking (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter)
Start page / Customisable homepage / Virtual desktop (iGoogle, Pageflake)

Tags / Tagging = use of one-word subject headings
Widget (Blogger uses the term "gadget")
Wiki (Wetpaint, Wikipedia)
*******************************************

Good stuff

Applications involving design and picture uploading/editing were good fun because they allow for creativity (Flickr, Picnik, Picasa Web Album).

Social networking with LinkedIn was a useful exercise because I realized how many good connections I actually had in my email address book, and how useful this can be for job searching. By asking people to join me on LinkedIn I newly got in touch with a number of old friends and colleagues.

I liked the idea of using a "virtual desktop" (iGoogle, sharing documents "in the cloud" (Google Docs, Think Free) and sharing bookmarks (Delicious). I will probably go on to use these tools for my own work.

I enjoyed the exercise of changing content in a Wiki (Wikipedia), something that I had always wanted to do, in order to see how it is done. One starts to think about the whole debate about what is "authoritative" information. Is it better if ideological discussions are fought out online, or is a "properly" selected editorial board of "specialists" preferable. Very thought-provoking.

***********************************************

Distraction

Interlinking a lot of Web 2.0 tools with each other seemed confusing, sometimes redundant, and even pointless to me. That probably shows my seel-by-date. Certain expressions, photos, or snippets of informations will ultimately get displayed in other contexts and this may create wrong impressions.
One can't spend one's entire working day jumping from one link or feed or widget to another.
Feed reading, Embedding, you name it, it's too much gimickry.

************************************************

Like Television ?

Looking up stuff on YouTube was good fun, and I understand that one can find weard and wonderful things.
Podcasts seem to be a very good thing, particularly those that allow you to catch up with television and radio programs. But it is all a bit to passive. I don't like to watch things on small screens for too long.

As someone who doesn't watch television, doesn't listen to podcasts on-the-go (with a MP3 player or suchlike), but who does like going to the cinema, I expect that I will be using more podcasts. It's a bit like video rental, one makes an active, considered choice what to watch, rather than zapping around on YouTube. Some of my friends constantly download movies and watch these on their computers. Somehow I don't see myself going that route.

Almost there . . .

Thing 22
I have now added a widget to display my latest "Delicious" bookmarks to iGoogle.
I had a lot of problems accessing "My Delicious". Too many email addresses, login names, passwords are going round...

My iGoogle page looks dull, because I didn't have the time and the patience to learn how to customize it.
I was unable to find a place that allowed me to resize the gadgets (i.e. widgets).

Thing 21
I enjoyed the result of attaching a widget displaying my photographs from Flickr to the bottom of this blog.

Blogger Gadget (i.e. "Widget") Flickr Photostream

I have added the Flickr Photostream at the bottom of my blog, and it is very attractive.
Maddeningly, my PC has settings that make it display images on webpages in "Internet Explorer". In "Firefox", images are mostly suppressed.
This means I need to switch to IE in order to see how the widget looks like on my blog.
I haven't been able to sort this out myself. Have tinkered with various settings, but to no avail.

Think Free Office

Have signed up to "Think Free Office" with my Google Mail account, and waited for the Java application to download. Some simple text manipulation, just to get this "Thing" out of the way.

I tried to insert an image of the "Think Free Office" document that I created, but since it is hosted on the web, I wasn't able to find it in the file search.

I used the "print screen" command and copied and pasted the image into Microsoft's "Paint", saved the file and inserted it here as an image, to prove that I did my "Thing".

There is probably a better way of doing this....
-------------------------------------
I have also downloaded the "Free Power Tool", in order to be able to use "Think Free Office" offline.
Apparently, files get synchronized as soon as one logs back from offline mode into the online version of Think Free Office. That's rather clever, blackberryish.


As I am currently writing an article for a book, where I need to share information with other authors contributing to the same book, I find the idea of using "Think Free Office" very appealing. And it saves me from keeping track of the latest file versions by USB memory stick.
While I am ploughing on with the last "Things", I am uploading the files for thei project to the "Think Free Power Tool". The default setting is for synchronization every 20 minutes.
-----------------------------------
No time for additional tasks.

Galloping on to the last 3 Things.

Creating a Google document

I wrote "https://docs.google.com" in the browser line and got into "Google docs" without having to go through the log-in process. This means that logging onto "Blogger" automatically logs one into "Google docs", with one's Google Mail settings. This is rather eerie and big-brotherish.

Have sent a link to the 23 Things email address, allowing them to "share" the document, but not to make alterations.

My internet access is very sluggish today and I don't know if "Google docs" is affected by it - but there was definitely a delay between keying in words and seeing them on screen.

Wikipedia

Have now read the entry about the history of Wikipedia, and learned by following a link, that the oldest and largest encyclopedia ever achieved was the Chinese Yongle encyclopedia.

I have accessed a biographical article about Salman Schocken, fa person I know much about from my own research, both in the German and in the English version of Wikipedia.
In the German article, I have chosen to improve information in 2 sentences.
The English article is so badly written that it would take me far too much time to edit and improve it. The links are biased and not good (or broken), and I can tell from the content who has written the article.

Gateway to library

I have logged on to the Oxford Web 2.0 Wiki with my (existing) Wetpaint login details.

Our library hasn't created any Web 2.0 tools yet.
But I have in the past contributed some bookmarks I found useful during the cataloguing of antiquarian books in Hebrew characters to "Cataloger's Desktop". This is a cataloguer's toolbox managed and marketed by the Library of Congress. It is similar to bookmark-sharing on Web 2.0 interfaces such as "Delicious", but access to CD is restricted to holders of paid-up accounts.


After reading through some of the library postings, I wrote a thread to James Fishwick's info on the OIL (Oriental Institute Library).

After posting the thread, I "tweeted" it on Twitter.

Retweeting

Have managed to "retweet" to my (one and only) follower.
On to the next "Thing"

Challenging

Using Twitter is quite a challenge.
I have written a bit of profile information and couldn't decide whether to restrict use or not.
I am not too keen that too much stuff about me floats about on the web.
Will probably remove some of the accounts that I have opened during the exercise.
I now understand what twitter is about, which is good, I don't manage to follow Emma's instructions on the 23 Things blog.
I don't seem able to do "retweet", and I cannot get rid of the irritating "trending" element on my Twitter profile.
But I have seen that other Twitter users *have* got rid of it.

Deadline looming

Just got back from Easter holiday. Don't know whether I will make it by tomorrow's deadline.

I have just written my first "Tweet" and have chosen 2 people to "follow".

Have looked at some of the librarian blogs suggested by the 23 Things team (http://tweepml.org/100-British-Librarians-on-Twitter and http://wefollow.com/twitter/librarian)

Twitter

Have just set up a Twitter account.

Took me a while to find a username that wasn't taken.
And when I was asked whether I am "human", I had to run through 4 audio tests (writing down the words heard in a short audio clip), because I couldn't see any words displayed on the screen. Mysterious.

LinkedIn - continued

I am still busy going through my imported email addresses, in order to "invite" people to join my network.
It's a strange exercise, because one needs to tread carefully. Professional contacts, colleagues...
What about colleagues who are friends? All this categorization. The world's gone "tagging"-mad.
Everybody is a cataloguer now, that's the revenge of the librarian.

Have also uploaded a photo to LinkedIn, as well as improved my "public profile".
I always meant to post my CV and publications list somewhere (initially I thought of WebLearn, the Virtual Learning Environment). But I never got around to doing it. So that's a good thing, that the 23Things exercise pushes us to do stuff.

LinkedIn continued

Have uploaded my email addressbook to LinkedIn. It is quite eery to see how names of people I once knew suddenly "pop" up.
After reading a bit about how LinkedIn works, I understood that one has to be careful and selective about whom to invite to one's network of contacts.

I have now accepted the invitations that I was sent ages ago, in order to begin creating my own network.
I have also begun marking email addresses in order to send out invitations to join me on LinkedIn.
To some of my invitations, I have added a few personal notes.
So far, I have reached the letter C in the alphabet.

I have also begun to write my own profile.
The boxes that are offered by LinkedIn are tedious to fill in.
I will probably decide to upload a pdf of my (edited and abbreviated) CV, a recent photograph, and my list of publications - something I have meant to do for a long time.

Look forward to see who "accepts" my invitation.

LinkedIn

Last year, a friend of mine from Jerusalem has "invited" me to LinkedIn, and without really knowing what I was doing I accepted the invitation and became a member.

Since then, I keep getting messages via LinkedIn from former acquaintances who have somehow found my name on "LinkedIn", and who want to nudge me into linking up with them again.
So far, I have ignored these requests, because I feel that I haven't got the time, patience and will to engage with people I have long lost contact with.

Does this show that I am becoming ossified, impervious to change, an "old fogie" or "Alte Sachen", because I don't properly appreciate the value of social networking?
I can barely keep up with my "conventional" contacts (friends, family, work colleagues) via email, telephone and letter. Obviously, I am weary of adding another means of digital communication and adding another layer of "virtual friends" to my existing contacts.

For Thing 14, I will go and find out whether LinkedIn can be benefitial for me in a professional way. I have just begun the chartership procedure for CILIP, and I have hopes that via a professional network I can rekindle professional contacts.

Off we go....

Libraries on Facebook

Should libraries use Facebook?
Which features of Facebook are good for library usage?

When I attended a staff development sesson on Web 2.0 in 2009, we looked at the Facebook pages set up by the Vere Harmsworth library and some other Oxford libraries. I was quite excited about the opportunities offered by Web 2.0 sites, such as virtual bookshelves of new acquisitions. Take a look at the Vere Harmsworth library's e-shelf for February.

I do not really like the "fan" corner, where people upload cheesy pictures of themselves. It takes away from the professionality of the page, but other than that I can see that a Facebook page is another access point for young, "digital native", library users.

Because there are so many different Web 2.0 platforms, and the fame and lifespan of some of theses platforms is limited, library professionals ought to be selective and cautious.

Library postings to various Web 2.0 "showcases" should

• come out at the same time,
• have uniform content,
• should be properly proof-read,
• shouldn't infringe on copyright,
• should be accessible to visually impaired web users [tag all images for voice software]
• and, most importantly, ... should be of high quality!

Social Networking Websites / Facebook

Have just been reading up on the differences between Facebook FAN PAGES and GROUPS.

 

FAN PAGES

5th most trafficked site in the world, visible to unregistered people, indexed by search engines (Search Engine Optimization), manual "invites", visitor statistics ("Page insights"), creation of "related events", more suitable for long-term relationships with fans/readers/customers, you can have multiple pages

 

GROUPS

good for "bulk invites" & "viral marketing", good for hosting a quick active discussion, good for groups that are centered around a common subject, good for creating attention, not much customization, a group mailing can contain up to 5000 emails, deactivating the group can be difficult/impossible [?], groups can be open/closed/secret

 

                                                                                ***

Note:

• Titles for a Group or Page cannot be changed!!!
• One has to manually track any and all activity on Facebook.
• Facebook will not notify you when someone has commented on your Group or Page, posted a link/photo/video, added to the discussion board etc.

 

YouTube account

I created a YouTube account (linked to my existing Google sign-in) and subscribed to the channel "peterfoxofficial".

YouTube / Video Sharing

1
Have looked up music videos by Peter Fox, a Berlin hip hop singer who is very good.

My favourite is "Schwarz zu Blau", a song dedicated to Berlin and its [lovable] ugliness. Fox's trademark videos have lots of music playing monkeys. SCHWARZ ZU BLAU [German lyrics][English translation]
Another good video of Peter Fox is ALLES NEU

2
Have looked at the comments posted with the official video of "Schwarz zu Blau". They are rather inane. I have no desire to sign up to YouTube in order to post my own comment.

3
Have clicked on the linke to Peter Fox's own "channel" and listened to some videos of live concerts in Berlin, and some interviews (Peter Fox & Cold Steel)

4
Went back to YouTube/Channels and chose "Education".
I have typed "Hebrew University of Jerusalem" in the search window and found a list of HU postings. Did look at one of them - a lecture by Raphael Mechoulam about "The Cannabinoid system in Neuro-protection"

Podcasting

Have just looked at the podcasting inducation video "Podcasting in plain English". I have learned what POD in PODCASTING stands for: "personal on demand" (versus BROADCASTING).
I have created an RSS subfolder in Google Reader entitled "Podcasts", to tell the difference between other RSS feeds and Podcasts.

BBC podcasts

• Gardener's Question Time (radio program)
  [very easy to use, clear, beautiful]

University of Oxford

• music from Merton College Chapel (music only)
  [when fiddling around I started playing several podcasts simultaneously, which meant that the music got overlayed - very weird]

Podcast.com

• 2 American belly-dancers in Bangalore (Video story with soundtrack)

Podcast Alley

• I looked for a podcast on pottery, with video images. I found "Pottery Pod", a collection of practical hands-on podcasts by American potters. Some of the recording are a bit low-tech and I couldn't always understand the rambling voice track. Some videos were terribly slow to download and look at (by default with "QuickTime"). I wonder if one needs some special podcast downloading software? Some link on "Podcast Alley" calls it a "Podcast Aggregator".
  What is a "Podcast aggregator", I wonder?

Networking, Network Explorer

Have now also added Angela Carritt's Delicious entry to my Network on Delicious.
By clicking around and looking at AC's network, I can see that one can create endless rings and roundabouts, by linking and by adding little Flags indicating that one is a Fan. Two little flags indicate that the fanship is Mutual.

Have added Lucile Desligneres to my Network on Delicious as well.

When I clicked on Delicious Network Explorer in order to view my network, I get the error message
"Error, can't establish connection to fetch data". Why is that?
It should show at least 3 entries on my Delicious network (Philosophy Library, Angela Carritt, Lucile Deslignieres).

Puzzled.

I have also noticed that when I apply Labels to my blog postings, I get controlled vocabulary now.
Is there a way I can suppress this feature, so that I can type in any tagging term that I fancy?

Networking / Delicious

Have now added the Delicious bookmarks of the Philosophy library, which I found listed in the OULS Web 2.0 Directory to my Network on Delicious.

Bookmarks on Delicious

Ploughing on:

• have signed up to Delicious (using my Yahoo login details)
• have uploaded my bookmarks from Firefox to Delicious, something I had meant to do for ages
  [uploading was very fast, for more than 1000 bookmarks]
• have decided to keep most of my bookmarks "private" until I improve the tagging
  [I need to get used to the new structure of my bookmark collection. I had them organized in directories, by subject, and got so used to it. Now I can display them by date, or alphabetically, or by tags - a whole new world]
• have made a few bookmarks "public"
• have improved the tagging on those public bookmarks
  [I find it irritating that tags can only be one word long. What does one do with compound names?
  Hyphenation doesn't work, I have tried that. Have used "_" instead, but that's not satisfactory.
• have added the tag "ox23" to all my public bookmarks, so that they get picked up by other Delicious users who search by tag "ox23"

Photo editing

I have quickly looked at FotoFlexer and Pixer.us but without trying them out and comparing their functionality to that of Picnic. It's just too much, I can hardly keep up with the wretched 23Things as it is.

No need to download Picasa 3.1, got that already on my computer.
Picase forever puzzles me, because I never quite know when I am sorting my photographs "virtually", and when I am creating new folders (i.e. actual subdirectories on my harddisk).

New stone carving, Old Library, awaiting installation

New stone carving, Old Library, awaiting installation,
originally uploaded by Wolvercote snapper.

This is the same photograph, after I have tinkered with it in "Picnic".

I am "blogging" this photo straight from Flickr.

Gee, I can use a lot of Web 2.0 slang now. Scary.

Note: the post was created from Flickr, but I went in afterwards, in order to add tags.

"Life is no picnic" (anon., 7th cent.)

I will tinker with this photograph in "Picnic":

Without really understanding what I was doing, I have also set up a template for posting directly from Flickr to my blog.

All this interconnectedness starts to get on my nerves. It's like going around in circles, everything is looped up with everything else. Too much information.

I find that the Mozilla Firefox browser isn't good for any of this blogging business. Only in Internet Explorer can I see the actual photographs I am uploading. Why is that? Does anybody know?
Knock, knock, anybody there?

Flickr

I didn't need to set up a Yahoo account because I already have a Yahoo email account.
Have joined Flickr (Thing 7) and chosen a "Flickr-identity", and have uploaded a number of photographs taken in 2006 and 2007.

The photographs I have uploaded document skilled restoration work that took place in my College's famous Canterbury Quad - stonemasonry repairs and repainting of decorated lead guttering. Over several weeks in 2006 and 2007, I took photographs documenting the works. I even climbed onto the scaffolding to take close-up shots. Here is my favourite stone carving: bear mother with cub, covered in dust.

RSS feeds - explore further

Am playing around with RSS feeds, to see what I can do with them.
I quite like the way that tags display on the right-hand margin:

I have created folders for my RSS feeds by subject, which makes sense (Creative, Library work, News). 

I have marked an item with a "star" as a favorite.

But I am not sure that I want to "share" or "publish" my collection of RSS feeds. This whole self-promoting, slightly exhibitionist side of Web 2.0 / social networking sits uncomfortable with me. This probably outs me as an "analogue native".

Coming to think of it - I was 24 when I first used a personal computer. It was in Library School in Jerusalem in 1987. A whole classroom full of IBM PCs, screens displaying green text on a black background, and big floppy disks in paper envelopes. I took to emailing like a fish to water, used to exchange emails almost daily with a cousin who was working at the University in Oxford at the time. Only university people were using email in those days.




 

Trying to keep up with "Things", run, run, run

Monday morning - need to get on with my 23 Things, I am 2 weeks behind schedule, ouff!
Just signed up for Google Reader and subscribed to the RSS feed for 23 Things, and a bundle of "News" feeds. I don't really like RSS news feeds, because they show sensationalist headlines only. Reading a real newspaper is what I like, where I can dip in and out of articles at leisure.

Now signed up to 5 more RSS feeds:

• Victoria and Albert Museum, press releases
• Manchester City Gallery
• James at OIL [23Things Oxford]
• I want to [Phil Bradley, library related]
• 23Things Oxford

When saving this post, I got notified that one cannot use the "ampersand" sign (in posts and in post labels).
That's why I wrote "Victoria and Albert Museum", rather than "Vee ampersand Ay" [if you see my point].
Odd

Advanced blog features

Have changed a few "settings", as recommended by the 23 Things team. Have set time to "GMT", and have chosen a different date format.

Posting from a mobile phone may not be possible - it says "for US numbers only". Does anybody know more?

tinkering

Have read a few blogs of other participants and found that some people have a very good command of Web 2.0 customization & design skills already. I know that one can do a lot of beautiful things, but when I fiddle for too long and experiment, I start to feel guilty for "wasting time". And I run out of patience.
But a lot of web stuff, and Web 2.0 in particular, is all about learning by doing and trial and error, it seems.
I therefore hope that this 23 Things-thing will teach me a few basic skill that will come in handy when needed.

iGoogle page

Last week, I customized my iGoogle opening page and made it my "home page" for the Mozilla Firefox browser.

• date & time [GMT]
• weather [set to "Oxford"]
• Picasa web albums [not sure they display okay]
  Note added on 9.4.2010: I think that I linked to the Picasa Web Album folder overview, and NOT to particular images. In any event, on my PC, Firefox often doesn't display images, and I haven't been able to alter browser settings to change this. Therefore viewing in "Internet Explorer" is recommended.
  On 9.4.2010, I have sorted this out and an album of Picasa images now displays as it should (after sorting out login/password problems).
• Perlentaucher.de [German website that aggregates news content]
• BBC [UK & world news]
• CNN [World news]
• Zeit Online [German weekly]

I haven't done much customization and the page doesn't look great. I didn't find out how to resize the application windows. Here is a screenshot:

Google Mail account

I already have a google mail account, because I use Google's picture editing/uploading program "Picasa".

Blog is now set up / blog name

It's done - the blog is set up and I am ready to go.

I got very excited about the possibilites of Web 2.0 during the staff development day with Phil Bradley in 2009. I came back to our library with many good intentions. I particularly liked the idea of creating a web-based desktop, which can be used from whatever computer one uses. But I never got around to build one...
And I wanted to tag and store my bookmarks in a Web 2.0 interface. But never did...
And my colleagues weren't too keen on a facebook site for the library. So my enthusiasm fizzled out...
But I *do* think that we need to communicate with "digital native" readers in their language and using Web 2.0 tools is after all just another new-fangled way of communicating.
I am glad that this "23things" training came along - just at the right moment!

REGISTRATION
Have registered my blog (Thing4).

NAME OF BLOG
The name I have chosen for my blog relates to the beautiful old garden I see from my office window - it is called the "Gooseberry Garden", and it has a goldfish pond.

My youngest niece Nilufar standing next to the goldfish pond.
Nilufar is the Persian word for "water lilly", and there are many water lillies in the goldfish pond.

But none of them is as lovely as my niece!