Web 2.0 features, for home and work. What can the Web do for us?

I looked at Twitter because up until this point i had scorned Twitter in favour of Facebook. I have resisted the urge to Twitter because i am sure my computer savvy friends get enough information about me that they didnt really want as it is without "microblogging" 20 times a day!

I can see how it would be useful at work because people say that it can provide new tools, links to websites and quick answers to questions, if the library Twittered and it got enough of a following we could twitter to followers what is happening, where to find reviews, what new books and DVDs we have just got in etc

I didnt actually sign up to Twitter because like i said earlier, Facebook takes enough of my time as it is. And while i am actually bored with Facebook, it still is a great way to keep in touch with family and friends all aroudn the world - it maintains a connection where there otherwise may not be, and i guess Twitter is the same. Twitter has been in the news alot and "everyone" (eg anyone who is anyone) is talking about it. This could mean it is a good tool for the now, but what of the future, will the followers get bored, will sonmething new take over as the new Twitter?

I like this quote from the Top 100 website "Big jump since last year. I learn something new several times a day and stay connected with people that form my most valuable network. This is the one tool I would choose if I could only keep one (as long as everyone else kept it also!). Barry Dahl " He makes a good point, these types of programs and networks rely on being the in thing, there are so many of them that have come about recently, will this mean some will drop off and the people who use the unpopular ones will end up losing their network of friends andHAVE to join another site?

I understand there is a program that you download to your computer to manage your Twitter account so you can see who is following what and who is doing what. Imagine having to have a computer program that manages your social life - and on a computer. Who is getting out and seeing and talking to their friends these days??

Ffrom a job point of view, it would be great marketing tool for the Mobile library to tweet is location add photos of the bus parked in beautiful locations (all taken on nice sunny Bay of Plenty days of course) and it could link to the timetable on the library website like a "where are we right now" sort of thing. Maybe google maps could be added as well so a patron could see exactly where on the street we are!

On second look of Web 2.0 features i looked at Google chrome. I use this at home because its speed and because IE would no longer let me upload photos to facebook - the flash player seemed to halt the process every time. I like Chrome because it saves you from typing in any internet addresses as it is a little like predictive texting, it predicts from a few letters what you want to look at - even if you have never been there before. It also will do a comprehensive search of the Web from the address bar. I often do recommend this to friends because of its psychic ability. Using Chrome at work would be great, i just think its a bit more user friendly than IE - and it lets you use the features of websites that IE sometimes isnt compatible with.

Claire

Google Reader

Its really weird that this was the next task in the Amazing Challenge because i just saw the 'reader' link on Google the other day and had a quick look at it because it was a topic discussed in my current Library paper.

I guess I need to have a better look at how to read it, and if i looked at it every day i suppose there wouldnt be so much stuff to read, but just having 5 or 6 subscriptions meant a lot of scrolling, or to click on the "mark all as read" buttong.
Its good that its just like Gmail which is the email that i use the most, so i know the basics of how to use it. Is it not just like going to those websites yourself tho, I need to find out how to manage the subscription so it only returns those items that actually interest me, cos at the moment it is returning for example from the NZ Herald website all the top stories. I could just go to that website to view those.
If i figured out how to manage these subscriptions it would be good to subscribe to library blogs, websites etc so i can keep up with the latest, it may take a while to trawl thru the internet and find RSS feeds to subscribe to!

I'm really not sure how libraries can use this. can the library subscribe to certain feeds and show that information on their website without having to actually be logged on to the net? Maybe Ellie can enlighten me on that one!

out

Addendum: Just noticed that Library Elf provides RSS feeds too, but they do warn that some readers show these to the general public even if you have set your profile to private. There is a use for RSS feeds for librarians and libraries!!

Microsoft Excel

Today I was doing a project on Excel for my Information Systems paper. It wasnt going well, but once i got some help it went fine. Did i get any of that help from my tutor? NO! I got it from Dad who got it from someone else. My tutor seemed more interested in making me feel like a school child than giving me any helpful advice! He said i should treat it like an exam and any "collusion" between studens could result in our assessments not being accepted!

what a plonker. The instructions are NOT as clear as he seems to think they are. Each step is broken down into bullet points and what confused me is it seems you dont follow thru each bullet point one after the other, but look at the whole lot together and then do it.

And another thing, they gave us a template to work from to do a report in Word. I HATE using documents that other people have created. I consider myself an Expert Word User and i would format the document differently, so it takes twice as long to type information in, because you have to circumnavigate someone elses bad formatting!

All this is a waste of time, but I am really just practicing blogging!