Fleshing out

i'm a total square....

i tried to go and flesh out my facebook page. i just kept wondering why i would want to do any of this. i swear i know how to have fun, i swear. i just can't get into taking little surveys and poking my friends. and it is a lot of effort for me to find things i would like to get into on facebook. i had a much better time with flickr. the photos are pretty, easy to find and give lots of good info. i love finding stuff on youtube for the same reason. i remember being really excited about friendster when it first came out and i got in touch with a bunch of friends. i just kinda stopped looking at it one day.

i consume too much stuff already. i actively seek out ways to be less excited and look at less information. with facebook i feel like i'm looking at a lot of ads and doodads and not seeing the point.

it's cool that so many people are excited and express themselves. that in itself is fun for me to see and i appreciate just knowing about it.

maybe i'm missing the point and not digging deep enough for interesting things to look at on facebook. i would like to use the excuse that i'm too old - however, many of my peers love this stuff. i can theorize about how it is useful as a professional tool to stay in tune with what our patrons are doing and reach out to them. in reality, facebook just doesn't speak to me.

Social networking

Online social networking is another tool that I just don't use in my personal life. I am constantly wanting more interaction with the few people I already know, and it is hard to find time to do even that. Also, guiltily, I am more of a voyeur.

That said, as I look for new ideas for the workplace I can see how being part of a social network would be very helpful- to share information and ideas with like minded people.

A lot of creative thinking can generate from informal interactions and that is the most inspiring part of social networking. People are pro-actively participating and expressing themselves. We can't ignore the popularity of the medium...people feel very comfortable online and that freedom produces a creative environment. Libraries should have a presence in these networks because of their popularity, and because of the ease with which people use them.

There is huge potential for empowerment through sharing resources and contributing to ideas using social networks.

meebo sans skype

there it is...my little widget. i don't use online chat very much but i love it for quick interoffice questions. i just wish meebo worked with skype. it doesn't seem to.

skype was a great im'ing tool when i worked in an office that had a satellite office in russia because you can chat and use it for phone calls through your computer. i still use it for free international calls.

where to begin with newsreaders...

that's mostly how i feel when i try to look at newreaders that should be easy and informative, but inevitably feel overwhelming to me - i just don't know where to begin. i started to list how i felt about feedster, topix, syndic8, technorati, and google blog search, but scrapped that for this opinion about all of them- too busy, too many ads and too mainstream. now, maybe i'm not giving them enough time or credit. but i'm not interested in something that doesn't have an immediate aesthetic appeal for me. the exception may be google blog search. that seems pretty straight forward but i rarely look just for blogs.

i usually find new blogs or sites by looking at the sites that are referred to on my favorite sites.

i like Current. it is a TV channel / website, created by Al Gore, that has news stories from several different sources submitted by users. in the spirit of web 2.0, it works in collaboration with its users. the site includes lots of pods created and submitted by its members. you don't have to be a member to see all of the great stuff though. and, you don't have to watch tv. you don't even have to watch pods, because there is enough interesting and relevant news submitted through links and comments.

RSS and NPR

RSS feeds for podcasts! yeah! like this from NPR:

http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=4819382

you can see when a new podcast is added and keep track of the ones you have already listened to. i can imagine a library using RSS for all kinds of updates to the public: tutorials, new books, schedule changes, special events, etc.

it is great to be able to check out regular information sources without seeing ads. and, i like that i can subscribe to a specific feed within a site. i don't have to see all of NPR if i'm really only interested in receiving updates about technology podcasts.

more Flickr - Kefir How-To

i'm experimenting with adding images and links. the image above has notes included in flickr. you can see them when you scroll over the neck and planet. guess they don't show up here.

i like this whole photo set. hmmm, i would like to add a running slideshow to my blog. here is a link for now:

http://flickr.com/photos/lairilai/sets/72057594051156887/show/

to my roommate's dismay, i've been fermenting different food items around the apartment. okay, mostly in kitchen...

comics are a fun way to learn and i like this one that describes how to make kefir:

Item 5: Photos & Images - Discover Flickr

maps and flickr! what a great idea...you can use "geotags" to add your photos to a map. then people can see where you took them. i appreciate that there are several different privacy settings.

the World Map is a lot of fun:
http://flickr.com/map/

i've been reading up on creative commons and like that flickr users are using them to control their own standards for sharing photos. i don't know enough about it yet to have a good grasp on how widely creative commons is used, or how successful it has been...but i like the idea of individuals deciding how to share their information.

http://creativecommons.org/