Thing 4 Online Communities - continued

I was able to view the David C Barrow Elementary Media Center link on Facebook and thought about how many possibilities a library Facebook page could open. Then I went to check to see if any other elem. schools have a presence on Facebook and immediately was blocked by our district's content filter. Facebook is a no-no for now.  I am wondering if any of our local elementary schools have a Facebook page?

I can't see Twitter as something I would like. It already drives me nuts when my Facebook friends enter those little 140ish character bits like "I'm making soup tonight".  Why not tell what kind of soup and share the recipe when you're posting to 200 some friends. If you want someone specifically to know those kind of insignificant details, why not just text it to them? I guess I "don't get" Twitter.

I looked at GoodReads and LibraryThing. I didn't join either one, but I already belong to Shelfari and share books with friends through that site. I like it a lot. It's been very helpful to me in keeping track of what I've read, what I want to read, and what my friends are reading.

Thing 4 - Online Communities

I thought the clip about the social media revolution. Unfortunately, I was trying to watch it from a hotel internet connection and it took forever to load and play. I am definitely going to watch it again when I get home. The facts and figures were astonishing. It's hard to believe that e-mail is passe (or soon will be).

I am on vacation this week in Florida. (It's been so beautiful here all week. It will be hard to come back to upstate NY.) My internet connectivity has been very spotty so I will wait to finish my thing 4 blog until I return.

Thing 3 - Photo Sharing

I have a Snapfish account and use a Picassa album for a group I'm in so I was interested in finding out about Flickr. I signed up for an account and posted a set from a recent author visit by Nancy Castaldo, to our school. (See pictures which was easy to link to my Blogger account using Flickr's blogging tool.)

I also explored some of the pictures and decided to search for golf in Alaska. My son is moving to Valdez, Alaska in June. I'd like to try to golf when I'm there for a visit, but certainly not in conditions like the one I choose to display on my blog page. I was unable to add this one to the body of this blog. I think the owner of the photo has it protected. But, it worked fine using Flickr's blogging tool and gave all the proper credit to the photographer automatically. 

I have more to learn about Flickr before I decide whether or not I'll continue to use it for the library photos. For personal use, I will continue with Snapfish since they have all the options to create albums, calendars, mugs, etc.

Birchwood Media Center's photostream

Birchwood Media Center's photostream on Flickr.

Here are the pictures from Nancy Castaldo's visit to Birchwood on April 8, 2011.

Arctic Golfing

Arctic Golfing, a photo by David Brannan on Flickr.

Thing 2:RSS #2

Today I added LISNews: The Original #librarianchat to my iGoogle page. It has some interesting blogs.

Thing 2:RSS

Loved the introductory video...clever and funny way to learn about RSS.

I created an igoogle home page and, for a start, successfully subscribed to CNN, Learn with CDLC, and YouTube. I put Snopes on it too. I seem to get so many of those inflamatory e-mails (ie Cell phone numbers going public) and wind up checking Snopes frequently. What a great way to keep abreast of the newest urban legends.

I tried to subscribe to the Learn with CDLC blogs page. I got the gadget to appear, but no information. I guess I'll bookmark that page. It's much easier to keep up with everyone in the class through the NetVibes page. Thanks for that.

I'll spend the rest of the week looking for other RSS feeds that will be useful to me.

Our automated library catalog, OPALS, has recently included a feature allowing us  to add RSS feeds to the home page. Animal of the day was their sample feed. I tried adding another one but couldn't get it to work before I ran out of "play" time.