TBLC Library 2.0 Challenge

Reading Fortune magazine (March 2007 issue) over the weekend, I came across the following quote about the power of creating an blog for your library…

“When you are writing a blog, you are constantly looking for new things to write about…And when you are constantly looking for ‘neat,’ ‘cool,’ ‘interesting’ things to write about, your company starts to feel neat, cool, and interesting to you again, and perhaps how it did when you first began the company.”  - Brian Brown, a Blog Consultant, on pajamamarket.com

In the general 2.0 presentation, I mention this site- finetune.com but I hadn’t really played with it until this week - and its really fun. You have to create an account, but then you can create playlists to listen to at your desk, through speakers for party and share with each other.

Here is one I created of songs from Junior and Highschool - http://www.finetune.com/playlist/1400088 but they have a lot of current songs as well.

The site integrates several 2.0 technologies especially - tagging and social networking to help you find music. Users ‘tag‘ songs to make them more searchable and you can connect with others who like the same artists and songs to find to new music.

Let me know if you create a list, I am always on the lookout for new music.

If you attended our Podcasting Think Tank–or even if you didn’t–you can win fabulous prizes and the adulation of your friends and colleagues by doing some or all of the homework.  Pay attention.  Here it is.

Find some existing library podcasts and submit their URL to this blog as a comment [1 Ticket]

Choose an aggregator and subscribe to five podcasts of any type [1 Ticket]

Autosync your aggregator with your mp3 player and get your subscribed podcasts onto your player automatically [2 Tickets]

Find and share with the rest of us a ’slick’ way to use iTunes as a podcast aggregator and get the podcasts onto a non-iPod mp3 player [2 Tickets]

Create a podcast of any length with Audacity or some similar tool [4 Tickets]

Add a musical “intro”, “outro”, or “bed” to your podcast without violating copyright laws [2 Tickets]

Post your podcast to the web, and tell us how to find it [4 Tickets]

You should be able to share your success with the rest of us by posting a ‘comment’ to this post.  If you have problems doing that, email me at: carlsoa@tblc.org.

For a look at the prizes you can claim with your Golden Tickets, click on the that link.

Good luck!

Our Podcasting Think Tank will be homework intensive with lots of opportunities to earn golden tickets.  If you’re interested in showing your library how to ’speak up’ on the web, you’ll want to take advantage of these opportunities.  You do know how to post the fact that you’ve earned tickets, right?  Hint:  there’s a link right on this site.

New technology in ye’ old days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX0-nqRmtos

I saw this article on my Shifted Librarian blog & thought I would share it with you guys.

Keeping up when you don’t have the time

Keeping Up When You Don’t Have the Time By Jenny

I recently got a call from a former boss (one of the best I’ve ever had!) asking for advice on how to stay current about technology when you’re a public library reference librarian, you just don’t have a lot of time or money, and you don’t want to become a “techie.” I believe that staying current these days means reading blogs, so that is my core recommendation, and I’d recommend tracking 10-12 of them if possible, just to get a broad enough view.

My major criteria for the blog recommendations are consistent posting over time, frequency (more than once a week), sticking to the topic, and a general sense of value to a public librarian. This could have been a very long list and it’s very subjective (it is not a “best of”), so this truly is a baseline - add on from here.

Read some blogs using an RSS reader/aggregator (NetVibes, PageFlakes, Google Reader, Bloglines, more at AllRSS).

At minimum, you should be reading:

Librarian in Black

Library Garden

Library Link of the Day

LISNews

Tame the Web

You can also find a blog relevant to any work-related subject interests you have - Library Law, Pop Goes the Library (popular culture), The M-Word (marketing), ResourceShelf (reference), Library Grants, etc. - so check the list at LISWiki.

Read Library Journal and Computers in Libraries. Read USA Today’s Tech section (which you can read via RSS feed).

Watch the SirsiDynix Virtual Institutes. Read the biweekly Carnival of the InfoSciences.

Read AL Direct in your email inbox each Wednesday. (Disclaimer: I work for ALA, but I honestly believe that George Eberhart consistently provides a great roundup of news, blog posts, and events.)

Read the reports (or at least the summaries) from the Pew Research Center.