It's Monday afternoon and I'm just about to wrap up my time at ALA. What can I say? 20,000+ attendees, hundreds of vendors, 4 days of programs... If there were 2 main buzz concepts from the conference, I'd say "information literacy" is a very hot topic and in the Web 2.0 world "facebook" is very hot. In the info literacy world, everyone agrees that it's important, but I didn't necessarily see any consensus on the best way to collaborate, assess, market, etc. Lots of libraries are trying different things.
Regarding Web 2.0, facebook is hot in a lot of colleges as a way to interface with students. I assume we'll cover this in week 6 - social networking. Here's an article: chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/2643/searching-library-collections-in-facebook
The Elmhurst College Library is doing something interesting:
www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2392193669&ref=s
and UIUC: www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2414276217
The exhibits are always fun to go through. Gretchen, you'd love it - lots of book giveaways, book deals, book raffles, etc.
All in all one of the best parts of the conference were some of the people I pleasantly ran into: some former colleagues at Northwestern and a former Dominican U. administrator. I also had a wonderful day trip to San Diego and Coronado island. Sorry, Marilyn, I didn't see you here at all! Hope you had a good time.
Well, if any of this babble has sparked an interest in ALA, you're in luck - the conference is in Chicago in July, 2009.
Adios for now.
(image generated through bighugelabs.com)
Monday, June 30, 2008
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Wikis
I posted to the library2oakton wiki, and found it very easy to edit and update. It's nice to get to know everyone better; kind of like a group blog.
I have mixed feelings about Wikipedia - it's a love/hate thing. Working in a high school library I see WAY too much casual use of Wikipedia when better sources should be used. On the other hand, I do trust it more than I used to. I had a freshmen that hacked into an article (just because she could) and added random lies to an article on 'Grace Hopper'. I monitored it, and noticed that the bad info was removed in 2 hours - much faster than I thought it would be. The school's IP address could have been banned from ever making changes on Wikipedia, so I discussed with her why not to do this.
I went to a lecture several months ago where an expert on this subject said there are several thousand editors out there for Wikipedia. My question would be whether they are all truly subject experts, or how is it otherwise monitored? I will say that it is a good source of certain current topics where online encyclopedias are WAY behind, or not in scope. An example: try looking up Camtasia (a type of software) in Encyclopedia Britannica online and you get nowhere. Look it up in Wikipedia, and you get a pretty clear definition.
Ted
I have mixed feelings about Wikipedia - it's a love/hate thing. Working in a high school library I see WAY too much casual use of Wikipedia when better sources should be used. On the other hand, I do trust it more than I used to. I had a freshmen that hacked into an article (just because she could) and added random lies to an article on 'Grace Hopper'. I monitored it, and noticed that the bad info was removed in 2 hours - much faster than I thought it would be. The school's IP address could have been banned from ever making changes on Wikipedia, so I discussed with her why not to do this.
I went to a lecture several months ago where an expert on this subject said there are several thousand editors out there for Wikipedia. My question would be whether they are all truly subject experts, or how is it otherwise monitored? I will say that it is a good source of certain current topics where online encyclopedias are WAY behind, or not in scope. An example: try looking up Camtasia (a type of software) in Encyclopedia Britannica online and you get nowhere. Look it up in Wikipedia, and you get a pretty clear definition.
Ted
Thursday, June 12, 2008
RSS
Well, it took a few days to grow on me, but now that I've been using it for 3 days I like the RSS feeds. I set up Chicago Tribune, local weather, and various blogs. I like the fact that I can skim headlines, and then just click in to get more info if I want it. There are lots of news stories in the Tribune that I don't care about, but it's easy to skim through when using the 'list view' instead of 'expanded view' in Google reader.
A couple years ago I started to set up RSS feeds using a software app and lost interest in it. Using a web-based package is much better, and may stick with me since I can view it anywhere.
By the way, if you're a music person like me, feel free to respond to that poll you see in my blog.
A couple years ago I started to set up RSS feeds using a software app and lost interest in it. Using a web-based package is much better, and may stick with me since I can view it anywhere.
By the way, if you're a music person like me, feel free to respond to that poll you see in my blog.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Intro
Hello, I'm Ted and I do reference work part time at Oakton Community College. I'll try not to be the world's 2nd most boring blog (ha), but I really do love libraries, and this is a great opportunity to learn the new tools.
I work full time in a high school library, and will be starting a new job in Pilsen in August. I also do some part time work at Evanston Public Library in various departments. I love the variety of the different populations and settings.
I guess it's appropriate I picked the "harbor" template for my blog. I grew up in Benton Harbor, MI - 66 miles "as the crow flies" across Lake Michigan, but a whole world away.
I will be attending the ALA conference in Anaheim this summer - really just an excuse to get away and see California, my 3rd favorite state. I'll be sure to post some things I learn at the conference.
I work full time in a high school library, and will be starting a new job in Pilsen in August. I also do some part time work at Evanston Public Library in various departments. I love the variety of the different populations and settings.
I guess it's appropriate I picked the "harbor" template for my blog. I grew up in Benton Harbor, MI - 66 miles "as the crow flies" across Lake Michigan, but a whole world away.
I will be attending the ALA conference in Anaheim this summer - really just an excuse to get away and see California, my 3rd favorite state. I'll be sure to post some things I learn at the conference.
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