Friday, January 18, 2008

It's over! Well, not really.

Talk about leaving things to the last minute! Today is the deadline for completing the 23 Things, and here I am scooting in at the last possible moment. The title of this post is "It's over! Well, not really." because the official 23 Things program is complete for me, but I feel like I have learned so many things over the course of these last few months that I will continue to learn for many, many months to come. This program has been a great success for me personally, and the library system as a whole. I am happy to have completed the program on time and it makes me smile when I hear other staff persons talking about Flickr or Delicious in everyday conversation. I think even those of us who grumbled about having 23 new projects to work on have learned at least a small something that will help them both professionally and personally. I look forward to more Learning 2.0! Learning 3.0?

Downloadable audio

Well, I went through the process of creating a NetLibrary account, finding an audiobook I was interested in, downloading it, but then never listened to it. I have an iPod, which is not compatible and the idea of listening to it on my laptop was not very appealing. Exactly how many patrons feel, I believe. I downloaded Ultramarathon Man, by Dean Karnazes. The guy who ran all those marathons (50 in 50 days) and those long endurance runs. I still want to read/listen to it. How amazing.

Monday, January 14, 2008

Podcasts

I have iTunes on my computer at home and have experimented with podcasts. I used to subscribe to several, including NPR's Story of the Day and NPR's book reviews, but I found that I wasn't very good at hooking my iPod to iTunes and getting the podcasts onto my iPod. I'd have days worth of podcasts, then would have a hard time listening to them to get caught up. I really like the idea of podcasts, and there are many out there I'd love to listen to, but the delivery isn't so easy for me. I have a hard time going into iTunes everyday. If there were direct delivery to my iPod (wirelessly) I'd be much happier. Perhaps in the next couple of years.

Tuesday, January 8, 2008

YouTube You Choose

One of my favorite things about YouTube (not the puppy videos or the singing bird videos) is the You Choose feature that profiles the presidential candidates (www.youtube.com/youchoose). In addition to the video profiles, YouTube has provided the several key issues (education, energy, healthcare, immigration, Iraq, and the economy) and the candidates have posted videos showing their positions on the issues. These videos are posted by the campaigns themselves, and are from previous appearances by the candidates. I love that YouTube has made it so easy for people to get a taste of the candidates views and positions. The videos are more accessible to many people than the New York Times election guide (http://politics.nytimes.com/election-guide/2008/candidates/index.html) or some other guides that may not be geared towards a mass audience, or the younger voters.