Saturday, November 5, 2011

Ciao - Reflections on Learning 2.0 Activities


What a fun trip this has been (and will continue to be)!   My favorite discovery of this program has been that if there is something you’re looking to do, organize, or share, there is probably an application out there to help you do just that (and probably for free, too).  There also seem to be very active online communities surrounding most productivity tools, so if you just google the names of ones that you are interested in, you can find out a lot of information before joining and even after joining you can learn things that the tutorials don’t necessarily cover. 

Zotero definitely wins for best find out of all of the tools we’ve explored.  It will make collecting info for class projects and research an easier process.  All of the tools, however, were important to explore - even the ones that I will probably never use again, because a lot of other people do use them and those people will be our future library patrons.  Also, just because I can’t see myself personally utilizing these tools doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t be effective tools in a library setting.

Learning 2.0 has definitely made me look at how web 2.0 tools can be adopted by libraries and for patrons.  One of the tenets of 2.0 technology, interactivity, is imperative to the library, especially if we are to remain relevant in an increasingly web-based world.  By reaching out to our patrons and involving them in the creation of content and online community, they will hopefully be engaged enough to continue to utilize library resources and services, in whatever format or space that takes place.

Learning 2.0 Activity #10 - Other Web 2.0 Tools


I participated in the optional Lync session that explored Google’s online applications, but I decided to look at the list of 2008’s Web 2.0 Awards in the Discovery Exercise for #10 anyways.  I would not consider myself technologically-inclined, yet I was pleasantly surprised to see that, after taking this class, I was familiar with many of the names on the list (27 to be exact).  I even found myself asking questions like “Where’s diigo on this list?  Or dropbox?”  (Then I remembered that it was from 2008, which, in computer years, is like the equivalent of 10 years ago).  One site that I have heard many classmates talk about is LibraryThing, “a cataloging and social networking site for book lovers.”  I already use Goodreads so decided not to join LibraryThing, especially since I see there is a fee to catalog your library if it is over 200 books (mine’s not yet, but I hope that one day it is).  From the tour and what I’ve googled about LibraryThing, however, it seems to offer more options for cataloging your collection and maybe a more “professional” atmosphere.  This does make me wonder how e-books are, and will be, cataloged.  I only own a few e-books that were free downloads, so I never bothered to enter them into Goodreads.  As more people read more e-books, will they bother with sites like LT and Goodreads when their e-book apps (or readers) start to build in the same features?

I have utilized Google tools both for school and personal use for the past few years.  Googledocs is great for collaborating with classmates.  Picasa offers the ability to share photos with selected people or groups (and has an easy uploader right from iPhoto). My husband and I share calendars through gcal, and it integrates seamlessly into the calendar on my iPod Touch, so anything that he or I add in gcal automatically shows up on my Touch, and anything I add into the Touch automatically shows up on the gcal.  The Touch also pulls in my and my husband’s work calendars from our Microsoft outlook calendars (exchange server) so I have all our calendars in one place.  It has come in so handy that I would probably be lost without it.  That is another great thing about Google – their products play well with others, across different operating systems, devices, etc.