Join me in the CJRLC Tech Challenge
The Central Jersey Regional Library Cooperative (CJRLC) has issued a Learning 2.o challenge to anyone who works in a CJRLC member library. This is a great chance to learn new skills and I hope others will join me in taking the CJRLC Tech Challenge.
I have already completed over 90% o of the items on the challenge, but I am taking it anyway and giving it my own twist. For instance, instead of creating another blogger blog I set up a WordPress blog called Janie’s CJRLC Challenge Blog
I have been meaning to learn more about WordPress for several months and just never got around to it. This is the perfect reason for me to finally play with WordPress as well as other new technologies and tools that I just never seem to get around to using.
For instance, I have explored LibraryThing and Squidoo and know what they are what they do, but never used them extensively. This will be my chance. I am also going to look for new tools and sites and then blog about them as I find them.
Since starting the challenge yesterday I already explored a new to me service called SplashCast and created my first embedded SplashCast on my new blog. Go over and have a look. I think SplashCast has great potential and I am glad to have found it.
Amazing (short) Web 2.0 Video
By way of Boing Boing…
Check out this amazing video,”Web 2.0… the Machine is Us/ing Us,” created by Michael Wesch, Assistant Cultural Anthropology Professor at Kansas State University.
What a great way to kick off the first 5 minutes of any web 2.0 workshop or discussion!
2/8/07 Teleconference: 15 Minutes a Day!: All It Takes to Keep Up in a 2.0 World
Stephen Abram is dong a one-hour “teleconference on learning faster,” entitled “15 Minutes a Day! All It Takes to Keep Up in a 2.0 World with Stephen Abram” this coming Thursday, February 8th at 11 AM ET for librarians “who want to learn more about keeping up with the vast amount of information and change in our 2.0 world.” Sound interesting? Go to his blog post for more information and to register, and see the excerpt below to get you even more interested!:
“Stephen shares his techniques and tips for keeping up and increasing the capacity of library staff to add tools, resources, learning and insights. Learn about 2.0 and add tricks to your kitbag of processes and techniques for keeping up with important changes and opportunities.
The Benefits:
Learn:
– Tips & techniques for keeping up with the tsunami of information
– Tools for enhancing capacity to sort through information
– Pointers for determining which trends and pieces of information are important for the library world
– Some of the top trends that our speaker [Abram] is watching”
Statistics Surrounding our ‘Most Celebrated Sporting Event’–The Super Bowl!
OK, for once, my post is not a post about librarians, teachers, or technology. It is, however, about data–interesting data related to an important event to many this weekend: the Super Bowl.
I found it listed on Librarians’ Internet Index, one of my favorite quality reference sites, brought to us by an unlikely, at least to me, but otherwise well-known quality organization: The U.S. Census Bureau!
This short and interesting special edition press release comes from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Facts for Features & Special Editions newsroom, which collects stats on “demographic and economic subject areas intended to commemorate anniversaries or observances or to provide background information for topics in the news.” You can receive RSS feeds to these releases, too, if you want to be cool and stay up-to-date!
Anyway, this latest release provides facts and other links highlighting the demographics of the cities related to and info about the teams in this year’s Super Bowl, as well comparing how times have changed (i.e., populations, aging, educational levels, earnings, baby names) from the 1967 (Super Bowl I) to this year’s Super Bowl XLI.
It’s a quick read, so check it out!
Why Librarians and Libraries are Important
Here we go, someone who get it! As many times as I have heard my friends ask me why I chose a “dying profession,” I have never worried about my job security. Personally, my reason for this was because of the old saying:
If people, in general, thought rationally there would never be a need for librarians. Since history has proven this not to be the case, librarians’ job will always be secure.
My friend sent me this article on the Library profession which gives 33 Reasons Why Librarians and Libraries are Important. Yes, many of the reasons are arguments against the Internet. For the rationale thinkers out there, who are picky about who and where they get their information from, this is not really a surprise but for the other 46% of Americans who consider Wikipedia a reliable source of information, it might give them something to think about and, who knows… perhaps even get a library card.
Gaming and more @ your library
Hey I just wanted to post a brief report on the NJLA Information Technology meeting that was held on Thursday at the East Brunswick Public Library. LG’s Tyler Rousseau gave a great presentation on Gaming in Libraries! The full presentation and handouts will be available very soon on the “Links of Interest” section on the NJLA IT page.
After Ty’s presentation everyone got a chance to do some hands-on gaming! We provided Play Stations with Dance Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero (one of my personal faves); some online gaming and the new Nintendo Wii. The only downside to this event was that NOW I MUST HAVE A Wii!!! 😉
I don’t consider myself to be much of a “gamer,” but once I tried this I found out what all the fuss is about! It comes with the sports game that includes bowling, tennis and a few other things. I played the bowling game (against a very formidable opponent, Mary Martin, who kicked my butt!) and I am really hooked! The “real action” play of using the wireless hand-held controller while performing actions very similar to “real” bowling was just so much fun! I am officially saving up my money as of yesterday!
Funny aside: The other night a newscaster was reading from the teleprompter and read “Wii” as “World War II”!
Also, if anyone is interested, our next meeting will be held March 8, location TBA, and will focus on Vodcasting! Check our page on the NJLA website for more information!
And, I wanted to point people to a great tool shared by Jessica Adler at the meeting (one of the regular features of our meetings is sharing information and sites or tools of interest)! The tool is Snipshot and it allows you to edit photos online before you share them. There is nothing to install – it is 100% web-based, with a one-click important from any site, and you can save to a free, permanent URL. I haven’t tried it yet but it looks great! Thanks, Jess!!!
ALA Midwinter in Seattle
At some point I’ll post some thoughts about ALA Midwinter, but at least I’ve gotten my pix uploaded to Flickr.
A Graphic Novel Wins the Printz!
Update on U.S. Web Search Market–Google, Yahoo, MSN, Ask, & Time Warner
In this morning’s USA Today Tech section, a short article was written about the U.S. search market from comScore Networks, showing that in December 2006,…
* Google sites were ranked as #1 with 47.3% of U.S. search market
* Yahoo sites as #2 with 28.5%
* Microsoft sites as #3 with 10.5%
* Ask Network as #4 with 5.4%
Also interesting from the article…
* “An estimated 6.7 billion searches were conducted by U.S. Web users in December, up 1% from November.”
“The number of U.S. Web search queries has grown 30% since December of 2005, comScore said.
Go to the actual January 15, 2007 press release of comScore Networks survey cited for some more detail, which also lists…
* Time Warner Network as #5 with 4.9% of the U.S search market,
and it states there that “Google Sites led the pack with 3.2 billion search queries performed, followed by Yahoo Sites (1.9 billion), MSN-Microsoft (713 million), Ask Network (363 million), and Time Warner Network (335 million).”
Library Garden 