Week 10 -- iHCPL experience summary

I knew most the topics prior to the iHCPL exercises. It is still a good learning experience. The instructions were clear and the topics were not that hard to pick up. If I have to name one thing of my favorite, it has to be the Wowie free ebooks. I am a big ebook fan. Instant accessing to the content not only helped me answer many hard reference questions, it also satisfied my own needs like everyone else -- I want it now.

I think it helps a lot for staff to have current technological skills. They will not be intimidated by questions that were very technical to them before. At least they have something to recommend if something didn't work out for the patron.

Thanks for providing the learning experience.

Week 9 -- downloadable Media

LibiVox is a free ebook site. Most of the titles are classics in public domain. It would be a good alternative when the library copy is not available. At least you have a copy to work with. It has 1035 titles. You can browse alphabetically or search by title author or subject. Subject or genre browse is not available.

Wowio has an attractive homepage displaying the latest releases with book jacket. The top book and staff's favorite list are also nice features to promote titles. The The site uses commercial sponsorships to compensate authors and publishers so the coverage is more diverse and not limiting to public domain titles. You can even request titles that are not on the list. I created account and downloaded a game book in PDF format. Fast connection is needed for 10MB books. Kudos to WOWio.

Week 9 -- Podcasts Smodcasts

For the three suggested podcast directories and finding tools, I found the Podcast.net is the easiest one to use and does not require downloading additional files to play. The directory type is intuitive but I wish the coverage could be little more comprehensive. Podcastalley.com is similar but requires downloading. For a lot of people who have their own tools to manage feeds, blogs, etc. this is definitely a drawback. Yahoo podcast is the least favorable. It is searching all audio files and the result does not limit to podcast. Searching "craft" returned bunch of audio files with artist name "craft". Some of them requires fee to download the piece.

I found the best way to search library related podcast is simply type "library podcast" in any search engine. Denver Public library had a clever idea. They podcast their storytime. I added their site to my blogline and listened to one of the story time story. The teller sounded very professional. Kudos to Denver Pubic library.

Week 9 -- YouTube

Libraries have been taking the ride using it to promote their services and collections. Texas State Library And Archive commission has couple clips to promote the Texshare database at. But the champion goes to UC Berkley. http://www.youtube.com/profile_play_list?user=ucberkeley provides you the top quality of college education.

My 9th grade daughter is taking biology class. At the open house, the teacher said that he only uses textbook and all the students need to do to get a good grade is reading the textbook and memorize the terminology. I would think that with new technology and flashing web resources, biology class could really wow the students. What a shame. (The school hired a new teacher not becase he is bad. Fortunately, my daughter was moved to the new class. ) I found this site from one of the blogs I subscribe to. Professor Marian Diamond, a charming lady truly wowed me. I actually went through her first class. I went to many first classes in college. It was never like this. Watch how this profession carried herself through the first class.

I watched it when it was first posted and now it was viewed more than 76,000. The comments are fantastic as one said "Lol. Some people said she's a gem. You got that right. Of course she's a gem, then why would her last name be Diamond? XD"

See for yourself.

Week 8 -- Web Application -- Zoho

I love Zoho. I am a big Office user but this is as good as you can get for free. The introduction welcome letter was very effective to demonstrate what format Zoho can do. While I was typing using zoho, I was wondering if I can export it to my desktop and reopen with Word or other application.

The answer is YES. Not only I can export it to my desktop, it also gives me options of exporting it as Word, SXW, PDF, ODT, RTF, TXT and HTML.

It has great potentials.

Week 8 -- Social networking -- Ning and others

I am no so familiar with Ning, so I tested it out by creating a new account. It appeared to be normal stuff that need to be filled out. However, once I started editing my page, I had trouble changing the settings. First I selected a theme and I got "Error on page" and it stopped working no matter where I clicked. I still could move the mouse up and down but simply wouldn’t do anything at that point. I had to get out the edit of MY Page. The rest of the editing and set up were fine, and the interface is intuitive. However, I could not locate the log out button after I was done.

Face book and my space are easier to manage.