Jtindale’s Weblog

I used a staff computer to complete this week so did not download Secondlife–but I did read about it and Cybrary city via the links the moderators gave us this week–loved the idea of discussing horror works in a haunted gothic mansion!!

I played bejewelled and it was fun for about 10 minutes or so and then I got a bit bored–no danger for me in becoming addicted!!  I also tried “Bubblebug” on yahoo games–I was really bad at it!!  Great game for hand/eye co-ordination and developing a sense of timing.

Ideas for using a site like “Secondlife” for library applications are only limited by our imaginations–a virtual storytelling playhouse comes to mind –being able to interact with characters as they are telling the story to you would be cool (picture and interactive Alice in Wonderland!)

Libraries need to be interested in these technologies because our patrons/customers are using these technologies. 

Using virtual technology like Secondlife for just about any library programming is possible–I went into the library section of Secondlife and was blown away by how REAL everything is–postings of courses, conferences etc.–creates a surreal feeling and almost blurs the line between real-life and virtual-life…

This would be a good tool to use before circulating publicity–others could add ideas etc before the document is finalized.

This would also be a great tool to establish book lists —grade eight humour, biography, poetry–everyone could add their “2 cents”!!!

http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting/includes/betweenthecovers.xml

http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting/includes/canadareads.xml

My first exposure to youtube was when a friend emailed me something really hilarious via a link to the youtube site.  i have seen things on there that make me laugh til I cried and make me cry until I’m a sniffling idiot.  I really worry about the violent stuff that I hear is being posted on podcasts now–neanderthals fighting at sporting events and getting attention on youtube…makes me wonder where it’s heading…

I tried to download 6 different books from netlibrary but all were currently in use–very frustrating!  Netlibrary also makes you click a couple of times before you get the information that the book is not available.  Netlibrary is also “buried” in our website–unless you know how to get to where it is, it is highly unlikely you’d ever find it!  I found searching for a title a bit cumbersome as well–I kept having to use the back button to start another search –the book genre/category listing kept disappearing when I clicked on a book I wanted to download.

Overdrive shows you at a glance if the audio book is available–so I downloaded The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton and Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott.  I found it easy to navigate and easy to get to.

This is a great feature–I haven’t received an update yet as I’ve just created this, but I can see library customers being thrilled with the ability to stay current at the touch of a (couple of) buttons!

Book reviews, health information, auto recalls etc would be very useful–especially when they are brought TO the customer–once the feed is set up

My RSS feed is from ALtheath database for information on multiple myeloma:

  http://rss.ebscohost.com/AlertSyndicationService/Syndication.asmx/GetFeed?guid=1332167

I wasn’t able to subscribe to the feed using IE on this staff computer–I got an error message that IE requires that I have MSXML3SP5 or greater.

I am enjoying this so much, I thought I’d add it to my blog as a link: http://generatorblog.blogspot.com

My newest creation is my fairy name:  Tangle Elfglitter!!

div>Your fairy is called <i>Tangle Elfglitter</i></div><div>She is a cheerful sprite.</div><div>She lives at the bottom of tangled gardens and in hedgerows.</div><div>She is only seen in the light of a shooting star.</div><div>She wears tangled dresses of multicoloured petals. She has delicate green wings like a cicada.</div><div><a href=”http://www.emmadavies.net/fairy/default.aspx”>Get your free fairy name here!</a></div>

I added del.icio.us to my sidebar as “my favourite things” and Librarything to my sidebar as “my favourite books” –using the info on hpl’s learning 2.0 blog and the support button of wordpress.