This Old Brain

2009-02-19T19:18:00.000-07:00

And in conclusion...

2008-03-24T10:50:00.002-06:00

We have learned so many things since this class started, and at such a fast pace, haven't we? I had to go back and read my own Blog postings just to remember all I learned.

Back at the beginning, we created a blog. Since we had to use it all the time to report on what we were learning, I now feel really comfortable with blogging-- I can say with confidence that I know I will continue to use it.

Next came RSS feeds. My initial reaction was that I would probably drop my Bloglines account after this class was finished. But guess what? After checking Bloglines routinely for 3 months, I have had lots of interesting discoveries from them. I think the trick is not to overload. I dropped several after realizing that I was never getting any "WOW" moments from them (you know-- the lightbulb above my head...) So Bloglines stays for the time being.

I like Flickr (except for the spelling of it). But I didn't use it enough in this class to make it be something that I can do effortlessly. It will stay on the back burner for now, at least until I get a digital camera. (My kids and husband all have digitals, so I just let them do all the picture-taking in the family.)

Podcasts. I thought they were okay at the time we studied them, probably not something I'd use. But after accidentally running into podcasts on other sites and seeing how they were used, and having my sister sending me a link to a very inspiring TED talk podcast, I'm finding myself more and more impressed. Podcasts are cool.

YouTube. My kids are really into this. I hear one yelling to the other, "Hey come look at this," followed by hoots of laughter. Unlike podcasts, I haven't really run into anything on YouTube that "feeds my brain." Perhaps it's there, and I just didn't look hard enough, but this one's going by the wayside for now.

The tagging I liked a lot, but now that I am thinking back on it, I don't think I really grasped the "social bookmarking" aspect of it. I guess that's where you tagged something and found out that 678 other people had tagged it too, and you got to see what tags they used. I liked my own tags just fine, I guess.

Wikis. I can really see the value in them for collaborative projects, but there are a lot of people out there who get their kicks putting their sicko marks on otherwise good stuff. Take the "Definition of a Librarian" page that I recommended in one of my posts. I went back to that wiki myself about a week after my first visit there, and found some pretty crude content had been added. I have a friend who has many wiki entries out there in wiki land. He monitors them daily for changes, and spends a lot of time repairing the damage on a routine basis. He finds it pretty frustrating.
Incidentally, he is the one who is heading up the National Historic Landmark Wiki. Those of us who are part of that project have to log on with a password in order to add content or make changes.

I would definitely be interested in future learning opportunities in this format. If I were to do anything differently, it might be to provide classes in shorter bursts. Say a three-week course just on using Flickr, Podcasts, and YouTube, for example. One extra week at the end for those who fell behind for one reason or another. I know that I got overwhelmed at a point in the middle of the class, and it took some effort to pick it up and get going again.

And on a final note, thank you so much to Lauren, Maggie, Suzanne, and Tracy. This was a huge undertaking for you all, and I want you to know that it was very much appreciated.

Irene Scheidecker, Butte Public Library

Wikis...wicked!

2008-03-18T21:24:00.005-06:00

Well, there I was, just reading the Lesson 9 page of our Library Challenge. Suddenly, an interesting link caught my eye, so I clicked, and that led to more clickable links, and two hours later I have read so much interesting stuff my head is spinning. If this were a labyrinth and I had to find my way back by retracing my steps, I would be lost forever. (Luckily, I can find the place from which I started by going back to my "Bookmarks," but I might never see again some of the places I passed along the way.)

I was lost the longest in the LIS (Library and Information Service) wiki. There was a list of Articles of Interest, and also a list of Areas for Development. I saw things in both lists that caught my eye, so of course I had to click and read. I read the discussions about cell phones in libraries (so that I could find out that there is no definitive answer) and about laptops for patron check-out (although this is primarily being done in academic and not public libraries).

Some of the categories in Areas for Development were weblogs, digitization, Library 2.0, and RFID (which I now know what is). I followed the links to all of these, read the main wiki pages, looked at the discussion pages, clicked on other links contained within. I found one weblog I liked so much I added it to my RSS feeds, something I haven't done since I added my first feeds the week we studied about it (and luckily I could still remember how to do this from Lesson 3).

So, here is the link to the Library Computer Guy's blog, and although he's blogging from Oklahoma, I think some of his observations of working in a public library are universal. http://librarycomputerguy.wordpress.com/

I also ran into this podcast on his blog, which thanks to Lesson 6 I knew how to share with you. (I didn't know it was going to run for nearly 20 minutes when I first clicked on it, but I found the speaker so interesting that I listened to all of it.)

The speaker, Howard Rheingold, talks about the coming world of collaboration, participatory media and collective action — and how Wikipedia is really an outgrowth of our natural human instinct to work as a group. As he points out, humans have been banding together to work collectively since our days of hunting mastodons.

On a final note about wikis, I am a small contributor to a wiki project that started here in Butte, Montana. The goal of the project is to document every property in the National Historic Landmark District of Butte-Anaconda (over 6000 individual properties). We do historical research, mostly at the Archives, about the buildings, original owners, historical uses, architects, etc. We add all this content along with photos or whatever else. In the hopeful end result, a user will be able to look at a map of the historic district, click on any building, and up would pop a photo/ basic info page. From there one could click on additional links to go into as much (or as little) detail as one wished. I think it will be a very cool thing.

Experiments in Tagging

2008-03-16T19:56:00.003-06:00

There are times in my life that I just have TOO MUCH going on, and that has been the case for the past couple weeks.

I actually did do the tagging assignment before I disappeared from my blog. Since we are putting a new focus on the Young Adult section of our library, I went out "surfing" for ideas on the Internet. I have always been pretty good about organizing my bookmarks. For example, in the past I would have created a favorites folder called "Young Adult" and inside of it there would have been other folders called, for example, "Booklists" and "Cool Webpages" and "Program Ideas."

But tagging takes that process one step better, as in the case when I found a library YA webpage with a really cool look to it, and it had links to excellent Young Adult booklists, and it listed the programs for teens that the library would be doing for that month. Tags: teens programming booklists WebpageDesign.

The one tricky thing about tagging is to remember your previous tag labels, so that you don't label something "teens" one time and "YoungAdults" the next. (You notice I also figured out the other tricky thing about tagging-- if you want to give something a two-word tag, you have to join the words so that you don't get something tagged with both "young" and "adults," for example.)

By the way, if anyone from Great Falls ever reads my blog, I loved your teen webpage!

Cassie at DublinBridge via webcam

2008-03-02T16:45:00.002-07:00

DublinBridge01, originally uploaded by imscheid.

If you ever get the chance to travel, this is a fun thing to do for the family back home. Find out where the webcams are located in the places you will visit, study the webcam's view so that you will know the best place to stand when you get there. Then you choose a time that is convenient both for you and for the folks at home, let them know to log on and they can see you (although somewhat small) in person.

This photo sets the scene. No one is there yet.

DublinBridge2

2008-03-02T16:38:00.002-07:00

DublinBridge2, originally uploaded by imscheid.

My daughter Cassie is currently with a college tour in Ireland, and let us know to log on to ireland.com this morning at 8 AM (middle of the afternoon there). In this shot her group of about 6 has arrived at the location, but since it's before the designated time, no one is looking at the webcam yet. Cassie had the good sense to wear something bright-colored -- an aqua blue jacket.

DublinBridge3

2008-03-02T16:37:00.005-07:00

DublinBridge3, originally uploaded by imscheid.

There's Cassie, right at the bridge's corner, with a bright bit of sunlight shining on her.

The webcam refreshed once a minute, so every time it refreshed we saved the new view in a folder on our computer, which I later uploaded to Flickr. Although I'm sure most of you readers have already seen enough, I'm going to keep showing the views until the group finally departs about ten minutes after the hour. This is so that Cassie and friends can go to an Internet cafe in Dublin tomorrow, log onto my blog and see themselves (and laugh).

DublinBridge4

2008-03-02T16:36:00.006-07:00

DublinBridge4, originally uploaded by imscheid.

If you are tired of looking at Cassie and friends, check out the Irish traffic in the background.

DublinBridge5

2008-03-02T16:36:00.005-07:00

DublinBridge5, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge6

2008-03-02T16:36:00.003-07:00

DublinBridge6, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge7

2008-03-02T16:36:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge7, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge8

2008-03-02T16:35:00.008-07:00

DublinBridge8, originally uploaded by imscheid.

The pedestrian light must have just changed. Sudden big crowd on the bridge. Who's the little red jacket person near Cassie?

DublinBridge9

2008-03-02T16:35:00.005-07:00

DublinBridge9, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge10

2008-03-02T16:34:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge10, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge11

2008-03-02T16:33:00.003-07:00

DublinBridge11, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge12

2008-03-02T16:33:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge12, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge13

2008-03-02T16:32:00.003-07:00

DublinBridge13, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge14

2008-03-02T16:32:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge14, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge15

2008-03-02T16:31:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge15, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge16

2008-03-02T16:30:00.003-07:00

DublinBridge16, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge17

2008-03-02T16:30:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge17, originally uploaded by imscheid.

DublinBridge2

2008-03-02T14:45:00.001-07:00

DublinBridge2, originally uploaded by imscheid.

Cassie at DublinBridge via webcam

2008-03-02T14:44:00.002-07:00

DublinBridge01, originally uploaded by imscheid.

Uncyclopedia on Librarians

2008-02-28T20:56:00.003-07:00

Well, I started my Wiki homework by clicking on everything clickable on our Lesson page.
http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Librarian

The link above was something I clicked on while browsing the Bull Run Library wiki. (A definition of "librarians" from the Uncyclopedia that was too funny not to share...)

Bad News...Good News

2008-02-28T20:03:00.003-07:00

The bad news is that I'm two weeks behind in my lessons. The good news is that I didn't die, or even get sick... Just had way too much other stuff happening.

The bad news is that our library has had a pathetic Young Adult section ever since I started working here. The good news is that our new director has gotten approval for a Young Adult position, which will actually be a shared position among three current staff members (I'm one.) We're pretty excited about the possibilities, and can hardly wait to start brain-storming.

The bad news is that our shifts at the library rarely overlap, so having planning sessions seems difficult-to-impossible. The good news is that through some of these new tools we're learning (like del.icio.us and wikis), we can have an ongoing discussion and feed on each other's energy and ideas. So I actually did set up a del.icio.us account today, then went out web surfing for Young Adult ideas (programming, web pages, advisory councils), posting and tagging as I went.

The bad news is that I couldn't spend more time on it because it was last week's lesson and this is this week. The good news is that our next lesson is on Wikis, and one of my YA-sharing partners told me she thought Wikis would be a cool tool for us for this new job share.

The bad news is that I'm signing off now, and the good news is you don't have to read any more of this.

Conan the Librarian

2008-02-11T18:08:00.000-07:00

I can't believe I found one of my favorite all-time clips, from the 1989 movie UHF (with Wierd Al Yankovic)

Podcast Prayers Answered

2008-02-07T10:15:00.001-07:00

I looked at our new lesson on podcasts early in the week, went out to the podcast sites. Nothing looked interesting to me. I thought "I wonder if you can get NPR." (National Public Radio) It is just about the only thing I always enjoy listening to. But a search for it came up empty.

Then, lo and behold! This morning I thought I'd better do something for this week's lesson, but as always I started by checking my bloglines to see what other people were doing with this lesson. In addition to following fellow librarians blogs, one of the other blogs I subscribed to is called Montana Bibliotechies. And there was the link for adding NPR podcast to your blog!!!

Also, a Bibliotechie post from earlier this week was totally related to podcasting and making it a useful tool for libraries. It included some way more interesting podcast suggestions than I had been able to find on my own.

Here's the link: http://mtbibliotechie.blogspot.com/2008/02/more-on-video-podcasts.html

And here's to lovers of NPR everywhere:

Add NPR to your page

(from Library Thing)

2008-02-02T19:35:00.001-07:00

New Me?

2008-01-31T20:46:00.000-07:00

Here is some of the fun I had on http://hairmixer.com.

The first photo on the left is me borrowing the hair of Bonita, a college friend of my daughter Cassie's.

On the far right is me in Dame Judi Dench's hair. I think I could go for that look. It seems to look pretty good on women "of a certain age." But I hope I wouldn't need the earrings to have the look-- too pinchy, I think.

This cool generator also gives you a magazine cover featuring you in your new hairdo. And a nice little email button so you can send the results to yourself (or to your daughter's friend...)

The Three Faces of Me

2008-01-29T17:20:00.000-07:00

This was just too crazy not to share!

I've long been fascinated with that right-face/left-face concept, but before now all we could do was hold a piece of paper over one side of our face at a time. Now I can clearly see that half of me smiles better than the other half. (And how about that cowlick?)

Anyway, I really need a new hairstyle, so I'll be hunting down that generator for my next experiment in craziness.

P.S. Here's the website where you can do the face symmetry thing: http://www.pichacks.com/

Glut !

2008-01-26T18:26:00.000-07:00

I wasn't going to add a new post today. I was just trying to read more info about how Bloglines worked.
And then this one sentence caught my eye: "Tell a friend how Bloglines has helped you manage Internet information glut!" Actually, it wasn't the whole sentence that caught my eye-- just that one word-- GLUT.
Isn't that a great word? Just the physical act of saying it out loud makes you feel like what the word means.
Anyway, glut pretty well describes how I feel about the whole Internet experience. Maybe even how I feel about the whole modern-day world that we live in. Just too much -- stuff, information, clothes in my closet, activity, you name it... Just too much!
In the next half of my life, I'm going to try to get rid of all the baggage that I've accumulated in the first half. "Less is more" will be my motto. (I'll probably start on this new philosophy right after I go shopping tomorrow.)

Montana Library Photos

2008-01-24T20:02:00.001-07:00

Book Arch at Bicentennial Library, originally uploaded by lmcmullen.

Well, one thing I learned with this week's lesson is that Flickr is not spelled "flicker." New age spelling, I guess...
I pict a kool foto to put heer in my blog.

(Thanks to Lauren McMullen for lots of fun pictures of the many faces of Montana libraries! This one is from the Bicentennial Library, but I don't know where in Montana that is... Lauren?)

Library of Congress is Flickering

2008-01-17T19:36:00.000-07:00

It seems amazing to me that I never even heard of Flicker last week, won't even learn about it until next week's lesson, but today when I got onto my bloglines site to see how my "feeds" were doing, I found out that the Library of Congress, that venerable old institution, is joining the modern age just like I am!

It seems that the LOC is going to make available on Flicker some 171,000 photo images that the general public can access, and people can even tag them (which I don't know what means at this point, but I figure if it's good enough for the Library of Congress, it's good enough for me.)

So I went out to the LOC's Flicker site:
My Friend Flickr: A Match Made in Photo Heaven

I clicked on the 30's-40's color collection, which had 1615 images in it. There are probably 20 or 30 little images per page for 27 pages, and you can run your cursor over the little images to find out where they were taken, and of course you can double-click on them if you want to see one up close and personal. I want you to know that I gave the quick-scan to all 27 pages, and was rewarded on page 25 with Butte, Montana. One shot taken looking over the city from the vantage point of the Big M, and then numerous shots of a junk/salvage yard in Butte. (Remember that this is war years, and metal recycling was doing one's part for the war effort.)

There are some Beaverhead County photos there, too, and a few others from various places in the state. Anyway, afterwards I thought about how long it had taken me to to look at those 1615 little images in haste, and then I tried to make the mental leap to 171,000 images. (I think that's what the Library of Congress was thinking, too, when they decided to throw it out to the public for help in identification, clarification, etc...)

Don't you just love technology???

Blogs + Libraries = Neat Stuff!

2008-01-16T22:27:00.000-07:00

This RSS feeding is a totally new concept for me, but I set up my bloglines account, and started looking for interesting things to have "fed" to me.

I added a "Word of the Day" to keep my vocabulary up-to-snuff. I didn't add any news feeds, because I am old-fashioned about liking to read the news in a newspaper with my coffee in the morning (even though we in Butte often refer to our hometown newspaper as the Montana Substandard).

Then I started looking at some library-related sites, and with a click-click here and a click-click there, the next thing I knew I was reading this interesting article about how Public Libraries could make use of weblogs. About the middle of the article (in the section called Why Weblogs in Public Libraries?) the author lists some really neat possibilities for using this kind of technology. Here is the link for anybody else who is interested:
www.ala.org/ala/pla/plapubs/epublications/weblogs.cfm

It made me say Yeah! Cool! We could do this!

The Bane of my Existence...

2008-01-12T22:25:00.000-07:00

I've decided that Lifelong Learning is the bane of my existence. It is the reason my house is so cluttered, that my schedule is so full, and that I never seem to get anything done.
The problem, I'm afraid, is that there's nothing that doesn't interest me. My energies are scattered around all the things I love doing.

So the habit I think will be the hardest for me is good old #1: Begin with the end in mind. The end, of course, isn't the final day of this class or the last lesson I complete. The end, rather, is what I hope to achieve by taking this challenge. Do I want to be blogging away for the rest of my life? I don't think so! But would I like to be able to create a classy website? Know how to share family info and photos better? Keep in touch with my tech-savvy kids? Yep, I sure would!

Habit that's the easiest for me? #4: I have incredible confidence in myself as a competent learner. (It's the bane of my existence.) I never want to hire an attorney, because I know I can figure out all that legalese myself. I never want to pay money for classy clothes, because I know I could figure out how to sew them myself. Plumbing? Electrical? Furniture refinishing? If there's a book about it in the library (and there always is), I figure I can teach myself just about anything.

I would like a few more hours in the day, and maybe an extra room or two in my house, and as long as I'm wishing, how about a housekeeper and a cook thrown in?

or maybe it's ... Lifelong Learning - Aha!

2008-01-05T22:10:00.000-07:00

I'm not gonna lie to you-- this old brain spends a lot of time staring at the computer screen trying to remember things.
Like, for example "What exactly was the assignment? Am I supposed to be telling about my favorite habit, or was it my best habit, or was it the habit I most admire?"
I spend a lot of time minimizing the screen I'm on and going back to some previous page I saw somewhere.
Maybe it's because I'm trying to do this at bedtime. Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow morning, refreshed and full of creative insights, and say something inspiring.
Or not.
Stay tuned (if you can bear the suspense...)

Lifelong Learning -Hah!

2008-01-04T21:39:00.000-07:00

Well, here I am, creating a blog!
I have pretty mixed feelings about it. I watch young people (my own and others) texting and blogging and facebooking away, and I honestly don't think the world is a better place because of it.

But there's that Bob Dylan song from my youth:
"Come mothers and fathers throughout the land
And don't criticize what you can't understand.
Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command,
Your old world is rapidly aging.
So get out of the new one if you can't lend a hand,
For the times they are a-changing."

So... I hope I don't live long enough to see the total demise of printed material. But while my brain still works at all, I feel I ought to try to understand (before I criticize) this new world, and maybe even to "lend a hand."