Learning 2.0 Week 12 - Wrap; social networks and catch up.

I believe that social networks do have a place in the public library sphere. There exist many opportunities to create networks in many different areas of interests. My library has a number of book groups extended over the various library branches. Each of these groups can create their own social network sites to communicate with each other - within groups and between groups. Another idea is to have a "Friends of the Library" network, where library members can discuss among themselves and with the staff ideas and direction that the library should focus on. Other social networking groups include local studies, children story time and playgroup, family history. All of these different social networks can help promote the library with the broader online community, attracting new users and members. The library can also use these groups to promote its own resources and facilities as well.

Wrap up:
I final come to the end of this course. It has been a long trip. I've learnt a lot about the wide array of resources and facilities the the Internet has available to promote, obtain and use information. I, for one, will continually using all the online facilities that I have learnt about and signed up to for both work and pleasure.

Learning 2.0 Week 11 - online applications

I see online applications like zoho-docs, google-docs, slide share etc as assisting library staff members to create and share with each other information that they can use within the library. The public library I work at has a number of committees that focus on a particular area of interest that provide a service to the public. I'm a member of the readers advisory committee, and I think that myself and fellow committee members can create documents covering various ideas and proposals and share them with each other. This would allow all members on the committee to comment and add their own ideas. Then, at our next monthly meeting wee can access the finished document and discuss it further. Therefore, an online application like google docs allows for the creating, contributing and sharing of ideas and have a common place to access it. A great tool!

Learning 2.0 Week 10 - Mash-ups

I see mash-ups as a new way to present information on the web. From location to highlighting various services. A public library service can easily use mash-ups to show the location of it main branch on its web site - or, if it has multiple branches, the location of all of its branches, using the Google maps tool. A mash-up can have four categories - video/photo, mapping, searching, news - all four of these categories can be put to use to highlight the various services a library provides. I can see the local studies librarians using mash-ups to present areas of historical interests in the local area, providing a map location, photo or video and a voice thread commentary. Also, local studies can apply this to family history, so users can locate various parts around the world and in Australia, where their relations have lived. Mash-ups can help promote the library and be used by library users for their own information needs.

Learning 2.0 Week 9 - Podcasts and Audio

What a great way to distribute and catch-up on audio information - especially if you didn't have the opportunity to listen to a specific broadcast first-hand. It enables many forms of communication - from radio broadcasts, lectures, talks and discussions - readily available to anyone with a MP3 player, ipod or computer.
Public libraries can utilise podcasts and audio casts within their scope of providing information freely to the public. This can cover many areas, ranging from author talks, lectures and story time activities. These can be recorded and placed onto the library's website for the public to download. Again, it's another way to provide and access information.

Week 8 Answer boards and Social searching

I do see a number of ways a public library can use 'Answer boards' and 'Social Searching' to benefit library users. While I think Answer boards do have a place, they shouldn't be use exclusively by librarians but as a last resort if they can't find information within their libraries own book or electronic resources.
There may be times when a librarian may need to use an Answer board website if the enquiry is one that is very specialised or broad and the librarian can't locate any information to satisfactorily answer the question. The Librarian can use the "Slamming the boards' website to find the answer.
Libraries can also place links on their own website to Answer board websites, so library patrons can use and ask questions and obtain answers for themselves. Then user can, if they want more information, use the library's own catalogue to search and locate the information. This would help in the area of general reference and/or specific reference questions and specialised reference questions.
With 'social searching', this could be used by libraries to assist patrons in choosing resources. An example can be with 'Amazon' with its features 'Customers who bought this item also bought' and 'Customer reviews'. Libraries can use these features to see what authors write similar books which would assist patrons looking for new authors who write books similar to one they like. This would be good for readers' advisory service. For library patrons, reading the customer reviews can provide them an insight to books they may like to read as well. Library book groups can also use a service like this to get ideas for future books to read and the customer reviews can be used for discussion points for book groups.
Libraries, thus, could incorporate both Answer boards and social searching to aid library patrons in finding information - especially reference enquiries and selecting reading material.

Week 7 Tagging, Folksonomies, etc

I can see a number of uses in a public library for Tagging, folksonomies, del.icio.us, and Library Thing.
With Library Thing, book groups, like the ones being run at Hornsby library and its branches, can each set up an account, whereby, they can keep a list of what books each individual group has read over the previous year. Also, these books groups could establish there own blogs so each member of the group can post about the book they have read for that month. This Library Thing account and blog can then be linked to the library's own website and members of a book group who couldn't attend a meeting can still keep up-to-date with their fellow members. Also, once these blogs are established they can be registered with Technorati and be linked with other book group blogs. This will allow for more varied ideas, views and opinions to be shared, especially with other libraries and other book groups.
A public library can, using del.icio.us, can create tags to highlight specific collections and resources. Users can click on the tags they're interested in and find a list of items that the library has on that subject.An example being 'Hornsby Flora' and a list of resources on the native flora of Hornsby can listed so users know what resources they can access to find out more about the native flora of the Hornsby area. It would also be good for displays, especially in the junior collection, as themes and subjects for school projects or general interest, can be listed under these tags. This can also be applied for students studying for the Higher School Certificate. Students can create tags to list resources that they can use for study, especially websites and databases that can aid their studies. Again, these tags can be linked to the library's own website for access.
Thus, one can see that there are a number of possible uses for tagging for a public library to promote and provide wider access to its resources, both print and electronic, for a variety of users of the library and to make accessing these resources more user friendly.

Week 6 Video online.

I finally managed to place a online video onto my blog. I did it a month or two ago but didn't write about it on my blog. But it's there under my week 5 entry about wikis. Please have a look.