Geocahshing

I have to admit I had never heard of Geocashing and it appears to have been going for sometime now. WA Cashing is holding its 10th anniversary in Albany next year! Well although I love the outdoors and hiking, this isn't for me. I don't have a GPS and my mobile is soooo dated I wouldn't be able to get it enabled anyway. So no practice for me, but I do get the idea. Looks like it might be something for the mainly post baby generation folks whose equipment is more up to date.
In our libraries one possible use could be a local history treasure hunt.


Wrap Up
Well I'm glad I have completed the course (well I think I have even if not in time to be eligible for a prize)and I have to take off my hat to Mel and Mark for the fantastic job they have done. Your enthusiasm and thoroughness are to be commended.
I have been a tad negative in some of my comments and this is no reflection to your organisation. I just feel we should have given staff a little more time, particularly part-timers. Added to this was the fact that it all took far more time to do than I think we had anticipated, particularly at Ellenbrook and Bullsbrook.I did the bulk of the course at home and I only have a very slow connection. So doing things like adding photos took literally hours.
I'm not sure making it compulsory was the right way to go. Personally I found having to do 5 blog comments per week a bit of a chore and I feel I had had enough practice after 10!

Podcasting

At last one for me!!!!!!!!!!! I love podcasts, and have been listening to them for at least 4-5 years. I download a heap of podcasts- all ABC ones and listen to them on my MP3 player on my morning walks. I listen to the Health Report, the Law Report, Rear Vision, Hindsight, Big Ideas and Backgrounf Briefing. It is a great way of catching up on issues that interest me at a time which suits me.
I've tried to watch the Librarian Militant, Librarian Triumphant, but it is taking too long to download - will have to do another time.

Online videos

Well, let's have a go at this one

Gastowm steam clock in Vancouver



Isn't this cute. Saw it when we were in Vancouver recently. This is old technology. And we all flock to see it. Wonder what people in 100 years will be thinking of some of our current technology

Now what use could we make of video online in libraries? Once again as a marketing tool, a training tool. Just like all the video clips we have watched doing this course - we could have mini videos of how to use the catalogue, how to search our online data bases. If we had a blogsite we could add snippets of recent library events.

Facebook and Twitter

Well Facebook isn't my thing. Will probably spend a bit of time trying to find some long lost friends. But as to actually using it as a social network, this old luddite prefers the old telephone and email. Its application to our work is another thing. It certainly can be used as a great marketing tool. Once again though it will require a commitment to ensuring it is constantly updated and monitored and that requires time. It is good to see the younger staff in our library showing initiative and drive to embrace Facebook as a marketing tool. We may have to look at what else we are currently doing that needs to be scaled back in order to provide the time needed to make the Facebook tool effective.

Well I'm now tweeting. My kids will be horrified - even they don't tweet. Forgot to tweet yesterday. Well that is my assessment down the tube. I can see the value in these networks for some people and it could be an interesting marketing tool, but for me no. I really don't have the need to be in that sort of immediate all the time contact with friends or family. There are some theories going round that email will die a natural death because of things such as twitter. But I can’t see that happening for sometime. The baby boomer generation are addicted to their email – in the main.

Library Thing

Well I have spent soooooooooooooooo much time trying to add a widget to this blog - to no avail- just get comments like 'URL contains illegal characters, that I am giving up'. I can see the possible applications of tagging in the library especially for reference work, for those 'repeat' questions. Great application possibilities for the school side of our community libraries.
I was going to call this week's blog Home Valley and post my ongoing Kimberley photo, but it all takes so long (especially from home) - probably 30 minutes or so and I have already spent a good hour on this widget thing........................
Here we go again
Some books in my library
Wow my first widget!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks Claire

Tagging

Tagging is something which could obviously prove very useful, and I can see myself using Delicious if I were prepared to spend time making the necessary tags. But for now just using favourites suits me fine. Yes – I know I could lose them if the computer crashed. But in the end Delicious has ‘disappeared’ which is as good/bad as the computer crashing.
I can see great applications for tagging in the school library environment in particular. All those regular subjects and projects could be ‘indexed’, making life much easier for the teacher librarian to retrieve sites and add to them.

Chamberlain Gorge

We hired a boat to get up this gorge. No swimming - crocs around.

On a heavier note, Wikis was my learning task this week. Well that I can see some application for internally for the libraries. Among other things, it would be a great place for procedure manuals. I belong to a cooking ‘club’ which meets monthly and we spend the day cooking around a theme such as preserves, pasta, Christmas goodies etc. I did think starting a Wiki for the group could be useful as we planned each session, and we could keep a record of what we had made, the recipes, photos etc. And who knows, I might get around to doing it one day!