Final thoughts

Wasn't it only a couple of weeks ago that we had the launch party at the Judge?? How time flies. I read through my previous posts just to remind myself of what I said and I seem to have promised to investigate quite a few Things for the new academic year. Oh dear, time is not on my side. However, if they can't be achieved by then, at least I have had a taster and can come back to investigate further.

Here are my thoughts about some of the Things (with links to my previous posts):
iGoogle - I still use it to gather all my favourite sites together and I will continue to do so.
Google Calendar - this is now being used by the Cambridge Librarians CamTools User Education group (which I'm a member of).
Flickr - I want to explore this further & add pictures of the Education Library for a possible virtual tour.
Slideshare - I will be looking at this over the next few weeks for inspiration for library inductions!
Podcasting - When I have the luxury of more time (ha ha), I would love to dabble with podcasts.
Facebook - still on the peripheral and tempting me after seeing how other libraries use it, but is this just a duplication of information which is already available and yet another site to maintain?
LinkedIn - I'm not planning to use this, but it's good to know what other professionals are using it for.
Twitter - Our Library has an account, but I won't be using it for myself.
LibraryThing - Fun to set up, but not particularly useful for Education as we have lists of new books available on CamTools.
Zotero - I now understand how this works!

A wide range of Web 2.0 technologies have been considered for Cam23. With all the possibilities, it's very easy to rush into using as many tools as possible to connect with our readers. But there has to be a balance between keeping up with what our readers are using to access information, and providing the information they need. I have mentioned CamTools in just about every post, but it really does help us to provide resources to all Education students. And as Faculty students are registered onto the Library CamTools site when they start their course, we have a captive audience! Saying that, I hope this final post doesn't make me sound blinkered or set in my ways. I have enjoyed looking at the Things and I've relished the opportunity this programme has given me to think 'outside the box' and to see what potential each tool may have for the Library service and for me as a professional. I wanted to do the following during my Cam23 journey:

1. Work with other colleagues within the University
2. Learn more about Web 2.0 technologies
3. Discover what tools could be used to improve services to readers

With confidence, I can tick all 3!

And to finish, here's my pretty Wordle:

LibraryThing

My own (not so) private Library

LibraryThing was very easy to set up and fun to add titles. I hadn't heard of it before Cam23 so I found some of the links which Kirsty encouraged us to read quite interesting. For example, the Social networking for Bookworms article suggests that LibraryThing can "connect likeminded readers - a sort of MySpace for bookworms", with the emphasis on finding more books and "not to kindle online relationships or cliques". Tagging is of course a strong element of many Web 2.0 technologies & LibraryThing is no exception, with librarians tagging their own books to "create indexes far more vibrant than anything the Library of Congress could handle".

Here's a screen shot of my profile page:


And here is the list of books I have added so far...

Use for Libraries?
I've had a look at those libraries which already use LibraryThing (Central Science & Nuffield College), but I'm not sure if it's for us at the moment. Here at Education we use CamTools to list books from reading lists or titles which have recently been added to stock. These lists include pictures of the front cover, plus a link to Newton to check if the book is available.

By the way, I liked a couple of the quotes from What do Librarians do? - "Information Ninja" & "I'm what Google wants to be when it grows up" are ones I would like to add to my name badge for the new academic year!!

Google Calendar

A new Thing for me

I hadn't come across Google Calendar until I was researching it for my blog post for Thing 6. It's been very interesting to see how other libraries are using it to advertise opening hours (especially if they have several branch libraries) and publicise events, and it started me wondering whether the Education Library would find it useful or not. You're able to embed the Calendar into web pages so it could be an alternative display for our opening hours. I'm also curious to see if it can be embedded within our CamTools sites - more investigation is needed...

My Google Calendar is looking like this at the moment:

I've added some of my meetings to the Calendar, with a reminder to be sent to me by e-mail. For fun, I have the weather icons displayed at the top of the columns & I have added the World Cup 2010 calendar!

Useful for the Library?

I had thought Google Calendar could be an alternative to the Weekly Sheet which we have available on the Library staff CamTools - it details staff hours, the lunch rota, events & meetings. But I think all this information would make the Calendar a little over-crowded and difficult to read. However, I will continue to use Google Calendar for meetings and events that I'm involved in. I might look into creating a general Library Calendar to add details of all the inductions we run in the Michaelmas Term as Library staff may find it an easier way to check when we will be busy with new registrations.

Doodle & scheduling meetings

I have come across Doodle a few times as it's used by other Librarians to arrange meetings, but I haven't used it myself before this Thing. It was very easy to set up and use which is probably why it's so popular.

The optional extras were meet-o-matic (I have used it in the past to organise Library Advisory Group meetings) and Tungle which is new to me. I registered my details with Tungle (this didn't take very long) - I think it is a better looking scheduler and I liked how you could 'paint' your availability onto it!


I have synced my Google Calendar to both Doodle and Tungle (for those of you who haven't come across Google Calendar, fear not as this is explained in Thing 6), and I will experiment with using both to see how they may be used for work.