Commoncraft does it again. Twitter in Plain English is a great explanation of why Twitter is so popular. What are YOU doing? 140 characters or less please.
Social Networking
Social networking for gardeners – myfolia.com
There are social networking sites out there for every interest. Well, at least there are for most of my interests. 
Even though I’m not much of a knitter, I enjoy lurking at ravelry.com. And now there’s myfolia.com. I didn’t go looking for this site, it found me through flickr. Social networking connecting me with more social networking! myfolia connects you with gardeners in your growing zone and around the world. Share photos of your garden from flickr. Share your gardening notes and more. I’m really looking forward to exploring this one some more.
Evaluating Web Content – in the age of blogs, wikis & social networking
Laura Cohen and Trudi Jacobson (U of Albany Libraries) have put together a terrific new guide to Evaluating Web Content, with particular attention being paid to blogs, wikis, social networking, multimedia sources and more.
10 years ago, Trudi and Laura collaborated on what I’ve always considered the definitive guide to evaluating web content. Their new guide is equally invaluable.
From Laura’s blog post Evaluating Web Content in the 2.0 Era:
“In a way, it’s fair to say that evaluative criteria don’t really change based on the type of site or material encountered. While this may be true, it’s also the case that students need help with looking for cues in different types of environments. In fact, some students aren’t even sure what they’re looking at.”
Making Friends
Here I am, sitting all alone in my home office. It’s just me and the fish. I used to feel pretty isolated working alone. No longer. I have so many friends and colleagues right at my fingertips.
Sure, I have my email running all day long. But that doesn’t feel as immediate as it used to. And I have to confess, IM is just a bit TOO immediate and distracting for this over 50 brain. What I do rely on are (more…)
NYLA – Social Networking Tools PreConference
Jill Hurst-Wahl presented a full day session on social networking tools at the New York Library Association meeting. She filled presented all sorts of terrific ideas for using social networking tools in libraries and answered many interesting questions from the participants. She encouraged everyone to experiment with the tools and consider how they might help libraries connect with patrons and each other, share content and collaborate.
Specific tools discussed included:
- Skype
- LibraryThing
- slideshare
- YouTube
- delicious
- Google Docs
- Zoho
Other topics included wikis, blogs, rss readers, mashups and much more. It was a very full day! From the great questions and ideas from the audience, it seemed everyone found some interesting new ideas to take away. During breaks many people were sharing ideas for ways these tools could help them in their libraries. As one participant stated at the end of the session: “I just have so many ideas and projects in mind now.”
Jill’s slides are available at: http://www.hurstassociates.com/ppt/nyla2007.ppt
