You did it! Wow – congratulations!! You’ve reached the 23rd thing. Be sure to give yourself a pat on the back “POB” for completing the program. Your reward for completing this journey before the January 23rd deadline is a useful and handy MP3. But before sending this off to you, we need you to fill out an evaluation form of this program.

Exercise:

1. Please fill out the evaluation form for CTLS’s 23 Things Program. This is where you’ll specify whether you want an mp3 player or gift card to Best Buy, and also give us an address to mail the incentives and ce certificate off to.

Optional: In your final blog entry for 23 Things, please reflect on your learning journey and post a few thoughts. Here are some questions to prompt you if you’re drawing a blank …

• What were your favorite discoveries or exercises on this learning journey?
• How has this program assisted or affected your lifelong learning goals?
• Were there any take-aways or unexpected outcomes from this program that surprised you?
• What could we do differently to improve upon this program’s format or concept?And last but not least…
• If we offered another discovery program like this in the future, would you again chose to participate?

And finally, thank you so much for participating in this life-long learning adventure.  We hope this is the beginning (or continuation) of a beautiful friendship between you and Web 2.0 technologies!

Thanks again, CTLS

The library staff species is well-known for its love of books. And this love doesn’t stop at the written word, no. It encompasses books on tape, books on cd, and now…downloadable audiobooks!

With your new MP3 player right around the corner, you might want to start thinking of how you can get those beloved books to play on it.  If your library uses NetLibrary or OverDrive, then that is a great place to start. But realizing that not everyone will have this, I would like you to check out Librivox, a website where volunteers record themselves reading books from the public domain and then upload them for your downloading convenience. You can download the books through iTunes, subscribe to the book in an RSS feed, sign up for a chapter-a-day in your email inbox, download each chapter, or download the whole book in a zip file (which is a compressed file that will need to be “unzipped” or uncompressed once on your computer — winzip is an example of a zip program). I have listened to many a Sherlock Holmes mystery, turn-of-the-century mysteries, all the Jane Austens you can shake a stick at, some E.M. Forster, G.K. Chesterton, and I think I might tackle Tom Jones next.

You might also want to take a look at http://www.podiobooks.com/ – not a huge site and much of it is science fiction, but all the books published there are free to download.  I liked Singularity and How to Disappear Completely — both books are read by their authors.

What are podcasts and vidcasts?

Watch the short video to get an overview of podcasting.

The word podcast is used to refer to a audio or video broadcast that is distributed over the Internet. Sometimes people call the video broadcasts vidcasts.

You don’t have to have an iPod or a MP3 player to listen to podcasts. You can listen to them right on your PC or Mac. You’ll need headphones or a speaker and the ability/permission to download – check with your tech support.

Who creates podcasts?

• Traditional radio broadcasters like NPR and BBC
• Television stations like CNN for news and lots of t.v. shows have official podcasts where producers, directors and actors give insight into the show (Here’s ABC’s official Ugly Betty podcast, as an example.)
• Libraries and library systems: Librarian Live is a weekly podcast produced by the North Texas Regional Library System, Central Texas Library System, Alamo Area Library System, and the Northeast Texas Library System. We make it just for you!
• Anybody with a microphone, a computer, and an Internet connection that has something to say and share. The possibilities are endless when you think about all the wonderful authors to be interviewed, museum exhibits to discuss, scientific advancements to share, live music to listen to (KUT 90.5fm does a Texas Music Matters segment that they’re calling a feed, but it’s an audio podcast. They have more out there “feeds” out there, too!)

Discovery Exercise
 

1. Take a look at one or two of the podcast directories listed below and see if you can find a podcast that interests you. Hint: you can type in the word library to find library podcasts.

• Podcast.com
• Podcastalley.com
• Yahoo Podcasts - but what an unhelpful interface!
• Educational Podcast Directory
• Or if you have iTunes installed on your computer (free to do), look them up through the iTunes store. The podcasts are still free even though it’s a “store” — or just about all of them, anyway! (More on iTunes below.)
• You can also go directly to a site (like NPR or CNN or Scientific American) and look through their treasure trove of podcasts there

    2.   Listen to one (or more) podcast that you find.
    3.   Blog about the podcast. Did you find anything useful?

If you find a podcast you enjoy, you might want to subscribe to it, so that you don’t miss an episode. Use RSS or one of the podcast subscription services software services listed above to subscribe.

Why should you know about podcasts and vidcasts?

With the introduction of mobile devices like the iPod, mp3 player and and phones like the iPhone, the world of the web is becoming more and more portable. People want:

• Opt-in
• Mobile
• On demand

Podcasts fit the bill perfectly!

• I subscribe to what I want (opt-in)
• I can take it with me (mobile)
• I get updates automatically through a subscription, or grab off the web 24/7/365 (on demand)

Think about it! People could subscribe to a podcast about library events that comes out once a week or today’s events that comes out every day (I realize that’s way ambitious). They can get the podcast automatically through software specially designed for this (see next section), and they can listen to it on the go.

About Podcast Subscription Software

For convenience, you can subscribe to your favorite podcasts and have them automatically downloaded to your podcast subscription software (see below) each time a podcast is updated.

iTunes is one way to subscribe to podcasts. iTunes is a free download, and works on both PCs and Macs. Some other free software player options include Juice and Odeo. Once you select and download your software, follow the instructions on how to subscribe to podcasts. After the podcast files are downloaded, they can be transferred to your mp3 player, if you have one.

You can also subscribe to a podcast in an RSS reader, so that you are alerted when a new podcast is posted on your favorite site. Find out more about RSS & RSS readers here.

Library pod/vidcasts

• Stories for kids on Denver Public Library’s site
• Library events for teens by teens on Seattle Public Library’s site
• Educational lectures on Kentucky University Libraries‘ site.

More information for the curious

Make your own podcasts!
Want to make your own podcast and share it on the web? Look at these sites for free software and hints on creating podcasts. As always, add any podcasts you create to your blog.

• How to Podcast
• Create Your Own Podcast
• Audacity is a free cross-platform software for recording and editing sounds–podcasting!

YouTube
The video on this page was embedded from YouTube, which allows you to subscribe to their favorite channels, which makes YouTube a podcasting (or vidcasting) service. And to make YouTube even more fabulous, you can embed video from YouTube to blogs, wikis, websites, and social websites, like Facebook.

Why “podcast?”
The word “podcast” comes from the combination of iPod + broadcast. iPods were the first portable devices that had scripts that allowed podcasts to be automatically transferred to the device.

If you’ve ever seen a YouTube video like the one below, you’ve experienced video sharing.

The good, the bad, and the illegally downloaded are on YouTube for all to see, which is one reason many districts and libraries block YouTube. Another reason is bandwidth—like music, video is a bandwidth hog. We recommend you complete this exercise during light Internet usage times.

YouTube revolutionized the way video is shared on the Internet by making it easy to upload and share videos. Other video sites have popped up, including Google Video, and now Flickr allows video.
Do some searching around YouTube yourself and see what the site has to offer. You’ll find everything from 1970s TV commercials and 60s music videos to library dominos and kids singing about bloopers here. Of course, like any free site you’ll also find a lot stuff not worth watching too. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t explore and see for yourself what the site has too offer.
 

Discovery Exercise:

1. Explore YouTube & find a video worth adding as an entry in your blog.
2. Create a blog post about your experience. What did you like or dislike about the site and why did you choose the video that you did? Can you see any features or components of the site that might be interesting if they were applied to library websites?

OPTIONAL: Try placing the video inside your blog using the copy and paste code for the for “Embeddable Player.”

Other popular video hosting sites:

• Yahoo Videos
• Google videos
• Others – top video site list

Why should you know about video sharing?

It’s popular
According to PEW (don’t you just love PEW?), 57% of internet users have watched videos online and most of them share what they find with others. 74% of broadband users watch or download video online. And those stats are over a year old (July 2007), so you know they have to be higher now.

*heart*
People love video. You love video. Admit it. And you’ve had someone, somewhere, send you a link to an online video. That’s the sharing aspect.

There’s more than one way to share
Of course, there are other ways of sharing. By embedding the video on this page, I’ve shared it with you. I can also share it on other social sites, like Facebook, MySpace, Digg and others. YouTube has these handy “share” buttons that make this whole sharing business pretty easy. If you want more information about embedding, see this blog entry:
Embed Your YouTube Videos With Cool Skin Flix Skins.

Trash and treasure
Of course, you’ll also find a lot stuff not worth watching. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t explore and see for yourself what the video sites have to offer. You can see your favorite band playing live (somewhere, somebody recorded it), or catch an interview with an actor you like, or groan over so bad they’re good movie clips (“Nobody puts Baby in the corner“, anyone?).

How Libraries are using Video
Think about the possibility of sharing library information via video. Lots of libraries are doing this already.

• promote a program (Round Rock Public Library’s Sail Away with Books Reading Program)
• introduce your library to the community
• something else

Here’s a video created for the TexShare Databases that you might have also seen:

More information for the curious

Want to make your own videos? Find out how:

• Making and Optimizing Your Videos from YouTube

Feeling brave?
Make your own video and upload it to YouTube or Google Video. If you do, be sure to link it in the comments section below. We all want to see it!

Throughout the course of this 23 Things program we’ve explored just a small sampling of these new Internet technologies and websites that are empowering users with the ability to create and share content. But given time there are so many more we could explore.

For this discovery exercise, participants are asked to select any site from this list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees and explore it. With so many to choose from, it might be handy to first select a category that interests you (like Books or Personal Organization) and then simply select a tool/site to explore. Be careful to select a tool that is Free and that doesn’t require a plug-in or download. The majority of these free, so this shouldn’t be a problem.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Select any site/tool from the list of Web 2.0 Awards nominees. (If you prefer to select from just the winners, here’s a link to the short list.)
2. Explore the site you selected.
3. Create a post about your discovery. What did you like or dislike about the tool? What were the site’s useful features? Could you see any applications for its use in a library setting?

Web 2.0 – with so much to explore, try to start with just one.

The availability and use of online productivity web-based applications (think word processing and spreadsheets) has exploded over the past several years, with good reason. These powerful applications provide users with the ability to create and share documents over the Internet without the need of installed desktop applications. Some experts speculate that this emerging trend may mean the death to traditional software-based productivity tools, while others think web-based applications have their place, but not in the office. But no matter which side of the office suite platform you side with, on this both sides seem to agree; web-based apps have their place, especially for public access computer patrons.

One large benefit to web-based applications it that they eliminate the need to worry about different software versions or file types as you email documents or move from PC to PC. Another bonus is that they easily accommodate collaboration by allowing multiple users to edit the same file (with versioning) and provide users the ability to save and convert documents as multiple file types (including HTML and pdf). And, you can even use many of these tools, such as Zoho Writer and Google Docs to author and publish posts to your blog. It’s this type of integration with other web 2.0 tools that also makes web-based apps so appealing. And if your patrons still want the Microsoft Office suite, they can create a free account at Microsoft’s Office Live Workspace and get all the benefits of it being web-based (hey, Microsoft didn’t want to become obsolete next to all these web-based apps, so they stepped up to the plate and delivered their own web-based version).

Still isn’t making too much sense? Here’s a Google Docs in Plain English if you need some clarification:

For this discovery exercise, you guys are asked to take a look at a web-based word processing tool called Zoho Writer, create a simple document and then document your discoveries in your blog. If you prefer to use Google Docs, no problem — feel free to use it. If you’re up to the challenge, you might even export your document as an HTML file or publish it through Zoho or Google Docs to your blog.

With Zoho and web-based applications, the possibilities are endless.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Create a free account for yourself in Zoho Writer (you can also sign in using your Google account).
2. Explore the site and create a few test documents of two (or explore Google Docs).
3. Try out Zoho Writer’s features (or Google Docs) and create a blog post about your discoveries.

Optional: If you’re up for the challenge, try using Zoho’s “publish” options to post to your blog.

BTW: Here’s a document (viewable as a webpage) Helene Blowers mocked up in Zoho about some of the features she found beneficial during her Learning 2.0 program.

“Sandbox” is the term that wikis often use to describe the area of the website that should be used for play. For this discovery and exploration exercise, we’ve set up a whole CTLS 23 Things Favorites wiki* that’s for nothing but play!

For this “explore-and-play-with-wikis” exercise, you are asked to add an entry or two to the CTLS 23 Things Favorites wiki. The theme of this wiki is simply “Favorites” : Favorite books, favorite library blogs, favorite programs at your library, favorite anything …all you need to do is play and add your thoughts. To mark your adventure on this site, you should add your blog to the Favorite Blogs page.

• PB Wiki Tour – Find out how this collaborative tool can be used
• PBWiki Video Gallery – Short videos of PBwiki features
• PB Wiki Tips

1. Access the CTLS 23 Things Favorites wiki and create a login account for yourself.
2. Add your blog to the Favorite Blogs page. That’s how we’ll know that you’ve been there. It’s easy to do if you follow this simple syntax:
   

   Example:

   [ URL | Title of blog]

   [ http://ctls23things.wordpress.com | CTLS 23 Things ]

   With brackets [ ] and just a little typing, you’ve added a link – yup, it’s as easy as that!

   OPTIONAL: Add a favorite or two to a few other pages (Favorite books, favorite vacation spot, etc). And, if you feel up to the challenge, you might even want to create a separate page for book review or short travel essay and link up to that.

3. Create a post in your blog about the experience.

* NOTE: The CTLS Sandbox Wiki was created using the free version of PBWiki, a tool that lets you create webpages that anyone can edit.

A wiki is a collaborative website and authoring tool that allows users to easily add, remove and edit content. Wikipedia, the online open-community encyclopedia, is the largest and perhaps the most well known of these knowledge sharing tools. With the benefits that wikis provide the use and popularity of these tools is exploding. Some of the benefits that make wikis so attractive are:

• Anyone (registered or unregistered, if unrestricted) can add, edit or delete content.
• Tracking tools within wikis allow you to easily keep up on what been changed and by whom.
• Earlier versions of a page can be viewed and reinstated when needed.
• And users do not need to know HTML in order to apply styles to text or add and edit content. In most cases simple syntax structure is used.

I hope you’re not sick of these “In Plain English” tutorials, because I think they’re so darn good. So let’s plan a camping trip:

As the use of wikis has grown over the last few years, libraries all over the country have begun to use them to collaborate and share knowledge. Among their applications are pathfinder or subject guide wikis, book review wikis, ALA conference wikis and even library best practices wikis.

1. For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a look at some library wikis and blog about your finding. Here’s a few examples to get you started:
   • SJCPL Subject Guides – a pathfinder wiki developed by the St. Joseph County Public Library system
   • Library Success: A best practices wiki
   • Library Instruction Wiki
   • ALA 2008 Anaheim wiki – an example of a wiki created to support a specific event
   • ALA Wikis - all sorts of ALA wikis running around!
   • Other library wiki examples
2. Create a blog post about your findings. What did you find interesting? What types of applications within libraries might work well with a wiki?

Library 2.0 is term used to describe a new set of concepts for developing and delivering library services. The name, as you may guess, is an extension of Web2.0 and shares many of its same philosophies and concepts including harnessing the user in both design and implementation of services, embracing constant change as a development cycle over the traditional notion of upgrades, and reworking library services to meet the users in their space, as opposed to ours (libraries).

Many have argued that the notion of Library 2.0 is more than just a term used to describe concepts that merely revolve around the use of technology; it also a term that can be used to describe both physical and mindset changes that are occurring within libraries to make our spaces and services more user-centric and inviting. Others within the profession have asserted that libraries have always been 2.0: collaborative, customer friendly and welcoming. But no matter which side of the debate proponents fall, both sides agree that libraries of tomorrow, even five or ten years from now, will look substantially different from libraries today.

Discovery Exercise:

I want you to use your library searching skills to :

1. Get on Academic Search Complete (a TexShare database).
2. Search for Library Technology Reports (the ALA Tech Source publication), the Sept/Oct 2007 edition : Web 2.0 and Libraries, Part 2 : Trends and Technologies.
3. Read a chapter or portion of the report that grabs your attention.
4. Create a blog post about your thoughts on what you read.

Or:

1. Search for some interesting online articles about Library 2.0.
2. Create a blog post about your thoughts on the article(s), and link to the article if possible. Library 2.0 – It’s many things to many people. What does it mean to you?

So now that you’ve been blogging for awhile, you might be wondering just how big the blogosphere is. Well, according to Technorati, the leading search tool and authority for blogs, 133 million blog records have been indexed by them since 2002.

Yes, these numbers are astounding, but as you’ve already seen for yourselves, blogging is so easy that these publishing tools are being taken advantage of by almost every industry, including libraries.

So how does a person get their blog listed as part of the blogosphere and how can you tag your posts with keywords to make them more findable through a Technorati search? The answer to the first question is that your blog is probably already being captured by Technorati due to the fact that you’re already using Blogger, the most popular blogging tool. But if you want to join the party and have your blog officially listed on Technorati and also take advantage of the watchlist and other features, you’ll need to claim your blog yourself. As for tagging posts with Technorati tags? This is easy, too. All you need to do is add a little bit of HTML code to the bottom of your post (see my example below) and Technorati will pick up these tags when it spiders (or web crawls) your site.

You can search for keywords in blog posts, search for entire blog posts that have been tagged with a certain keyword, or search for blogs that have been registered and tagged as whole blogs about a certain subject (like photography or libraries).

Discovery Resources:

Technorati Tour – videocast of new features & new look
Technorati Discover & Popular features

1. Take a look at Technorati and try doing a keyword search for “Learning 2.0” in Blog posts, in tags and in the Blog Directory. Are the results different?
2. Explore popular blog, searches and tags. Is anything interesting or surprising in your results?
3. Create a blog post about your discoveries on this site.

OPTIONAL: If you’re up for a challenge, learn how to tag your posts by with Technorati tags so they can join tag searches. Create a post about something. It can be anything you want and add the HTML code to the bottom to tag it as “CTLS.” You may also want to consider claiming your blog and creating a watchlist.
NOTE: When adding HTML code, you’ll want to make sure you’re in Blogger’s Edit HTML window.

There’s a lot to explore.