Minnesota's Long Senate Race Has Finally Ended!
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Lily Finale
Lilies are favorite flowers of mine, and I like to plant a few new ones each year. Yesterday I noticed that the first one of the season is blooming, so I am using photos shared by others on FLICKR for my final post before the deadline.
Thing 47! Evaluation
Some Observations about MORE THINGS on 17 June:
1. Some that were the "most fun" were also the "most frustrating" for me. Even though I spent lots of time working on GOOGLE Maps and screencasting, I am not satisfied with my efforts, and want to continue to use those THINGS.
2. Thanks to the Things, I spend much time on Facebook and Twitter now. It is amazing how they change our communication and the way that we spend our time. When I just checked, I found that I have 117 friends on Facebook, and follow 117 on Twitter. What a coincidence!
3. There are many potential library uses for the Things we just completed, and I hope to implement what I have learned professionally as well as personally.
4. I found it easier to do the first 23 Things last summer than I did this round when I started while I was working full time. My preference is to work on one a day rather than a group of them at a time to try to finish by the deadline.
5. RSS is probably the Thing that I use the least, and WebJunction one that I want to use more than I currently do.
6. Some of the Things that I found most fun and useful were the music and photo ones. It was great to learn about sites (like Animoto) that I had not used before.
7. I enjoyed looking at the blogs of other Things participants, especially after "meeting" some of them on the 23 Things Ning and Twitter.
8. Thank you for offering More Things!
Monday, June 15, 2009
Thing 46! WebJunction
Thing 46
I will admit that for me WebJunction is one of the least utilized Things. Even though I had used the site before the first 23 Things, I neglect to use it routinely as I do Facebook, the 23 Things Ning and Twitter. After finishing these Things, I hope to explore some of the courses available from the University of North Texas and the Illinois State Library. I enjoyed the librarian spotlight on Kristen Mastel and exploring some of the information in the featured groups. The Calendar of Events is also a useful feature. A MINITEX Messenger EXTRA (June 8, 2009), features a special cover story on WebJunction with valuable information from Bill DeJohn, Ann Walker Smalley, Mary Ann Van Cura, Deanna Sylte and Jennifer Hootman.
I will admit that for me WebJunction is one of the least utilized Things. Even though I had used the site before the first 23 Things, I neglect to use it routinely as I do Facebook, the 23 Things Ning and Twitter. After finishing these Things, I hope to explore some of the courses available from the University of North Texas and the Illinois State Library. I enjoyed the librarian spotlight on Kristen Mastel and exploring some of the information in the featured groups. The Calendar of Events is also a useful feature. A MINITEX Messenger EXTRA (June 8, 2009), features a special cover story on WebJunction with valuable information from Bill DeJohn, Ann Walker Smalley, Mary Ann Van Cura, Deanna Sylte and Jennifer Hootman.
Thing 45! Cloud Computing
Cloud Computing.
Thanks to Sheila in Millstone for this photo on FLICKR!
In the June 15, 2009 issue of TIME (page 40), Jon Rubenstein was quoted about people not wanting to be tethered to a computer. He stated, "People keep their data all over the place. It's spread throughout the cloud." I read that before starting on Thing 45, but have been conscious of Cloud Computing being I knew it was one of the last Things. Without being aware, I had been doing Cloud Computing for a long time. More Things on A Stick has helped me to do more, and to try to start organizing. The ZOHO that we have used at work for over a year has been very useful for meeting agendas and minutes, and especially for a project that the librarians have been working on to redesign our subject pages. When we work at multiple campuses, and do not see each other often, it is a great way to keep current without needing to send countless email messages.
The readings on Cloud Computing were very interesting. A major concern seems to be security. I need to do more exploring of the options available, especially for libraries, that I began learning about in Thing 45.
Thanks to Sheila in Millstone for this photo on FLICKR!
In the June 15, 2009 issue of TIME (page 40), Jon Rubenstein was quoted about people not wanting to be tethered to a computer. He stated, "People keep their data all over the place. It's spread throughout the cloud." I read that before starting on Thing 45, but have been conscious of Cloud Computing being I knew it was one of the last Things. Without being aware, I had been doing Cloud Computing for a long time. More Things on A Stick has helped me to do more, and to try to start organizing. The ZOHO that we have used at work for over a year has been very useful for meeting agendas and minutes, and especially for a project that the librarians have been working on to redesign our subject pages. When we work at multiple campuses, and do not see each other often, it is a great way to keep current without needing to send countless email messages.
The readings on Cloud Computing were very interesting. A major concern seems to be security. I need to do more exploring of the options available, especially for libraries, that I began learning about in Thing 45.
Thing 44! The Economy
Thing 44 provides many helpful sites for living in today's economy. Because we have recently redesigned our subject web pages, I was happy to find good sites to add for ECONOMICS. On the right, I added a variety from Thing 44 for The Economy.
The drawback that I found in living in a rural area was using sites that had nothing for my zip code of 56143. An example is the Printable Coupons one with "Nothing found today". It is better to hunt for a specific store like Wal-Mart (not my favorite place to shop) than to put in my zip code. Another example is Erideshare . When I put in my zip code with a 40 mile radius (the distance that I drive to work), there were no results. This site would probably be useful in a metro area. The Freecycle site also had nothing for my zip code, but I could browse what was listed for others.
With the popularity of gardening this year following Michelle Obama's planting of a White House garden, I think the Victory Garden site and University of Minnesota Extension sites are good.
I have used online banking for years, but did not add accounts to any of the suggested sites here for doing budgeting. The convenience of online banking is great. If I forget to write an amount for a check in my check book, I can check for it a few days later online.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Thing 43! Online TV & Video
Thing 43 was new for me as I had not used the online video sources Hulu and Joost before for watching programming. I watched a segment from Meet the Press on Hulu and added a widget here on recent commentary on the Obama administration. On Joost I watched a Jon Stewart segment from Comedy Central. I am not a regular watcher of any situation comedies, but am happy to know about sources to watch any programming that I might have missed and want to watch later. I have a relative currently doing video at the College World Series in Omaha, but did not find any coverage of that to watch.
Services like Hulu and Joost change the typical TV viewing habits for many people. If someone misses an episode of their favorite program, it is easy to watch it at any time, and much simpler than setting a VCR.
Thing 42! Music 2.0
For the last few months at work, I have been listening to MPR online on my work computer when I am back in my office area. I listen to news, and had not tried any of the music sites from Thing 41 until now. It was really fun to "customize" my Pandora list with artists I wanted. I will probably add more later. There is a link to the Pandora artists I selected on the sidebar of the blog. The QuickMix option is my favorite. I also established accounts with live365 and Receiva Internet Radio, and selected some favorites there to return to later.
After Jim Ed Poole retired, and the MPR Morning Show stopped broadcasting, Dale Connelly began Radio Heartland online. In the February 2009 issue of Minnesota Monthly, he said, "As people become accustomed to using their computers as radios, and as digital broadcasting becomes more commonplace, they will discover that it's just as easy to see what we're up to as it's been for the past 25 years." My listening habits have changed, and will continue as I discover more online options.
(Thanks to De Bijloke for this photo of Jazz at Lincoln Center on Flickr, 07/07/07).
After Jim Ed Poole retired, and the MPR Morning Show stopped broadcasting, Dale Connelly began Radio Heartland online. In the February 2009 issue of Minnesota Monthly, he said, "As people become accustomed to using their computers as radios, and as digital broadcasting becomes more commonplace, they will discover that it's just as easy to see what we're up to as it's been for the past 25 years." My listening habits have changed, and will continue as I discover more online options.
(Thanks to De Bijloke for this photo of Jazz at Lincoln Center on Flickr, 07/07/07).
Thing 41! Mashup Your Life.
There are now many sites to combine different accounts, and I just signed up for a few today. I like FriendFeed for Twitter, and found nine there, but none of my 113 friends from Facebook. Being I already had the Twitter and Delicious accounts on the sidebar, I put the new Lifestream one here. Later, I will probably omit the separate listings, if I decide to keep this, but I do not know how many accounts that I want!
Thing 40! Mashup the Web
Today I tried MANY of the suggested sites for Thing 40.
For MUSIC, I enjoyed searching and saving selections in Pandora.FM. The link for Splice did not work.
For BOOKS, I checked all of the sites listed.
For SOCIAL, I did an account for Ping.fm. It is good to be able to combine account information for Facebook, Delicious and Twitter. I also tried the Lunchbox and Wheel of Food sites. These sites are more useful when using a zip code such as 55423 in the Twin Cities area rather than our local rural zip code which yields no results. As I have not had lunch yet, thinking of the food sites makes me hungry!
Of the PHOTO/FLICKR sites, my favorite is Interestingness. I had fun doing random views of the photos.
For the VIDEO sites, I enjoyed TimeTube where I used Supreme Court as a search topic and now have a reminder when it is updated.
For GOOGLE, I did a search for a neighborhood under Walkable.
Being I had used Big Huge Labs before, I tried new mashup options, and posted a simple Palyvore fashion one below:
For MUSIC, I enjoyed searching and saving selections in Pandora.FM. The link for Splice did not work.
For BOOKS, I checked all of the sites listed.
For SOCIAL, I did an account for Ping.fm. It is good to be able to combine account information for Facebook, Delicious and Twitter. I also tried the Lunchbox and Wheel of Food sites. These sites are more useful when using a zip code such as 55423 in the Twin Cities area rather than our local rural zip code which yields no results. As I have not had lunch yet, thinking of the food sites makes me hungry!
Of the PHOTO/FLICKR sites, my favorite is Interestingness. I had fun doing random views of the photos.
For the VIDEO sites, I enjoyed TimeTube where I used Supreme Court as a search topic and now have a reminder when it is updated.
For GOOGLE, I did a search for a neighborhood under Walkable.
Being I had used Big Huge Labs before, I tried new mashup options, and posted a simple Palyvore fashion one below:
Thing 39! Digital Storytelling
Digital Storytelling is fun and can be useful for libraries. I did accounts for Scrapblog and Smilebox, and want to use both later. Both have many options for doing a graduation page. Scrapblog allows downloading of photos already in Facebook, so I did that for a quick page.
Thing 38! Screencasting
I had not done Screencasting before, and see how useful it could be for library webpages and library tutorials. After watching the ten minute Jing video, I downloaded Jing. I also watched the demo for Skitch. ScreenToaster was the last one I looked at, and I registered at the site. I was surprised how easy ScreenToaster was to use, but after the June 20th deadline, I definitely need to work on this THING. I had fun with WORDLE, but whatever I tried there did not upload to my blog, so I just did a screencast of one to add here. There is music on other THINGS near this one, so I did not add music.
Friday, June 5, 2009
Thing 37! Photo Tales - # 2
Like the previous one, I spent hours on Thing 37, but feel like it was just a start! It will be fun to do some more "polished" photo presentations after I finish all of the Things. After the first 23 Things, I enjoyed using FLICKR and PictureTrail for more presentations. Today I just did a quick video with some of my Washington photos from Spring Break in March. Animoto is fun and easy to use. After that, I used SLIDE for family photos. There are SO many options there that I kept changing my mind on which theme to select. I also want to try One True Media for a montage. Even though these sites are useful for library uses, I am probably thinking more of personal photos, and looking forward to doing something fun with Alaska photos after we return in August. I have done other digital slideshows with music, but just used the options available from the sites that I used today even if not the most appropriate. With Image Mosaic Generator, I used a sunflower photo which I added to the blog, but it looks much better in the full size. CaptionBubble.com is also a fun site.
Thing 36 ! Comic Relief # 3
ago answer blog book checked com comic comments congress dc delicious enjoyed explore facebook finding follow found free fun http interesting kayh labels library link minnesota mla news online pages people places plan pm posted questions reading reference relief shelfari sites state things travel twitter updates washington west widget year
created at TagCrowd.com
I have spent WAY too much time on THING 36, so need to move on . . . A newspaper headline that I generated was added to my blog, and I did a Dewey Decimal number for my name. I tried most of the comic strip generators, and had fun with one for children. WORDLE was one of my favorites for this thing, and I plan to return to that again. It will probably be useful for library applications and maybe for making signs. I was amazed how the same information could generate so many different results. The tiny label maker was another fun one. Now I better move on as June 20th approaches . . .
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