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!

Thing 46! WebJunction

Winnipeg Junction, Minnesota
Originally uploaded by afiler

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.

Thing 41! Mashup Your Life.

powered by lifestream.fm!

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:

Thing 28! Customized Home Pages

I have had iGoogle for awhile, but had not been a recent user, so gave it a new look with lots of updates and some widgets. After doing that, I explored Pageflakes which is now my homepage. I probably like the appearance of iGoogle better, but had fun with all of the options to explore at Pageflakes. Now I have a calendar there, link to Daily Kos, and daily horoscope. I like having Facebook and Twitter available on my Pageflakes page. Maybe I should put iGoogle as my page on my home computer, and Pageflakes at work. I will continue to explore the many options available. There are so many ways to customize and personalize. I want to explore Netvibes more.

Thing 27! Twitter

I had been hearing about Twitter, and thought that it might be in the first 23 Things. A few weeks ago, the Minneapolis and Saint Paul Sunday papers both had stories on Twitter. The Pioneer Press one said that "the median age of Twitter users is 31 compared to 26 on Facebook."

The day that I joined this week, when I was driving to work I heard that WCCO Radio was now on Twitter. In the Mark Halperin site that I follow on my blog, I noticed a Twitter option. When I joined, I became a follower of them first and since have added Minnesota Gopher sports, the Pioneer Press, MPR, Minn Post and other sites to follow. The first night that I was on Twitter, Nightline broadcast a segment on it, so it was fun to follow the comments about it online while I as listening to the TV in the next room.

I spend enough time on Facebook that I do not need to do the same with Twitter. Since joining Twitter, I prefer to do searches on topics rather than find followers. The best use I found so far was to do a search on Minnesota writer Bill Holm yesterday after I knew of his death. It was interesting to read the many comments and see the sources of information about him. I also have checked out comments from the 23 Things folks. The Hibbing Library is a good example of a library using Twitter, and I will be interested to see if more libraries will embrace Twitter.

Now you can follow me on Twitter by finding the link on the sidebar near the bottom right of my blog. After a few weeks of use, I will see if I agree with author Tim Ferriss (The 4-Hour Work Week) who called Twitter, "Pointless email on steroids."