Week 9 Finding podcasts

This week I discovered and have a better understanding about Podcasts. I was asked to look at one or two of the Podcasts directories and find something that I find interesting. I followed the link in our instructions and found 609,000 in Google. I found an interesting Podcasts from Fairfax County Public Library in Virginia called BookCast http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/LIBRARY/bookcast/ where there are interviews with several authors. I listened to one about Ellen Crosby.
http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/library/bookcast/crosby.htm

I also looked and listened to NPR Podcast Directories and Library of Congress Podcasts. NPR had Summer book review and recommendations. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91364064
The Library of Congress had Podcasts from the 2007 Book Festival that is held in Washington, DC every September. I listened to Shelia P. Moses discuss the disappearance of family traditions in the home. She read from her newest book, "The Baptism" (Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2007). This book is in PBCLS Young Adult fiction section.

Shelia P. Moses who is a poet, author, playwright and producer. She is the ninth of 10 children. Moses writes about family life in a North Carolina rural town. She is a Coretta Scott King Honor winner and a National Book Award finalist. Her books have been nominated as the American Library Association's Best Books for Young Adults.

I also listened to Sanja Gupta discuss his new book, "Chasing Life: New Discoveries in the Search for Immortality to Help You Age Less Today (Warner Wellnesss, 2007). This book is in PBCLS Adult non-fiction section.

Sanjay Gupta is a practicing neurosurgeon. He is associate chief of neurosurgery at Grady Memorial Hospital and assistant professor at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. The Emmy award-winning chief medical correspondent at CNN covers important health news and hosts the weekend show "House Call with Dr. Sanjay Gupta."

On my bloglines I subscribed to the Library of Congress RSS feed on what's new on the website.

I think podcasts are a great way to keep informed on authors and their new books. It's also a great place to hear book reviews. There are so many subjects to find podcasts about. Maybe a story on our website about podcast would be interesting for our patrons. I wonder if the Youth Services department could havepodcasts of popular books on our website for patrons of children who are unable to come to our weekly storytimes because theier patrons have to work. I could see where podcasts could also be valuable to elderly or homebound patrons who may not be able to come to the library. Podcasts are an excellent way to keep informed about the book world.

Week 9 YouTube

This is a great video that appeared at this year's American Library Association (ALA)conference. It is a great summary of why libraries are still important. I have often gotten videos in my emails from friends and family and I have heard about YouTube videos in the news. I haven't really spent time searching for videos until now. I think it would be great to have a video on our website that shows what the library has to offer. It would be great to have a video that shows that we have meeting rooms to be used and have information on what types of meetings can be held in our meeting rooms. Also, it would be great to have an online registration with instant notification of approval to use the meeting room.

I think that the library should use the best technology available to keep our patrons well informed and also give information to new patrons who are thinking about joining. There is a generation of people out there that is constantly seeking information from the internet.

Week 8 Web 2.0 award list

Several of the award list winners have been discovered in previous weeks such as Del.icio.us, Flickr and Pbwiki. It was interesting to see other websites that are similar to the ones that we have been introduced to during this project. I like that they are arranged by category. When I need to recommend websites to patrons I will definitely have this in my favorites.

Week 8 Online productivity

The 2008 Essence Music Festival happens in New Orleans, Louisiana on

Friday, July 4 - Sunday, July 6. Some of the artist scheduled to appear.

 

Friday, July 4	Saturday, July 5	Sunday, July 6
Rihanna	LL Cool J	Morris Day and the Time
Chris Brown	Patti Labelle	Keyshia Cole
Kanye West	Jill Scott	Mary J. Blige

 

http://www.essencemusicfestival.com

 

    

 

 

 

I like Zoho writer. I would definitely recommend this to patrons who don't have Microsoft Word on their home computer. This document writer has alot of features that are in Microsoft Office. I like that you can be creative.

Week 7 PBCLS wiki

PBCLS wiki is a great place to find out information from other librarians. I added my blogspot url and I add a favorite website. I will be sure to bookmark our wiki so I can find out new information that my coworkers are sharing. This would be a great place for patrons share their favorites also.

Week 7 wiki

I discovered wikipedia about a year ago because of a patron who frequently calls the Reference Desk with interesting questions about famous people. He wanted to know what religion Arnold Palmer practices. I was excited to find some information that might suggest what religion he believes in. I think wikipedia is helpful as long as the information added can be verified. I often hesitate to offer information from wikipedia because I worry about how accurate the information is. I do find it very helpful when I can't find biography information on the Biography Reference Center database.

When I explored the suggested wikis on the Discovery exercises, I was excited to find a wiki about the ALA 2008 conference going on from June 26-July 2. I have always dreamed about attending an ALA conference. I plan to attend one hopefully when I celebrate my 10th year anniversary with PBCLS. I know that the budget will not pay for my way to go, but, I think that it is one of my personal long range career goals. I am not a member of ALA yet, and I keep saying that I am going to join, I haven't done it yet. I must put this on my short term goals and try and join by the end of the year. I enjoyed looking at the Flikr pictures from the conference and the Technorati from the conference. There are so many pictures uploaded that I plan to spend more time looking at the information that is available there.

I also looked at the Bull Run Public Library wiki which is the a public library in Prince William County, VA. There I searched for books by two of my favorite fiction authors and 2 non-fiction subjects. I was able to see how many and where in the system they can be found. I suppose a wiki would lead people to our website, but I think going to our website is the best thing. It's nice to see what other libraries have to offer. For more information on Prince William County check out the wiki.
http://www.pwcgov.org/default.aspx?topic=010010001090002560

Also, I found of interest under the project management subject a strategic plan from the Durham County Library. See wiki link for more information.
http://dclstrategicplan.pbwiki.

I would love for PBCLS to have a Circulation wiki and a Reference wiki where we can share information. Maybe on our website we could offer weblinks where authors talk about upcoming books that they have written or maybe talk about how they got their first book published. I think with technology we need to keep up with what's out there and share it with our patrons. Lots of people still don't know how much we have to offer on our website now. I enjoy wikis and I will explore them whenever time permits.

Week 6 Web 2.0

My thing was to read two of the five perspectives. I read all five. I found the perspective from Michael Stephens, Blogger interesting. I think library employees should have time to play and learn. Sometimes our jobs can be very stressful. With the economy, it seems that more and more patrons are coming to the library for internet access. It seems to me that sometimes I think that we need a branch that has only internet access. I find that most of our internet patrons have never checked out any material. Dr. Wendy Schultz was the other perspective that I read. I agree that we should continue to examine our services that work and improve the services that don't. We have customer surveys throughout the year, but, I think it would be nice to have roundtable discussions with patrons and ask them for input on the things that the libary is doing well and what things the library needs to improve on. Web 2.0 is a place to go to keep up with the latest trends in technology and what other libraries are doing.