Thing 15: Games Games Games

I found the games, interesting, but very hard to use. I didn't always understand what was happening. I'm not sure I see how a virtual library in Second Life would play in to actual library use. However, it would have possibilities.

The pirate game I could not get at all and think it isn't very useful to the work world right now. However, I'm willing to be proved wrong.

Thing 14: LibraryThing

Fun, fun, fun tool. However, I'm not sure how accurate or how useful it would be to a small academic library with an older than average collection.

I do think it is a great tool for personal libraries and for public libraries. It was easy to use and easy to find. It was very cool seeing who else had the same book as you. It was fun to see how they were rated.

Our library doesn't particular share book lists. This would be a good way to start doing that. I guess I was previously thinking of it as a tool to make cataloging for specific things easier. When one would use it for book list sharing that seems more logical for the small library I work at.

I liked that there were tons of discussions on my all time favorite book, "Pride and Prejudice." Classic. :) Good tool. I think I will bring it up at the next staff meeting.

Thing 13: Productivity Enhancers.

I tried all sorts of the productivity enhancers. I think that sticky note could be used for marking weather or not a page is worth looking at for a research paper and things of that nature. I really liked the countdown...as you can see...and also the weather. I believe that those are the three most useful tools that I can use.

The compounding google features one was a not helpful to me as it is easier for me to keep track of them by keeping them separate.

I think the countdown would be a great tool to advertise for National Library Week at our IRC.

Interesting indeed.

Thing 12: Do you digg?

I think this is a neat tool. I like that you can see what others are viewing and that what is viewed is based on popularity with people rather than 'the man.' Ha. Anyway, I think that the library could keep track of it's most popular feature on the website and then work on improving those. It could be a very good thing.

I think that these tools could definitely be a productivity enhancer. A person could get around faster and get more done. It's all about navigation sometimes and where the right place to look is.

I have never read a story or an article through this way that I know of, but it is really interesting so I may start reading articles and stories that way more often.

Thing 11: Tagging and Del.icio.us

I think that del.icio.us could be a helpful tool. I can see where it would be useful to tag website and other things to be better organized. It would also be convenient to be able to access the IRC's websites and databases from anywhere. Students could grab those off campus. They would have an easy way of finding what they need to.

My one complaint is that the whole del.icio.us experience was a little confusing for me. I didn't understand at first exactly what the point of it all was, so I'm not sure how user friendly it is upfront. Still, once something is learned it can be exceedingly helpful.

Thing 10: The Wiki

I'm not sure I exactly understand what a wiki is. I get that it is public information that can be edited, but I'm not sure how to properly incorporate this in to the IRC I work at. I could not view the video, which was discouraging, but I did investigate the wikis as best I could.

I think I really may have missed something here. I wasn't even able to edit or add to anything on the 23wiki. If I have missed a step I would really appreciate someone pointing me in the right direction.

Wikipedia has been banned from scholarly papers here at the institution I work at. I think it is because anyone can edit it or post anything to it. I know that if something wrong were posted it wouldn't last long, but I wonder how Wikipedia is regulated.

Thing 9: Online Document Editing

Online document editing sounds like it could really do good. I'm wondering though, if it has it's down falls. What happens if, for example, Google Docs crashes. Are there systems in place that would save that file online as well? Just curious.

I think both of them you needed an account so unfortunately I wasn't able to try them through the 23 things. However, I've tried it before using another program and I do like it. I think that Google's features are easier to use and understand, plus the Google video really breaks the service down to what it would do. Zoho is pretty similar and carries the same idea. What would our founding fathers think? I think that they would think it is forward thinking and I believe that they were pretty forward thinking guys.