Flickr

I used Flickr to find photos of places I've already been.  Searching by 'tags only' usually yields fewer results, not surprisingly.  I took the 'tour' and thought there were a lot of neat features.  But I haven't seen any photos/collections that actually use ANY of them!

The photo I really wanted to post was of my hometown public library, but alas downloads were not allowed.  So I'll settle for this peaceful scene, added to Flickr by BluePail, which we visited only two months ago:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/22/183129680_8fc53a38f0.jpg

Wikis

I'll admit that I have never loved the U of S wiki.  In the past it has reminded me a bit of our intranet, where things appear where you don't expect them, the labels don't all make sense, and it is challenging to go back and change things or print things properly.  Various groups that I've been a part of have made use of it, however.  What I'm thinking about now is the overlap between the functionality of GoogleDocs, wikis, and our internal o: drive.  I've used all of them mostly for the same thing: sharing and editing documents.  If I diversified in my needs a bit though, the wiki would probably become the most appropriate tool, since I think there is more functionality that just a doc on the o: drive.  As usual, part of the hurdle is just getting used to something new, but some programs are way more intuitive to figure out than others.  Somehow, the wiki and I have issues.

Podcasting

Had a bit of a time figuring out how to add a feed from a podcast but used Google for some instruction -- generally it seems to be about 'adding a gadget', so those are the options to look for on your iGoogle or Blogger pages. So my podcast is here on the right -- the CBC 'laugh of the day'.

And another thing...

I wanted to make a post that included text AND the YouTube video, so I'm trying another one here. This is for all the cat lovers out there.

YouTube

I knew just what video to post for this week's thing:  our brand new "Welcome to the Murray Library" video, shot and edited by my intern Eric.  He did a great job and I'm happy to share it.

I haven't made or uploaded any videos on YouTube myself, but I find it easy to share and embed the ones I find there in other places.  I suppose my use of YouTube has been fairly basic but what I have figured out on the site is pretty intuitive. 

We've established a Murray Channel there now, so that when we have more Murray specific videos (as we hope we will sometime!) they'll all be together there.  Videos seem to be the way of recruitment and outreach across the campus these days.  We in the library better hop to it!

Murry Library on YouTube

Prezi

Just used Prezi and had a stroll down memory lane, musically speaking.  Why is it that the bands you loved when you were 12 are just about the best bands ever, even if you can't even stand to listen to them anymore?

Prezi made it easy to do things, but not necessarily the things that I wanted to do.  I kept scrolling with the mouse, thinking that it would move me around as usual. But it just kept changing the size of everything.  It also took me a while to get my head around the idea that the text is moved and sized in the same way as everything else (those blue circles).  That's really different from PowerPoint and Word software.

So, it would just take some getting used to.  But I bet that 10 year olds would be all over it.