unhappy penguins

I've been hearing about club penguin, but can't sign up using the SDCL staff computers.I'm blocked for some reason. I'll try it from home

my site now

The web 2.0 challenge is long over, and I lost steam at the end. So I'm converting this page into a work resource for myself, with the links I've been using. I'm on the committee to review the children's weblinks for SDCL, so that will be a handy place to track them and keep my comments.

Roll on Rollyo

I have been putting this one off - no way it can work better than google, I thought. Well, of course, that's true - google is faster, seems to have things sorted better, and simply more sophisticated.

However, one search that always frustrates me is searching for library craft ideas. I seem to get endless bad sites that don't fit what I need, and an awful lot of advertising. I started just going to sites that I know probably have something. Rollyo is nice because I only can search them all at the same time.

It is still pretty clunky and doesn't seem to search some of the sites very well, but it does work, and I can use limiters, which is handy. I also like being able to sort the search by site - very handy.

Image generators and Library Thing

Image Generators: I tried out some online image generators. They were kind of entertaining, but I decided that it is actually a lot more fun to draw my own pictures using a pencil and paper. That way I can draw whatever I want - and not just what the generator will let me use. Sometimes low tech rules. Of course, it's not so easy to post what I draw using a pencil, since I don't have a scanner, so you will be spared my art.

Library Thing: Pretty neat, especially for those wanting to catalog their home libraries. Since I use a library catalog at work all day already, it's a little too much like work for me. I wonder how searchable the tags are compared to the controlled language of MARC records? It would be interesting to find out. I cataloged five of my favorite children's fantasies if anyone is interested: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/jgastil

The social networking aspects are nice, but I prefer goodreads.com , which is less geared to the cataloging and more geared to seeing what you and your friends have been reading.

RSS

I hate acronyms. We can't use a simple name, like, say "Feeds," which actually has some relationship to its meaning. No, we must call it RSS. That way, those in the know can feel smug and everyone else can feel stupid. Grrrr.

Despite my hatred of the name, I think RSS is really cool. I certainly haven't mastered all the ins and outs, but I managed to sign up for bloglines and a few feeds. I also put feeds from most of your sites into my blog directly, which is very handy. I like the idea of going to one spot and having everything I want there - links, updates, notes.

Flickr

Week three of the Web 2.0 challenge: Flickr.

I am perhaps the last person in the United States to not own a cell phone or digital camera. I'm actually not an enthusiastic photographer, because when I'm busy taking pictures, I'm not actually focused on appreciating the event that I'm trying to record.

So, no surprise that Flickr didn't get me particularly excited. I did manage to post a picture there and upload it to this blog, so I think I've got the basics figured out. I also made a cat in the hat trading card, which was pretty fun.

Seems like Flickr is a great source to show all your family vacation photos without forcing everyone to sit in a darkened room watching slides. ("Here's a picture of Brad at the airport, look, there's a bit of the taxi we took in the background!") If you post them on Flickr, everyone can just say what a lovely trip and get on with their lives.

cat in the hat

cat in the hat
Originally uploaded by janetgastil

Cat the the Hat enjoying the children's area at the Lemon Grove Library.