Tuning in

I became really frustrated searching for podcasts - some I opened and found nothing there, others failed to load, some were very slow to load and even my computer turned itself off in disgust. I tried "St Georges Independent Schools" in Memphis and tried to find the Rosa Parks podcast but couldn't, also tried searching podcast "Ancient China comes to 21st Century" but had more success with EPN (Education Podcast Network). Watched the Commoncraft video on Podcastpickle.com and searched 'libraries'which connected me to Questia.com where I searched book review podcasts. In Podnova Part I of Tess Gerritsen didn't load. The Nashville Library Podcast on "Libraries in the 21st Century" was left for 15 minutes and still didn't load. I did however find it again later, found it had an RSS feed so chose it for my exercise.

A "broad"casting

I have watched most of the suggested YouTube library videos which were of varying quality. However I think videos on a library website would be an interesting and compelling way to increase patron numbers. With further refinement, any of the better ones would make far greater impact than those seen on our TV screens in the last 2 years. The best of these YouTube library videos are direct, to the point and the message clearly delivered. They could be applied to library websites as guidance around the catalogue (or library), there could be a fun one for children, a reference one and one about all the good things a patron can experience from owning a library card.
The video I have chosen for your entertainment is a musical one I have enjoyed many times and saved to my favourites.

Caught in the web too

I explored a few sites before finding one I wanted to blog about: Pandora, a music site, unavailable to users outside the U.S.; Mangolanguages - good reviews but one's progress would probably be slow, judging by the short videos watched and one needed to buy the software; Yelp -good for travellers to the U.S.
I finally decided on Revolutionhealth, a very busy, colourful site with lots to look at and judged first in its category. There were good links to respected health sites e.g. New England Journal of Medicine, American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons. The content is current, most recent date was 10 Sept 2008. Health Record is a secure place to keep your health information. The Community button links to blogs, forums and groups - enabling you to select a topic from a list, join discussions, share stories and find people with like problems while The Store button leads you to a drug store where you can purchase health related products. Overall excellent detail on a good range of medical conditions and related information.
Library applications? I would suggest the site as an alternative to Health and Wellness, as another option, and a site where people can communicate and share their personal medical
stories and experiences.

http://www.revolutionhealth.com/

Zoho so so

I did some exploring on Zoho but found some things I clicked on were very slow to load so I moved on to Google Docs where I created my document. I can see this application could be very useful for those who need to send documents to a number of people who can work on the text together correcting mistakes, rearranging layout etc and thus arriving at the perfect copy. In Google Docs I was interested to see how it could be applied to language teaching.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=dgkqd298_0dwggtsd3&hl=en

Rolling On

When searching for sites of interest to you, Rollyo could be useful to find quickly sites that others have already researched on your favourite topics and interests, however if you go only to Rollyo you may find you miss other sites, newer or more relevant. I found getting started a bit difficult. I eventually created a Search engine with my list of websites.

http://www.rollyo.com/search.html?q=travel+and+languages&sid=456546

Book it

I enjoyed touring Library Thing, searching all the links and added 6 books to my library, tags and all and viewed them by Cover and by List. This site could be something our keener customers could use and enjoy. It adds a new dimension to one's reading history. Maybe one day I could catalogue my own books in this way.

http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?view=lilyw79&deepsearch

The Generation Game

Played around with various links. The Alpha Picture video wouldn't run, the web page for many previously posted generators couldn't be found, wasn't sure about Webfetti as a certain horse was trying to push through the gates. I used the Bar Soap Generator and changed the inscription on the soap but couldn't seem to save it. I also created my own blog on the Lazy Bloggers Post Generator but couldn't save that either and played around with the alphabet letters in the soup in Alphabet Soup Word.

http://www.redkid.net/generator/soup/newsign.php?line1=HEALTHY+SOUP&Talk+Soup=Talk+Soup

http://www.aussiebloggers.com.au/blogpost.html http://www.redkid.net/generator/soap/