23 Mobile Things - Thing 2: Mobile Device Tips

My devices are the iPad and an HTC Evo.

I was almost relieved to learn where the search function was on the iPad. After I updated to iOS 7, I kept swiping left to no avail. I use the search function quite a bit! I appreciate the quick access to basic functions from the bottom of the screen. As a media specialist, I am often asked to help staff manage their batteries on Apple products, so the battery information was quite useful.

The video on the HTC was designed for the HTC One, so my Evo didn't have quite a few of the functions. I found a video about the HTC Evo, and it was quite helpful. I moved some apps to the internal storage, played with some functions that I didn't know existed and learned a bit more about the camera app.

Starting again: 23 Mobile Things - Thing 1

I don't normally get that excited about taking a class, but I learned SO much from the last Things class. I joined Facebook (which is now a Big Thing in my life), learned quite a bit about social networking, and ended up teaching a class based on what I'd learned. It was one of the most beneficial classes I've taken.

I am surrounded with technology, even more so now than when I took the first session. Kids in the middle school are also immersed in tech culture. I'm looking at this as a way to expand my knowledge base, learn about sites that kids frequent, and perhaps developing a mobile Things class for district staff.

I haven't posted to the blog in a number of years. It's interesting to look back and see which sites are still active. Tech world moves and grooves pretty fast!

SlideShare

Been awhile since I posted! I discovered this little gem today. I haven't spent much time with it, but it looks like I could use it for a Cool Things class.

This is a slideshow sharing site. I stumbed across it when I was looking for a refresher on art elements and principles. Lots of slideshows to use: Slideshare.

Ooooohhh..this is cool. A few years ago I was looking for a similar software app, and it was several hundred bucks. This room designing software is pretty well-rounded and FREE!! Whee!

http://v3.planningwiz.com/

Timelines

This is pretty nifty. I've often missed the good ol' Timeliner program. It was pretty quick and easy. I like this one because you can add multimedia files to it.

xtimeline


Of course, I found this on GoWeb2.0 - best site EVER.

Moving on

Thing 23 - The End!

This was a cool project. I had used many of the Things, but this project forced me to dig deeper. I am plannning on teaching a summer class (I think I'll call it 10 Things) for our staff. I'm going to use this as a guide.

I want to create more online access points for our students. I have the bones in place now. I'll just have to tweek and get these things publicized.

I have only learned to love blogging even more. I was thinking I'd delete this blog after the project, but now I'm excited to use it for teacher inservices and for teachers to use as a reference with students. My favorite Things would have to be the ELM resources, del.icio.us, all the image sites and the Zoho apps. I'm using all of these things quite a bit now.

I didn't connect with other 23 Thing folks as much as I would have liked. I put some calls out there on some sites, but didn't get any hits. I wish there were a requirement of some sort to start chatting with others!

I think my greatest "aha" came with the ELM resources. I'm still impressed that they are so full-featured and easy to use. I'm going to push them hard next year.

I mentioned previously that it would be nice to have some kind of required chatting place. It would have been cool to use a board for commenting, with a requirement to post.

I would certainly participate in a 23 Things program again.

Let's see, one sentence about my learning experience? Hmmm...Get Movin' on the Web? Or - Sucking your Time Dry Without Noticing the Time Fly By?

Thanks so much for those who put this program together. It was great!!

Thing 22 - Keeping Up!

So, committing to 15 minutes a day reading through blogs and watching videos to keep up? Not a problem (unfortunately??? Online Anonymous anyone? I find it highly ironic that there are so many online resources for online addiction...join their blog!!)

My issue would be actually signing up and trying the resources. I mentioned previously that I started to get "Register-Fever" after awhile. I've been monitoring my junk mail a lot during this project, and haven't noticed a larger influx of crud. That's a good sign. I also didn't take any of the surveys for cash in Second Life, either. That may be a wise move.

I feel a bit overwhelmed by all the accounts I have bookmarked, so I did do some major overhauling. I also put some links on del.icio.us. I like using that service quite a bit. I've already referred back to a few articles, and they were easy to find.

I'm also going to commit to teaching a summer inservice for staff on many of these resources. That will challenge me to really understand their use and features.

I bookmarked several of the sites listed on the Think 22 assignment page. I also created an Open ID with a Firefox extension that allows me to sign into sites with one password. Very cool.

Here are a few more I found:

Go2Web
I know this one is listed but TOO COOL.

You Suck at Photoshop
Yes, probably a tad off-putting for school, but I have learned a TON about Photoshop from these tutorials.

Technorati Tech
The latest tech chatter, and hugely popular site which tracks millions of blogs.

Technology Review
Kind of heady stuff, but I added the IT section to my RSS feeder

Thing 21 - Social Networks II

Gather - I had joined Gather last year when I renewed my MPR membership, but I didn't really spend any time figuring it out. I went there and spent more time clicking around. It seems like it's mainly original content provided by members, and geared toward adults. I checked out the "articles" which seemed to be written about other articles found in mainstream media sites, or on blogs. I prefer going right to the sites on my aggregator. The comments are interesting, but I see the same types of conversations under the original article.

I did like the photography section, though. I accidentally posted a picture on there, thinking I was putting it up as my photo ID, but it went into the gallery. I was surprised to start getting nice comments almost immediately. I like the way the photos are categorized. I think I'd spend most of my time here on the Gather site.

Webjunction - Wowee. This is a gold mine and I'm really disappointed that I don't pay enough attention to sites like these. I was going through my personal bookmarks not too long ago and when I pulled Webjunction up I thought, "Gee, that's a pretty cool site!" I spent some time on and registered for the the site. This is going in my daily links. The courses are exactly what I have been looking for (I can't tell if you can get grad credit and/or CEUs for them - that would be handy). I didn't realize that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation played a big part in its creation. The discussions boards kept me going for quite awhile. I feel like I found "my people!"


View my page on 23 Things on a Stick

Ning - I'm about at the saturation point for signing up for sites and creating a profile, so I was glad that I could just be a member of a group on Ning and not have to search around for people. I added a short "hello" post and added a comment to a conversation on databases. I think Webjunction might be more up my alley, but I'll monitor this site occasionally.

The editing options were pretty cool on Ning. You can post something, and take about 15 minutes to edit the post. You edit the post by clicking on it, and it just opens up. That doesn't sound like much, but it was pretty nifty.

I'm LOVING the What's On My Bookshelf site. Yes, I did actually sign up for another site. I know I can just go to the library (as my sig other keeps telling me), but I will use this site to find books. I would LOVE to see my books being used and not just sitting on the shelf. I've added a few books, just to get a point. I'll update if I someone contacts me. My bookshelf is BURSTING at the moment, so I'm not going to order one until I'm caught up. Which may be never, but you never know!

Thing 20 - Social Networks I

I created profiles on both MySpace and Facebook. I had a "shell" of sorts on MySpace, just to be able to look at some MySpace profiles some friends have. I am going to keep the MySpace page as a more personal site, and my Facebook will be for professional work.

I noticed that many public libraries have MySpace pages for their teen departments. Lots of high school libraries. I got a kick out of the groups that were filled with self-identified study geeks. They love their MySpace library groups, almost to a fault. Typical geek behavior. I can say that because I am unabashedly geek.

It seems that many of the MySpace groups featured polls on books, announcements, and some random chatter about various topics. I am considering creating a MySpace for my school's library next year. I'm trying to create new ways of publicizing books for boys (that's my goal - although I'm not avoiding girls' interests. I'm just working on that particular focus area this year). MySpace is blocked by our district filter, so it would just be an outside source.

On Facebook, I joined the library groups recommended on the 23 Things blog (Librarians and Facebook and Libraries Using Facebook Pages). I found the discussion on Facebook Profile Policies quite intriguing. I agree that it feels odd to have a personal vs. professional online spot. I didn't include information I felt was too personal - especially in regards to politics and religious views. What made that interesting is that I have 2 friends who I know personally who have Facebook accounts. I played around with the security settings to block professional friends from seeing information that would be too personal. I do like the fact that you can tailor the settings.

It was very easy to find friends on Facebook. It searched all of my web-based email lists. Is it odd that I feel a little freaked out because these sites can access my email lists so easily? True, I did have to provide a password, but yikes. It was enjoyable to be able to search so easily by graduation places and dates. I found a few folks I haven't talked to in years.

I placed a Facebook badge in my sidebar, but it's been difficult to get people to participate with one another during the project.

Contrasting Facebook and MySpace

Right off the bat I noticed that you can't look at full profiles on Facebook. It seems more secure. You can look for friends by accessing your online email accounts. I was surprised by how many of my friends already had Facebook accounts. I didn't like the network item in Facebook - it didn't have my town so I had to look at nearby larger cities, which was a bit useless. You can't delete that item from the profile.

I like the ability to make design changes in MySpace, but it also leads to some horrid designs. I have a friend who has a site I can barely read. She's got good info on it, but I couldn't read the ornate font, or see through the black background.

I didn't like the way Facebook tracks your actions. I was able to turn that off (I think), but it felt like an intrusive option in the first place. I recall reading how that was an issue as it related to purchasing items.

The article about using Facebook for professional use was interesting. I know of a lot of organizations and political folks who use both Facebook and MySpace, so I know it's done. I guess I prefer the e-folio online resume, which gives me much greater control over who sees my information, and what I want on there.

Thing 19 - Podcasts

I subscribe to a number of podcasts in iTunes. I travel frequently, so my iPod has become a close friend. I sub to This American Life, Speaking of Faith and Fresh Air. Public radio junkie? I think so. I enjoyed listening to the media specialist's podcasts listed on the Memoirs for the School Library Media Specialists. I wouldn't mind joining them, or sharing a podcast.

I have a great show that I'd recommend - it's called Grammar Girl. I linked to her podcast on apostrophes. She explains those pesky grammar difficulties in clear, fun language. I think this would be great for middle school and high school English classes. Maybe those students could create their own "tutoring" podcasts!

This is my first attempt at a podcast. I made the podcast in the style of a program that MPR broadcasts, about sounds in our lives. I used Audacity to record it. It took me a few times to get through it because my bird is so ANNOYING when I talk into a phone or microphone!

I couldn't figure out how to mix the tracks, so I just cut and paste them. The podcast is pretty quiet; I'll have to either get a mic for my computer, or figure out how to work with the gain control in Audacity more effectively. Either way, this was pretty fun.

I searched around and found a free site called PodBean. It seems like a regular blog site, but it has space for uploading podcasts. It's really easy to navigate, and I like the clean interface. I missed the GCast link on the first pass through the reading. I'd like to try that site, too. Here's Tico:

Powered by Podbean.com

Thing 18 - Online Video

I went a little nuts with this Thing. I'm pretty familiar with Youtube and some other video sites. I decided to take on the challenge and upload a video I created. I would like to use TeacherTube because YouTube is blocked in our district.

Unfortunately, I fought with Teacher Tube for hours. I could not get the video to upload, no matter what I tried. I started with a large .avi file. It would load all the way until the finalization point, and then it stuck there for an hour. I canceled and tried an .mov, a .wmv, and various smaller file sizes. Same thing. It would get to the finalization point and hang. I also tried using Google Video, but I kept getting an internal server error. I had read that Google was having issues today, so it was probably tied to that. I'm really frustrated at this point, so I just uploaded it to this blog. I'll keep trying to get it on Teacher Tube, because I'd like to use it next year.

I created a short video on how to use the library at my school. Of course it took me hours and hours to edit (I use Premiere Elements), and it's just a short little video. I'm pretty excited to use it next year to intro the library to new 5th graders, and for new students to the school. I wish I had done this earlier, but I had sufficient inspiration to create it now because of the Thing project. The audio is really tinny here, but it's fine on my original. I'll fight with it later.

My friends and I had a weird Youtube-flurry earlier this year and dug through so many 1980s music videos and 1970s Saturday morning cartoon shows that I considered ratting my hair in solidarity. At one point, as we were trading memories (any of you "old folks" remember Underdog? My favorite) someone messaged, "What did we do before the Internet?" Well, actually she said Intertubes, but you get what she meant.

I love the link from the 23 Things site to the book dominoes video. It's interesting to note how many people viewed that one compared to most of the other library videos. What do you suppose that means about people looking for information about libraries? Heh heh...

I posted a Youtube video about library training "back in the day" in Thing 2. There is a treasure trove of mid-century training/educational videos online - and I think I saw some of them in elementary school! Not too long ago, our media folks were talking about subscribing to a service that would serve videos on demand. Those talks have stalled because, for the most part, the online video sites have what teachers want. This video has been used by our admins in several sessions when we talk about what our students need to survive and thrive when they graduate. Sobering and inspiring stuff:


I also discovered this one recently. It's also really thought-provoking, and worth showing to teachers (and the public!)


Online videos are an amazing resource. Youtube is blocked in our district, but TeacherTube isn't. We've had fairly good luck finding videos there. Most of the teachers who use online videos are savvy enough to pull them offline so they aren't sucking bandwidth. Unfortunately, sites such as History.com don't let you pull the videos, so we have to chance our bandwidth availability sometimes. I can only see that online videos will become more and more vital to school curriculum.

This Youtube video of Jack Johnson singing Where Did All the Good People Go? is one I would love to show to a group of older students. It's probably more appropriate for high school, but what a great conversation starter:


Can't have a post about Youtube videos without posting the BEST video EVER.

Thing 17 - ELM Resources

I'm kind of disappointed I can't add anything "sparkly" to up the interest level on this post (although my interest in it is quite high) so here's a cute picture to start us off.

I could kick myself every time I log into the ELM resources. I have them linked on our school website, but they aren’t being utilized like they should be. I blame that entirely on myself; I just don’t feel comfortable with this resource. I opted to complete all but one of the challenges (I’m not sharing a folder in NetLibrary yet), and am committing myself to teaching a course for teachers this summer on this resource. I couldn’t remember how to access ELM at home, but another media specialist filled me in on that password. It’s hard to keep on top of everything (obviously why this course is so valuable).

Next year, if our media specialists remain together for our peer learning groups, I’d love to be able to use NetLibrary to do a book study. Great way to further our studies, create shared notes and use a valuable resource. I really need to think of ways to get teachers excited about using the ELM resources with their kids. They are so stuck on googling everything. I’d like to roll the databases into a curriculum class so teachers get a chance to do some digging.

InfoTrack Student: I put the RSS feed about smoking in my Reader – that was pretty nifty. I can see teachers and students tracking info that way. I was disappointed that our district blocks the term “MySpace” because every article and other resources were blocked. I was able to get info using the search term “social networking” but the search hits included articles on Facebook and Bebo and other topics I didn’t want. It took a little digging to find the RSS feeds on NPR for Children’s Health, but once I found the News Feeds page, it was pretty slick. I chose to add the Politics & Society feed, rather than the Children’s Health feed.

I created a webpage in EBSCO Page Composer. I found it to be a bit persnickety. Setting up the page was SLO—OWW (I did get a message about some GALE issues during that time, so that might have been causing the speed problem). Editing is really limited, and I was disappointed that it doesn’t just send the info out to a blog, rather than create a webpage. I don’t have an official website anymore, now that our district has gone to a portal, using an html page is tricky. I also added a local image, which would not show up when I saved the picture in the same place as the html file, as the directions required. I edited the html file in Frontpage, so it wasn’t a big deal, but still a pain.

Oh my, do I love ProQuest. I created the webpage, which was emailed to me within seconds. It was easy to narrow my search. I did some searches and marked results as I went. It reminded me of tagging. Love this resource.

I’ll admit I heaved a large sigh as I looked through NetLibrary. I found quite a few resources on peer coaching and training – two areas I’m currently studying – and now I have MORE items on my reading list! I am impressed by the number of available books. I wish it were easier to download the books for offline viewing. I added notes to a number of books. I keep repeating myself, but these are amazing resources!

Thing 16 - Student 2.0 Tools

Great, great resources. I have been working on implementing a new research method in our district - the I-Search - with little success. Partially, I think it has to do with the fact that we are "dumping" the entire research process into the 6th grade, without the "dribbling" of skills in previous grades that the Research Calculator site recommends.

Our teachers are not accustomed to a true research process. They are inclined to assign a "hot topic" to students, and to accepting what is, in essence, just a regurgitation of previously written information. It's hard to push teachers into the messy world of true research with their students. I REALLY appreciate the teacher resources that accompany the Research Calculator. I noticed that there are references to the I-Search process and a few well-written documents that talk about how to avoid plagiarism.

Defining a question is probably the most difficult aspect of the research process, and the support materials do a great job of covering how to define a topic and create a specific question. It would be handy to have a Bloom's Taxonomy handout in there, too. What a great resource, though. I'd like to share this with our curriculum director the next time we meet on our research process.

I found one glitch: the definitions aren't anchored well and lead to the whole glossary list, rather than to the word I clicked on. Small issue, but annoying.

I played with the Assignment Calculator, too. I was impressed that the links changed, depending on the subject area. I'd like to try that site for the next graduate class I take. Quite impressive.

Thing 15 - Online Games

I'm whiny. I'll admit it. I detest online games. I waste enough time online without getting sucked in by games. I'm not a total game Luddite - I've played Super Mario 3 quite a bit, spent more than enough time in the worlds of Myst and Riven, and will flip on DDR on my Playstation II (hey - it's exercise!). But generally, I avoid online games.

I did actually get a kick out of Second Life, although the whole money thing makes me suspicious. I wandered around a bit and chatted with some folks, and had a mentor show me how to change my appearance. It seems that hair is a big, darn deal in SL, so I may try to get my hands on some free hairstyle eventually. It reminded me of Myst/Riven a bit, but with no problem-solving tasks. It was weird to walk around, just for the sake of wandering around. I checked out Northern Illinois University (what a sad week it has been for them) because my dad went there when I was just a wee one, and I wanted to see what they were doing. I also stopped by some art galleries. It's amazing what creative things people are doing in that world.

From the reading, it's obvious that schools are finding success using this type of advertising and distance-learning opportunities, and it might be fun taking an online class in this manner - certainly more exciting than reading article after article and not meeting people face to face.

Took a screen shot, just for the heck of it. Gotta love the tie-dye. I'm KrisKros Smythe online. Maybe I'll see someone on there. Not that I'll spend a lot of time on here. No. No. No. Mustn't waste more time online.

Thing 14 - LibraryThing

I discovered LibraryThing last summer when I was working on organizing my church library. I was starting from scratch, looking for cheap cataloging software, and the first link on Google was LibraryThing. I could hardly believe it. I have about 400 books in the church library (I've got 335 books cataloged).

I led an adult forum at my church on the library early this fall, and explained to the folks who came to the class that about 10 years ago, when our schools began automating, we paid almost $10,000 to use a Union Catalog, which had around a 80% hit rate. This summer, I paid $25 for the same kind of service - and have an almost perfect hit rate. It's rare when Amazon doesn't have a book entry, but having access to the Library of Congress has enabled me to find some really obscure titles. This really is an amazing service.

Tagging books on Library Thing can be challenging because it's wide-open for interpretation. I tend to use the subject guides on Amazon, and have had some luck with the CIP's in books. I opted to shelve books by topics, rather than by Dewey. It makes more sense for a church library, where people are usually looking for specific topics, and the Dewey range is pretty crowded around the 200s.

This summer, the LibraryThing crew was making some adjustments to their servers and the service would be slow or unavailable at times. I haven't had any problems with it for months and I've noticed many enhancements. I just can't say enough good things about LibraryThing. It's perfect for personal collections, and church libraries. I'd love to be able to use it to advertise new acquisitions at the school, but I haven't been able to figure out how to import lists from Follett yet.

The Brainerd UCC church's library widget:

And just because I love tag clouds:

Thing 13 - Organizational Tools

I spend a lot of mind-fixating, puppy-dog-ignoring, housekeeping-eschewing time on the Internet each day. I have to Make. Myself. Get. Away. From. The Darn. Machine. every now and then. I realize it’s probably an addiction, and one I’m not going to give up on soon. But, realizing that about myself, I have also tried to organize my surfing habits so I can access the information I am looking for quickly, so I’m not clicking all over the place and getting side-tracked. Sounds pathetic, but I have found some effective tools to help in my pursuit of Intertubing Moderation. My aggregator (Google Reader) and iGoogle are the most effective tools in my arsenal.

iGoogle is great because I’ve grouped the things I like to look at right on my homepage: weather, Reader link, a countdown to specific events, a to-do list, my gmail account, etc. Firefox also helps me keep organized with its very effective and user-friendly add-ons. I log on to all my email accounts and favorite blogs with one click. I use several Firefox add-ons: Clipmarks, Notebook, Foxmarks, Veoh Video Downloader, and IE Filter.

Google Reader helps me feed my geeky need for political information. I can whip through hundreds of news stories in (for me) a short amount of time. Del.icio.us is going to be pretty handy because I can tag stories easily. I’m forever sifting through starred stories on Reader to find something I’m looking for (which, even though I know I can tag stories, is still easier on Del.icio.us).

Below is a shot of my iGoogle page. You’ll notice there are 29 days until spring break (come on…that’s important stuff!), it’s about -4º, my to-do list is caught up, and I’ve answered all of my gmail. Time for mindless surfing.

Comments from the Thing 13 blog prompts

I like the online calendars that were linked from the 23 Things blog, but it's hard to beat a good ol' Exchange calendar, which syncs with my iPaq. If I were to pick an online shared calendar to use, though, it would probably be Google Calendar. It's got a clean design, and it's very user-friendly.

I have an online to-dolist on my iGoogle page, but I don't use it very often, unless I'm working on specific projects. The only list I usually make consistently is for groceries, and I still find it easier to use old technology (pencil and paper) and maintain the list on my refrigerator. I tend to use the online to-do list at the beginning of the school year when I'm swamped with things to remember.

Okay, Zamzar? Cool beans. I'm not stuck without a translator often, but I was last week, trying to get an Appleworks doc translated to MS Word. (Nuts - there is no translator for that one!) But, the fact that it includes a Works and Wordperfect translator, and you can convert to pdf, and all of the audio translators...this is really good stuff. I wish I had known about this site earlier. I have use CutePdf quite a bit, and have been happy with that. I've noticed that on occasion, the free pdf makers make smaller documents than Acrobat!

Backpack makes me jittery. I'm not obsessive about planning and listing, and it feels overwhelming, just going through the example pages. I do like the product comparison features with pictures. For those who need this much order in their lives, this site has it all. I'm afraid I'd get stressed out just trying to keep up...heh heh. I'm impressed that I am able to keep up with my calendar and iGoogle page.

I'm amazed by all the organizational tools available on the web. For those who live and breath by a schedule, these are some impressive resources.

Thing 12 - Social Bookmarking II

I just moved this post up to keep things in order, so if you've been here in the last few days, you've already seen this one. I have an account on Digg, but I just reconfigged it to throw Digg blog entries to this 23 Things blog, rather than to my personal one. I love Digg - although I haven't tried any of the others mentioned in the Thing 12 overview.

The Newsvine site intrigues me and I added it to my Google Reader. I read RealClearPolitics every day (obsessively) and Newsvine reminds me of RCP in that it lists articles from a number of sources. Newsvine has a wider variety of topics than RCP, which is dedicated exclusively to political news. Newsvine seems kind of like the people's Huffington Post.

Digg cracks me up because they are just a tad sarcastic when you move around your settings pages. I appreciate a good snark. This is the Digg blog entry I posted today. I was the first one to add this to Digg.

Dan Brown: School-Level Cuts Hit New York City

I added this story to Digg today. Our district had drastic cuts due to a failed levy, and these stories catch me all the time. It's bad all over. I was most struck by this quote: "...they absolutely need a reduction of the standardized testing mania that has gripped city schools. No child's education will be hindered if he takes fewer high-stakes tests. Regrettably, Bloomberg's ill-considered budget cuts keep in place a draconian testing regime while ripping out many of the support struts that enable students to achieve on those tests--and in life.Someday, we will regret leaving millions of kids behind.

read more | digg story

Blog prompts:

• How do you think you can use these tools in your library or at home?

I use Digg to catch what folks are reading the most. It's easy to categorize information and search by dates. I often star stories on Google Reader, but it's hard to categorize them (update: until I noticed you can tag stories!). I think this would be great for social studies teachers - especially those who pay attention to current events. Current events come right to you, and you can blog about what you read. I could see a class of kids, blogging on current events and reading each other's work.

• Do these tools seem to be a productivity enhancer or a productivity detractor?

I like the fact that I can quickly get at the information that I like to focus on using these sites. It is driven by web-savvy folks, so it has a bent toward the young and politically motivated, but I don't mind that. I think it could detract if you start just "grazing", which is easy to do. If you are directed to look for specific topics, these are great tools.

• Have you ever read a story/item as a result of seeing it on one of these sites?

I posted one Digg item I read at the top of this post. I don't use Digg as often as Google Reader, but when I do use it, I generally use it to post thoughts to my personal blog. Newsvine is now in my aggregator, so it'll be added to my daily news dump.

Thing 11 - Social Bookmarking

Tagging: I opted to tag my Flickr photos rather than the Blogger entries. Perhaps it’s because most of the posts are similar in nature, or perhaps it’s because my creative mind has not been activated by my Caribou Lite White Latte with a shot of raspberry. Either way, I was not inspired to tag those posts. If I do, they’ll all say TechStuff. Boring. I did tag my pictures in Flickr, because I use those pictures in a number of ways and it’s handy to be able to pull up the ones I need.

I use tags a LOT on a LibraryThing account I set up for my church library. In fact, the physical library is organized around the tags on that site. I believe this site will be featured in another Thing, so I’m not going to spend much time talking about it here, but the tagging function of LibraryThing is awesome. I love using the subject clouds.

I just have to pause a moment because I’m feeling a little fahrklempt (which is a much funnier word when you say it, rather than spell it). Del.icio.us ROCKS!! I’ve been avoiding using it, even though I see it everywhere, because it’s “just one more thing to maintain.” I played with it for a few minutes and fell in love. I like the fact that the buttons are on the toolbar, and you can tag items immediately, rather than having to click through pages to use a site like Foxmarks. I won’t give up Foxmarks because I like having my personal bookmarks follow me around in a familiar interface, but I love the tagging feature on Del.icio.us. I star posts in Google Reader, but it just dumps everything in a pile. I went through all of my starred posts and added tags to them in Del.icio.us. (UPDATE: I LIED!!!! On a hunch, I searched the help files on Google Reader. Lo and behold, it lets you tag posts, and add them to Digg and Delicious. Whoopee!! Jumpin’ up and down. Now I’ll be off to tag my Reader posts for a bit).

The tag cloud in Del.icio.us made me a little woozy – I found some really useful sites in there. This is site is going to be my new best friend. Typing that word over and over is annoying, though. I always forget where the periods go.

For students and teachers, I like Pagekeeper. It’s got a clean interface – Del.icio.us is obviously a free-for-all and most teachers like a little quality control (at least at the elem-middle level). Our media specialists have been amassing lists of links for students, but there are so many more on Pagekeeper. I could see this - if not replacing - greatly enhancing the list of links. It’s also handy to be able to search other teacher’s sites for links, and see how many they have gathered. I, of course, added this to my Del.icio.us bookmarks because it’s so FREAKING COOL. Sorry. Latte time.

I checked out FURL, and it has one feature that I really like – archiving tagged pages. I am debating whether to start an account on FURL, rather than Del.icio.us, but I gave that one such high marks (note previous “FREAKING” tag) that I don’t really want to start over. FURL did lead me to Colbert’s Wikiality – The Truthiness Encyclopedia. That’s a big plus, for sure.

The social bookmarking .pdf was really valuable. The lack of oversight and possible political/personal slant of tags are certainly relevant issues in a library (and I’m thinking about the hours I pained over my graduate cataloging class). Without having used it with students, it’s hard to judge, but these sites seem to offer great productivity enhancement. Or yet another way of killing valuable time strapped obsessively to the intertubes. Whatever.