Amazing! An insect read my blog and knew how to edit the banner. Many thanks whoever you are. Now I have to think of some witty slogan to replace it. Maybe the butterfly can help again.

Can anyone tell me how to edit the banner on this blog? That stuff about Sarawak is so out of date but I don't know how to get rid of it. I have millions of readers out there. One of youse must know

I’ve got half an hour or so to spare so it’s a good time to polish off the last of the 3 extra things.

Kartoo

Kartoo is rather fun but I did get some weird and wacky results looking for images to insert into a presentation I have coming up soon. Then, egotist that I am, I tried to find a picture of moi but it offered me August Strindberg instead. Hmm… must be because he wrote ‘Miss Julie’. Still, it’s good to try something other than Google Images.

Voyage RSS feed reader

I became rather wary of feed readers after the 23 things when I found them to be a distraction when I least needed it. On my first attempt at Voyage my screen froze, on my second I retrieved an article called ‘Spider forces family out of home’ which led me to a treasure trove of man bites dog stories. More distractions! Very entertaining though.

Semantic Web

I’ve been hearing about this for a while but the case studies linked to our Wiki helped make it clearer. The concept-based search is a great advantage especially when it can manage multiple languages. The diagrams illustrating the technology look horrendously complex so I am glad I’m an end-user rather than a developer in this instance.

Now I have done all my things. I hope there won’t be too many more encores. I just want to go to the cinema for free, thank-you.

23 things plus 5

I've just linkedin to 4 colleagues who I'm trusting to advance my illustrious career shortly. Get on with it gals! I've been looking at VuFind for quite a while as well as a couple of other similar products such as AquaBrowser http://www.aquabrowser.com

They make resources look attractive but obviously don't impact on the quality of what is retrieved.

23 Things - Gallop to the finish line

OK. It’s time to make a belated lurch to the finish line on the 23 things. I still have 4 to go officially although I’ve done 3 of them without realising they were on the list.

The countdown:-

Thing 18

The aspect of Library 2.0 that most interests me is user involvement in the creation and maintenance of products and services. Libraries are the natural habitat of technological innovation and the willingness to share ideas and applications discussed by Eric von Hippel in ‘Democratising innovation’ is part of our professional ethic. Library 2.0 is also progress towards really putting customers first that we talk a lot about but actually do in a fairly limited way.

Thing 20

I found two clips on Youtube when I searched for ‘Swinburne Library’ though one was recognizably set in ‘Mr Tulk’, the café around the corner from the State Library in LaTrobe Street. The other involved dressed-up library users racing up and down the aisles between the book stacks.

Next I watched 4 students wreaking havoc in the Monash University Library and spoofing a library tour at the same time. Then ontoanother group of students surreptitiously devouring Big Macs in the Matheson. Hmmm, time to find something more edifying but what search terms to use?

I attempted to watch a tour of the beautiful Library of Congress having been on one myself several years ago but unfortunately the camera operator had so many technical problems it was unwatchable.

The best thing I found was a video on a children’s interactive library which synergised with Thing 18 above. Nice!

Thing 21

Onto the Sirsi Dynix Institute to listen to a Podcast. This is a site I’ve used a bit with students so no worries here. Another Thing accomplished and the end’s in sight.

Thing 23

The Wash Up. Although the Things hung over my head like the Sword of Damocles for months I’m glad to have done them and am already using several to good effect. We librarians are guns at adopting and adapting new technology and proof positive that one is never too old too learn.

Will I keep blogging? Of course. Blogging is vanity publishing at its best. You can see your name in lights and no-one is obliged to read it if they don’t want to. What could be better than that? Finishing the 23 things that’s what.

Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!