Thing 6: Communication Tools

Awful lot of reading to this one. (Imagine that!)

Once I figured out what pr0n means I was able to soldier on with this section.

43 Folders wasted an awful lot of time being clever, "pouring a 40" for himself. I learned some slang terms, but if Merlin Mann was really interested in productivity he could have said everything he needed to say in a paragraph or less.

Looking around 43 Folders there is actually good advice here. For instance the "Procrastination hack" is a technique I discovered on my own and works pretty well (of course I often put off using it). Maybe I will bookmark this site and probe it once in awhile.

Email is sort of the "grand old person" of communication. It makes a good bulletin board to get the general issues of the day as well as specific interchanges with folks. It's also a good way to keep a record if one ever needs explain the genesis of an idea or controversy. I've heard IM espoused as a good way to keep some things "off the record" but since the services I'm aware of seem to keep records of the conversation I think I'll stay wary of that usage. I would say that email increases productivity since most messages are to the point and devoid of social chat that are inevitable over the phone or face-to-face. I'm not sure that IM works the same way.

I use many email services and my biggest gripe is that once I've invested in one by saving emails to folders and by giving my address to people it becomes very difficult to leave that service if I ever become dissatisfied with it (I'm talking about you, Hotmail). The thought of downloading 8 years of saved messages one at a time and informing everyone I write to from the account that I'm moving is (so far) more daunting than the aggravation of putting up with their so-called improvements. The solution could be using Outlook or Thunderbird to download and store emails on my computer, but that seems so 20th Century.

We're still trying to get an IM group together. The main problems is that the services we've tried don't have an obvious way to inform someone intent on some other aspect of their job that a new message has arrived, and in having people online when you need to communicate with them. (Well, and having something to useful to say besides lol.) It should be useful for exchanging information that normally goes through email, and it could be useful for the downstairs to communicate with the upstairs (say with IS about a computer problem), but like the phone it depends on the person you're communicating with being at their desk, so why not just use the phone? Ditto for texting.

I'm still looking into web conferencing. I signed up with WebJunction Learning Webinars. It looks useful but it's hard to find the time to take advantage of it and I'm too exhausted right now to take Thing 6 any further.

Unqualified Support

A patron in the PCC said: "I would go berserk if it wasn't for the computers at the library."

28:31

Philip Rosedale talks about the virtual society he founded, Second Life, and its underpinnings in human creativity.

Thing 5

Image generators sure are fun. Anyone who works with images at the library can put them to good use. I'm not sure of the trading card idea as I see it getting quickly out of hand ("I'll trade you five Phil Eskews for one Burl Cooper," or a series called Superstars of the PCC.) The limitation is that the templates aren't always what you might desire but if Photoshop is unavailable it's a quick and dirty method to create functional design.

Statue of Henry Clay ©mightyquinnwky

Thing 4:Flickr

FLICKR certainly does fill one with ideas and despair all at once. Like, with the world being flooded with digital images who is going to look at all these pictures? It's the same feeling I get in major art museums: One great painting deserves all my attention for as long as I can give it, a hundred great paintings just wears me out. More importantly, FLICKR seems like a waystation instead of a destination. By this I mean that in 5 or 10 years we'll be accomplishing the same thing but in a different manner (although, I suppose learning the steps it takes to get there is useful). That said, it's a great resource and just the thing we need to know to help our patrons, not to mention using as a tool to maintain contact and inform others in our community. The ways other libraries are using FLICKR are interesting but I'm not sure I'd have the patience to search out books this way.

Autumn fog

Thing 3

I've been meaning to explore RSS for some time so this turned out to be the perfect opportunity. Unfortunately, my first impression is that it doesn't do much more for me than bookmarks since I'm not waiting with bated breath for the blogs I follow to change. This (and the literature we've read) leads me to believe I'm missing something that more usage may reveal. Keep posted. ;-P

23 Things Part 2

(Written while keeping one eye on Doug and another on a baby that is starting to fuss.)

The dynamic change we're experiencing is actually an old story in America. One of the main reasons Henry Clay failed in his quest to become President is because he didn't recognize the historic movement that his great rivals Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren embraced, when the idea of a republic changed to a democracy in less than a generation's time. When I started five years ago people did not use thumb drives, iPods, Wikipedia, or YouTube; and cell phones were the exception, not the rule. Libraries, being the repository and the clearinghouse of information, are bound to be at the cutting edge of the information age. The only way to keep ahead is to keep learning. As the saying goes, "A shark has to keep swimming or die."

The questions:

• I'm participating to learn in order to be better prepared to help the public.
• I'm able to find most information when I need it, or at least where it's located, without leaving my home or office.
• I'm decent, but not great, at Web 2.0, but at least I have an inkling of what I'm lacking. I realized that while I take advantage of much Web 2.0 stuff I don't do so very deeply—I figure out how to do what I need to do and ignore the rest, which means I miss out on many features. 23 Things seems a great way to fix that. Ditto for my library.
  
• I'm interested in everything to be discussed, although it looks like a list of Phil's classes.

April 13, 2004, evening shift.

Note: Most days are uneventful in the Public Computing Center (knock on wood) so I thought I'd enliven things with memorable incidents from the past. The vast majority of patrons (AKA customers) are friendly, reasonable people. Unfortunately, it's the other kind that furnish us with our most unforgettable encounters.

Things were going swimmingly when a patron asked to change computers because the one he was at had "froze up." So I let him have another and went over to fix the computer he had been using, only it worked fine. But I saw that the chair had liquid spilled in it. Liquid that smelled like beer. So I looked over to where the patron was sitting and saw that he had his coat in his lap and under the coat was either Indiana's biggest erection or a quart bottle. So I watched him for awhile and every few minutes he would look to see what I was doing. I made it obvious that I was watching him and he started to look a little aggrieved. Finally the PCC filled up and I had to start the waitlist (pre-SAM). I guess he thought that it was his opportunity because he pressed the coat to his lips for a drink (using a straw, I think).

I sauntered over and informed him that he couldn't drink at the terminals and if it was beer he was drinking he should take it out of the library. He acquiesced, leaving the room. I watched him go but don't know if he actually left the library. Security was busy somewhere else at that moment so I couldn't get his opinion. Unfortunately, now the PCC smelled of stale beer and a gaggle of young teens were clumped together "doing their homework."

All in a day's work.

Waking up the PCC

I try to arrive about 5 'till 9 and make sure all the computers are operational. Some don't start on their own and some have the infamous motherboard problem we know so well. I look to see that the children's games computers are cleared and ready to go and check to see if any headphones are missing, have been moved, or are broken. Then I check to see if enough paper is in the printer and a few sheets are in our scrap paper bin as well as enough pencils in the scrap pencil bin. Then I grab any books, CDs, DVDs, magazines that need to be returned and head out to the IS office where I make a general nuisance of myself for the next hour and a half before returning to the PCC, walking what I like to call "The Green Mile," all the while praying for a pleasant morning.