Rosalita Playing in the Snow

Rosalita Playing in the Snow

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

The End is Near

Wow, it's hard to believe that the end of the Learn and Play program is almost here. One of the goals of this program was to create a learning environment about Web 2.0 technologies and I hope the Learn and Play program accomplished that.

I would have to say my favorite thing about the program has been reading the blogs. I have gained so much insight about staff members, from the blog names to the blog posts it has been very enlightening.

I would like to say great job to everyone that particpated and I hope you had fun.

Art Vandelay

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

10 Random Things

1. I was born in New York and have lived in Burlington Vermont, Canton Ohio and Columbus.

2. The first album I ever bought was Get Lucky by Loverboy. My first concert was the Michael Stanley Band just like everyone from Northeastern Ohio.


3. I have two dogs, both mutts and 2 cats. My dogs are very spoiled and have trained me well.


4. My favorite Atari game was Missle Command and my favorite Nintendo game was Mike Tyson's Punch Out.


5. I have been taking Martial Arts for 15 years and have my Black Belt in Shuai Chiao. Never heard of it? If you go to Youtube and do a search for Shuai Chiao you can see some demonstrations.


6. After college, in an effort to avoid the grown up world, I backpacked in Europe for three months. My favorite places were London, Amsterdam, Venice and Prague. My only regret from this experience was that I did not go on the Sound of Music tour in Salzburg.


7. My first car was a 1982 Plymouth Horizon. It was a 4-speed, really hard to shift and would backfire when it rained.


8. My first job was at a local newspaper in Canton. I did the layout by hand by cutting the stories with an exacto knife and pasting them on the proofs. I used to have to make all of the stories fit on the page around the advertisements.



9. Every Tuesday after school my Mom would take me and my Sister to the library. We did this every week until 6th grade. My favorite books to check out were the Mrs. Piggle Wiggle books. These were great stories about a woman that had alternative cures for behavioral problems.



10. My favorite TV shows are Seinfeld, The Wire, Law and Order (the original), The Shield and The Office. This year is rough with The Wire and The Shield both ending.

MOLDI

I haven't been to the MOLDI site in a while and I was impressed on how easy it was to checkout and download a book. I do have to admit that I am stubborn when it comes to reading and prefer a book in my hands but I think digital books are going to become more prevelant. I am going to use MOLDI more in the future.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Podcasts

I have to admit I had a hard time sitting still when I first started listening to Podcasts. Without the visual element I would find my mind wandering. A while ago I took one of those tests you find on the internet, you know, the ones that advertise "What's yout I.Q.?", "what type of learner are you?". I took the one for what type of learner are you (and ues I have taken the I.Q. one also) and it turns out that I am a auditory learner. Now I don't know how reliable these tests are but I spent some time researching learning types and that does seem to be the way I learn best.

Keeping this in mind I started listening to more Podcasts and realize that there is a lot of valuable information in the Podcast format. Over the past year I have used Podcasts at work and even for some personal hobbies and have found them very useful.

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Youtube is Addicting

According to Wikipedia 100 million videos are watched every day. Wow that's a lot of videos. I know I have spent hours on Youtube just going from video to video. What I really like about a tool like Youtube is how it makes information so accessible. I take a martial art called Shuai Chiao. Now this martial art is thousands of years old but is not as popular as Judo or Tae Kwon Do so there are not too many books out about Shuai Chiao. Now on Youtube there are videos about my martial art that I have used to learn new techniques.
In applying this to the library just think of all the possiblities for sharing information with not only staff but customers.

Below are two links that show the Grand Master of Shuai Chiao doing some throws:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-UJ4NCCMA0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgPzk85BYIg

Also, the link below is a clip with "Art Vandelay"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_T35QhLx_KI

Sunday, October 26, 2008

CML Power Tools

I think the CML Power Tools page is a great place to start learning about Web 2.0 technologies and I can't wait to see it expanded. I am a fan of the Library Toolbar becaause it makes accessing Library sites so easy.

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Web 2.0 Award Winners

For thing # 18 I select the list for Mobile Technology. A while back I had set up an account for Pandora and saw this site listed as one of the nominees. Pandora is a music site that llets you select music that you like and then plays songs by those artists. What Pandora also does is play songs by artists that are in the same category as the artists on your playlist. This lets you explore new music that you have not heard before. The drawback to Pandora is every once in a while a song is played that is not close to the music you like. Go ahead and check it out, it's a site that is easy to use and can be used for personal use.