Thing 14 - Collaboration tools

I tried Wallwisher  where you can build your own walls-  one feature was an online noticeboard maker which is used for making announcements, keeping notes and things you can do with Post-it-notes and I loved it. I like it's simplicity.  You create the wall and the posts and have followers subscribe via RSS feeds that are automatically sent to them.

The other features were also simple yet smart from a teaching wall where students can  post questions and receive answers and feedback from their teacher to a wall where you can  share and watch your photos and videos on the one page.

I also looked at Anymeeting where you can host a meeting, webinar, web conference. You could invite your colleagues /friends to join you in an online meeting space where you can share your computer screen, present powerpoint slides or have a 6 way video conference  There are options for up to 200 people to attend the meeting by being invited to a personal url just for that meetnig and there is an option for  a free membership with ads, or low cost without ads.  It does mention that this tool is small business focused however not for a large institution.  

Thing 13 Facebook

I do have a facebook account however I deactivated it a couple of years ago only after a few months of use.  It does concern me that I can't delete it totally but it was a very basic account when I created it so I had very generic information on there. I can't say I enjoyed it using it, I find the whole idea of using facebook  for social interaction foreign but that is because I enjoy socialising face to face!


The library's facebook account is quite bustling with activity which is good, it is a good way to "reach" students and I enjoyed reading some of the student's feedback.  I can see how facebook is a great tool for libraries, universities and other institutions.

Thing 11 - Productivity tools

I looked at Doodle which is used for scheduling/creating polls/organising events .  It looks like a good tool to use for social/family events, and it seems fairly straight forward to use for those purposes and would save on time with phone calls, txts etc trying to organise events and track who is able to attend.  In my present role at work it I wouldn't wouldn't really need to use it, I find meeting requests and emails is the most efficient way for me to work when scheduling the team together.


I also looked at Remember the Milk and while I can see it would be helpful to some, to me it seemed to complicate matters as I find using my outlook calender for reminders of what I need to do during my work day really helps me. I am assuming it would depend on the type of work you do and how many people you are supervising/liaising and working within each others scheduling priorities. I had a look at all of the tools and while they are all helpful I found that a couple of the tools were a little like reinventing the wheel. 

Thing 10 Social bookmarking

To be honest I was a little disappointed with social bookmarking

It seems similar to me to a lot of other web tools that are in use, it doesn't have a wow factor for me.
 Maybe I am getting too spoilt with choice?

It also seems very similar to facebook to me.

Having said all that I can see how this tool can be put to good use. I  like the idea of being able to save websites and access them offline. I  have only ever saved my favourite websites on my own computer. I don't have a need to share them however I can see how people working on a group project for study or even a hobby would make very good use of it.

Thing 9 Images – Flickr, Instagram and Pinterest

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wowowjr/8297679054/   From Flickr 

From Flickr  - George Lucas’s library at Skywalker Ranch, a company retreat in Marin County, California

• I had only ever used google images for personal use and for work for quick easy images but have never used   photo sharing sites except picasso when people wanted to share an album for me.   
• I would never share photos in this way as I don't take a lot of photos and the ones I do I like to keep for me and not with the entire world, I am obviously not a modern gal.
• I do use images at times for work, but not very often with my role. 
• I love love love this photo of this library, this is my dream library, quiet and with hardly anyone using it!! I was happily surprised that George Lucas has my taste! 

Thing 7 & 8 RSS feeds

It took me a little while to get the hang of it and for some reason I didn't enjoy this "thing" too much......however I did persist and subscribe to 5 feeds.

I can see how people can use RSS feeds for their work but for the position I hold I wouldn't need to.  I did subscribe to news sites and  television shows and subjects I  find intersesting but I am not sure anyone else would! 

In higher education RSS feeds could be used to automatically update subscribers on things such as scholarly publishers, databases, electronic journals and books. Library related uses may include RSS feeds of new book titles, news alerts from different subject areas and announcing library related events.

Thing 6 - Google

I have never used Google Drive before and didn't know it existed until I did this week's "thing".

 I would not place anything personal or senstive on there.  But as a shared drive that isn't submitting confidential data I think it would would great tool for students or anyone for that matter

I created a fun self portrait which I shared with a friend who then added her own creativity to it.  As I still had my drawing open anything my friend added  to it I  could see exactly what she was creating  at the exact same moment, that was fun.

I looked at the news tab on google as I hadn't used that yet, it was ok but I would still use my favourite news sites instead of going to google news.  I didn't like the layout as much as news.com or smh.com.

I use google for maps all the time but directions can be wrong a lot of the time too, images i use also and ututbe.  I wouldn't need to use the calendar tab though I did have a quick look at it

I am using gmail for 23 things but I have a hotmail account which I have used for years and am happy with.

I did enjoy looking at google this week, you get used to doing things a certain way and it does open your eyes to really look at what else is out there only a click away.