LIS 9763

1. Has your view of social software changed since starting this course? If so, how?

When I started this course, I initially thought that I knew nothing about social software. Later, I realized that I had either looked into or tried many of them early on, did not find them particularly useful, and forgot that I even knew about them. Web 2.0 stuff have become popular and more user friendly as time went on, so it was good to rediscover some of them and learn about the newer ones I’ve missed.

 
My project was to create a wiki that compiled various information and resources that would be of assistance to anyone considering/attending the MLIS program at the University of Western Ontario. To see my final project, please click here.
 
The wiki guide consist of two part, one, a general information guide and the other, a bunch of personal experience stories from current students and recent grads of the program. 
 

Just letting everyone know that I decided to take my 2nd blog holiday this week.

Web 2.0 applications allow for new ways of marketing. However, unlike traditional forms of marketing, it has a greater possibility of hitting large, geographically-scattered people rather than focusing on your target market.

Media sharing is becoming an important part of libraries. As internet connections became faster, information was increasingly found in digital format, and people have gradually became used to experiencing knowledge and entertainment through the computer.

This week’s readings tended to focus on games=play vs. education. So I am taking a different direction and focusing on an issue that I think has generally been overlooked in the literature we are reading. That is, the legal issues facing educational institutions using Second Life and other virtual worlds.

There are three main ideas on gaming in the library. One is centred on providing games and gaming related events in the library, another is about having a presence on or providing library services in online game environments (such as Second Life), and the third is adding gaming elements to libraries and instruction. These are three different things, so I am going to focus on the former today.

I don’t actually understand the way Myspace works, so AADL’s Myspace page is just plain strange to me because of this. The oddest thing about the AADL Myspace page is that it has 284 billion friends. I am not sure how that is even possible since there are only about 6.8 billion people on earth. Who are these friends and where did they come from? 

After the unit last week and our group project, I have a better understanding of what folksonomies are and how they are used. This week's case studies showed that tagging in library catalogues is the next big thing. I already sort of knew this because the University of Western Ontario and the University of Guelph both have new library catalogues in beta that have tagging features.

The focus of our group project was to create an online teen community where ideas can be shared and learning can take place using a social bookmarking tool. We wanted to create a venue for teenagers to recommend books, movies, etc. to other teens and the library using tags. At the same time, librarians will use this social bookmarking tool to learn about teen interests and recommend resources, both in the library and on the web, that may be of interest to teens. For example, some teens may tag books, movies, etc. from retailers such as amazon/chapters/futureshop/etc.