Your Neighborhood Librarian 2.0

Holy mackerel, I've done 23 things with Web 2.0!

But I had a head start, sort of. I started using online resources to share photos and stories and videos because our family is spread so far and wide, and I really began enjoying expressing myself through the medium. Once I hooked SiteMeter up to my blog, I got kind of excited about how many people were coming to my blog, and from which directions. There have been months when over 250 people a day chec

Online recorded books. Ohhh, I have what you might call a hate-hate relationship with Overdrive and NetLibrary. Last year, when I got all nutso and decided to work out regularly, I figured the only way I could enjoy it would be to listen to a book while I was on the Elliptical.

But I have an iPod, which doesn't do Windows Media, which is the only format the books come in. Sooo, when it got to be time to upgrade my phone, I got a Smartphone, which could play Windows Media. I got a Bluet

Podcasts. I use iTunes at home, and I've listened to the odd podcast, but I thought I'd check out Podcast Alley and other directory sites.

I found Free Radio Sub Pop, the podcast from Sub Pop records in Seattle, erstwhile home of Nirvana, Mudhoney, Alice in Chains, etc. Free MP3 downloads from Sub Pop? Ok, I'll subscribe to that!

YouTube is Thing 20. Here are videos from my family on YouTube.

My husband has approximately a hundred gamillion sisters, brothers, nieces, nephews, and cousins, so we have been using YouTube for a while to keep in touch with them.

A couple things I have learned the icky way:

• Don't post video of your children in their jammies - you get A LOT of hits, and that skeeves me out.


• Listen carefully to the v

Zillow got an award in the Best of the Web 2.0 awards, and I have to say, Zillow is a complete guilty pleasure. Just like Google Maps, you can find and see a map or aerial imagery of 'most any neighborhood, down to the house level. Unlike Google Maps, Zillow shows you how much each house has sold or been appraised for.

That's gotta be illegal, right? Apparently not, and what a blast it is!

Oh yeah you can use it to help your cousin shop for a house, and on occasion I have used i

I use Google Docs whenever I open a doc from email. Especially because I use Windows machines at work, but at home, my laptop is all Linux, baby. Google Docs has never let me down (except it won't open Microsoft Publisher documents), but I have noticed format discrepancies. It's best for on-the-go, such as last week when I had to quickly edit my resume on my laptop while waiting at the car dealership for the lady in the coveralls to tell me that the minivan wasn't going to blow up any time so

Ah, wikis. Wikis work best for moving targets or for developing ideas. Also, when collaboration is a must. My Internet safety project might could work as a wiki - I could invite my young people to contribute their thoughts, as well as parents, as we hash out a set of guidelines for staying safe online. In this case, the wiki's ability to track changes would come in handy too.

I don't really find wikis necessary on a lot of topics. Reg'lar old databases do just fine in a lot of cases.

I've used del.icio.us for a couple years now. I mainly use it to quick-store batches of sites for projects that I'm working on. For example, I'm working on an Internet safety presentation for the other parents at my son's school, and I've been getting little bits of research done here and there whenever I have a few moments. I store all those sites in del.icio.us with the tags "Internet" and "safety" and then when I get a chance to sit down and work on the presentation, they're all there in o

Well, ok. I made my own Rollyo thing so that I could search for reviews posted by my favorite kidlit bloggers. I can see how this tool might be of use to scholars or to serious hobbyists - if a guy was looking for parts for his 1972 BMW R2 motorcycle, I could see that he might have to always be searching about a dozen websites - but for my own purposes, I can find what I'm looking for in other ways.

The other day I helped a lady who was doing a book club for middle-grade boys. She was looking for "boy books". Now, many people turn up their noses at the idea that books can be "boy books" or "girl books" and indeed, I wouldn't tell a boy not to read Black Beauty or