Thing 23

I've thoroughly enjoyed the 23 Things experience, and really feel like I've learnt a great deal about Web 2.0. As both a computer scientist and a 'young person' I feel it's expected of me to understand all these technologies, and I now feel that I do! I've got a whole new set of skills and platforms to add to my experience, and if in the future a need for a certain technology arises, I feel confident I would know how to use it.

Some of my particular favourite things were Twitter and Google docs. Twitter has provided a great opportunity for me to network with library staff both at Warwick and further afield. I had a conversation with a cataloguer in Cambridge, who turned out to be on the CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing committee, and might be a useful contact. I've enjoyed tweeting about various aspects of my day to day job, hopefully making people more aware of the job of a cataloguer. I think Google docs is a great tool for collaboration. Unlike Twitter, I can't see an immediate use for it, but I'm very glad to have found out about it and I'm sure it will be useful in the future. While I can see little use for some of the tools at the moment, such as Slideshare, or Flickr, it is great to know that they exist, and that I could use them if I needed to.

It was also interesting to assess how relevant the tools were for use in libraries. Investigating, for example, the British Library’s use of Facebook has made me more aware of the benefits Web 2.0 can bring a library. I was very cynical at the beginning of the course, believing that librraies pushing things onto Facebook and Twitter, that were never read, was actually not getting any where. I can see how certain tools are brilliant for individuals within libraries, but I'm not sure whether a library having a Facebook page or a Twitter account makes a lot of difference. Maybe I will discover new ways that a library can utilise these tools in the future. For now, I'm happy to make use of the tools as an individual librarian, and I'm sure that they will contribute in some way to my future working life.

Thing 13: Reflection week

Well here we are, officially half-way, although in some respects not really half way at all for me. I feel the first few weeks were a nice gentle introduction, as they were mostly things I had encountered before. It was only this last week that I actually had to get to grips with a completely new technology, Twitter. And I'm really glad I have! It's nice to finally know what everyone else has been going on about, and it's also filled two holes for me: Firstly, a few weeks ago the Data Services team had a meeting about how we could make ourselves more known around the Library, and Twitter seems one very good way to go about this. Secondly, I'm also starting to work towards my CILIP chartership, a large portion of which seems to focus on networking with the wider librarianship professional. Again, Twitter seems one obvious way of going about this. I'm hoping more uses will emerge. Several members of staff have sung its praises, and described how they have used it to network with other professionals. However, in order to do this you have to be 'out there', getting yourself followers and regularly tweeting interesting things. I like the idea of communicating with other librarians, particularly other cataloguers, and am willing to give it a go. I've already sent a tweet that was re-tweeted by at least 4 librarians, which gave me a lot of pleasure. There's quite a lot of pressure to think of interesting things to say though!

So that's my reflection on my favourite 'thing'. I'm also enjoying blogging, and again am finding it useful as I begin on my Chartership journey. I'm not sure I would blog without some express purpose, but for the purpose of Chartership it is a great way of recording my thoughts and feelings on my work and experiences.

The next three weeks are packed full of technologies I haven't used before, so I'm looking forward to adding them to my repertoire.