The End, On Deadline Day, Even! (Thing #23!)

First of all, I have to say that being a part of this here Web Challenge has been a TON of fun for me. As you can tell by scrolling down the page, I clearly like the excuse to ramble about web technologies. But even more fun has been reading all of the other players' blogs (okay, not all of them, obviously, do you know how many posts have been written so far? A whole hell of a lot!) and talking to people about web 2.0. And desperately trying to convince all of you nay-sayers that RSS really is worth it.

My favorite thing was definitely google docs. I didn't use it before, and now I use it all the time. I'm even trying to convince my department members that we should start using google docs for all sorts of crazy things, like meeting notes! keeping track of librarian-by-appointments! or maybe even... the schedule! I'm being a bit silly here, but honestly, using google docs has really changed how I approach the internet and working at the library in general. And the simple fact that I can access my google docs from any computer I'm using at work or home makes my life SO much easier (see also: why I love del.icio.us!). Honorable mention has to go to flickr and my old pals RSS feeds, because I use them day in and day out and would be very sad to give them up.

As for my least favorite thing, I'm not sure. I will say that the RSS feeds Things weren't concise enough... and I really don't think I'll end up using LibraryThing seriously. I keep a list of what I'm reading elsewhere, and since I don't have any friends on LibraryThing, I just don't see myself using it all that regularly. Also, Technorati. I wasn't a fan, although I don't think I'm alone.

I think the library can definitely get more involved with wikis, and del.icio.us (one of these days I'll stop talking about making a reference desk del.icio.us account for our branch and just do it), and google docs, just for the collaboration.

As for that loaded last question, what's web 3.0? I can't even imagine. I did a pretty rudimentary google search and read some stuff that frankly went over my head a little bit. A lot of the articles (like this one I saw in PC Magazine) mention something called the Semantic Web which seems to be something where intelligent computers can read the web sort of like we read the web, to find what we're looking for, effectively turning the web into one giant database. .... What? I think we may have to wait and see what happens with Web 3.0. But I'm pretty content to continue to spend some time using and exploring Web 2.0.

More useful than you might think

I've known about LibraryThing for a long time, although I never set up an account. I suppose it never seemed necessary, because while I own a lot of books, they spent a lot of time in boxes while I lived with my parents. Actually, when I finally moved into my apartment this past September, one of the things I was most excited about was being able to put all of my books on shelves to be organized and gazed upon adoringly. Still, I didn't ever really feel a need to catalog them all online. I work at a library, I don't really need to catalog things in my free time.

But I signed up for LibraryThing for this challenge and I have to say, I may be a convert. Maybe. I'm not entirely sure quite yet. You can view my library here. So far, I have only added the books I've read most recently. I definitely like the ability to add my own tags. Since so many of the books I've been reading lately are library books and not books I own personally, I added a tag "fromthelibrary" to indicate books that I read but do not own. (I wouldn't want to misrepresent my personal library! just kidding. sort of.) So that was all well and good, until I realized that I can use tags in all sorts of ways.

I have been keeping track of all of the books I've read each year since 2005. I'm not sure why I started; probably just because. But it sort of evolved as the years went by, and now I've been making book resolutions, like "in 2007 I'm going to read more than 25 books". But what I realized this morning is that I can use tags like "read2008" to help me keep track of the books I'm reading each year... rather than using a plain old text file. You heard it here first: LibraryThing is useful!

But LibraryThing actually helped me at the reference desk one day a few months ago, which caught me by complete surprise at the time. A customer came up to the desk and said, “I’m looking for a book. Except I don’t know the title. Or the author.” My colleague and I exchanged a brief glance and then I said, “Okay, well what DO you know?” The customer went on, “It’s about a girl who travels back in time to the black plague.” Every once in a while, I can figure the book out right away, and in this case, my colleague knew it was Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. I had already begun my google search, so I saw it through to see if I could come up with the same answer, just as an exercise. I googled “novel time travel black plague” and the first result was a link this page on LibraryThing: Books tagged bubonic plague. One of the first results? Was Doomsday Book! How cool is that? Very.

It completely changed how I think about LibraryThing and reader's advisory. I know that tags are one of the most defining features of 2.0 resources, and I was able to see them in action, helping me answer a real-life reference question. Do I use LibraryThing now as my first resource when someone comes to the reference desk with a question like that? Definitely.