Everything in one place

I was introduced to Bloglines in 1999 but forgot about it after graduating college.  Just when I rediscovered it, I got an email last year reporting that Bloglines was closing down.  A mad panic to find a replacement ensued.  I ended up going with Google Reader.  This works for me since my blog was with Google and I use Google a lot.  Bloglines changed their mind about closing down but by then I was too entrenched with Google Reader.  I find Google Reader more visually appealing, even though there isn't much to it.  I have a personal Google Reader and I created one specifically for the Learning 2.0 course I'm taking.  I weeded my personal account down to 32 blogs and I have 25 blogs in the Learning 2.0 account.  I love RSS feeds because I love being able to read it all in one place instead of going from site to site.  It's so much easier and I'm grateful to the people who invented it.  I imagine that a library would use Google Reader to gather resources in one spot.  Getting RSS feeds from online newspapers, library-specific blogs (such as 025.431) and other information/research resources could help staff to find answers to reference questions or to post to the website/blog/Facebook/Twitter that may be of interest to patrons.

I created a Twitter account.  To be completely honest, I was hoping that wouldn't be a course requirement.  I don't like Twitter.  Being limited to 140 characters means that most of what I've read on Twitter is mundane, boring, and unnecessary. The only redeeming quality is that your favourite author(s) might have a Twitter account.  But since Twitter is so popular, a library could use it to reach more of its "connected" patrons.  Twitter could be used for the same things a library Facebook account, blog, and/or website could be used: namely, information about upcoming events, alerts about holiday hours, samples of new title listings, and links to online resources and articles of interest.


Read on,
Paula