For thing #7,

simply blog about anything technology related. Yes, it can be anything that relates to technology! You just need to share a few thoughts.

Here are a few blogs to inspire you:

• Stephen's Lighthouse -
  by SirsiDynix's Vice President of Innovation, Stephen Abram


• What I Learned Today... Web 2.0 and programming tips from a library technology enthusiast, What I Learned Today...covers blogs, RSS, Wikis and more as they relate to libraries


• Library Bytes - by Helene Blowers, creator of the original Learning 2.0 project. "Byte-sized" chunks of news about libraries & new technologies.


• The Shifted Librarian - by Jenny Levine.


• and many, many, more! See what other blogs you can find that discuss current library technology trends.


• For credit: Post the link to your blog entry on technology as a comment to this blog post.

Just for fun...

• Voki

PS: Also be sure add at least one comment to another participant's blog. That's what online communities are all about - connecting and communication. :)

# 6 More Flickr Fun

Like many web 2.0 sites, Flickr has encouraged other people to build their own online applications using images found on the site. Through the use of APIs (application programming interfaces), many people have created third party tools and mashups* that use Flickr images. Here are just a sampling of a few …

• Mappr - allows you to take Flickr images and paste them on a map


• Flickr Color Pickr - lets you find public photos in Flickr that match a specific color.


• Montagr – create a photo mosaic from photos found on Flickr.


• Spell With Flickr - spell words with images of letters from Flickr.

Discover more mashups, web apps, and Flickr tools.

Discovery Exercise:

Your discovery exercise for this “thing” is to:

1. Explore some of the fun Flickr mashups and 3rd party tools that are out there.


2. Create a blog post about one that intrigues you. (a couple of paragraphs and if you're bold, post your creation to your blog


3. Post a comment to this blog entry with a link to your blog post

Check out some these fun tools like Big Huge Labs’ Trading Card Maker. And there’s a ton of librarians out there that have created their own Library Trading Card.

So have some fun discovering and exploring some neat little apps. And if you're up to the challenge while you’re at it, why not create a trading card of your own. :)

* Mashup Note: Wikipedia offers some great articles that explain mashups. Basically they are hybrid web applications that take features from one application (like Flickr) and mash it up with another (like a map). In this example, you get Mappr (http://mappr.com).

#5 Discover Flickr

Photo sharing websites have been around since the 90s, but it took a small startup site called Flickr to catapult the idea of “sharing” into a full blown online community. Within the past few years, Flickr has become the fastest growing photo sharing site on the web and is known as one of the first websites to use keyword “tags” to create associations and connections between photos and users of the site.

Here's another Common Craft video about photo sharing

Tip: pause the video until it completely loads, then press play. This should help in being able to view the whole video without it stopping to load every three seconds. If that still doesn't work, skip ahead, all of the information in the video is covered in the tutorials below

For this discovery exercise, you are asked to take a good look at Flickr and discover what this site has to offer. Even if you already use a photo sharing site like Snapfish or Photobucket take a look at Flickr. You can compare to what you are currently using and when it's time to comment let everyone know what your thoughts. Find out how tags work, what groups are, and all the neat things that people and other libraries are using Flickr for.

Discovery Resources:

• Flickr Learn More tour (6 steps)


• Mediamazine Flickr Tutorials


• Flickr: Popular tags
  Interesting- Last 7 days


• Flickr Services (3rd party applications & mashups)and let’s not forget to look at some other libraries on Flickr

Discovery Exercise:

In this discovery exercise, you have two options…

1. Take a good look around Flickr and discover an interesting image that you want to blog about (a paragraph or two). Be sure to include either a link to the image or, if you create a Flickr account, you can use Flickr's blogging tool to add the image in your post. Another option you have for including images in your post is to use Blogger's photo upload tool.
   
   --OR--


2. If you're up to an easy challenge and have access to a digital camera* ... create a Free account in Flickr and use your digital camera to capture a few pictures of something in your department or branch. Upload these to your Flickr account and tag the images “JPL2” and mark it public. Then create a post in your blog about your photo and experience. Be sure to include the image in your post. Once you have a Flickr account, you have two options for doing this: through Flickr's blogging tool or using Blogger's photo upload feature.
   
   *Work together with friends and coworkers, or even better, make it a branch project. You all can use the same photos, just make sure you link and blog about them individually.

To receive credit for this exercise: Post a comment to this blog entry with the link to the post on your blog with the Flickr image and your write up about the photograph. Your blog entry should be a couple of paragraphs long to give the reader and idea of why you chose that photograph.

So go ahead, explore the site and have some Flickr photo fun and if you're interested in looking at some photo hosting sites, then check out this Wired story.

PS: A quick word about photo posting etiquette - When posting identifiable photos of other people (especially minors) is it advisable to get the person's permission before posting their photo in a publicly accessible place like Flickr. Never upload pictures that weren't taken by you (unless you have the photographer's consent) and always give credit when you include photos taken by someone else in your blog.

#4 Register Your blog and Join the Party

If you’ve made it this far, you already have three items or “things” completed of the twenty three that are required to earn the USB MP3 player and 9 hours of training credit.

But how do you qualify? Good question! By registering your blog and recording your progress on each of the 23 things. Tracking will be done through the JPL Training Office and ILS staff through emails and by using RSS feeds to this blog as well as the blogs you created in Discovery Exercise #3.

To get credit for exercises #3 and #4 do the following:

1. Register your blog with the JPL Training Office by emailing the url (link) of your blog with your full name to jpltraining@coj.net.


2. Add a comment to this post with the url to your blog. We will list all of the participants on the JPL Learning 2.0 People page.

Starting with Exercise #5, you also need to include the URL for the permanent link to each of your blog posts that capture your thoughts, comments or findings about your discovery process. And depending upon the Blogger template that you selected, the permanent link for each individual posts can be found either through the post’s title (as in this post) or through a link in the post's footer area that contains the date.



If you click on the permanent link for an individual post, you will be taken to its page. This is the link that you want to use when recording your progress in this project. To copy the permanent link for an individual post, use your right-click mouse button to open the shortcut menu. Select "copy shortcut" you can now paste the url into your email message to jpltraining@coj.net and in your comment.

Good luck and as always have fun!

#3 Grab Yourself a Blog in 3 Easy Steps

Watch this video from Common Craft about blogs:





Now that you’ve done some exploring around this website and understand how this program will work, it’s time to setup your very own personal blog to begin recording your thoughts, discoveries and exercises in. For this program, We recommend that you use Blogger, a popular free online blog hosting service that is extremely easy to use.

Creating a blog using Blogger takes just three steps:

1. Create an account (view screenshot)


2. Name your blog (view screenshot)


3. Select your template. (view screenshot)

Once you’ve created your blog here are two important things to know:

• To add posts: The maintenance interface that you will use to add posts, edit or change the step-up your blog is accessed online at http://www.blogger.com Be sure to write down your login and password.


• To view your blog: Your blog address is http://(xxxx).blogspot.com, (xxxx)=the unique identifier you entered in Step 2. Be sure to also write down your blog address.

If you run into problems or would like more information about blogs and using Blogger here are some discovery resources you can use:

• Blogger’s Quick Tutorial


• And here's a video on how to create a blog on Blogger.

OK -- Now, it’s your turn...

Discovery Exercise:

Setup a blog for yourself through Blogger.

Add a test post or two.

Note: Use one of your test posts to create an entry about the habits among the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits that is easiest and hardest for you & why.

Have fun!!!!

Create an entry about the habits among the 7 and 1/2 lifelong learning habits that is easiest and hardest for you & why.

IMPORTANT NOTE: How you choose to identify yourself on your blog is your choice. You can blog under a screen name, anonymously, or as yourself. However, in order to qualify for the staff incentives and the 9 hours of training credit, you will need to do register your blog with the JPL Training Office. You will find instructions on how to do this in Discovery Exercise #4.

#1 Discovery Has Never Been So Much Fun!

Wow! This first week of JPL L2.0 has been great with lots of staff members starting our learning journey.

From your comments so far, I can see that we are going to have fun discovering these great tools that are out there on the web for us to use.

For those of you already on board with this learning adventure, thanks for proving that JPL has more than it’s share of early adopters. And for those of you who are still watching what's going on, join on in. You can start anytime.

#2 Lifelong Learning & L2

Listen to this podcast [1:31]-->
powered by ODEO

Among libraries, lifelong learning is one of those core values we shelve our books by. So it makes sense that before we embark on this new online learning and discovery journey that we should take a few minutes to review a few habits that can assist in creating lifelong learners.

These habits, which we’ve called the Seven and 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners, will provide you with a refresher on what it means to be a lifelong learner.

Discovery Exercise:

1. Make sure you have headphones or speakers attached to your computer (you can also read along if you don't have headphones handy).


2. Open up the 7 & 1/2 Habits online tutorial and view the online tutorial. Note: If you have questions or feedback about the tutorial, contact one of the contributors of this blog. Original PLCMC staff members are listed in the tutorial.


3. As you watch and listen, write down which habit among the 7 & 1/2 that is easiest for you and which is hardest.


4. Post your thoughts about the JPL Learning 2.0 project and lifelong learning to this blog entry. Introduce yourself (first names are fine) and tell us what you think is going to be the easiest habit to keep and what will be the hardest and why.

Important: Your comment here will be the way we know you have completed Things 1 and 2 so make sure you complete this important step.



• Click on the comments link at the end of this post


• Write your answer in the comment box provided


• Choose the Name/URL option and enter your first name and last initial followed by your coj.net email address in the name box.
  ex. Karen Walker (kwalker@coj.net)

Have fun! If you haven't jumped on board yet, it's never too late to become a lifelong learner.

Welcome to the JPL Learning 2.0 program & blog. Chances are if you made your way here, you are interested in learning about and playing around (yes, playing is allowed in libraries) with some new web 2.0 tools that will help you expand your information literacy toolbox.

- or -

are just interested in earning a cool USB MP3 and 9 hours of training credit.

Either way… I'm glad you're here!!

Learning 2.0 is online learning program that encourages staff to learn more about emerging technologies on the web that are changing the way people, society and libraries access information and communicate with each other.

Over the course of the next nine weeks, this website will highlight “23 Things” and discovery exercises to help staff become familiar with blogging, RSS news feeds, tagging, wikis, podcasting, online applications, and video and image hosting sites.

To familiarize yourself with this project, be sure to read the About page. The FAQs should answer most of your questions about this program. If not, then please add your question to the FAQ page as a comment.

So fasten your seat belts, grab your mouse and get ready for a discovery adventure… and remember, it's OK to play in the library and have fun!