Thing 55. Slideshare – Presentations online!

SlideShare is an online community for sharing presentations.

It lets you upload Powerpoint or Open office presentations and share them online through a Youtube style interface.

Some of the things you can do on SlideShare

Embed slideshows into your own blog or website.
Share slideshows publicly or privately. There are several ways to share privately.
Synch audio to your slides.
Market your event on slideshare.
Join groups to connect with SlideShare members who share your interests
Download the original PowerPoint / Pdf file

Like other social networking services, you can add tags to your presentations, and/or comment on others’ presentations.

Users who upload presentations can choose to make them available to be downloaded.

Slideshare supports Creative Commons.

After you have uploaded a slideshow, you can go to the 'edit your slideshows' page and either keep 'All Rights Reserved' or choose from one of the Creative Commons licenses.

Discovery Exercise

1. Set up a free account with SlideShare

2. Search for slideshows on Learning 2.0, or Web 2.1 or anything else that interests you.

3. Embed a slideshow in your blog.

4. Blog about the experience and what use you could find for slideshare

Optional

Install Slideshare on your blog or Facebook profile so that you (and others) have access there.

Thing 54: Bookjetty - your books, your libraries!

Back in Learning 2.0 you looked at LibraryThing at Task 11. While LibraryThing is going from strength to strength, these days there are other similar sites that you can use to catalogue your own library, list books you want to own or read or review books. Such sites include Booktagger, Shelfari and Goodreads. Several applications are also available on Facebook, such as iread and Visual Bookshelf. It seems that everyone wants to help people with their books.

In Thing 54, we are going to focus on a book site with a difference! Bookjetty is a Singapore-based site where people can catalogue their own books and list things they are reading, have read or want. You can review books, tag them, rate them and add a widget to your blog. But here’s the difference: if you want an item, you can be linked to Amazon to purchase it AND you can search library catalogues! There are links to over 300 library catalogues worldwide. The search there gives you the call number, and a quick click on that takes you to the library catalogue where you can see if the item is available and reserve it! How cool is that!

You can see Polyxena’s Bookjetty books here and check out the Bookjetty widget on the blog Hecuba’s story here as well as Polyxena's page on the Boroondara Learning 2.1 ning. You can also search our catalogue, the City of Boroondara Library Service catalogue, on Bookjetty if you select that library.



Discovery exercise

1. Set up a free account with Bookjetty and look around on the site

2. Identify and set up local libraries that you would like to search

3. Catalogue a minimum of six books making some of them books wanted, some books read

4. Install the Bookjetty widget on your blog so that you (and others) have access there.

5. Blog about the experience and how you found the tool.

Thing 53. LitLovers - a well read online community

One of the hardest parts of being involved in a book club is deciding what books to read and finding the resources to back up the choices.

Well, Litlovers makes those decisions a bit easier.

Litlovers is an online community dedicated to books and book clubs.

Here’s how they describe themselves:

"An online community dedicated to books and book clubs—because both enrich our lives. We've got great resources to enhance your book club experience. Whether you're selecting books, or thinking & talking about them, LitLovers is the place to come.What can you do on LitLovers? What can't you do! Find a book. Find a review. Find a discussion guide. Take a course. Whip up a recipe (to match your book, of course)! There's so much to do—and so much fun—you won't want to leave"

The site is divided into four main areas:

LitClub

LitCourse

LitShop

LitFun

and there is also an online forum, LitTalk, where you can discuss all things book related.

Discovery exercise

1. Explore the Litlovers site.

2. Think of a book that would be a good one to discuss in a book club. Check out the litlovers site for resources about the title.

3. Check out LitCourses and enrol in one that appeals to you.

4. Blog about how you and/or your library could use Litlovers.

Thing 52: Clip the highlights with Clipmarks!

Ever wished you could just stash away, in an organized and retrievable manner, various bits and pieces that you had been scanning or reading? Well, Clipmarks is the tool for you. It is my current favourite Web 2.0 tool ;>) and makes me feel more in control of all the stuff that comes onto my computer!

With Furl and Bloglines, you can save the urls, but with Clipmarks you can save the actual article or the clips you want. Once you have signed up to Clipmarks, you install a button on your browser (IE or Firefox are enabled), and then simply clip any website or blog article. You can then send the clip to your blog, email it, or print it and save it into one of your ClipCasts (aka subject folders). You can save the clips for public or private viewing. You can also set up Clipmarks so that your Clipmarks are accessible through your Facebook profile, MySpace, Blogger and others. You can see mine here on Facebook.

And all of this only relates to YOUR clips. You also have access to everyone else’s clips (just in cases you wanted more stuff)!


Discovery exercise

1. Set up a free account with Clipmarks

2. Set up at least two Clipcasts for your account

3. Clip and save a couple of clips from blogs or websites to the two Clipcasts, making some clips private and some public

4. Blog about the experience and what use you could find for the tool. If you use them, compare and contrast the functionality with Bloglines, and Furl. What works best for you, what doesn't work?

Optional

Install Clipmarks on your blog or Facebook profile so that you (and others) have access there.

March is Out of Oz Month!

March 2008 is a special month for Learning 2.1. For the first time your guide is coming from outside the USA! Your guide for the month of March is the City of Boroondara Library Service in Melbourne, Australia. The City of Boroondara Library Service is a public library in the inner east of Melbourne, Victoria. A wide range of collections, services and programmes are provided from five libraries at Ashburton, Balwyn, Camberwell, Hawthorn and Kew. You can find more information about the City of Boroondara Library Service on our website, on our Facebook page and on the staff ning.

In 2007, City of Boroondara Library Service staff were amongst the 1000 Victorian Public staff who participated in the state-wide Learning 2.0 program. Boroondara library staff who completed this program are now participating in the Boroondara Learning 2.1 program conducted through our Boroondara Learning 2.1 ning.

Specifically this month, your guides will be Boroondara staff Anne Holmes and Fiona Malcolm.

Anne(aka Polyxena, Annabel and other ids you don’t need to know about) has worked in public libraries for over 30 years. She remembers batch circulation and cataloguing systems and Sunday nights spent loading tapes for system saves and system restores. Anne completed the Learning 2.0 program in 2007 and has been hooked on Web 2.0 since (if she wasn’t before). But she does tend to live in the past also – a fascination with local, family and public history facilitates this, as does Web 2.0's applications for this! You can find out more about Anne at her Web 2.0 blog Hecuba’s story and her Facebook profile as well as from her profiles on the Explore, Discover, Play ning, the Boroondara staff ning and the Boroondara Learning 2.1 ning.

Fiona(aka fi, fifi, tapsister, batgirl_the_librarian) refuses to think about how many years she has spent working in public libraries. When not working or Web 2.0ing, she spends far too much time and money on musical theatre, reads too many crime novels, dabbles in family history and tries to live up to her personal motto of “If only I used my power for good instead of evil”. Check out Fiona’s blogs at Ministry of funny looks, or fi2008.