Week 13: Personal Experience With Social Software

There is so much I want to talk about in these last two weeks. In this post I will discuss my personal experience with social software. In the accompanying post this week, I will reflect on the distance ed experience as well as library schools’ role in promoting social software classes. Next week I will turn my attention to best practices in libraries.

What has amazed me more than anything about this course is how easy these tools are to use. And to think that so many people are unaware of that fact, myself included! Unlike many students in this class, I was unfamiliar with almost every technology we learned, so I have felt like a kid in a candy store; these tools are truly amazing. Trying to pinpoint which ones are my favourites is next to impossible; I don’t think I can narrow it down. I don’t know how I ever lived without Google Reader before. I’ve placed a shortcut to it on my desktop and continue to use it all the time. How did I ever stay current before without it? I can’t imagine going back to life without it. One of my favourite courses this term was Reader’s Advisory. I have six different reader’s advisory blogs that I subscribe to. I love the fact that I now know who has won the latest book awards, or what books are up-and-coming. My knowledge of current information was so hit-and-miss before I had my reader. This is my first stop for favourite news feeds too. I must have wasted so much time in the past checking umpteen sites.

How did I not recognize the importance of blogs before? I thought of them as online diaries that served no useful purpose. I have come to realize that for timely and reflective pieces, there is no better medium. I have already started my own account on Blogger; so far I haven’t posted much (taking 5 courses here seems to be a 24/7 activity) but I am looking forward to posting my thoughts in the future. There is something so invigorating about posting your thoughts for the world to see. I’ve had material published before, but the readership for academic books or articles is very small. It can also be small for a blog, but the potential for a large audience seems certainly greater.

And wikis – I love them! I created a wiki for my prototype and loved the ease with which I could produce an entire website. I am contemplating using one to create an e-portfolio. I love the fact that I can be creative and design a site that looks attractive.

I can’t even imagine my life without social bookmarking. I use the del.icio.us button on my browser all the time. It serves two different purposes for me. Whenever I want information on current topics, I search del.icio.us before I go anywhere else. What I really love about it, though, is the fact that it has provided me with a much better system of bookmarking my favourite sites than my browser does. I love the fact that I can assign tags to a bookmarked site. Now I have a number of ways of searching for something that I bookmarked. So often I have lost bookmarked sites because I have tried to file them in categories and can’t find where I placed them. I also love the fact that I can add a note line. A note such as “This blog was great for. . .” serves to jog my memory about why I thought an article was useful in the first place. And best of all is the portability of my bookmarks. I can access them from any computer.

Media sharing is another terrific tool. I will definitely keep my photos on Flickr if for no other reason than to have them safely backed up online. Although I can’t imagine posting a video to YouTube, I will certainly continue to use it. I had no idea that it was so searchable. Although I enjoyed my visit to Second Life, I would need to spend a lot more time there to really appreciate its features. And time is something I always seem to be lacking.

What I am looking forward to between the end of my courses and the beginning of my co-op is time to experiment with other blogging tools, aggregators, and social bookmarking tools. I want to find the best fit for me.

Check out my reflections on the course in the accompanying blog. I will be back next week with my thoughts on Social Software and Libraries.