Thing 23- Final thoughts about this training

This has been a good training- very hands-on with a lot of flexibility in how to progress and try out various things. I read a lot of other bloggers' postings, which enriched my own experience. I would definitely participate in any future offerings. I have learned about new things I'd never heard of, I've watched podcasts and tutorials on things I'd heard of, but never experienced, and I've looked more in-depth at things I'd already done some things with before. One of the most positive byproducts is that some of the terminology is being used more widely, like mashups or delicious, and I now have a point-of-reference for their adaptation into the wider language. Of particular value to me have been FLICKR and the image-generator, as I am a yahoo email user- so my image is now on my email, and I have a site for posting my pictures. I am glad to have started a list of RSS feeds, which I have been checking back on, and to learn to easily recognize the icon for this possibility. Also, knowing about Zoho and Google docs may be helpful with customers at our public computers. And MERLIN is a site we all need to know. The negatives are quibbles compared to the positives. The broken links were no fun, but then again they do illustrate the ever-changing environment of technology on the web, and I was encouraged to find out how other people had dealt with workarounds, if there were any. Perhaps somebody could get CEUS for recreating those exercises with new links-
Also, as a part-time person, the logistics of doing this training have been challenging. Without enough time off the desk, and without my own computer and in a common workspace environment, it has often been too difficult to focus and have the necessary time to follow-through. My most successful explorations, and the ones I have remembered the best, have come from doing the exercises at home. I hope future trainings like this will be offered. They provide a lot of value.

Thng 22- Audiobooks

Just discovered I have a follower through Googlefriends- cool- It was good to review both Overdrive and NetLibrary procedures for downloading books, as we get questions at the information desk. I viewed the tutorials for each and signed in to each to view the offerings- I don't have an MP3 player, and have never been a fan of using my desk top for audiobooks- but I have recently acquired a laptop, so realize that I may in future I may want to use it to download something , if I am on the road- I also had not realized that some items offer the option to burn to a CD, which is also a possibility for my next long car trip. As with our books, the hot titles seem to have waits. Nothing really grabbed me to download immediately, so I will wait until a car trip is upon me to give it a personal try. It is also good to be reminded about Project Gutenberg, which I had looked at once upon a time, but not in recent memory. I see keeping up with audiobooks mostly about helping our customers, rather than my own personal interest. Will be interesting to see what impact the Kindle and the new Ipad have on our ebook offerings (as well as our print ones!)