MLA CE Week 7

This week we are exploring Podcasting and Video Sharing. The reading assignments provided valuable insights into the technology powering these new forms of communication.

I was impressed by the extent of available content in Podcasts. Subject material includes both academic topics and personal areas of interest. Some of the material is professionally produced by organizations but much of it seems to come from individuals. Having recently visited the BodyWorlds Exhibit, I enjoyed listening to the comments from University of Virginia Ethics Faculty on the exhibit. Their podcast is titled "Displaying Dead And Different Bodies: Spectacle / Sideshow / Education ? I differ with some of their comments but I found the discussion interesting. I found this exhibit to be highly educational providing a unique opportunity to better understand the complexity of our bodies.

While I have not produced a podcast the procedure seems simple and straightforward requiring a computer, digital microphone, and Internet access. Large IT Departments and / or expensive equipment are not needed to accomplish this goal. This technology could be used to record Grand Rounds, nursing in-service presentations, special messages from hospital administration, or community lectures . Employees could could access this information at anytime via the Internet. Links to public education lectures could be placed on the library's homepage. Small Community Hospital Libraries with limited staff could use this technology to leverage their institutions. Programs could be developed to provide health care workers with the CME needed to renew clinical licenses. This could also be used to market hospital services to the community and to promote the Medical Library as a place to locate reliable health information.

Online video is another story. I have explored U-Tube in the past and I still see major difficulties in creating, producing, and utilizing this resource as a medium of communication in a small medical library. I have attached a video tour of Harper College Library at the end of this post as a case in point.

In using this technology a number of issues seem to exist. One must develop a well scripted program that clearly and effectively communicates your message to a specific audience. This requires a knowledge of both the subject matter to be presented and the target audience. One is limited by the short length of most of these videos (Ten minutes or less). If the topic is complex more time might be required to effectively communicate the information. Multiple audiences e.g., LVN's RN's might require several different versions. This implies a substantial staff time commitment to develop a program.

Some information might be communicated more effectively in person rather than on a video. If I was a student, knowing where library functions are physically located appears to be more important than being told that the Reference Librarians can help you find needed resources. A live tour conducted by trained volunteers could show students the organization of the library more effectively than a video. In addition, live tours provides students with the opportunity to ask specific questions about the housing of materials within the library.

The necessity to use "hip" technology to lure students into the library by implying it is a "cool" place to be seems sad to me. If this kind of reassurance is needed, perhaps the individual is not ready for the experience an institution of higher learning aims to instill. Perhaps we need to rethink the way we are raising our children and the value we have placed on social acceptance versus the ability to accept and defend one's own opinions. Curmudgeon!!!

An additional problem I have with U-Tube involves the experience I have watching these videos. I have not been able to adjust my computer setting to allow seeing these videos in anything but a stop / start fashion. They are slow to load and play hesitantly. This does not produce a setting conducive to learning.

Recording a program requires expensive equipment that many Community Hospitals do not possess. Uploading short programs seems simple. Longer programs would require streaming and this involves storage issues, IT support, and major expense not available in the Community Hospital Setting.

BELOW IS A U-TUBE VIDEO TOUR OF HARPER COLLEGE LIBRARY:

MLA CE WEEK 6

Yosemite1
Originally uploaded by Community Health Library

This week I am investigating image sharing resources. Hiking is one of my favorite activities. I am posting photos I took several years ago on a trip to Yosemite National Park. These photos were taken on the Snow Creek Trail. This trail starts near Mirror Lake and is the steepest accent out of Yosemite Valley.

The photos were stored on Flickr. This was easily accomplished and the images were rapidly uploaded and stored. Some of the titles were removed. The Blog upload was more involved and was not as easily accomplished. I tried using a link that points back to flickr but I ended up with several copies of the same photo, and html code in the visible text of the blog. I configured Google to accept photos from Flicker but it seems to take only one per post.

Image sharing could be useful if one was involved in creating a report or developing some marketing tools for a library. Creative Commons allows assigning various levels of copyright protection to your images.

The mechanics of accomplishing this task were not seamless as one would like. It was difficult to get the photos exactly where I wanted them. I am sure some of this was unfamiliarity with the applications I used. I would suggest using Webshots or Photobucket. These applications seem easier to use and produce more controlable results.

MLA CE WEEK 5

This week I have been testing web 2.0 office products. Specifically, I have been comparing Zoho Sheet, Zoho Writer, Zoho Show, & Zoho Planner with Google Documents, Google Calendar, and the standard Microsoft equivalents.

Zoho Sheet seems very similar to the Microsoft counterpart Excel. In this case I think its a matter of familiarity. It is often easier to continue using a product until sufficient advances are made by a competitor before changing to the new application. This requires learning new controls and proficiency develops slowly.

Zoho Show is impressive in its ability to resize objects and place them in specific locations on a page. I liked the wide variety of backgrounds and formatting choices. All of the Zoho products were extremely slow to load. I do not know how well these applications perform on a Mac (My usual platform) as I previewed all the applications on a PC.

Google calendar seems superior in its ability to create schedules and share these with colleagues. I was not impressed with Zoho Planner. Google documents is a great place to store files and share them with others.

One product I find very useful was not mentioned in the course. I still use Adobe Acrobat to send files to others. When send multiple .Pdf files to others or to myself for comment I find PANDO to be extremely useful. Large amounts of data can be quickly forwarded in a Pando Package to anyone with an e-mail address.

Excel, Word, & PowerPoint are still the standards and while there may be some issues when groups have to create or edit documents, the alternative choices need further refining to be maximally usable.

MLA CE WEEK 4

This week we have been exploring the DEL.ICIO.US Website. This tool allows users the ability to store bookmarks that can then be retrieved on any computer, at any location. Users can adjust privacy controls to allow, or prohibit sharing of individual bookmarks with other site visitors. Users can assign any number of "keyword tags" to individual bookmarks. Having bookmarks on one password protected site, stored under multiple individually-assigned tags, certainly facilitates content retrieval. I have over 11oo bookmarks, and have downloaded them to this site. I am in the slow process of assigning tags to these bookmarks and weeding out those no longer of value in my work. From an accessibility standpoint, I think this site has real value. It is wonderful having not to continually e-mail myself a backup copy of my bookmarks.

As a search tool, I think there may be value in the concept, but it needs to be refined. Searching the site to find similar content in other's bookmarks may help one locate needed information. I conducted some searches in forensic pathology and was unable to locate the sites I was looking for because no one had bookmarked these sites and/or the bookmarks were not part of the public record. Common sites (Amazon.com) will have many bookmarks but unusual sites may not be bookmarked at all. I found sites bookmarked under this tag, however, they had only minimal forensic content. Many broken links led nowhere. The tags and notes seem of limited value in sorting through generated results. Each individual developed their own scheme for tagging and followed this scheme with greater or lesser precision. Pages still have to be visited and reviewed to see if value can be found.

Overall, I think this is a very useful tool that will improve over time.