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Great! I'm nearly half way there. :)
I have done pretty much everything I wanted to do in previous weeks so just finished up this week by changing the Learning 2.0 Wiki and taking another quick look at Technorati - which is something I am very glad to know about and will be using out of personal interest in the future.
When on Technorati I had a look at the popular books being blogged about and was pretty much disgusted at what people are reading. Half the books are about credit cards and money - Hello people! Don't overspend and you'll be fine! And there is even one on how to increase your ranking on a Google search, Get to 
the top on Google. (see left)
My problem here is how insanely easy it is to increase your Google ranking. I could sum it up in about 5 sentences, yet someone has managed to write an entire book on the subject. I am astounded!
Anyway, I think that's enough ranting for now. To the stacks!
Hmmm... Interesting subject. I find Wiki's confusing in some ways and not in others. I use Wikipedia quite a lot when researching things that I don't need a great deal of accuracy on and am quite familiar with that use.
It's when Wiki's are used for things such as the CIA's Intellipedia, i.e. "consists of three wikis running on JWICS, SIPRNet and InterlinkU"... ??? Can't the CIA manage to get a wiki running off their own servers? I think the main thing that confuses me is: where do most wikis live? Did Ward Cunningham release an open source code that people are using to create wikis on their own servers or are most somehow linked to Wikipedia or something similar? Is it a trait of wikis that they are free of charge to create? Anyway, I'm not quite clear on it but I do understand the uses of wikis for some applications.
Of the links I followed I thought a couple such as the SJCPL Subject Guides and the Book Lovers Wiki were very easy to read and straight forward to follow. One of the problems I've noticed is that since anyone can start a wiki - a lot of these people don't seem to know what looks good or is easy to read at a glance, resulting in clunky looking pages that are not user friendly.
I've created a Wikipedia account and have edited the details to inform anyone interested that Pitt Town Bottoms has a model aircraft flying field! And yes, I did actually live in Pitt Town for a few years before leaving home. :)
I'll be adding my addition to the SL Learning 2.0 Wiki as soon as I get approval.
I must say that, although I originally tried to deny that Flickr was the best photo sharing community on the web, it really cannot be denied for long. It looks good, is easy to use and best of all isn't trying to advertise a service for profit! This is a good thing in my opinion. Photobucket is a close second although not as fun or good looking.
State Library of NSW material on Flickr is plentiful! A fair bit of Bondi Jitterbug stuff popping up. Some random photos of the library externally and internally from other users, and some mash-ups. Had a look at the SLNSW mash-ups page - I'm not a massive fan of the work being done there but I like the idea. The handbags are alright! My favourite online mash-up pool is Repicture Australia.
I really love Picture Australia - think it's fantastic! I have another job at a museum where we upload a lot to Picture Australia. A great way for government institutions to get images out there.
Creative Commons is a great idea. It embraces the digital age without forgetting about personal rights. I had heard some about it from Cory Doctorow's posts on Boing Boing before but didn't realise you could check the terms by clicking the link before! That is very handy.
Ok, have run out of time (again) so will have to leave it at that. Bye!
What is the purpose of this mystical blog, you ask? The reasons are plentiful and astounding. Let me elaborate...
I've grown up around computers - my first one was a present from my Dad for the Christmas of 1988 - I was 5 years old and it was a Commodore 64. He was more excited about it than I was at first, but once I realised the mathematical joy of Bentley Bear's Shopping Adventures I was well on my way to becoming a future computer literate "good citizen". So, basically, I know computers - but I don't know everything about the internet yet. And that is why I'm committing to my new mistress Learning 2.0 - to become Master of teh Intarwebz. I've already learned one new thing - Google blog search. Could be very good for getting the eluslive unfiltered client feedback we so crave!
Lifelong learning - it rocks. I'm even thinking about joining a night course at Sydney Uni soon. It must be in the blood, my grandfather is an avid member of the University of the 3rd Age. At first I thought it was some kind of new age religious cult - but was pleasantly surprised when I looked it up. :)
I'm a fan of blogs that basically act as a collection of random links, such as Boing Boing. I'm also a fan of photoblogs that collect random images from the internet in one place. I guess you could say I'm a fan of random. The trick is finding a blog maker who thinks along the same lines as you.
The State Library of NSW is already quite adept at blogging so I think the benifits are already clear! Great for internal information distribution and open forum style commenting. Public blogging is a great way to get your new info out there and make new items or discoveries more searchable through Google etc. Also, as mentioned before - Blog searching would be a great way of getting honest client feedback, a near impossible task most of the time!
That's all for now. Peace out!
the top on Google. (see left)
