Welcome Back Webolution

Yay for the return of Webolution. For once, I am ahead of the Webolution game. I took it upon myself to complete this task independently about a week and a half ago. Because we all know how fun it is to have great products that we feel like a total idiot describing. I read through the FAQ's, which were pretty easy to follow, and I downloaded the Digital Editions. Downloading a book was REMARKABLY easy. And fast. And, as pro-print and anti-electronic-books as I've been forever--I imagined it to be cold and weird and unfamiliar and pretty unpleasant--I was happily surprised. It was so easy to use and read! I thought everything about it was pretty darn intuitive. I like how organized and simple the Digital Editions is, I liked how easy it was to move around in the book and how customizable you could make your viewing. I could see how this is actually super beneficial technology for super on-the-go people. (I still don't think I'd want to be reading my future kids their future bedtime stories off a screen though. Also, I don't think I am an "on-the-go" person.) I digress. This is all great. And I don't feel like an idiot describing it to people. I was impressed with how current a lot of the titles are, although not so impressed with overall number, but still. It's very cool. I do not own and have not tried/witnessed actual downloading of the book onto a device, but. I imagine it goes seamlessly. Does anyone have an e-reader?

Task 23--Survey--CHECK!

Wahoooooo! Webolution achievement glory. I really enjoyed Webolution. I was racing to finish before CAL and made it. Yipppeeee. So. Webolution in retrospect. I liked learning about many things. I think digital audiobook downloads, file conversions, and open office are the most "potentially helpful to patrons" things to learn that I've gotten out of this. I also liked a lot of the Reader's Advisory stuff which brought up some sites I hadn't looked at before. The reminders of our resources were good, too. I wasn't a big fan of the weird, non-famous, "indie" - aka we'll charge you once we're "somebody" - music tasks, but then again, I'm not musically inclined, and they're still good to know about. I feel like I learned more than I had known before about Open Source, and Copyright...which are increasingly important. My personal favorite just to play with was Picnik. Some were silly in that I can't think of a single actually useful purpose for, like Sound Snap, but they were still fun to experiment with. I think most importantly, Webolution exposes us to tools and sites and concepts we wouldn't cross paths with ordinairily, and thats all that matters. I'm considering my tech savviness horizons broadened. I support any attempts at occasional, ongoing webolution!

Task 22--Sites We Like--CHECK!

This one totally confuses me. It should be easy-peesy, yes, but. For the billionth time, I'm sure, I don't have the Internet at home, and even when I did, I was never a big surfer. So that leaves breaks here at work to do any of that type of thing, and it never really occurs to me. I do pretty much only practical, personally beneficial tasks online I guess. I don't personally follow any especially entertaining blogs or sites. So I have very little...or I guess nothing...to share. Which is sad. I do visit the occasional cake, baking, or general cooking websites...I like All Recipes a bunch. Seasonally speaking, I think Elf Yourself is the best thing ever created. See it in action, featuring yours truly Reference staff, here. I'll warn that you may fall over laughing. And then you will have to fill out an injury report, so be careful. Anyway. I did like Nancy's tastespotting, although that linked me from blog to blog to blog, and I can see how this type of thing is totally addicting, because all of a sudden, I find myself reading about this LA librarian who is also tackling baking and this month is making one bundt cake a day for thirty days. I hope she has a lot of hungry friends. Enjoyable, though. It should be fun to see what everyone else follows. Sorry I'm boring!

Task 21--Picnik--CHECK!

Okay. Best. Webolution. Task. Ever. Picnik really is a picnic. Things I love: A) it's free, B) no registration, C) super crazy easy to use, and D is for delightful. Yes, Photoshop is blow-your-mind extensive and the master of manipulating any image in any way imaginable, but the price makes it totally out of reach for most, and there's a lot of trickery to learn. (I took a class once, for fun, and it was awesome, but I could never buy it, so probably have lost everything. ::shrugs::) Picnik is super enjoyable and perfect for everyday, ordinary touchups and other edits or fun additions. I enjoyed it a lot. If I had the Internet at home, and if I had a lot of digital photos, I would seriously consider storing/sharing/editing through this site. Picassa is cool, too. This was a fun task to play with. And now. A Picniked photo of my cat, Oliver.

Task 20--Local and Other Gov't--CHECK!

This task is a good reminder of how helpful these sites can be, and yes, I forget about the Community Directory page periodically--I tend to just type in the addresses, but this is faster and more convenient. So cool things I discovered while exploring. I went to the Mesa County site, and out of curiosity, clicked on "Community Involvement" which led to "Volunteer Opportunities", which is exciting, and Animal Services needs some people for some pretty awesome things, one of which is being a foster parent to baby animals until they're old enough to be adoptable. That sounds like a WHOLE lot of fun (who doesn't like baby animals?), but I would probably want to keep them all and not give them up again. ::sigh:: But there were other options there as well. Next, I found all the Death/Birth record stuff through the Health Department, which is good to know. I found the Assessor page, which looks easy to use, but I don't own property, boo, so couldn't assess it. I then moved on to the State of Colorado site. I use this a lot to help patrons. Obviously taxes are a big one--Residents--Taxes. Easy enough. Another one I find myself using really frequently is Employment--Licenses. It gives a list of which professions require licenses, how to obtain them, how to apply for them or renew them, so. This is really helpful. Then I went back to the Community Directory to poke around some more. I went to the Chamber's site. And I found coupons! I love a bargain and I certainly love a coupon. Under Business Services, it has postings of them--like for Dos Hombres, Partyland, a Gourmet Cheesecake place. Fun! They also have a good local business directory. So Task 20 accomplished.

Task 18--Wiki--CHECK!

I'm a fan of the wiki...so back off wiki haters. I think its wildly convenient and helfpful. Sometimes frustrating and difficult to navigate? Okay, occasionally, but I think that's usually the exception and not the rule. I'll admit I did need the hints sometimes. (I have never, ever, been asked about library plant life. ::Shrugs:: Ever.) At any rate, I got a 100. There is much, much, much more there than I have ever really had the occasion to look at, so this is a good reminder of the wealth of its content, and maybe I'll have to "page watch" some things so I stay as in the loop as possible. But yes, a helpful task over all.

Task 18--Tiny URL/Zamar--CHECK!

I'm a big fan of Tiny URL. In a lot of my virtual reference work for school, etc., we were trained/instructed to use Tiny URL in all email correspondences, since longer links would break in the messages. At any rate. So I did a Google search for banana coconut cupcakes...why not?The original URL for my selected result: http://www.nibbledish.com/people/Chengaleng/recipes/banana-coconut-cupcakes

The Tiny URL: http://tinyurl.com/ylfxm8y

It is really helpful for a variety of reasons, but if using, you should just be careful to explain you have shortened the link for their convenience. Even in our comp classes here, we teach people what they can glean from a URL address, and folks should understand that the REAL URL will appear in their address bar after they open it. Meanwhile I've never used the above recipe and can't verify its deliciousness.

So Zamar. Its cool. I like that there's no registering at all and that certainly saves a step. I think it would be very helpful in the PC area. Only setback I see is that mine took maybe ten minutes? to send to my email, so. Then there's the "I need my time back" whine. But still really useful. I was hoping it would take a PDF or image or something and convert it to a web address, but I couldn't figure that out. I've used Tripod for such things successfully in the past. At any rate. You can now enjoy a seasonal photo of my friend's adorable about 10 month old baby. Zamar successfully converted it from bmp and jpg and tiff and pdf and all those fun things. Again, only setback was it took a while. But he's adorable in all formats and certainly worth the time.