Thing 36

Hey, I got an actual legit comment on my blog! I said something that caused someone to feel strongly enough to comment about my opinions! I feel like I've won some sort of blog-Oscar. I'm not talking about a shout out from a coworker or friend, nor am I talking about some inebriate who stumbled on to my blog and typed random stuff. I got a comment that was thought out and made a great point. Thanks Bill! You make me feel like blogging.

Content Generators: Password/E-mail Icon generators seem a bit odd to me. I guess I like to generate my own passwords and e-mail icons. especially passwords. I have a terrible memory for stuff like that, so I need my passwords to make some small measure of sense to me.

I tried the BGpattern genrator, and I like it in principle, but I find the actual created backgrouds sort of samey. Still, better than I could do on my own. I also tried the image generator, which is good fun.

The free image converter could be very helpful. I hope I remember it next time I need to convert a picture.

Wufoo also looks helpful and fun. I'm going to use it to create an online incident report! Which isn't fun, but needs doing.

Where were citation generators when i was in school? These rock! Again I hope I remember them when I go back to school.

The graph and chart creators are also very cool, and once again, I hope I remember them when i need them. I'm getting pretty good at creating charts and graphs with Excel, so I might not need this, but you never know.

Tag Clouds are nice and all. The one I've already got going on suits my needs just fine. Which brings me to the crux of my point with this thing I believe. When I need something like the tool in this thing, knowing the tool exists would be seriously awesome. Alas, I fear I won't remember the tool when I need it. Plus there are ways of doing this stuff that I can already use. For now on I will use this easy to remember acronym for that point: WINSLtTiTT,KtTEWbSA.AIFIWRtTWINI.PTAWoDTSTICAU

Time Toast: WINSLtTiTT,KtTEWbSA.AIFIWRtTWINI.PTAWoDTSTICAU

Simply Noise: Umm, it generates noise. How is that cool?

Random Web 2.0 name generator: It's funny. Name generators usually are.

Label Makers: WINSLtTiTT,KtTEWbSA.AIFIWRtTWINI.PTAWoDTSTICAU

Some of the stuff in the 'Other' catagory baffles me a bit, but whatevs, to each his or her own.

Here's the comic strip I created: http://stripgenerator.com/strip/230156/



I tried the text to movie thing a few times, and It's just not working for me. If I remember, I'm try it at home some time.



Lolcatz are always funny. I just watched the Big Bang theory episode with the Lolcatz shout out. Well, technically, I just watch all of Big Bang Theory. Good show. Here's a picture:

As far as useful goes, generators are fun, but I'm not exactly sure if they are useful. I guess I can create comic strips explianing things to people. That's some what useful. Mostly though, I'm thinking fun. Which is not a bad thing.

Thing 35

Book 2.0: I love using Librarything. Librarything might be my favorite thing for the 1st 23 things. For this thing I decided to try lib.rario.us. It's pretty cool. Seems to be pretty much the same thing as Librarything. I suppose, if i was so included, I could keep track of my DVD collection here. I am ultra nerdy and i keep track of what I've watched and when I watched it last. I could totally use lib.rario.us for that instead of little slips of paper tucked instead all of my DVDs.

I checked out Books in My Phone, but I couldn't get it to work right. I'm sure with a little more fiddling I get it. It'll just take some time.

I tried Read Trails, and it's an interesting concept. I'm not sure I really get it. It's not so much about listing books in a series as it is listing books that have a vague correlation or books with similar themes. I added one, I don't know that I will become a frequent user, but you never know.

I checked out Overbooked, and it seemed pretty cool. I got a lot of Douglas Adamsque recommendation that I hadn't gotten before.

I took a look at Book Sprouts. Online book groups could be cool. I'm generally afraid of book groups because I don't think enough of the people in them will share my tastes enough for books I will enjoy to be selected as reading materials. Plus I find people take book groups too seriously. But an online might have a totally different vibe.

Podiobooks is also interesting. I started listening to "down and Out in the Magic Kingdom", and it seemed pretty cool. I like that the site has stuff you're not going to find anywhere else.

Swaptree is an interesting idea. I might become a user of this site. Though I'd prefer a place to find people who were interested in buying stuff I want to get rid of. Still trading is cool.

BookBrowse also seems pretty cool. There's a lot of neat stuff out there. It's just a matter of being able to keep it all straight. When I want a recommendation for a good book, I have like 9,000,000,000 options for where to go. Plus there are the piles of books I have at home that I've yet to read, and all the books that look cool as I see them getting checked out to other people. It's almost overwhelming.

Just One More Book would be cool if i had any interest in kids books. I don't, but if someone did this would be a cool thing to check out.

Booksfree is netflix for books. But it's not free. Which is somewhat miss leading.

I've tried a few of Facebook's book aps. And I like them, just not as much as I like Librarything. Which reminds me, I need to shell out a little green if I want to keep using librarything.

Honestly, I think books are going to be around for quite a while yet. There's still money to be made. When there isn't any cash involved anymore, then you'll see an exodus away from them. The library is as busy as it's ever been and our numbers keep going up. I think this points to people needing/wanting one of our core services: Books! Many of the sites I visited enhanced book reading, but didn't really make me think books are going out of style.

Thing 34

Answer Sites: I think answer sites are fun. Some of the stupid questions people ask are hilarious, plus some of the answers can be hysterical too. And I think that's the appeal. A lot of the questions people are asking aren't factual. It's somebody wanting an opinion on their hair, or wanting relationship advice. there were some questions that had real answers, but those questions were in the minority. Also, people were using the question site as a jumping off point for discussions, or to validate a thought. I didn't see a whole lot of stuff that belonged at the reference desk. I don't like people are using these site as primary definitive answers. It's just a fun way to get some quick info.

I looked at Yahoo Answers and Askville. They were booth similar and both had the comedy of silly questions and laughable answers.

the Slam the Boards thing seems to run counter the the purpose of the sites to me. the site themselves seem light and fun, the slam the boards thing seems like a way of saying "In Your Face! Our Library-Fu Defeats you Google-Jitsu!" Which is sort of silly. Besides, what sort of primary source do you use for the question "OMG, should i cut my hair short?"?

I answered a video game question at Yahoo Answer. It seemed fine. I didn't feel the urge to wash my hands afterwards anyway.

So, yeah, the one thing I think this raises for me is that these answer site are fun. Are libraries fun? When was the last time you got a fun reference question that made you smile? Do patrons think of libraries as a fun place?