no flash drive for me

So yeah, I missed the Sept. 15 deadline. I'm devastated that I won't be getting my prize as well as all the fame and glory due to all those who complete the 23 Things. However, I'm too close to stop now, so I plan to complete the program anyway. Yes, it will be hard, but reward or no reward I refuse disappoint my legions of fans! So stayed tuned, more is on the way...

Thing #18: YouTube and other online video

I've never spent much time on YouTube before now. My overriding impression of it was "scary" - to think that I could be walking down the street and have my pants fall down, and next thing you know it's the top-rated video on YouTube! (And of course it would be top-rated, were that to happen.)

As increasing numbers of YouTube videos are posted on other sites I've watched a few here and there. I'm sure YouTube will have - and has probably already had - a significant impact on this year's presidential election. I find it disturbing when sound bites ("video bites?") are posted in such a way as to be taken out of context. But,with recent developments in the campaigns, well, um, one of the campaigns, I can't help but kind of hope that online videos may help to expose the, er, limitations of certain candidates. But this is not a political blog...

Today I did spend some time watching videos, and it was fun. I see a lot of potential for educational applications. For example, this TV advertisement for Salem cigarettes from 1970 could serve as hard-hitting documentation on the smoking culture that existed before today's 18-22 yr. old college students were born. It would be hard to get the same impact from other formats.



I also enjoyed watching various library tour videos. There are a lot of them, many quite creative and funny. For example, this one from Harper College Library:



I would love to see a side-splittingly funny yet educational video created publicizing the St. Olaf Libraries to our students. Maybe as an introduction to the library scavenger hunt that the freshmen participate in during orientation. (Last year some students made a very funny video about the library as a project, but if it's on YouTube, I can't find it.) Library types tend to have good senses of humor, and that's certainly the case at ours. We should exploit that and show the students that we're fun people!

Thing #17: ELM productivity tools

I'm trying to step things up here with Sept. 15 coming up fast. Will I be the first dog to complete the 23 Things? Can I request a flavor for my 23 Things flash drive? Do you have liver flavor? Peanut butter?

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One of the perks of working at St. Olaf is that I have access to the databases included on ELM as well as many others at work and at home via a proxy server. But it's wonderful that anyone in Minnesota who can get online can also access these databases for free. I wonder what percentage of MN residents know about this terrific service.

Since I'm lucky enough to have direct access through St. Olaf (no login) I did most of this Thing by going through the College's electronic resources page rather than through ELM. St. Olaf's implementation of SFX also allows me to find a copy of an article from a citation using the "Find it" button.

For my search alert I created a feed from LISTA. I hadn't known I could create a feed to my reader that will automatically notify me of new results for my saved search. I don't know if this is something that students and/or faculty know about and make use of. I would think faculty would find it especially handy.

Also, I had no idea that one could get audio feeds in search results from InfoTrac. Very impressive! I'm realizing how far behind I am in using indexes and databases.

The EBSCO page composer is a bit of a mystery to me as I don't understand its intended use. (Perhaps I'm having a senior moment.) Also, I got terribly frustrated trying to use the composer. Among other things, when I added a link my text disappeared. And since, again, I don't understand the purpose of creating a web page in EBSCO, this gets a pretty low rating from me! Maybe it will all become clear at a later time.

Both the Proquest and NetLibrary assignments were learning experiences for me personally. Our reference librarians are very skilled at searching and making use of the features of all kinds of databases so I don't imagine there's much new here for them. But I can use all the help I can get so for the most part I enjoyed this Thing.

OK, this doesn't feel like my best post, but I'm very tired, so that's all for now!