What does Veronica Mars have to do with Delicious?

The assignment for week five was to explore Delicious and Technorati. I have mixed feelings about Delicious. I think it can be a very useful tool for organizing bookmarks and making them available to the user from any computer. I've added a number of sites that I regularly access from work such as other museums, reference resources, and archival suppliers. It will take some time and experimentation on my part to make the tags useful to me.

I instantly liked Technorati. It gave me the results that I expected to see when I used topix and syndic8. And I didn't have to break out a manual.

Random note: What does Veronica Mars have to do with Delicious? Read the last question on the FAQ page.

Dangerous Bliss

The 23 things blog designated week four as "play week" and I visited the following sites: The Generator Blog, Library Thing, Livemocha, and Web 2.0 award winners.

I think I lost several hours of my life playing with The Generator Blog. I now know that "Chuck Norris is the reason Waldo is hiding" from the Chuck Norris Random Fact Generator and that my Depeche Mode name is "Dangerous Bliss." I also had to force myself to stop clicking through The Random Kitten Generator even though I am a life-long dog lover. The only drawback to The Generator Blog (other than losing several hours of my life) is that I discovered a number of links were no longer operational.

Library Thing is to librarians (and book lovers) what Ravelry is to knitters. Ravelry's library feature enables knitters to share their book "stash" with their online friends as well. I think sites like this are very useful in bringing people with common interests together and that Library Thing is a potentially useful tool for promoting the VHS collections. I enjoyed scrolling through some of the VHS library and will have to take a look at Alec's Legacy by Frank Robinson to find out why a Celtic cross is on the cover.

I did not engage in a conversation on Livemocha, but I will keep the site in mind if I ever decide to learn Hindi and surprise my brother's in laws.

I think the Web 2.0 award winners site is very useful if you are looking for the top sites in a specific category that interests you. I was pleasantly surprised to see Etsy on the list under retail. The internet has so much information I could spend (and have spent) hours examining only a small little corner of it. I also think the number of hours I spend on the computer are both "dangerous" and "bliss." It's a good thing that I don't watch that much t.v. I'd never get anything done.

RSS and Newsreaders

I have not been procrastinating writing this post. I have been avoiding it. After spending a couple of weeks experimenting with newsreaders, I have decided that I prefer Bloglines to Google Reader because it offered some topics when I signed up that interested me, such as the Abstract Art feed from flickr, without forcing me to go search for them in cyberspace. I also added news feeds from CNN, BBC news, and NPR: Arts & Entertainment. A lot of the major headlines repeat on each site, so it is nice to have them feed into one place and decide whether or not I want to read them later.

I have also discovered that Bloglines is a great way to keep up with the knitty blog, a blog that is part of the online magazine called knitty. Apparently the United Nations has declared 2009 "The International Year of Natural Fibers." INYF for short. The UN decided this in December of 2006. Where have I been?

As for topix and syndic8, I was less than impressed. Overall I preferred the layout of topix, but it didn't bring me any closer to knitting resources than Ravelry or knitting blogs already do. The FAQ pages for both sites are more complex than the manual that came with my computerized sewing machine. The sewing machine is easier to use.

Wearable InLight

Wearable InLight, originally uploaded by theknittingpict.

So this is one way to send a photo from flickr to my blog. oooohhhh. aaaaahhhhhhh.

flickr

Several months ago, a registrar on the RC-AAM list serve suggested that everyone on the list search for their institutions on flickr. I was startled to find pictures taken in the VHS galleries. I was especially startled to see pictures from a temporary exhibition in a gallery that should have been posted "No Photography." The photos I saw in June appear to have been removed. At least they don't turn up in my present search of flickr. However, I am intrigued by a series of photographs from the Story of Virginia and Virginians at Work. Why did one photographer find the acoustiguides so interesting? It must've been an assignment for a class. The exterior of the VHS, along with the War Horse, also appears to be a popular subject.

I created a flickr account over the summer in order to post pictures to Ravelry, a social networking web site for knitters, crocheters, and other fiber artists. I've been too busy knitting (what else) to upload photographs of my past and current knitting projects to flickr for Ravelry (my mother keeps bugging me about this), but I did use flickr in early September to post some photos that I took during InLight Richmond (First Friday) on September 5th. theknittingpict's flickr

I'm not sure how the VHS could use flickr. I'm hesitant to suggest using it for posting images of items in the VHS collections. This former Visual Resources Manager is slightly paranoid about people using VHS images without permission. I hope to someday get over this fear and live a normal and productive life. Maybe flickr is a better place for photos of events and exhibitions at the VHS.

Random note: I really enjoyed the "fun stuff" on Jim Bumgardner's web site, especially Stick Figures in Peril.

"I wonder how long it will take you to get this?"

My cousin sent the above text message to my uncle a few years ago.  He surprised himself by finding it a couple of hours after she sent it.  I don't use my cell phone for text messaging.  I'm not resistant to the technology.  I'm presently resistant to the cost.  

So what do I think of Twitter?  I'm not sure how I would use it.  Accessing "tweets" through a cell phone as a text message or through a desktop application, like Twitterrific, makes the most sense because logging into a web site to retrieve "quick updates" seems counterintuitive.  I can always dream about winning the lottery and buying at least one iPhone, but the desktop application is the more realistic option for me.  I spend most of days in front of a computer anyway.  (Note to self:  In order to have a chance at winning the lottery, you must purchase a lottery ticket.)

And what would be my purpose for using Twitter?  Personal or professional?  I already use Facebook to micro-blog and my family and friends can see my posts there.  And now that I really think about it...I have a friend that uses Plurk, a competitor of Twitter.  Do I Twitter or Plurk?  I wonder how long it will take me to get this?

A picture is worth a thousand words.

The number of knitting related blogs on the internet are too numerous to count.  Blogs provide knitters with the opportunity to share their projects and thoughts with other knitters around the world, rather than limit them to their local knitting group.  Some knitters have even become famous through their blogs (at least in the knitting world).  I frequently search the internet for the perfect yarn, demonstrations of difficult techniques, and to see what other knitters are creating.

Why haven't I started my own blog?  Simply put, I don't like to write.  It is not my preferred method of self expression.  When I started graduate school, my father and I created a formula for calculating the number of pictures needed to equal the required number of pages for a term paper.  It went something like this:

1 picture = 1000 words

250 words = 1 page

4 pages = 1000 words

Therefore 1 picture = 4 pages

and 5 pictures = One 20 page term paper

I never tested the formula with my grades on the line.  However, art historians use pictures to support the text of their papers and my master's thesis consisted of 83 pictures to 78 pages of text (not including the 6 page bibliography).  

I have yet to read my thesis.  I'm terrified that I will discover errors that I should have easily seen during a grueling semester of writing and editing.  Six years out of school I still refer back to the pictures.  I know that they say what I needed them to say and don't need to look at the text.  Whether or not I use this blog as an outlet for written words will remain to be seen.  If I can successfully communicate with a picture, I will.