Things to do!

More Things to catch up on

Thing 13: Finding presentations and podcasts

I have a YouTube account though I have not used it to upload any of my own media. I have used it for, like most people, for finding music videos, but also for instructive videos to help me when I have a question on how to use a specific piece of software or equipment, requiring a step by step to talk me through. This has proved really useful in the past. Whilst studying with The Open University I have also used YouTube for watching a recorded presentation that was shared with the learning group. Aside from that I have not delved to deeply into its uses. I was surprised to see the 'Watch Graeme Anthony's C.V.I.V' video that was shown as an example of self-marketing at Lucy Hawkins 'Using social media for job searching and self-marketing', and this highlighted the potential that YouTube holds for exposing your skills to a wide audience.

I have previously visited the Oxford University's Podcast pages and can see that thee would be very useful teaching tools and points of reference and citation for students to refer to in there research after attending a talk or event. Similarly this would be the same with Slideshare. My experience of using Slideshare is so far limited to the viewing end and mainly through what has been available in the 23 Things programme. Though on browsing the presentations available, searching 23 Things, I found a KeyNote presentation called The 24th Thing, which provides thought provoking images and statistics with regards to the future of libraries in the digital age and the ever increase of technology such as mobile phones, iPads and Kindles. 

Thing 14: Exploring Wikipedia

I think Wikipedia is amazing! It is a huge source of knowledge that is ever evolving and being added to. Sometimes the information may have inaccuracies or debate around it but this shows a record of evolution of the data that is made available by the site. The results I have found have usually been up-to-date and have provided me with the data I have required at the time. I have found it useful to get quick overviews and background information on people and names that have cropped up in study and for dates and events - information that is freely and readily available without to much work in finding or at any cost. Articles of interest Higgs-Boson, Space Diver & for reference Legal Deposit.

Thing 15: Making and sharing podcasts and videos

I have a Mac at home and have had a brief play with Garage Band and iMovie, but have yet to really put these to the test. I have yet had the need to use these for any real purpose, but will be something that I play with when time allows. I found the Creative Commons search interesting when browsing this Thing and was a little surprised by the variety of what you could find available through searching the different sites - I have often fallen into the belief that Google provides all and everything!

Thing 16: Sharing research online

I have had a play with Prezi and found the experience quite enjoyable! I could see that this could be used as a more fun way to give your talk or presentation over something like Power point which is the most common. It has a great way of leading you into further details as and when you are ready for your viewer to see them. I have not made the most of the tools available on this yet but had a quick go of creating something simple from a talk I attended a little while ago - New Digital Initiatives at the Bodleian. I have not found yet, but it would be useful if Prezi allows you to add links into your work so that more information can be pulled from what you are presenting later. I am not sure how much use I will get from this as generally I am without the required computer equipment when I address others, but this is a tool that I can see developing in the future.