Web 2.0 Awards

Map search engines have come a long way with http://www.wayfaring.com/. You can create personalized maps. However, I will point out that it is a little difficult to manipulate and somewhat frustrating. For example, at first it told me that Leonardtown, MD didn't exist. It's an exciting promise of what map search engines might become, but it has to become a little more 'user-friendly'.
A lot of award winners were interesting, but they fell into 2 categories, either strictly recreational or serious IT professional. Very few were appropriate to the public library environment.

Online productivity tools

I love the whole concept of online office applications, because that means you can easily access and work on your documents anywhere you have an Internet connection. No more floppies, CD's or zip drives! This is analogous to going from land line telephones to cell phone technology. I've tried Zoho Writer which seems easier to use than Microsoft Office. Correct me if I'm wrong.
I've checked out Google Docs & Spreadsheets, which seems to be a 'bread and butter' type application and not have as many functions as Zoho. However, you can integrate it into a personalized iGoogle page which is a major advantage if Google is your home page.
The next thing that I am going to look into is publishing from both programs. Which is easier, and which is better?

Sandbox Wiki

Sandbox Wiki is supposed to be fun? I don't think so. I've registered, which is easy enough. I could even add it to 'Favorites Blog' page. However, when it came to making the link work, I spent over an hour, probably close to two, going around in circles, trying to locate what I was doing wrong.
It finally worked, but I have no idea how it happened.

Wikis

The whole concept of 'wikis' is rather mind boggling. Anybody can edit anything, and that means no control, no quality assurance, and no limits to the kind of information you can find. The plus side of wikis is freedom; the negative side is anarchy. It truly is like the Wild West.
Since I do like to read books, I enjoyed looking at 'Book Lovers Wiki' developed by Princeton Public Library. I like to see what other communities are reading. It's usually different from your own, and you can get a lot of good suggestions that you wouldn't have otherwise. And it goes without saying that our library system could use this successfully.
Also, yousendit.com looks intriguing. You can send large files (up to 100 mb) to an e-mail account. I suppose that you better hope that the e-mail account in question can handle it.

The Future of Libraries

Libraries have to adapt to customer-initated changes, or they will not survive. Already, I can see a shift away from the demand for a 'brick & mortar' library to a 'virtual' library. Customers are using book collections less and less. Judging by the number of reference questions that I get in information service, and, yes, the numbers have decreased over the decade, I have to conclude our customers are getting their information from 'somewhere else' and that 'somewhere else' must be the Internet. I spend more time helping the customer with technological issues than finding information.
Our library websites must be highly visible, easy to use information portals. As our customers become more educated about online resources, the demand will increase.
For Die-Hard Book readers: One interesting suggestion is to adopt a 'NetFlix' model for lending books. The customer builds a reading list, and the materials are sent by 'snail mail' with a return envelope. It's just an idea, but an intriguing one.
It's very difficult to speculate about the future of libraries since the changes are occurring so quickly. By the time you have absorbed an idea, the whole 'landscape' has changed, and what you have learned is passe'.

Technorati

I've looked at 'technorati' and don't find it particularly interesting. It seems to consist mainly of rambling musings and thoughts, nothing particularly useful. I suppose that if I were 'into' blogging and excited by the idea I would like it. As it is, technorati leaves me cold.

del.icio.us

Wow! I really like del.icio.us! Of course, I've good reason to like it, since I've lost my 'Foxfire' bookmarks, not just once but twice. It took a long time to upload 1710 rather old 'Explorer' bookmarks, but it was definitely worth it for the peace of mind. Now, I'm learning to tag the items, so that they're easier to locate. The hard part is to recover some of the more recent bookmarks that were irretrievably lost. Ah me!

Rollyo

Rollyo is not worth a whole lot. It's just as easy, perhaps easier, to use the search engines that I'm familiar with.
For all it's worth, here's a link to a very simple Rollyo that I created, based on what I learned at some Medical Reference classes.
http://rollyo.com/rlrudigier/medical/

More about feeds

More about feeds. Merlin has a 'Social Networking' link. At first, I thought, "This is not very interesting." However, I was proved wrong. I was able to locate a musician cousin, Paula Kelley, in 'Wink', a search engine for social networks. I was able to view her 'My Space' profile and listen and download her music.
I also liked syndic8.com. It is a simple, straightforward open directory of RSS feeds, which is very easy to use. I got great results the first time I searched for different feeds. No tedious learning curve involved!