Week Three: Online Meetings

I watched the archived webinar “Getting a Grip on Social Networking- Flickr, Del.icio.us, and Twitter” by Shelly Drumm at BCR. It was very well done. I enjoyed Shelly as an instructor and heard about some neat ways to use social networking in libraries. San Mateo Library tags del.icio.us entries using the Dewey Decimal System. A participant in the webinar mentioned a museum using Twitter or another technology to post updates about the museum on an electronic board that visitors see as they enter the building. Other interesting ideas are mentioned, so people who are interested should give it a look.

While going to library school at ESU I used Wimba during at least four courses. The meetings were a nice compromise between posting on an online discussion forum and having class in person. I was able to see my instructor via webcam for some of the meetings, which made the sessions less sterile. It was great to be able to view powerpoint presentations as the teacher presented. One teacher posted questions to the class, then she publicly displayed the answers we submitted; everyone was able to get a word in and we could compare what everyone thought pretty effectively.

Perhaps access to webinars will grow as the technology becomes more familiar. Webinars may be something that people stumble on as they look for information on Google, in the same way that people are linked to blogs now. The collaborative aspect of the tool may catch on and allow greater numbers of people to work together online.