TS Fay sort of interrupted my progress on this learning program but now I'm finished at last - yay!
Overall, this was a very, very good experience for me, both personally and professionally. It reminded me of some services that the library offers that I had kind of forgotten about (like Overdrive); it turned me on to some cool things that I had not done before (like Bloglines - I am a total addict now!), and it helped me get more comfortable with current Web technology, which will definitely help me in assisting library customers.
I do think, however, that the time commitment was greater than predicted, although I spent more time on some lessons than others. It was hard to find even one free hour a week to get to it, especially in the last few weeks, and I know of quite a few people who simply quit because they just couldn't find enough time to do it. Which is sad, but that's the climate in public libraries today - not enough funds to pay enough people to do the job. I worry about our future as an institution.
But back to the matter at hand. The other issue I had was that there wasn't a lot of consistency in the links that were included in each lesson. Some opened up a new window when you clicked on them, some didn't. Some were even broken and wouldn't work at all. This would have been very confusing to a newbie who didn't know their way around a Web site.
For the next go-around, I'd recommend a longer period of time to work on the lessons (how about just one lesson per week instead of several per week). I'd also like to recommend that someone go over each lesson with a fine-toothed comb and check all the links to make sure they work and are consistent. I'd recommend new windows for all offsite links so that learners don't navigate away from the original page, to which they must return to post their comment to finish the lesson.
As to the question of whether I would participate in similar programs in the future? Absolutely yes. It was very valuable and lots of fun. Thanks so much to everyone who worked on this!
Thursday, September 4, 2008
#22 Overdrive
I enjoyed looking through Overdrive to see what new titles have been added since the last time I used it at least two years ago. Looks like there are some new titles since I last looked, so that's pretty cool.
It was easy to log in with my library card number & PIN - I liked not having to set up a separate account in order to use Overdrive like we have to do on so many of our online services (and in the ILLiad system as well - customers get very confused having to have two separate accounts for requesting things. But I digress.)
I'm not a fan of having to download a piece of software onto my PC in order to use Overdrive but I guess in order to have a book checked out and usable on your PC for a length of time, you have to have the software that enables you to access it until your checkout period has expired. I have the software loaded onto my home computer and have listened to a few titles (again, this was a while back) but probably won't do it at work - no time!
It was easy to search for titles and look at the selections by category, although I wish there were an easy way to break down the levels within each category. For example, I can look at all fiction, juvenile fiction and young adult fiction but I can't limit the SciFi/Fantasy category to exclude juvenile fiction and have to wade through many titles I'm probably not interested in. It would be nice if some additional searching capabilities were implemented to make it easier to find exactly what you want. The keyword search box is fairly limited but works well.
Other than that, though, I wonder how long we can afford to continue offering this online resource? Are people using it enough to justify the cost? I am not a big fan of audio books but I can see this increasing in popularity as more and more people get MP3 players that they can carry with them on trips, etc. If we can't afford to buy more titles due to the budget situation I'm concerned it won't get enough use to justify the cost. We can let customers know about it but if it doesn't offer what they want, they won't use it.
Nevertheless, an interesting resource, and one I tend to forget about, so thanks for the reminder.
It was easy to log in with my library card number & PIN - I liked not having to set up a separate account in order to use Overdrive like we have to do on so many of our online services (and in the ILLiad system as well - customers get very confused having to have two separate accounts for requesting things. But I digress.)
I'm not a fan of having to download a piece of software onto my PC in order to use Overdrive but I guess in order to have a book checked out and usable on your PC for a length of time, you have to have the software that enables you to access it until your checkout period has expired. I have the software loaded onto my home computer and have listened to a few titles (again, this was a while back) but probably won't do it at work - no time!
It was easy to search for titles and look at the selections by category, although I wish there were an easy way to break down the levels within each category. For example, I can look at all fiction, juvenile fiction and young adult fiction but I can't limit the SciFi/Fantasy category to exclude juvenile fiction and have to wade through many titles I'm probably not interested in. It would be nice if some additional searching capabilities were implemented to make it easier to find exactly what you want. The keyword search box is fairly limited but works well.
Other than that, though, I wonder how long we can afford to continue offering this online resource? Are people using it enough to justify the cost? I am not a big fan of audio books but I can see this increasing in popularity as more and more people get MP3 players that they can carry with them on trips, etc. If we can't afford to buy more titles due to the budget situation I'm concerned it won't get enough use to justify the cost. We can let customers know about it but if it doesn't offer what they want, they won't use it.
Nevertheless, an interesting resource, and one I tend to forget about, so thanks for the reminder.
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