Library Thang

Well, I just signed up for that Library Thang... At All Staff Day, we were advised to keep a list of the books we read for a year, and this venue is just perfect for it. Library Thang is a great on line collaborative effort. I might pay more attention to its reviews because I think librarians and/or people who would go to a place called Librarything have a better handle on books than the public at large.

The more I go through this training, the more I realize how relevant it is for the future (and, I guess, for the present). This training takes me, kicking and screaming, into the virtual world of the young. I remember starting my Master's program way back when, and hearing that no papers would be accepted unless they came off a computer. PCs were brand new, and the college decided to"move" its students into that technological reality as it became the standard. I bought my first computer - a XP clone with a 40 Mb hard drive, two 5 1/4" floppy drives, and a whopping 4 Mb of RAM - cutting edge technology for that time.

Interestingly enough, the PC era advocated personal privacy, not social networking. I see a tension between social networking and privacy - just as I see that tension between the Patriot Act and personal privacy. I like on line collaboration as a personal opinion type of forum, but hold a certain amount of concern that the public quality of social networking will open many up to abuse of personal information.