15 Technologies for Libraries ---Free, but at what cost to your soul?

Great --more stuff I feel like I should know how to use and that make me feel like I'm doing everything some old, hard, 2010 way.   I read Ellyssa Kroski's post about 15 new technologies for libraries. http://oedb.org/ilibrarian/15-free-technologies-libraries/

Actually, some of these I have used. Some I've heard of. Others are brand new to me.

Here is the list of fifteen technologies and my take on them:

 THE FIFTEEN:

1. Poll Everywhere---Ask a question --get people to text or tweet or internet their vote. The results are immediately displayed in a chart for all to see. Turn every learning moment into a popularity contest! Have not used it.
    
2. Animoto----Used it!! Both primitive and slick. Easy peazy to use, but the free version gives you hardly any recording time.

3. Mail Chimp ---Because using ordinary e-mail for e-mail campaigns is so backward. Mail Chimp has templates---and chimps!  Have not used it.

4. Zoho Creator ---Lets you custom build apps. Right --like you know how to do that!

5. PBWorks ----I have used this to keep track of all the sh### I read on librarian blogs. A knowledge management tool.

6. Coral -----An Electronic Management System for ERMS, or Electronic Resources Managers. Once I was one, and I had to dance the ERM tune. Now I'm not. Ha! So I could care less.

7.   Dropbox ----Yeah, yeah, yeah. We know. Useful tool. I was using it daily for personal stuff, like storing photos and word files. Not into that file-sharing aspect of it though. File sharing leads to unpleasant things, like doing work.  

8. Wufoo ----Aren't we SICK of cutsie app names by now? Does EVERYTHING digital has to come with a nonsensical name with multiple vowels that sounds like it belongs in a Dr. Seuss rhyme? I mean, the novelty of this is long gone, and I for one would find it refreshing to see a plain ol name like "Web Form Maker." Because that's what this app does. It makes web forms. No, I haven't used it.

9. Twitterfeed---Tweet your blog, or blog your tweet, or however it goes. Because a social media identify is like a bad flu. You only know that you have one when it comes out both ends. Haven't used!

10. Protopage ----Intriguing---a RSS reader alternative I didn't know about.  Looks better to me than Feedly, which I found obnoxious, and which has one of those annoyingly treacly names. I have much preferred CommaFeed, which I've been using since Google Reader pulled up stakes and left town. CommaFeed has a quiet, practical display which doesn't waste my time or eyeballs with some of the crap displayed on Feedly. Protopage is probably busier than I want, but I will have to check it out. Right now I'm loyal to CommaFeed, for being sane and anti-hype.

11.  Adobe Voice ----Now here's something!  Record yourself talking and they provide photos for you to add. I'm skeptical the photos are worth a darn, but as someone who loves to record herself attempting poetry, humor and performance art, this one has exciting possibilities.

12. Survey Monkey ---Put the word "monkey" or "chimp" in the name of a and people will want to use it. This does work pretty well, though. We have used it for our library surveys, though we had to purchase the Pro version to have all the features we wanted.

13. Optimal Sort ---something to do with information architecture and card sorting. Wha? Hell no I haven't used it.

14. Jing ----I used this several years ago ----seemed like support for it had floundered, so I moved over to Screencastomatic. Maybe Jing is better now, and worth another look.

15.  Free Screensharing and Free Conference Call ---Bleh. Only thing worse than people making conference calls are people making conference calls with spiffy new web tools. But I like the matter-of-fact name!

Screencast-O-matic is good. Make good screencasts. I like.

It's taken awhile, but I finally found a screencasting program I like. I was gonna use Jing, but they discontinued Jing Pro, and basic Jing didn't have enough editing tools. So then I was gonna use Screenr, but I could never get the screen recorder to launch. I tried many, many times on my work computer and my laptop, and it just spun there, never loading. A promise that never delivered, like some cavemen I knew back when there were cavemen. 

So I gave Screencast-O-matic a shot, and so far I'm happy with it. The screen recorder opened right away and before you knew it I was recording. I decided to get the pro version cuz it has editing tools ---change the speed, zoom and pan, add overlays, animations, transitions, fade in and fade out, add text, add call-outs, add images and audio ---and only costs $15 a year. Which in your world is what they call chump change.

I liked that Screencast-O-matic had little videos on its website showing me how to use the editing tools. That way I could see what the editing tools could do before I decided whether or not to go pro. I also like that the edit tools give you the option of sizing your video for YouTube. And whether you use the free version or pro, you can publish directly to YouTube, or to a MP4, AVI or FLV file.

I'm completely new to screencasting and to adding animation and call-outs and all, but Screencast-O-matic is pretty easy to use and I'm learning quickly. Even for a cave-woman. I recommend it.