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If you have any doubts about whether we are in the midst of a social media revolution, you need to watch this video. Compelling facts show we all need to get on board if we want to remain in the mainstream and not be left behind. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIFYPQjYhv8

Overview

To launch our DC/SLA Unconference held at Catholic University on April 3, Stephen Abram shared the history of the 23 things model which SLA volunteers followed to develop SLA's 23 Things along with ongoing ways we can continue to harness tools that best meet our goals in 2009 and beyond. Stephen said that short burst of ideas match adult learning styles while, at the same time, the 23 Things model offers a structure for learning. As an unanticipated consequence of applying this model, many participating libraries also saw cultural barriers across the organization reduced.

Ideas Shared for 2009

The below ideas shared during our unconference tie together our 2009 goals along with associated tools we plan to explore (and perhaps exploit) during 2009:

(view as slideshow)
	Living, breathing idea map: Drawn during the live conversation and sharing by participants.		Ideas reformatted using Mindomo.com. On right: Key ideas shared by all participants. On left: Tools/applications mentioned during our time together.

Quick links

Additional presentations participants were interested in knowing more about...

• Blogs:
  • Stephen Abram's Lighthouse
  • Marie Kaddell's Government Information Pro
• Presentations/articles:
  • Twitter: Changing Our Lives in <= 140 Characters (PDF)
  • Social Networking Made Easy with Ning (MPG)
• Check out upcoming 2009 SLA Annual Unconference Sessions - make sure to mark your schedule to attend one or more sessions. Format is flexible and presenters are YOU!
• Don't understand what an Unconference session is? See our definitions and resources.

Share Your Experience

Share your comments on what you thought about what people shared or the method used (i.e., Unconference model).

Play Week

Fun! However, if there is any way to import the avatar I created in Yahoo Avatars, I sure haven't figured it out. Can someone help me?

And Meez -- fuggedaboudit! Everything costs $ unless you want to look like a dork LOL.

Similary, I couldn't figure out how to export framed photos I created in Big Huge Labs.

But even though I'm not much of an exporter, I'm glad to have some hands on experience with this stuff!
 
And don't even start me on Second Life. I'm dying to get some hands on experience, but my IT dept. can't seem to 'open my ports' or whatever I need to do to access it...and since it's not (directly) part of my work I'm not about to force the issue. Bummer.

We still have members signing up to do 23 Things and that is wonderful as it will be here for a long time.

Here is a brief report on 23 Things statistics:

• 1574 started 23 Things (as of 1.6.09)
• 31 members completed all 23 Things (but two of them got their survey in after the Dec. 15 deadline) so we have 29 members in the prize drawing. (Winners to be announced at the Leadership Summit in Savannah.)
• 11 members completed over 13 but less than 23
• 6 members completed a Baker's Dozen

And my guess is that lots of members did about half or more of the 23 Things, but did not complete the survey.

Just finishing up Photosharing (yes, I'm slow LOL).   2 problems:

1. I'm surprised we were encouraged to learn on Flickr and Blogspot...which are (seemingly) incompatible.

2. Also, cannot load pix from my camera phone to Flickr...is there an interim step required, such as downloading pix from my BB to my PC?

Otherwise, very instructive! 

What a great learning experience this has been. Thanks to everyone who was involved in developing and implementing the program. I've learned a lot and look forward to learning more!

We are approaching 1500 members doing the 23 Things, but so far only 29 members appear to have completed all 23 Things. When you have completed all 23 Things, be sure to fill out the SLA's 23 Things Initiative: Follow-up Survey. Remember that the deadline to complete all 23 Things and be entered in the drawing for one of 23 $100 Visa gift cards is December 15, 2008. You must complete all 23 Things and the survey to be eligible.

This is really fun after all.

I finished the 23 Things in the middle of last month.  What a great idea this program has proven to be.  As an independent info pro, I really appreciated the structure, context, and tools that the 23 Things program provided to me.  The content provided just the right amount of exposure and practice with dozens of Web 2.0 tools, and I have already started to use some of them in my business and on behalf of my clients.  Thanks and kudos to Debbie Hunt, Stephen Abram, and the many volunteers who made this program happen.  Cindy Shamel, Shamel Information Services

We are getting close to having 1000 people working their way through the 23 Things! As of today there are 987 other SLA members that along with you have also committed to improving their technology skills by completing 23 Things. Keep working at it!

A few updates/reminders/suggestions:

We have had our first publicly posted completion of 23 Things. Congratulations to Dianna Roberts from New Zealand! See how she did it on her blog: http://www.bloglines.com/blog/DiannaR. If you have completed the program, feel free to send me a link to your blog. I will post congratulations and examples of other completed efforts when available.

Recently we posted an extension of the deadline for completion of 23 Things, now December 15. This is the cut-off for being recognized with a prize and certificate. The site will remain available for those that aren't able to finish, or who can't start the program at this time. Of course we hope you will be able to complete as soon as you can!

Finally, I presented an introduction to this program at the Upstate New York chapter's fall meeting and there were still many people who had not heard of it. So please, spread the word. Encourage other members to participate. Get a group of people from your chapter to work on it together, and be each other's motivation! This really is a valuable program and we want to ensure that every person that feels the need to improve their skills is able to participate.

Thanks!

Hi. I set up my first blog in blogspot and opened my del.icio.us account and can get into each one. But how exactly do I bookmark my blog to the latter so that I can tag it to SLA23Things? Sorry for being obtuse about this. Iris

If you're like me, you got off to a great start with 23 Things, then the rest of your life (personal and professional) got in the way! Now you will have till December 15 to get signed up OR to complete 23 Things. I'm rededicating myself to getting all 23 done.

There wil be  certificates and prizes for those who complete all 23 Things by December 15. Stay tuned for updates. And be sure to read others' comments to learn and also to provide answers.

The Pittsburgh Chapter report by member Nancy Flury-Carlson had an "a-ha moment" at the June SLA Conference:

"The Innovation Lab, and in particular the 23 Things initiative, really impressed me. Stephen Abram provided an overview during one of his talks, and at the end said something along the lines of "Is there enough value in that to justify your dues?" He is absolutely right on this point. I started the 23 Things initiative this past week, and though I'm only on the fourth or fifth Thing, I have already learned so much more by "doing" than I would have by reading or listening to someone explain these tools. I have a new blog, a wiki account, del.ic.ious capabilities, enabled an RSS feed, and yesterday I explored Technorati. This is enabled by the step-by-step instructions and the overall plan put together by the 23 Things team. Really, it's the most value I've received from the overall SLA organization in a long time, or maybe ever! (And I've been a member since 1980)."

Last January when I came on the SLA Board, our president Stephen Abrams, asked me what I wanted to do as a Director. I told him I wanted to bring our members up to speed to become the information go-to gurus in their organizations for Web 2.0 tools. We brainstormed and came up with Learn 2.0: 23 Things and it's wonderful to see our members get excited about it. It took a load of work with the 23 Things committee working very hard to bring this to SLA members. You are experiencing the results of that hard work and together we are all reaping the benefits of becoming Web 2.0 savvy. I hope you will continue to do 23 Things, and when you get stuck, post a comment on the page where you have a question or dilemma. The 23 Things Committee is monitoring these comments and will do our best to answer them. And we hope that all SLA members will post answers, comments, cool new tools they find and more. Let's make this summer very productive as we make this journey together.

I received this response on my blog to my post titled "Del.icio.us Reflections."   

Check out http://www.faviki.com/ It is just as easy, but the tags are 'smarter'. Faviki is a social bookmarking tool which allows you to tag webpages you want to remember with Wikipedia terms. This means that everybody uses the same names for tags from the world's largest collection of knowledge.

See for yourself the advantages that semantic social bookmarking offers.

An attempt at authority control or controlled vocabulary?  Could be an interesting development.