Week 6, Exercise 13 - 15

Had a good look at Del.icio.us and created an account. It is pretty easy to use and is a very useful tool, especially for research. It helps you to organize your bookmarked web pages and by tagging them it helps to retrieve them easier. Tags are casual, so you are not limited to a standard list - choose the tag what suits you. It is also interesting to see what kind of tags other people have used for the same or similar sites.

I used Technocrati before but this exercise helped me to improve my knowledge. Searched other people's blogs and revisited some of the most popular blogs like Boing Boing or Gizmodo, the gadget guide.

As much as I do not want to see the end of the books - what could be more relaxing than sitting in your preferred armchair, cat on your lap, a piano concerto in the background and reading a good book - I have to admit that the world has changed dramatically in the last decade and libraries should shift directions and adopt new technologies. They should enable customers to source information in ways that they use on the web and allow users access wherever they are: home, work, school, in public transport, etc. It is no doubt that the young generation, savvy in all new gadgets and technologies, has a preference for electronic titles. Recently, in Japan, have been sold more than 3 million electronic titles which can be accessed via mobile phones. There are some advantages in all this, you don't need to carry the physical books and remember to return them to the library. I was wondering if somebody thought about the health issues - after sitting eight hours at work in front of your computer (more and more jobs require this), isn't it hard on your eyes and spine to do the same when you arrive home and decide to "relax"? Not everybody can afford to buy the new Kindle type expensive gadgets.