From the Web 2.0 Award Winners, I chose Zillow, the winner from the real estate category. This is a great site for homesellers. You can post a property for free and include any pictures or info you want. You can even put a property on the website as a "Make Me Move" property. That means you describe property and list the price you would like to receive. Potential buyers can contact through an e-mail. You are testing the waters to see if your house would sell--a great idea!
For homebuyers, there are many great features--there is instant links to recently sold homes in your area of interest, there are "Zestimates", an estimate of the current value of the home, and there are links to other real estate websites that include MLS home listings, such as Realtor.com, etc. There are the usual introductory info on buying a home found in most real estate websites but the new Discussions portion is an interesting feature.
On the whole, I can see why Zillow was the winner!
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Friday, October 12, 2007
23 Things #16
Wikis would greatly enhance our library's website. I have used Enoch Pratt's subject pages extensively but have been frustrated by webpage addresses that were no longer valid or "holes" that I detected in the list. Of course, I had no way of addressing the problems. If Howard County Library developed the subject pages as a wiki that our customers could use, experts from the community could give information that librarians might not have.
Also, allowing customers to add reviews of particular books or movies on our catalog would be great! I've always read customers' reviews of books on Amazon or Barnes and Noble's website while preparing a booktalk or including a book for a bookclub list.
Including a community wiki on our website would be helpful, especially if all the communities had separate entries.
Of course, there could be a problem with vandalism and inappropriate comments. Controls would have to be instituted from the start. However, I see more positive value in using wikis in our library website than negatives.
Please note my 23 Things #17 can be found on our Staff Internet.
Also, allowing customers to add reviews of particular books or movies on our catalog would be great! I've always read customers' reviews of books on Amazon or Barnes and Noble's website while preparing a booktalk or including a book for a bookclub list.
Including a community wiki on our website would be helpful, especially if all the communities had separate entries.
Of course, there could be a problem with vandalism and inappropriate comments. Controls would have to be instituted from the start. However, I see more positive value in using wikis in our library website than negatives.
Please note my 23 Things #17 can be found on our Staff Internet.
23 Things # 15
After reading the perspectives on Library 2.0, I was amazed at how well Howard County Library already incorporates many of its philosophies and is implementing many of aspects of Library 2.0. We certainly embrace technology and use our customers needs and wants to drive our current and future plans ("Into a New World of Librarianship".) I do worry about forcing us all into areas that might expose us as individuals to personal danger--such as establising myspaces, etc. Our privacy must be respected and our personal lives and opinions should be protected. I, for one, do not feel comfortable publishing on the web my personal opinions and experiences for the world to access. I want my private life to remain that--private.
23 Things #14
When comparing a search on "Learning 2.0" in Blog posts, tags , and Blog directory in Technorati, I found there were 4,447 in Blog posts, 3,945 in tags, and 310 in Blog directory. After exploring under Technorati's Popular section the Top Favorited Blogs and Top Blogs, I realized I'd heard of almost none of them. The current top searches in Tehnorati came as no surprise. However, I was pleasantly surprised to see how many of the posts from the Popular section were in non-English languages--just an example of how the Internet is bring the world together. Of course, I had to wade through all the porn entries before finding useful ones--an example of the Internet's darker side.
mdlearn2
mdlearn2
Saturday, October 6, 2007
23 Things # 12
Creating and using Rollyo is logical and timesaving--similar to the Favorites on your toolbar. I do not like all the commercial websites added to the searchroll. Also, I added this blog to my searchbox on Rollyo but it didn't seem to work. Anyway, the link to my search roll is in my link area.
23 Things #11
LibraryThing looks great! It can help with readers' advisory and we may want to tell our customers about it! the link to my LibraryThing catalog is in my link area.
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