# 12 - Rollyo

Hey, I like it! At first I couldn't quite see what was so special about this but the penny dropped as I worked through the exercise. Instead of doing a world wide web search I am able to search a limited set of quality websites and thereby remove from my results list all of the rubbishy hits that I don't want to waste time with. Cool. I created a search roll called beasts birds and bugs. It includes a selection of websites developed by amateur collectors, conservation organisations, scientific research bodies and government departments. These sites deal with a range of animal-related information from pet care and animal welfare to specific guides for identifying insects. The University of Southern Queensland has developed a particularly good guide for spider identification: http://www.usq.edu.au/spider/index.htm

Little "Charlotte" here decided to have her babies in our shed. I think this species of Huntsman is 'holconia immanis' - they have a distinctive stripe on the abdomen.

# 11 - LibraryThing

This is a tool that I can actually see myself using to keep track of my personal collection and to find recommended reading. For the purpose of this exercise I wasn't too rigorous in finding the right edition for each of the books I added to my catalogue so it isn't completely accurate. I have good intentions of going back when I have more time to add the rest of my collections- we'll see if it happens. Here's the link http://www.librarything.com/catalog/thing11

# 10 - Image Generators

There were so many things to play with I found it hard to settle on one for this task. I looked at about six or seven before deciding to express myself through the medium of Alphabet Soup. If you feel like playing with your food, you can find this generator at the following link: http://www.redkid.net/generator/soup/sign.php

# 9 - Finding Feeds

Well, I went straight to the bloglines search tool to add my feeds and I will confess that I didn't take the time to check out the other options. I used both methods for adding the feeds: using blogline's search tool and from the feed icon directly from the websites I was interested in. I'm not sure that I was getting this second method quite right but they're all there and functioning so maybe it was just simpler than I expected. I tried the "extra stuff to explore" suggestion and subsrcribed through EBSCO to a journal called "Learning & Motivation". I'll let you know if it's effective...finding the old interest flagging somewhat...

# 8 - RSS & Newsfeeds

This one held me up a bit. It isn't particularly difficult but I found that it wasn't particularly exciting either. I created a Bloglines account and added eight feeds ranging from the Calvin and Hobbes comic strip to ABC's Gardening Australia (hopefully I'll find some inspiration here to get a vegetable garden started [ABC not goComics]). I made my subscriptions public and if you're having a really quiet day and you're feeling curious, you can find them here: http://www.bloglines.com/public/myweegreenblog I can see how this could be good for environmental scanning activities and professional development but personally I would be more inclined to use my favourites list than become too familiar with this. Maybe I'm missing something...?

# 7 - Blog about Technology

Geez... I feel old when I think about all the technological gadgets out there that I don't know how to use. I think when you use technology for practical purposes rather than for recreation you really get left behind. You need to play with things and approach them with curiosity rather than cynicism (or suspicion) and I'm not sure that I do that. I was a late starter and I have a feeling I will be scrambling to catch up for some time yet. My use of computers is fairly limited: internet banking, bookings, movie times, email, msn messenger and sometimes I might read online papers or my horoscope. My immediate objectives are to upgrade from the old floppy disc to a memory stick and to get myself a digital camera. I'm not yet convinced that I would make good use of facebook or any of the other popular tools for social networking, however, I intend to expand my flickr collection and this has partly inspired my desire for a new camera.

# 6 - More Flickr Fun

So, I played around with some Flickr tools such as Color Pickr and Montagr. They are kind of fun but the mashup I found really intriguing (maybe disturbing) was showcased in the Mash Up Awards. "Rotten Neighbor" at http://www.rottenneighbor.com/ is a U.S based mashup that allows you to locate and identify bad neighbours! I had trouble zooming in to see the level of detail given on the map so I'm not sure if actual individual's addresses are posted here, but some contributors have gone so far as to specify which apartment their detested neighbours live in. Very dodgy. Some pretty grubby language used too. The maps can be pegged with pop-ups branding their neighbours as 'pervert guy' or 'scum-bag polluters' (and these are a couple of the gentler titles given) with a description of their bad habits. Entertaining but sort of creepy.