Luddite Learning

Blog for Week Three of MLA 2.0 Course – MySpace, Facebook, and Linkedin

I found this week’s assignments much easier than I thought they would be. My main problem is that I’m trying to take this course at home on an old laptop computer with dialup Internet access. I was afraid that I would not be able to get into Facebook at all, but it wasn’t that time consuming to access it. I have learned a few lessons about trying to do Web 2.0 on an old computer with dialup access – that will be another Blog soon, I hope. I also plan to clean up my Blog pages and add some photos.

I finally figured out that one of my problems with setting up my Blog was that I was importing text incorrectly. And once I finally saw the video on how to blog, it all became much more clear.

This week I was able to successfully set up a Facebook and Linkedin account and view the MySpace library sites mentioned in exercise 3.

Anyway, on to Week Three Assignments:

• How can social networking be used by MLA to connect members: Linked In is certainly a way that MLA and other organizations could connect members. It appears to be most suited for job placement. Perhaps it could replace the current systems that MLA uses.
• I found the questions asked quite disturbing, and apparently I had to answer them before being allowed to sign up. I don’t lie well, so I had to add real information that I would rather not share. I assume that other librarians and professionals might also be reluctant to participate at this time if forced to divulge such details.

• Should your library have a Facebook or MySpace page? Not at this time. Having a MySpace page for the entire organization to reach young people – both younger members and younger consumers – might be quite effective. I really enjoyed the Denver library site!

• Are there privacy concerns for individuals when using social networking sites. Absolutely, especially for women. We hear horror stories about problems with potential employers, stalkers, other users spreading false rumors, and other bad things.

• What did you like or not like about your experience with Facebook or MySpace. The exercise was with MySpace, not Facebook. I found the sign up procedure for MySpace to be unnecessarily difficult. It should warn potential users that they cannot access MySpace until they process an e-mail message that MySpace sends. I was not able to use MySpace for several days because the message was sent to my work e-mail and I could not set up a different account with my Gmail account. Once I could access my account, I found it quite easy to use, although I had the same problems as others did in that it primarily looked for “friends” with similar e-mail accounts. I found it relatively easy to find the pages for MLA, PUBMED, and WorldCat and add them to my page. Would I use any of these in real life? Not at this time. But it was fun to play with them.