Thing 13: Delicious & Nutritious, Tastes Just Like Chicken

I've enjoyed the 12 "things" I've done so far and have thought of useful applications of the 2.0 technologies in my library, but del.icio.us is the first thing to make a lightbulb go off over my head cartoon-style.

I use seven different computers at the Pflugerville Community Library. Yes, you read that correctly. Sometimes I even use all seven in a single day. It just depends on what I'm working on. I also regularly access Web sites that can only be properly viewed with Internet Explorer (you'd think, it being nearly 2009 and all, that those sites would get with the Firefox program). I often get frustrated at not having my bookmarks at six of the seven computers and at having to open two different browsers to find all of my bookmarks. Obviously, del.icio.us can't solve the problem of me having to use two browsers, but at least I could just go to one place when I'm looking up a web address for a colleague or patron, etc. I can't believe I had never thought of using del.icio.us before!

Not only do I think del.icio.us is a great solution for me as I hop from computer to computer, but I also think a library account could be a really useful collaborative tool among the staff. People could add useful sites as they found them and they'd be accessible to the rest of the staff immediately. No more "oh, I know Becca has a really useful readers advisory site she likes, but I can't think of what it is" or "can you remember the address of the Travis County Web site?" Brilliant!

I'm so enamored of del.icio.us now that I'm even considering overcoming my aforementioned anxiety about creating new accounts to set up a personal account.