The Daring Librarian

Ever wonder where your Tweets are going? How many Favourites, Re-Tweets, & Replies? Well, Twitter analytics is here to help! View graphic in full size Do they really matter? Nope! Like the number of followers, it's really not about quantity as it is about quality. The quality of the conversations you're having on Twitter. How much are you are sharing, helping, listening, & asking? Are you participating in some Twitter Chats? Are you helping newbies?  Are you contributing to our EPIC PLN? If not, c'mon! We're waiting for you! But if you're really not ready that's OK, too! Keep lurking, listening, & RT-ing!  I try and never give out any social media guilt trips. We're here for you when you're ready to talk on Twitter :-) Hope this infographic helps! Your thoughts are always eagerly welcomed in the comments! Give me a break from the spammers, please! LOL Cheers! ~Gwyneth

Why not give a gift to yourself? Of balance. Do you sleep with the phone next to your bed? Perhaps binging or vibrating every time a text or Tweet comes in?  A friend of mine Friday night teased me when she saw my iPhone screen. That I had over 23,000 emails I hadn't read and she told me to take a screenshot. I shrugged & said, well - I don't use my phone for that- I read all my emails on my computer. Is that wrong? She laughed. Whatever. ;-) "The benefits of a smartphone sabbatical are many. Research shows too much tech can interfere with our sleep, make us feel insecure and more ." - HuffPo The purpose of this 7 Day Digital Detox Smart Phone Challenge is to find a balance in your life between the hectic, frenetic, continuous connectivity to the world and social media with slowing down, paying attention and valuing our loved ones, friends, & family. Do I practice what I preach? Nahhh! Ok Sometimes! But I hope this infographic abov...

  Creativity in all it's engaging guises but presented with a new technology and social media twist! I really can't remember how I stumbled across this idea of writing super short Tweet size stories.  I certainly didn't originate it - yet when I searched the hashtag I found an assortment of fits and starts with a challenge to write a short story in the form of a Tweet - and I was intrigued! I guess it's sorta related to the Tweet Me a Book Review idea I had and blogged about a few years ago with it's accompanying Wikispaces lesson page. The activity is below is copied from my Wikispaces page where, at the bottom of the page, I uploaded for you the doublesided paper PDF version for practice or when you want that social media engagement but you can't get to or have the machines. The Wikispaces version of the lesson features a java script character counter widget and a Google form to submit the story. A good portion of my kiddos are under 13 and I wou...

Happy New Year!  It's that time of year that I do my Geeky house cleaning, so it's another year going over my past posts about this topic and thinking how to improve them! At first I thought I could leave out the password comic & tip and then the Sony thing happened. WTHeck!? It was recently released that some Sony employees had a password of s0ny123 and the worst, "password!" Also, with brute force hacking making the rounds, I decided to update a few of my tips. "The only person you can rely on to keep your password secure is yourself. And let me tell you, you're probably not doing enough to keep number one safe. The reason: Your special lump of letters, numbers, and symbols are likely spread over too many sites, are not long enough, and are probably too personal. Most of our passwords suck. And it's kind of a big problem." - Gizmodo   1. Craft a Perfect Password & Dump Your Cache OK, so there IS no perfect!...

Why Blog? You don't start blogging for awards. Although they're very nice!  More about awards at the very end of this post. Do not let anyone force you or guilt trip you to start a blog. Not even yourself! You blog because you are passionate about your profession, and have ideas & content to share with potential readers, or want a living, growing on-going journal of your professional life. If you blog it, they will come. Eventually. It may just take a while! Don't give up! I blogged for YEARS out the aethernets and for a handful of readers! And you surely don't start blogging for comments. If you are expecting comments when you start blogging you're gonna be quickly discouraged and give up. I get about 6 or 7 comments per blog post and most all of those are spam. That's why I treasure and am grateful for each and every REAL comment I get! Now, I am in NO WAY saying I'm an expert blogger, (or writer! Ha!) but I do have some reflective ideas and...