Cpd23 - Thing 6 - Online Networks

Out of all the online networks you had to come to mine...

I have been using LinkedIn the longest. I was initially put off by the amount of information it requires you to type in but I hoped the benefits of joining would outweigh that. So far they have, it is really easy to view and take part in conversations without having to limit the word count and there have been some interesting topics, for example, what one attribute makes a great librarian; there was also quite a heated debate about Cilip training.

Since starting to use Twitter to liaise with people possibly interested in CoFHE LASEC, I have got into it a lot more and now use it every day - this has meant that my LinkedIn usage has dropped but it hasn't taken it over. I now follow many professional organisations, newspapers focusing on education and numerous fellow librarians.

I look at the New Professional's site regularly and found about an SLA Conference competition through it, which I entered but sadly didn't win.  Unfortunately I had quite a few problems with the site - I had tried to edit some elements and it wouldn't let me so I deleted my account to start again but the same problem happened. I now have two accounts, neither of which work properly so I now just lurk on the site!

I had heard of the Librarians as Teachers but hadn't been really aware of what they got up to. I found out about the London Library Teachmeet through them and attended that which was really informative. I intend to sign up to their network shortly. It should be very useful to me as I do a lot of delivering inductions and information literacy sessions to Higher Education students.

I don't use Facebook too often as it's filtered at my workplace. I occasionally check it when I get home and often upload pictures to it. I realise there are lots of overlaps between professional and personal but for now I will keep Facebook for keeping up with friends and nosing through people's photographs.

I used to use CILIP Communities a lot but then nothing new ever seemed to be added. Since joining CoFHE LASEC, I do look a bit more now, especially as our blog is on there. Now seems the right time to add that new content is added to our blog on an almost weekly basis from people working in the education sector!

Since having spoken to Tina Reynolds and Jo Alcock at last night's CPD23 London event, I have now started following online content from BIALL, ALA and SLA and will be investigating membership a bit more thoroughly. I'll probably say a bit more about that in the next blog.

Google+ - well it seems to have got people in a stir is all I can say at the moment. I don't particularly want another site similar to Facebook and Twitter. Plus, I imagine at the moment it's just going to be the same people I follow now. Maybe when it comes out of its beta version I will take it a little more seriously...