Well, today has been interesting. I got a message via the BIGWIG site today asking if I was still interested in being part of the social software showcase that happens around and at ALA. I said yes, I was interested, thank you! I’m schlepping my “Collaborating in the Cloud” presentation all over the place these days!
Speaking of, that was the presentation that I did today – and it went over very well. It was another packed room, standing room only, and the audience was very receptive! After the presentation, I got an invitation from a reference librarian at the College of Bermuda to come to them to give the talk again. I’m still unsure if I’ll be able to do that one – timing issues and all – but I’m certainly going to try!! After that, I came back to my room to check my mail and discovered that Michael Stephens, whom I had just name checked in my last post, has asked me if I’d like to post information about what the library is doing in our transition from Exchange email to Google Apps for Domains on his Tame The Web blog. I said yes to that one, definitely!! It was a busy, very productive day!
Besides my session, I also attended the forum on copyright this morning. Michael Sauers was one of the panelists and he did a great job explaining the problems with American copyright using funny (and yet sad) stories from the disasters of our copyright policies – he asked the Carribbean folks at the conference not to do what we were doing. He was followed by a lady from the Jamaican copyright office who reported on Jamaica’s attempts to do exactly what the US is doing in regards to copyright. Michael’s expressions during her talk were priceless…
I also attended Cliff Landis’ presentation on information overload. I would tell you more about it, but I don’t want to overload you… ok, I’ll overload you! He discussed a number of ways to manage information – being selective about what you choose to receive, such as listservs and the like – and 3 tools to help you manage your information and achieve balance. The slides he used are up on slideshare, so I’ll let you take a look at ’em yourself.
In between all of this activity, I spent a bit of time in my room. At one point, I decided to step out onto the balcony to smoke and see what was going on outside. I shut the balcony door – a bit too hard, apparently – and managed to lock myself on the balcony. Those of you who know me, know that I’m really bad about doing that to my hotel room – done it twice this trip and haven’t blogged about it because it’s just expected and it’s not really news. This is the first time I’ve gotten stuck on a balcony, though. I had to shout 5 floors down to the outside bar below my room to get them to send someone up to let me back into my room. Talk about embarrassing…
After the bulk of the conference day was done, we all loaded up in buses and went to the Montego Bay Civic Center, where we saw a collection of performers who gave us a great look into the culture of Jamaica. It was seriously cool!!
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