Thing 9 - MERLIN and other useful library-related blogs and feeds

Can't help thinking of our little feathered friend. Alright, the first stop for "Thing 9" is MERLIN. MERLIN stands for Maryland's Essential Resource for Library Information Networks. It is an online community where library staff interact, learn and exchange ideas from one another on subjects related to online technologies. It also provides valuable online learning resources and tools. Among the many useful resources posted, I discovered Maryland's 23Things Network created on Ning by our very own Beth Tribe (Beth, I did join the group but will have to try hard to stay active), SkillSoft online computer training program, and Citebite for email reference. One resource that I think we could put to immediate use is Photo Story - a Microsoft product that can be downloaded FOR FREE from the Microsoft site. It allows you to create a slideshow or movie with your own digital photos and add special effects, sound, and text to produce a high-quality product with very little investment of time or resources. We could use it to make Teen Club movies with the teens. Oh, by the way, I did add this site to my Blogline feeds.

As for other search tools for feeds, Feedster is in the process of updating it's site, we'll exciting new features when it's back up. Topix features local news on it's front page which provides convenience. In addition to the ease of use, Syndic8 now provides helpful new features including: Feed Tagging, Fresh PodCasts in 6 Languages and Fresh News in 6 Languages. But I did not have enough time to figure out how to get them to work. Technorati is a searching tool for finding blogs and RSS feeds for topic specific blogs that interest you. As to joining Technorati, it sounds a little bit more involved than I have time for. But I will definitely revisit.