Amazing Challenge - New Zealand

My favourite part of this challenge was exploring other web 2.0 things in England, mostly because I was already familiar with the things we explored in the other countries. I also got a new insight into the uses of YouTube in HongKong - I didn't realise there was so much instructional material there.
Although I found some new cool things, I didn't see much that immediately had an application for our library. Perhaps, now the Hunt and Gather has been canned we could put videos of how to search the library catalogue onto YouTube? We don't want the OPACs to be able to link to YouTube though. I wonder if there is a way around it.
I learnt some new stuff and had some fun but didn't get very much inspiration for new ways to use web 2.0 in the library so my goals were mostly met.
I enjoyed the way the challenge was set up and thought that the tutorials you found were great. Well done Ellie!

Social Networking - Italy

I had a look at the Library Beebo but couldn't work out how to add a comment. I wondered if you needed an account before you could do this. I have a Facebook account but not a Beebo one.
I found an article "Stalking the Wild Appeal Factor: Readers' Advisory and Social Networking Sites" in Academic Research Library. It was talking about using sites like LibraryThing, Shelfari and GoodRead to help in Readers' Advisory work. I love LibraryThing but hadn't really thought of it as a social networking site. I guess it is if you get into the discussion boards and 'follow' people with interesting libraries but I don't use it like that. I do check my Facebook page every day. Quite a few of my in-laws are on Facebook and it is a good way to keep up-to-date with their comings and goings. David's sister and her husband have recently moved to the UK and I enjoy reading their updates as they find jobs and places to live. I don't bother with the quizzes (particularly after reading Philip's email) but do play some of the games.

Podcasting - HongKong

Every week I download interesting podcasts from National Radio and listen them while I am gardening or doing housework but I haven't explored YouTube much. With a wedding cake to make in a couple of weeks I thought I would see if there was a podcast on making chocolate roses - there was.

Social Bookmarking - Finland

I have been using Delicious for quite a while (http://delicious.com/RefPenny) so not too much new to learn there. I decided instead to look at Technorati.
I didn't think much of their 'channels' - 'entertainment' didn't include books and 'lifestyle' didn't include cooking, craft or gardening. The blog directory did have a headings for 'food and wine' and 'home and garden' but still nothing on books. I tried searching for blogs on storytelling but didn't have much luck until I searched for blogs with 'storytelling' as a tag rather than blog posts with storytelling as a tag. This type of search wasn't immediately apparent. You need to 'search the blogasphere' first before it gives you search options.
I also 'claimed my blog' - time will tell as to whether the traffic increases.