Librarian by Day » Information Management

You’ve got 30 minutes, how do you use them?

Bobbi Newman — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 16:05:55 +0000

I’ve seen some interesting conversations pop up online lately about FriendFeed vs Twitter, if spending time on Friendfeed killed your blog, (or not) that feedreaders are dead.

Here is the thing, most of us don’t have that much time to spend online, networking, learning, creating content, whatever. I remember Helene Blowers talking about taking 15 minutes each day to read blogs, to stay informed. I gave myself 30. There are only so many hours in the day, and so many of them are taken up with other things, so really it doesn’t leave me much time to spend online (we can’t all be Robert Scoble). So sacrifices are made. I know where I spend my 30 each morning.

But I want to know where do you spend yours? You’ve got 30 minutes today, only 30 minutes where will you spend it?

[polldaddy poll=1357900]
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Twitter: making the cut

Bobbi Newman — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 17:56:44 +0000

As we’ve seen from previous posts keeping up and feeling overwhelmed is something I struggle with regularly. There are so many great people out there in libraryland, it makes sense that I would want to keep up with all of them. As part of my “I’m not a Superhero” therapy I’m admitting I can’t do everything I’ve been attempting and over the next month or so I’ll be weeding. I started with Twitter.

First I needed to figure out what I need/want to get from Twitter, so I went to my del.icio.us account. I’m an avid user of delicious and while I don’t like the option to automatically post my links to my blog I’ve decided I should share them more often. Here are the ones I reread

I also considered some of the popular and/or successful librarians who don’t use Twitter. I wont point fingers, but they are out there.

I decided what I want from Twitter is a “real” connection and/or useful information. So it was weeding time. Yes I know this can be perceived as cold, but hey, it’s my time and it’s valuable! Then I went through my “following” pages.

With some people I recognized names/handles immediately. If I did, I questioned -

Have I had a personal interaction with them? If yes, most of them stayed. If no, I took a look at their feed and biography.
Was I getting useful information from them?
Could that information be better accessed somewhere else? For example if it’s a link to their latest blog post, I should have their blog in my FeedReader. That way I can read it when I have the proper time and attention to devote to it.
Did I want to connect with them but hadn’t yet?

If I didn’t recognize a name I looked at their feed and biography and considered -

Was I getting useful information from them?
Could that information be better accessed somewhere else?
Did I want to connect with them but hadn’t yet?

I’m now down to 133 people. I’m really hoping to get down to 100. We’ll see. I also decided if what I’m looking for it a real connection or information I’d better be providing that those things too. I believe by attempting to connect with fewer people I’ll be making better connects with those I connect with.

Has anyone else done this? If you follow 500 people do you feel like you’re getting what you need/want from Twiitter? and what is it?Similar Posts:

How do you find the time?

Bobbi Newman — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 13:14:30 +0000

It seems every time I give a presentation on Web tools one of the questions I’m asked by overwhelmed participants is – how do you find the time to keep up with everything? I give an off the top of my head answer, which, while truthful, doesn’t cover everything. I’m hoping writing about it will help me give a clearer answer next time, maybe get some tips and tricks from you and provide a reference point for future questioners.

I dont’ try to keep up with everything. There is so much going on, I think it would be impossible to try to do it al and have a balanced life, so I accept that there will always be something I don’t know about.
I have a great network of people; when I find something new I share, when they find something new they share
I take what I like and throw the rest out. I’ll try most new services, set up an account, play with it for a while. If doesn’t click or do what I want, I stop using it.
I dont’ use every tool everyday. Twitter is often overwhelming to me, and it interrupts me when I’m really focusing, so some days I don’t check in at all. I know I miss some good things, but it’s part of that “can’t do everything” acceptance.
I’m organized – I use a feed reader and have over 10 folders. One title daily – those are the blogs that have high priority, I don’t necessarily read them every day but if I have time they are the first ones that get read. This is a select folder and there are never more than 10 blogs in there. Other blogs are organized under subject. I try to read most of these once a week or so.
I don’t try to do everything at once. First I got a Myspace page, mastered that (it took a while let me tell you and I cursed Myspace more than once) then I moved on to the next thing.
I use gmail for my email list subscriptions, it groups emails together which makes is easy to follow conversations or delete the whole thread if I’m not interested. It also allows me to create custom labels (instead of folders) and sort incoming email by those and color code them!

Tools I use: a feed reader, blogs, email lists, FriendFeed, Facebook, Twitter, but use what works for you and you feel comfortable with. When I help my coworkers get organized I do 4 things with them

set up a feed reader, show them how to use it and organize it
put 5 library blogs in it that I recommend they read
add folders for other RSS feeds they’d like to follow
tell them to take half an hour everyday to read them.

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