App Love: For Book Nerds

 Here's the start of what I hope to be an occasional feature -- App Love, where I share some of my favorite apps in different subjects. I will try not to overdo it, and of course there will be apps that you'll see that I've left off. These are only ones that I have tried myself. If you have any you'd like to add, please comment below! As a perfect start to my App Love, I'm going to share some great apps for book nerds.

• GoodReads - This app is a lifesaver. When I'm looking at books in the store, or at the library,  I can scan the ISBN and I can instantly access all the information about the book on GoodReads, including reviews. Additionally, I can see all of my own books, mark books that I want to read, see books I've previously read (along with their ratings and reviews), and a lot more. This is my all time favorite book app out there, and the website to boot. What did I do before GoodReads made this so easy? If you're interested in the social media aspect, you can also connect with other readers, see what they are reading, and (my favorite feature), compare your books with a beautiful Venn diagram! Huzzah!

• Overdrive - If you like free books, then head to your local library and see if they have Overdrive. Overdrive lets you can check out free library e-books and audiobooks with a library card with participating libraries. Jefferson-Madison Regional Library (mine!) does it, and it's so easy. I can easily download an audiobook to listen to at the gym while I'm doing my warm-up. And if you don't think it's easy, then just ask your trusty neighborhood librarian to help you, and you shouldn't have any problems. Best part is, these library items can never be late -- because they return themselves when they expire!

• Readar - If you travel a lot and like hitting up libraries, bookstores, and bookish events anywhere you go, then this is the app for you! By LibraryThing.com (where you can catalog your own home library collection), this app will locate bookstores, libraries, and book events so you always know where you can get your next fix.

Some of the standards:

• Kindle App for iPad and iPhone - If you already have a Kindle account, you'll find that the Kindle app makes it easy to read Kindle books on other devices. It's easy to use and is pretty. Which counts a lot in the world of apps.
• iBooks - This was great for me when I had to read lots of PDFs. Of course, I hated printing them out, but I also hate reading on a computer screen. Reading on an iPad is a step up, and I loved it, and got to save some trees while I was at it.

Thing 6: Online Networks

Thing 6 is all about social networking, which I feel fairly confident about already.  The two main networks they talk about joining are LinkedIn and Facebook, so I've got those covered.  The next ones they cover are for social networks for librarians, such as CILIP, LISNPN, and the LATnetwork. None of the librarian networks really appealed to me too much at this current juncture. I'm loath to join a network that I'm not sure will be very useful to me, and I don't think that ones which discuss mainly events taking place in the UK will. I do believe it's great for getting a sense of what's going on with libraries internationally, but I'm not sure what I hope to accomplish with that right now, so I think I'll leave it be. That said, here are my notes on these networks:

LinkedIn
I was intrigued by the article on how people really use LinkedIn, here.  I think that one of the most important features is the groups. I've joined the professional groups that I belong to--

CPD Thing 4: Twitter, RSS, and Storify

Thing 4 in the 23 Things for Professional Development is about current awareness and staying up to date in library trends and other things that you like by using various technologies to make it a little easier. The three technologies this Thing has us looking at is Twitter, RSS Feeds, and Storify.

Twitter

I really haven't gotten into using Twitter. I already had a Twitter account at https://twitter.com/Spnge4Knowledge , but I for some reason got it in my head that I should use it to promote my own blog rather than using it to keep up with what's going on in the library world in general. Like the 23 Things blog said, I mainly thought of it as celebrities tweeting about what they ate for lunch, and on occasion, I've used it to see how ridiculous (and completely uninteresting) people can be which they feel they need to publicize. In fact, when I'm feeling down, I like to search for #YOLO because it always makes me laugh out loud. Seriously though, give that a shot... https://twitter.com/search?q=%23yolo&src=typd

Meanwhile, I also decided that I should only follow as many people as were following me, and therefore, I follow a puny amount of accounts, and I've been missing out on a lot of great chances to keep up with bigger fish. So the first thing I did was to look up VLA (Virginia Library Assn) and follow them. Then, I proceeded to look at who they follow, and went from there. I've now doubled the number of accounts that I follow, but they will hopefully be useful to me. Also, if you're looking for a job in libraries, there are a lot of organizations you can follow that post job information, which I've found to be helpful in the job search.

One of my favorite things to follow is EarlyWord, which abounds in awesome information about new books and movies that can help me get a leg up on what's coming up next. Having already been checking into the website off and on, I'm now following the Twitter account and have added it to my Google Reader-- see below.

RSS Feeds

I knew that this was an important tool, but somehow thought it to be more complicated than it really was (this is hilarious to me, since RSS stands for "Really Simple Syndication"), and was embarrassed that I didn't already know how to use it. However, I didn't actually realize that I had already started to use RSS feeds -- I "subscribed" to various blogs but only checked them through Blogger, rather than using Google Reader to just quickly browse the various new posts on blogs in this easy-to-use format. Not really sure why, but now that I've got the hang of it, it's awesome, and get this -- really simple. Especially because before now I wasn't quite sure how to follow blogs outside of the Google-sphere. Now I can follow everything, all in one spot, and quickly see what new posts might be worth checking out! Lovely. 

Storify

For me, Storify is just a step too far, and I'm not sure that I need to make different "stories" out of all the other social media content that exists out on the web. I like sharing different blogs and things, but I would rather just share it on my blog, where I can also weigh in on what I'm sharing a little more. So I'm skipping this one. Just because it is there doesn't mean it's right for me.