Web 2.0 Award Winners

I looked at several of the Web 2.0 Award sites and had a rather mixed reaction. Several were really commercial sites that were happy to sell you something (www.lulu.com; www.backpackit.com) although the product may be useful.

At least one of the award-winners was a "closed user site" (www.zango.com) where you couldn't get to see it. (Not sure how one becomes a member of that "closed user" circle). I guess the members of the award-giving committee were part of that special circle!

Many of the award-winners are known free sites that are very useful, such as YouTube, Twitter, GoogleMaps, Flickr, so they certainly deserve to be on the list.

A few sites showed the limitations of Web 2.0 in that they depend upon user input. For example, two sites that could be very useful because they are attempting to list events by place are www.upcoming.com and www.going.com. They only problem is that the local content is pretty limited and depends totally upon individuals entering the data. I would guess that if they become popular and well-known, then this type of website would become more useful.

The cooking websites were fun, especially with video demos (www.imcooked.com). It was great to see Christopher Walken roast a chicken, for example. Urbanspoon.com was interesting because it did include a lot of content about local restaurants. This page was well organized and easy to navigate. People can comment on their experiences and there is an expectation that copies of the menus can be uploaded.

Trip to the Grand Canyon

My list of "Places to see before I die" includes the Grand Canyon and Route 66. My husband and I decided to do the Route 66 trip this fall and then I realized that the Grand Canyon was not too far afield from it. A great discovery since I hadn't put the two together. (Geography -- perhaps not one of my best subjects, unless there is a map in front of me). So we set out on a combination journey.

When we travel, if at all possible we try to include a boat ride of some sort on a trip; a train is even better. (Skip the planes if at all possible, thank you very much). So our trip this fall did all the fun things we hoped for and included both a train (Grand Canyon Railway from Williams, AZ to the Grand Canyon) and a raft ride (in Glen Canyon, beginning at the Glen Canyon dam).

We're not that adventurous to take the week (or two week) raft down the Colorado River -- (no flush toilets, if you get what I mean); so we were quite happy to have an afternoon raft ride.

Needless to say, the Grand Canyon was, of course, spectacular, and going in the fall was great because the crowds weren't too bad. Not too many kids; lots of foreign travelers. And the weather was perfect. Blue skies every day.

7-1/2 Lifelong Learning Habits

Question:
Which habits among the 7-1/2 Lifelong Learning Habits are easiest and hardest for me.

Easiest:

To accept responsibility for my own learning; to create my own learning toolbox.

Hardest:

To use technology to my advantage.

Goal:

To complete the NetTrek training to advance my Web 2.0 skills.

I am glad that we are doing this Web 2.0 training because I have wanted to learn many of these tools and although I have been interested, I just haven't taken the time to really sit down and concentrate on learning them.

So thanks for the opportunity!

Fall of 2009

From the vantage point of the Raven's Nest, even from down on the ground, this has been a beautiful autumn. The leaves on the trees seem to have more color than in many years. Although the record rainfall has caused lots of the leaves to fall already, there is still plenty of color to fly around in.

Last night (October 26th), there was the most beautiful sunset I've seen in a long time. The western sky was all lit with a magnificent red glow.