Posted at 14:15h
in
Technology
by Jo Alcock
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One of the things that has stood out for me so far in my new job is the vast amount of reading I now have. I've always used the commute to and from work to read (study modules for my diploma, journal articles, reports, work related reading etc.), and tended to prefer to read these on paper than on screen. But in this job the volume of reading is a lot higher, and I was conscious of the amount of paper I was using (and also having to carry around between home and work), so I wondered if an e-reader might be a better way of doing things.
I do read a fair bit on my iPhone but I'd never tried a dedicated e-reader. Fortunately, I had the opportunity to borrow a Kindle for a couple of days thanks to
BCU eLibrary team. I had a couple of days of travelling so knew I'd be spending a lot of time on the train, so I decided to use the opportunity to see if the Kindle suited my needs.
As some of you may be aware (particularly those of you who follow my tweets), I had a mixed experience with it. I thought I'd share the main pros and cons from my experience as I know there are others wondering about getting a Kindle at the moment.
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A couple of weeks ago I attended my first full virtual conference - Handheld Librarian Online Conference V - yes, they have held five of them already! I've attended webinars before and tracked numerous events online that I have been unable to attend in person, but this was my first fully fledged online conference. It was really good value for money ($45), and although it meant working through the evening (due to time zone differences the conferences was 4 - 11.30pm in UK time!) it was definitely something I would do again. The software (Adobe Connect) worked really well, there were very few sound problems (ironically, the only ones I experiences was when the keynote speaker from Mashable was presenting), and the fact that is was all online meant that you could join in all aspects of the conference, including a virtual exhibition.
