Flickr

I planned to spend a short time browsing Flickr...and ended up, two-and-a half hours later, wondering where the time had gone. Some of the photos are artistically stunning...others not so much, but are still interesting. Others, I'm not so sure about. Do I really want pictures of my kid's birthday party in such a public forum??

Patrons may be able to search Flickr, particularly the Smithsonian site, to find historical photos and download ones without copyright restrictions. Some people will be able to identify people, places in otherwise inscrutable photos--I can hear it now; "Isn't that Aunt Louise, when she went to...".

Sharing photos of book displays, programming realia, or other sharable things may be beneficial to librarians looking for ideas. One out-of-the-box possibility: photo and post an object/painting, etc. that a patron is trying to identify, when other search avenues have dried up, and count on someone to know something about it!

Meeting Web 2.0

What a novel way to introduce Web 2.0! I can see how it could have an impact on how we "do library", and interact with patrons. It will be interesting to see down the road what we have found that works, and what will have fallen by the wayside.