Blog intro

This is my first official blog posting that contains my reflections. I have posted to other blogs, but its mainly been as a comment to another person's post or to treat a blog more as a discussion forum. I am uncomfortable in this new realm. I fully understand the value of reflective thought, however, I find it difficult to do so in print and in the public eye. This will be a new experience for me.

To clarify why I have difficulties in this area I will describe further. I hope that the main audience for this blog is the instructor for my LIS568 course for which this blog is a requirement. I will try to open up and describe my inner thoughts. I may very well delete this blog after the course is over (of course keeping an archive). But I am very aware that whatever is said on the Internet is very possibly being said to the world.

I recently found out how to create Google Alerts. I have since created "alerts" for my name and a separate alert for my street name and town. I now receive emails whenever a new or old page is discovered and indexed by Google. I have been reminded of some "blasts from the past" - comments I made to listservs years ago. I've been kept up-to-date about news items relating to my neighborhood sooner than I would have found out through the local TV news or the newspaper. I've learned that a colleague borrowed some text from a recent PPT presentation I created. I was also recently honored that an important researcher had made a mention of me on his blog. And I learned that whatever is posted to the Internet is not private.

I'm also always self-confident about my writing and speaking my mind, although people who know me would never think this is the case. With that being said I will try to share my inner reflections about this course and how this course relates to my current and future career through this blog.

Here goes it!