Online Book Communities

I have an account with Goodreads and I enjoy participating in several reading groups; currently the Newbery 2010 reading group is my favorite.  Youth Services also uses LibraryThing to organize booklists accessible from our Kids Stuff tab on the library's website.

I find sites such as del.icio.us, Goodreads, and LibraryThing very useful.  Rather than compiling bookmarks on a single machine, with these sites you can access the lists and tags from any computer and easily share suggestions created by others.

Social Bookmarking

I have used both del.icio.us and Diigo to tag information from the internet.  I think I tend to use delicious more often because I'm used to tagging sites for Infozone: the JPL Youth Services account.  I like the features in Diigo that let you highlight or place sticky notes on tagged sites, pdfs or documents.

Youth Services staff have been playing around with several sites to improve access and services to our patrons.  From the Kids Stuff section on the library's website, the HOMEWORK CENTER tab lists subject tags linked to our Del.icio.us account, giving patrons suggestions on websites and articles.

RSS

RSS feeds make it convenient to stay current not only with news sources but also with favorite bloggers.  I set up my reader to include feeds from some of my favorite book review blogs, Newbery discussions, and picture book discussions.  Many of these people or organizations also post notices on Twitter so following them there as well helps me keep up to date.