It’s sunday at the tech kiosk!

Showing how to post on a blog at the Web 2.0 Tech Kiosk!

I’ve been playing around a bit with Searchme and I have to say I’m impressed.  I’ve seen other visual search engines that just didn’t work for me.  They seemed more set on adding visual elements to traditional search than to really being *useful*.  For example, I don’t get much value from things like Aquabrowser, which is used at my local library.  Compared to that, Searchme has some great features.  I like that the results are displayed at a large size, as opposed to a tiny thumbnail.  I enjoy scrolling through (and I think the similarity to the iphone interface has to be noted here).  I like that you can narrow your search to a certain topic or category, and that there are even graphic icons to help you identify those categories.  I’m not sure how results are ranked, though.

All in all, another interesting tool to check out if you think (like I do) that the web shouldn’t just be a tool for those who like text.

(Taking a break from conference blogging.)

PC World reports on disruptive technologies that will reshape computing as we know it by 2010.  Some interesting theories, many of which  should affect what we’re doing with library services *today*.  If you don’t want to read the whole thing, concentrate on this:

The analysts also said:

– By 2010, Web mashups “will be the dominant model (80 percent) for the creation of composite enterprise applications.”

– “The concepts, language and technologies of consumer social software will become part of mainstream workplace technology vendors by 2010.”

– By 2010, It will cost less than US$1 to add a three-axis accelerometer — which allows a device, such as Nintendo’s Wii controller, to sense when and how it is being moved — to a piece of electronic equipment. “Acceleration and attitude (tilt) can be combined with technologies such as wireless to perform functions such as ‘touch to exchange business cards,’” the analysts offer as an example of how the technology could be applied in the future.

I first saw Chad Boeninger at Computers in Libraries in 2006, which was apparently his first presentation on the subject. I sat in on his session today to see what he had to add, or what he felt about wikis two years later.

Chad touched on the uses of wikis: as internal communication tools, as collaborative tool, and as tools for communication with library users. He began by questioning whether you really need a wiki, and suggested that librarians first define a purpose or problem, then decide whether a wiki is the right tool for the problem.

Chad talked about the fact that a lot of organizations use a shared drive, but information gets sorted by personal folders, not by content of the document. He has replaced that with a wiki, which is sorted by document content and allows users to find institutional knowledge and training materials in an easy way. Chad has also used a wiki to reorganize and invigorate his subject guide for Business (The “BizWiki”).

After a brief overview of wiki tools that are available, Chad used Wet Paint to create a wiki. I thought this was a really useful way of showing folks how fast and easy it was to create a wiki. I think a lot of people are intimidated by the idea of creating a wiki or blog until they get their hands on it themselves (which is part of the theory behind the Web 2.0 Tech Kiosk I’m working on). Unfortunately, I think Chad lost some of the crowd with the slow internet connection and the fact that he chose to install the Wiki software instead of simply starting a remotely hosted wiki which would have gone faster and probably had less troubleshooting involved. Instead, issues with permissions and PHP made the process look more difficult than some beginners might be ready for.

After getting his wiki up and running, Chad stressed the importance of making someone responsible for the structure and initial content of the wiki. People need guidance before they’ll contribute as well. Borrow organizational structure ideas from other wikis. Initial content might come from older sources, so people can get a feel for the new medium, and then add new content. Some of the first content you should add is help on how to use the wiki.

Encourage people to communicate through the wiki. Tell them to respond to emails or memos on the wiki. Chad also mentioned that you have to create a safe/collaborative space, where people don’t get their feelings hurt when content gets revised. Equally, he noted that as an admin, you can’t demand perfection. It’s about the content, not the polish.

Chad uses his BizWiki during instruction, so they get used to the content and feel. This is automatic promotion. Other means of promotion include linking to your Wiki from every relevant place, linking to the wiki resources through other resources, and ensuring that your content is useful and up to date.

After a few years, Chad emphasizes that you have to be flexible when thinking about the wiki. This includes

• Being realistic about expectations for use.
• Realizing that people may or may not add content.
• Realizing that your wiki is NEVER done. It’s organic. “A static wiki defeats the purpose of a wiki.”

While I knew most of what Chad talked about, it seemed a lot of people in the audience didn’t… and I think Chad did a decent job of covering the issues.  Most of the post-talk questions had to do with choosing a wiki vs. another tool… which I think is a bigger issue.  It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of people have been turned off of Web 2.0 stuff because they’ve chosen the wrong tool for the job and been disappointed with the results.  I think it would be great if more people who did these kinds of introductory talks dealt with the “why” and less with the how/how great.

I heard over Twitter that Steven Cohen had decided to usurp one of the conference rooms after a program cancellation.  He gave a presentation that folowed up on a series of articles he’d written called “What’s in Your Wallet?”  It was nice to meet Steven after following him online for over a year.  I’ve been a fan of Steven’s since I saw him speak at CIL a few years ago, and he didn’t disappoint me this time.

In this somewhat spontaneous talk, Steven opened his RSS reader up and showed us all how he manages to keep up with over 900 feeds, and what he’s reading.  I kept a pretty good list (see below), but also found myself visiting URLs and quickly bookmarking them in a CiL 2008 folder so I can go back and give them each a thorough once-over later.

Here are some of the great tools/tips that Steven shared:

- Page 2 RSS

- Subscribe to feeds for your users interests, and email the news to alert your users of relevant updates.  (Note:  I like this use… it’s sortof a hot-potato way of catching information and tossing it to your users)

- Get feeds from YouTube for stuff you like or use Youtube.com/rss/search/KEYWORD.rss or youtube.com/rss/search/keyword1 keyword2.rss, where Keyword= your search term.

- Google News feeds & Yahoo news feeds (Steven reminded us all that we should search more than one.  Never rely on just Google)

- The reference interview ends when the project ends… not when the person leaves the library/chat window/etc. Get contact info. and use feeds to continue to supply information until the project is done.

- Tweetscan - get RSS feeds of a search of Twitter posts

- Blog search RSS feeds (who is writing about you?)

- Technorati (just enter the url)

- Use “intitle:subject” to target your Google News search (so your RSS feed isn’t overwhelming or a waste of time)

Thanks to Steven for a fun and informative look behind the curtain!

Beth Galloway, Information Goddess Consulting

Slides available online (link to be added)

Widgets - a piece of a website that you embed somewhere else

• IGoogle.com - personalized Google, made up of widgets
• Blogger went widgets a year ago
• Facebook  - widgets and outside apps.

Widgets are user-created content

Why widgets? - We’re lazy.  “one click is too many”

• No downoading
• works on every browser
• easy! copy/paste

Old way- Link. download plugin. Install plugin.  click again.

New way- imbedded Youtube video.

Beth did a lot of widget how-to and showed some good examples of using widgets.

Q1: Meebo doesn’t allow for multiple log-ins into the same account.  How do you get around that?  - You can use Meebo chat room.  (A note from the audience that the Virtual Reference session includes other solutions).

Jenny Levine of TheShiftedLibrarian spoke, fresh off of hosting the Gaming Night the evening before.  Her slides are available online here.  Here are my random notes:

• The internet provides tools, but not human contact.  How do we translate that into the online world?
• We’re on our way with physical library spaces.
  • Check out the Delft Public Library’s contextual information boards… hi-tech “you are here” signs.
  • All content (games, music, books) in the same space.  Not segregated.
  • Personal spaces in a creative environment for social experiences.
• Gaming as a social forum that encourages social interaction.  Taps into our job: “connecting people”
• “It’s not the tech, it’s the touch”
• Many libraries think they’re doing high-tech/high-touch, but aren’t succeeding.
• Do we really need high-tech/high-touch, or do we only need high-touch, regardless of the tech?
• Recommends: Clay Shirky “Here Comes Everybody”
• High-touch - using human language on your website (We don’t have it, but we can get it for  you!)
• Text call numbers to your cell phone from the catalog!
• Meebo in the catalog!  (inside “the worst dead-end we have)
• Libraries in the user space (Facebook, etc)
• Add the librarian back in.
• The advantage we have over Google is people.  Show pictures.  Give it a human face.
•  IM status indicators on our websites add a human presence and an instant human point of contact.
• Today’s users are content creators. Capitalize on that.  Make the library a point to which they can submit content.
• ACRL using Meebo to chat about hot topics.
• “Social Networks” = Soylent Green (They’re made of people!)
• Social networks allow space for serendipity.  Virtual connections can become real connections.
• Stop filtering information on the way in… we have no idea what the end user will need.
• “Do we use tools that match our social capabilities?”
• LibraryThing for libraries extends content with *people*
• BiblioCommons - 200 Beta Testers.
  • Can use a user name (instead of barcode)
  • Coverflow imaging
  • Recent contributers to the “commons” - connect to people, not just content
  • Recently reviewed.  Browse someone’s library.  User in-boxes to enable communication between users.
  • Tagging prompts for adjectives. They want tone.
  • Opt to “trust” portions of a user’s preferences (just movies, just books, etc).
• Findbook.com - trusted research friends, sharing research/resources with others, finding “likeness”
• These hi-tech/hi-touch things are not just for users.
  • Library Society of the World
  • Twitter… virtual water cooler

Q1: how do you get staff excited? - Don’t frame it around the tool.  Frame it around the results.

Q2: How do you get the patrons to start using these tools? - Many tools are low-cost.  Take risks that are low-investment.  Don’t worry if there’s not high use.    Re-assess our evaluation of “success” for these tools.  We may be on the leading edge, so things have to build.  But providing services for the leading-edge group is important.  The solution is different because it’s about the people, not the tools.

Q3: How do you keep up?  - I don’t.  I skip thing.  I choose to follow those that I know will find the big stuff.  Do it when you can.  You’ll have times when you can experiment, and times when you can’t.  Use the social networking to find people to help so you don’t have to keep up with everything.  You don’t keep up with everything in the physical world, so don’t expect to in the virtual world.

Lee Rainie provided the opening keynote for CIL 2008. Took me a while to get my computer set up, so I’ll just recap the end of his talk. It’s worth noting, though, that he included quite a number of facts and figures from a soon-to-be-published Pew survey, which focused on how people attempt to locate information to solve problems that involve government information (but which includes a great amount of information about where libraries fit into that picture).  More on that later, if I get a chance.

Lee’s summary points for librarians included:

• People need to be more aware of how you’ve changed, what you provide, etc.
• Those who think they don’t need or want the internet may not know what they’re missing. Awareness is an inhibitor to internet use, and may be an inhibitor for library use as well.
• Tell library success stories success stories.
• Use user-generated content to have patrons tell their library success story. Make those tools available.
• Continue to do the job we’re supposed to do… stay on task.  Meet expectations so that users find what they seek (reliable information) at the library.
• Those who aren’t library users yet are “primed to think of us”. People know we’re out there, but we’re not yet the go-to source.  We need to:
  • 1) build awareness
  • 2) offer a comfortable environment. (personable, and physical)
  • 3) mentoring skills. tech support/hand holding/etc.
• This is the era of social networks. People are relying on other people for information. Networks are for learning, recommendations, etc. Networks are for problem solving.
• Ask ourselves:  “How can we be a node on someone’s social network?”

I enjoyed Lee’s talk quite a bit.  He has a casual and humorous way of presenting statistical information, and of making the implications clear.  There were some surprising statistics, but overall, I think the message is one we know (and continue to work with).  We need to be evangelists for our services.  We need to build trust with young patrons, and create life-long library users.  We need to be where users are looking for information (online), and tap into the methods of information seeking with which they’re familiar (social networks).  And we need to remember that while we may need to provide internet, games, tech support, etc in order to get people involved, we need to remain true to our mission of making reliable information available to patrons (regardless of the delivery medium).

Ryerson University in Toronto has punished a student for creating a study group on Facebook. According to the University, by creating an online study group in which students could discuss assignments and class lectures, the student had created “the potential for cheating on a large scale.”

As this article points out, Ryerson’s actions are a bit irrational. Cheating in a Facebook group would be easily traceable. Certainly easier than tracing plagiarism can be. But the real issue here is the University’s apparent fear of new technologies. These days, Librarians and Professors are joining Facebook because thats where their students are.  And what are their students doing there?  The same things students do in a non-virtual reality.  They’re communicating.  They gossip, they play, they goof off, and yes, they study.

It seems to me that Ryerson did teach this student a few lessons.  It taught this student that (a) the University doesn’t understand the tools the students are using, (b) that networking with your colleagues or fellow students is more trouble than its worth, and (c) that being innovative will only get you in trouble.

I would have loved it if Ryerson, instead of failing the student’s homework assignment, had volunteered to have one of its librarians join the Facebook community in order to point these students to appropriate resources to help them in their academic pursuits.  Think of the collaboration that could have come out of such an effort…  Sadly, I think that opportunity has been lost and might never come again.

(Thanks to Critic for Twittering the link to the original story!)