For the class I’m taking on Web 2.0, our newest assignment is to write a proposal for implementing a web 2.0 technology in our library, and to share it in our blog.  So, here goes…

For my library, I’d like to propose the use of a blog.  Blogs, or weblogs, are a web publishing platform that allows for the easy distribution of news.  Updates display in a reverse chronological order, so the newest news always rises to the top, ensuring that a visitor to the website is met with the most up-to-date content first.  Blogs can also be used to post images, videos, podcasts, and other formats of information.  They are sometimes used in tandem with tagging or RSS feeds to allow users to sort and receive information in the most efficient manner.

In my library, I’d like to create a blog to announce new acquisitions.  My library has an active acquisitions program for collecting rare materials related to the American Revolution.  A blog could be used to alert patrons to new items in the collection by providing a photograph and description of the item.

This would certainly fill a need in our library.  At the moment, our library catalog is not searchable online.  While there is a description of our holdings online, there is no real way to get a feeling for the scope and/or depth of our collections.  By featuring new acquisitions in a blog, our library could provide information about the collections to patrons interested in the American Revolution and the art of war in the 18th century.

Similar blogs exist for other libraries and special collections, which suggests that this kind of promotional blog about the collections can be successful in drumming up interest among patrons.  A few examples of these are:

- The Northern Illinois University Rare Books and Special Collections Blog 

- The Rare Books Library at the University of Seville 

-  Tutt library Special Collections at Colorado College 

- The Boston Athenaeum 

We typically purchase 20-30 new rare items each month, so the blog would be updated nearly monthly, ensuring fresh content on a regular basis to keep the reader engaged.   For our particular group of users, who are more apt to appreciate history than technology, I would also recommend not naming the site in a manner that promotes it’s format as a blog.  Calling the site simply “Recent Acquisitions” instead of “Acquisitions Blog” will relieve the user of any need to understand or learn what a “blog” is, or how to interact with one.  I do, however, think that the interactive aspect of a blog could be an interesting part of this site.  The primary users of the library collections are scholars, who might want to post comments about a new acquisition (either about it’s possible relevance to pre-existing scholarship, or about similar documents in other collections, etc.).  In some ways, this would become a virtual vertical file about the item–a collection of relevant thoughts and scholarly/research connections.  However, this would have to be tested on a trial basis to ensure that comments would remain topical and not be overrun with spam.  Commenting also opens up issues as far as policy, in terms of whether anonymous comments would be permitted, whether comments would be monitored, etc.

It would also be important to track statistics regarding how many people were visiting the site or harnessing the blog’s RSS feed.  This would be one way to judge the success/interest of the site.  As with all projects, it would be advisable to review the blog in terms of its success as a publicity tool on a regular basis to determine whether the format or content should be tweaked, or whether the project should be discontinued, altered, or moved to a more advanced stage.