Librarians in the 21st Century

I attended another session in the intermediate course on Virtual Librarianship in Second Life yesterday. It was not as stimulating as the previous three sessions, probably because it related to working with teens and I have have been turned off that age group by my experiences as a high school teacher. However, one thing that did come out of it was a reference to an article about Librarians in the 21st Century.in which the writer, Joyce Kasman Valenza, claims that ... librarians cannot expect to assume a leadership role in information technology and instruction, and we cannot claim any credibility with students, faculty, or administrators, if we do not recognize and thoughtfully exploit the paradigm shift of the past two years.
This is particularly relevant in light of my current efforts to run 23 Things at my library and my struggle to achieve acceptance of the role that Second Life or any other virtual world may play in the learning/teaching environment. I am empowered by the comment:
You do not take “no” for an answer when a network administrator or technology director refuses to support a pedagogically sound activity. You seek a way to get to “yes” if learners will benefit.
In yesterdays SL session I mentioned that I was trying to introduce my colleagues to new technology in spite of my director's reservations - and virtually behind her back, and received a resounding cheer from my classmates.
I wonder if the 23 Things participants realise just how much effort goes into running this exercise and how disappointing it is for me when they "cannot find the time" to complete each "Thing" as it is posted.