Free !

Free - how I love that word. Whether I'm finding things on the web or scrounging through shops in Second Life I'm always on the lookout for special bargains and freebies.

Sarah Houghton-Jan, Librarian in Black, has posted about free software cheat sheets available at http://www.customguide.com/quick_references.htm . These are useful guides that may be printed out and made available in the library for clients who need assistance with a variety of software applications for Microsoft or Mac.

Now this may not be the type of freebie that everyone is falling over themselves to obtain, but I think most educational libraries will find the cheat sheets very useful and time-saving.

Technology Trends

Librarian in Black, Sarah Houghton-Jan, summarises her contribution to ALA 2008 in Sarah's Top Technology Trends - virtual presentation for ALA 2008. I would like to draw attention to point #3 in the hope that the comments may filter through to the bureaucracy running our organisation.
I really like the way so much of the technology trends that are buzzed in Library circles were used in this presentation.

Web Taming Ringmaster

Michael Stevens' blog, Tame the Web, has two articles this week that I find particularly thought provoking.

1. Keys to a Successful Self Check-Out Project (linked from Michael’s blog)
Our new library is under construction (it's exciting to see progress with the new building across the road) and it would be good to consider implementing a changeover to a fully automated checkout policy. Please don’t argue until you have read the report and its answers to possible objections.

2. Brian Kelly: What if We’re Right? & Libpunk’d
Brian poses questions aimed at the detractors of Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 and proposes that there are more risks involved by not accepting such things as social networking and open source technology than by adopting them whole-heartedly.

Web 2.0 Tutorials

As anyone who reads this blog regularly will have guessed I am a great fan of using Web 2.0, particularly its potential for making libraries more "with it". This list of 100 Free Library 2.0 Webinars and Tutorials from the College@Home blog will help anyone who wants to find out more or give instructors ideas for spreading the word amongst unbelievers. I'm sure that library staff have already been converted but part of my mission is to get others to understand. Any library that hasn't yet run a variation of the 23 Learning 2.0 Things programme should consider implementing it as soon as they are able.

7 Things You Should Know About

The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative's (ELI's) 7 Things You Should Know About... series provides concise information on emerging learning technologies and related practices. If you have ever struggled to explain why various Web 2.0 tools are useful in the library or teaching environments here is a most useful series of explanations about technologies that may demonstrate positive learning impacts.

Currently there are 37 applications in the series which should give you all you need to stay up-to-date on emerging technologies.

Social networking in the library

Jessamyn West on librarian.net has a thoughtful discussion about why libraries should be socially networking. She mentions popular tools such as flickr, facebook and twitter, with helpful links to the ways in which some libraries are using them and recommends that all libraries should be offering 23 Things to help their staff get up to speed with the technology.

Google or Syndetics?

Sarah Houghton-Jan, the Librarian in Black has posted about Google Book Search API: LibraryThing and libraries grab it right up.

Google has released a new API that allows easy linking into any of the books included in Google Book Search. It's called "the Books Viewability API" and lets you more easily embed links to books on your own website. As an example, Google pointed to the Deschutes Public Library that uses "preview this book at Google" links in their catalog (here's an example). Tim at LibraryThing used the API immediately to fold Google Book Search content into LibraryThing results and has also released code that lets you fold Google book covers into your catalog too. Ooooh, sweet open goodness.

Does this mean that our library can use this feature instead of subscribing to Syndetics?

Centipedia

On Librarian in Black I found mention of a great way to use a wiki in a Library. If Central TAFE were to run with this idea we could call it Centipedia. See the original blog to understand my reason for this suggestion.

Marketing ourselves with widgets

One of the ideas proposed by Michael Stephens was that libraries should be making active use of web 2.0 applications. This holds the same for all businesses and is another way of looking at how we are advertising ourselves. BusinessWeek Talks Widgets, reported by ILibrarian, discusses several article about using some of these applications for social marketing campaigns.

We seem to be very inept in marketing ourselves and should take note of what can be achieved by making use of the available technology. If you can send me examples of how your library is doing it I'd be pleased to post them here.

Library 2.0 COW

Collaborative Online Workspace - an initiative of LATN, Librarians of the Australian Technological Network of universities. Presented by Alex Byrne, University Librarian, University of Technology, Sydney

Alex started by asking “What is driving the need for change?” and the simple answer was “we can and we must”.

Web2.0 is a mindshift about the use of technology, not the technology itself. We are the facilitators.

He discussed what he called “disruptive technologies” such as Google, blogs, ebay, Wikipedia, flickr, Amazon, MP3 and podcasting, mashups and social networking. In all of these the contributors become data collectors. They harness the wisdom of crowds (eg. Wikipedia).

There are many ways librarians can take advantage of these new technologies. LATN has developed a Collaborative Online Workspace.

They use open source content management software to work towards their concept of physical spaces moving towards virtual spaces.

Alex's presentation was very interesting but the venue in the State Library of WA left much to be desired. It was located in an open space and the speakers' words were swallowed up in the void. Add to that a buzz of noise coming from the central well of the building and the audience had to strain to catch what was said.

Heresy - and more

Roddy McLeod did me the complement of mentioning my blog in Information World Review at http://blog.iwr.co.uk/2008/01/information-pro.html. I have let him down I think by not touching my blog for the past two months - partly because I have been away on holiday but also because things seemed to get on top of me towards the end of the year. Hopefully I will be able to continue this year and maintain a standard that readers deserve.

The February edition of the Internet Resources Newsletter is out, always a useful source of information.

I wrote a draft entry yesterday but when I went in to finish it this morning the page was blank. That's most annoying as I had posted about several items of interest that I found in mt RSS feeds on my return to work and now can't remember what they were.

Two of my shared items relate to the library of the future and the way in which we should be heading. Pipe dreams for some but goals to which we should aspire. I particularly like the ideas in TTW Mailbox: Heretical Ideas in Library School in which students were asked to submit way-out ideas for a library service and these were subsequently discussed in class. We need more heresy in libraries to get away from our stereotypical images.

My friend Pauly in Second Life writes an IT Solutions blog in which he gives advice on optimising your enjoyment of Second Life as well as the stability of running the virtual world with fewer crashes.

Library Planning

The wiki is up for Central TAFE's day of planning "To establish Library goals and projects to meet the College Strategic Plans for 2008". The list of what we want to achieve is growing ever longer and I am afraid that, as was the case last year, few of these objectives will be realised.

I do hope our planning meeting doesn't result in this:

Discussed on the blog Librarian in Black was Michael Stephens's keynote address Ten Technologies: Ideas to Improve Library Productivity. There are some wonderful ideas and comments here - not least being his closing statements of library philosophy: Learn to Learn. Adapt to Change. Scan the Horizon.

Other ideas for library planning come from Katherine’s blog, Librarian’s Matter; David Lewis’ A model for academic libraries 2005 to 2025 and Part one and Part two of staff responses to the McMaster University Library Strategic planning process.

iLibrarian also has links to presentations from the Hawaii Library Association Conference.

The Library is alive and well

From ResourceShelf comes this article about the increase in numbers of people who visit libraries in Colorado. There is often talk about the demise of the library because of the rise of access to broadband and the ease by which search engines can be used to find information but this article should be compulsory reading for any of the powers-that-be who are thinking of cutting back on libraries in academic institutions, preferring to allocate them only virtual space.

Libraries attract record crowds by resourceshelf

Despite the rise of broadband Internet access in homes across the country and the ability to Google just about anything from anywhere, libraries are attracting record numbers of visitors.

Nationwide, visits to and items checked out of libraries are increasing steadily. According to the American Library Association, nearly 1.3 billion library patrons checked out more than 2 billion items in fiscal year 2005, the most recent figures available. That compares with 1.15 billion visitors checking out 1.7 billion items in fiscal year 2000.

Colorado 's 114 public libraries saw just shy of 28 million visitors in 2006, up slightly from 27.8 million visitors in 2005.

Source: Denver Post

Change of Job

I've been persuaded to accept a secondment to a Systems Librarian position with the LRSN for 2 days a week. Not sure if I'm doing the right thing as I'm very happy and perhaps too comfortable in my current job. There will be a bit more money on my payslip (it's level 5) and I've said that I'll try it until the end of the year so both sides can see if I am the right person for the job. I'll continue to work for TAFE the remaining 3 days and it makes sense that I'll be transferring to the eCentral campus. I will miss my current colleagues at Leederville. I've worked with them for 5 years and we've built up a cohesive team that is not afraid of challenges and whose members all have a lovely sense of humour.

Catchup

Although the college is closed for the mid-year break Library staff have been working hard behind the scenes. The bulk of our stocktaking assignment is complete at Leederville campus and we are getting ready for the influx of new students next week. I'll be leaving my very capable team to manage on their own as I'm swanning off to Bali for two weeks, my first real holiday in years. I'm so looking forward to having no responsibilities for a while as well as finding out about another culture and its people. Then, of course, there's the shopping and I've been given a list of things that various people want me to bring home for them. I hope my luggage allowance will cope with it all.

During the so-called break I've prepared a project brief to have a trial run of "23 Things (Learning 2.0)" at our library and had it accepted to start in week 5 of the new semester. My manager wants to be involved himself and I don't think I'll have any difficulty finding 5-10 volunteers for the trial.

I've also done a lot of reflection as I worked on my performance management review. It seems that our HR department has had to justify its existence by producing more and more forms to replace the old ones. So much is repetitive and doesn't seem to serve any useful purpose. Why not just a few simple questions such as:
What have you done during the past period?
What have you been unable to do - and why?
What do you plan to do during the next period?

The beginners Virtual Librarianship course is complete. Last weeks' session was interesting and some quite lively discussion evolved but it ended very suddenly leaving me with a feeling that there must be something more. We didn't even have an end of course party - not that I would have been able to keep my eyes open much later than the 12.30 pm Perth time the session ended. I'm planning to register for the intermediate course and, now that SL is available on the staff computer network, I'm hoping to be able to attend classes at a more reasonable time.

Swan TAFE asked me to give a brief demo of SL at their Black Friday function last week. If only they'd told me about the theme I'd have dressed more appropriately both on and off screen! It went down well and I hope to have made a few converts among people who are looking for new ways to get in touch with our students.

Ssshhh!!!

I did attend the Perth BarCamp briefly last Saturday. Wish I could have stayed longer but Saturdays are always so busy and my mum (aged 95) hates to have me out of her sight when I'm not working. Many others have blogged about the event and it appears to have been very successful. Did manage to catch Kathryn's presentation on SL. So glad that someone had radio access and she was able to give a proper demo.

But ... this morning when I fired up my pc I saw the SL icon that I had tried to use but failed when Central TAFE's firewall blocked access. Decided to download the new build anyway to use at home and, I don't know why, tried to access SL again. Success!! I don't know if this is just an experiment and it may last for only a short time but I sure hope not. Considering that I've been doing a lot of agitating to have it enabled at Central I don't understand why I wasn't advised.

The digital native thingy

I knew that my obsession with video style games such as Morrowind and Oblivion was not just a case of my being a "gaming granny" but something a bit more deep and meaningful. Now, as reported in insidehighered.com, College and university librarians have some unconventional advice: Play more video games. When ‘Digital Natives’ Go to the Library.
This irks me somewhat in that it categorises librarians once again using the Digital Native/Digital Immigrant tags. I recently attended "Nerd School", hoping to become more familiar with new terminology and usage of new technologies, but was instead subjected to a test to see whether I was an immigrant or a native. I defy many so-called "natives" to achieve as high a score as I got! I suffer from insatiable curiosity and am always trying out new things and learning all the time.

Google vs. Library

I think I'll use this Unshelved cartoon next time I present a web search skills class:-)