Is Google the New Microsoft?

http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/2010/02/09/is-google-the-new-microsoft
Ok, so now Google is challenging Facebook and Twitter by adding new social features to Gmail that would allow users to more quickly and easily share status updates and media.  These features are the heart and soul of Facebook and Twitter and by integrating it into their other programs such as Gmail, Picasa Photos, and YouTube, it poses the question, is Google beginning to look and act like Microsoft by trying to get in on every new innovation and make it their own?  Ever since they first produced their Windows operating system, Microsoft has always taken existing ideas and made them their own.  They have been highly successful and profitable with their flagship products, their Windows operating system and Office productivity suite.  While I still value these products, it seems like in the last ten years, they have done nothing original.  They latch onto a new concept or product developed by someone else and try to make it their own, often times unsuccessfully.  In contrast, Google has been a leader in new innovations and has done very well with their products, which by the way are mostly free.  But as Google expands into an ever increasing array of areas such as their own cell phone, and now these new Gmail services, you have to wonder, are they losing their edge?  Are they becoming another Microsoft?

Read more at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/08/gmail-social-feature-to-l_n_453809.html

Now on Facebook: Your Future Doctor, Partying

OK, so we’ve all heard the warnings about being careful about what we post on Facebook, right?  Be careful to not post anything that could come back to hurt you professionally, like party pictures or anything that might create a negative reflection on you.  OK, maybe not everyone has heard, or at least taken this advice to heart.  The latest edition of The Chronicle of Higher Education has a front page story about medical school students posting photos of alcohol soaked parties, joining groups like PIMP (Party of Important Male Physicians), and posing with cadavers.  The article is free online at http://chronicle.com/article/There-May-Be-Skeletons-in-Y/63803/ Just another reminder to be mindful of what you are doing in the cyber world.

Social media: A guide for college and university libraries

ACRL has put out a guide for those librarians who are beginning to experiment with using social media services.  This is a good tips and tricks article oh how these services can be best utilized to promote library services and to dialog with users.  Since I am in the early stages of these experiments myself, I found this guide somewhat useful.  The guide can be found at http://crln.acrl.org/content/71/1/10.full

TONIGHT: PBS FrontLine: Digital Nation

This looks like an excellent program on how the digital world and the real world converge.  Looks like it will be a great program; don’t miss it!   http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/digitalnation/view/

IOLUG Fall Meeting on Managing Your Digital Identity a Huge Success

Well, I’ve been quiet the last week or so but I’ve been busy.  Between spending large chunks of time at ISU to listen to ILS vendors give us sales pitches and demos of their systems, planning for the IOLUG meeting, and probably a dozen other little things that have popped up in the last week, I have not had much time to blog.  But again, that IS the theme of my blog…doing this, that, and the other thing!  So here is a quick wrap up of the Fall 2009 Indiana Online Users Group (IOLUG) Meeting.  The theme was “Hot or Not: Managing Your Digital Identity” it it was held at the Plainfield Public Library.  The morning Keynote was “Yes, You Are Speaking in Public: the Implications of Building a Personal and Professional Online Presence” by Jenica Rogers, Director of libraries at SUNNY, Potsdam.  This was followed by three breakout sessions 1) Online Public Identities: The Unexpected Dangers, by Jenica Rogers; 2) Tips and Tricks – a)New Friend Requests: Managing Personal and Professional Contacts on Facebook, by Jason Fields, b) Search Engine Optimization by Michael Witt, c) The Website with a Face: Digitally Connecting to People Where They Are, by me, Richard Bernier, and c) Virtual Venues and Collaborations:  Strengthening Your Staff and Services Using Facebook by Misti Shaw; 3) Facebook Basics (workshop) by Daniel Nguyen, Bill Helling, Emily Griffin, and Melissa Hostetler.  The afternoon keynote was “Social Library is People: Strategies for Making Your Online Organization More Human, by Toby Greenwalt, Virtual Services Coordinator for the Skokie Public Library.  The three breakout sessions included the Tips and Tricks and Facebook Basics again along with “Putting It All Together: Monitoring and Participating in Your Online Community without Losing Your Mind, by Toby Greenwalt.  The day was capped off with a Panel on Personal Experiences with Digital Identity.  Panelists were Melissa Kiser, Kayla Gregory, Malissa Hostetler, and Lisa Lobdell.

For me, this was the most enjoyable and enlightening IOLUG meeting so far.  It could not have come at a better time since I am currently engrossed in Web 2.0, social networking, and their integration into my libraries operations.  I also have two research projects in the works in this area.  I also enjoyed being a speaker.  It has been a while and I enjoyed it a great deal.  The highlights of the program for me included Jenica Roger’s Keynote, and learning more about the permission controls of Facebook by Jason Fields.  I am now reconsidering my decision to use a second Facebook account for professional uses and I may just make friends with my coworkers after all.  Actually, I will need to do so one way or another if I am going to launch and promote our Library’s Facebook page.  In my next posting, I will discuss the topic I spoke about in further detail.

Our Spring program will be on mobile computing and the integration of library services, or something like that.

Lost in a Sea of Web 2.0

OK, so I am exploring a research topic which in part will evaluate which Web 2.0 applications our students use for communication and various other productivity applications.  I know the quantity of internet tools has been growing over the years, but I am lost in a sea of applications that can be used.  The number of options for “add this” buttons comes to almost 200.  I don’t know what the overwhelming majority of them are for.   My first step would be to classify them by type, social network, social bookmarking, , etc.  Anyone know of an easy way to explore, categorize, and list these resources for an online survey?

http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/2009/10/20/lost-in-a-sea-of-web-2-0/

Becoming Library 2.0 the Right Way

http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/?p=132
As Logan Library moves towards Library 2.0 by integrating Web.2.0 technology, there is already discussion in the blogosphere about Web 3.0.  Any discussion of this by librarians at this point is premature at best.  Many libraries have rushed to embrace Web 2.0 technologies without having asked themselves why they should.  Many have jumped headlong and into creating a library blog and adding other features without it being tied into their library’s strategic goals.  An article in Information Today “Making Web 2.0 Work—From ‘Librarian Habilis’ to ‘Librarian Sapiens’ by Milica Cvetkovic makes the point that it must be tied into a library’s strategic goals.  Without doing so, two problems soon become apparent.  First, technologies are adopted by the library and not by their patrons.  Second, librarians often do not have the time to work on these technologies once they are launched.  It is something extra that they take on their own and considered secondary to their job.  On both of these points, I have something to say.

On the first point, I have always been reluctant to adopt something without foreseeing a direct benefit to our users.  However, I did try a few things through trial and error.  First, we started virtual reference a year and a half ago, it was hardly ever used.  But we used an external commercial service where we could only have one librarian logged in at a time and we had the link to the service only on the library’s main page.  With our implementation of LibGuides, we have placed chat widgets for each of our reference librarians (2) on every LibGuide.  Every Libguide page has at least one chat widget.  Thus, they can see if we are available wherever they are on our website doing research.  The response has been excellent; we get several IM reference requests per day.  The second experiment was to use Twitter to inform a class on updates to a specific LibGuide as well as for other library news.  In three weeks, we have only gained only four followers.  I have conducted a survey by show of hands of over 300 students during Freshmen College and Life Skills classes, asking how many use Twitter.  I often got zero hands or occasionally one or two.  But Twitter does have a scrolling ticker widget that we were able to put on our webpage so it was not a total waste.  On the second point, the title of my blog says it all.  I already do many jobs and so engaging in blogging and managing Web 2.0 platforms is just more work for me…and more stress.

It was quite timely that I read this article today (it came out today) because just a few hours before, I decided to conduct a study.  The study will 1) survey our users on what Web 2.0 technologies they are currently using (social networks, social bookmarking, communication, etc;  2) Reevaluate how our library resources are being utilized by all of our user population (database usage, location usage, etc); and 3) survey our students on their research practices.  This purpose of the study will be for publication in a peer-reviewed journal and for our own knowledge as we revise our strategic goals and objectives.  As Logan Library wades into the murky waters of Library 2.0, we will do so armed with factual knowledge of our users and not just assumptions.

Do Fancier Communication Tools Hinder Communication?

http://thisthatotherthing.wordpress.com/2009/10/12/do-fancier-communication-tools-hinder-communication/

An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal today discusses how email is being replaced by other forms of communication tools such as facebook, twitter, and the new beta version of Google Wave, a tool that combines photo sharing, email and commenting all in real time.  The article points out that while these tools are fun and more intuitive, they are also more impersonal.  For instance, if your friends on facebook are posting regular updates on what they are doing throughout the day, why bother to call them up to see how they are doing?  Another problem, I would like to point out is how easy it is to get inundated with information to the point to where you start tuning out.  We can miss important information by tuning out or through conscious filtering using filtering tools these services incorporate.  A final point is just how meaningful is this communication.  Just as phone conversations chop out a great deal of non verbal communication that we get in face to face communication, textual communication cuts off communication we get from talking.  And so I’ll throw text messaging into this mix.  Text messaging through cell phones is a great way to send quick information to someone.  For instance, you can say “Hey, I’m heading out the door” to someone you are going to pick up.  It’s simpler and more efficient than calling them to tell them that.  You can also carry on a short conversation at a time when talking is not appropriate.  I use text messaging all the time but it does have its limitations.  You reach a point where a text conversation is taking place that could be best done through a vocal phone conversation.  And forget about having any kind of meaningful relationship with someone through text messaging only.  This leads us to the question, does fancier communication tools hinder communication.

I will answer that question by simply saying that it can, but not necessarily.  I would like to address how we at Logan Library at Rose-Hulman are experimenting with one such technology to augment our reference communication with our students.  We have recently implemented LibGuides with profiles and chat widgets to each of our reference librarians on each subject guide.  Although we encourage our students to come to see us for research help any time they need it, there are times when a trip to the library is not necessary.  We know for a fact that most student research is done outside of the library, specifically in the residence halls and Greek houses.  Often times a student may have a simple question about which database would be their best option to search for a specific topic or how to find if we have a specific journal.  The chat option is a means of making ourselves available to them wherever they are.  Needless to say, there are times when the level of research assistance they need would be best carried out face to face.  In which case, we would ask them to come to the library at a convenient time for both parties.

Any kind of communication technology must used just like other tool.  If you go into a workshop (wood, machine, etc) each tool has a specific purpose.  Likewise, communication tools should be used for the right purposes.  So depending on the situation, choose your tool properly.

Redefining Library Relevance at Rose-Hulman

ACRL Value of Academic Libraries Comprehensive Research Review and Report is a RFP “seeking proposals for the development and delivery of a comprehensive review of the quantitative and  qualitative literature, methodologies, and best practices currently in place for demonstrating the value of academic libraries.”  The relevance of academic libraries is being questioned as a result of changing user expectations due to search engines like Google.  Libraries are scrambling to define themselves as relevant to their user community.  At Logan Library, we are doing this in a few ways.  One is through increased emphasis on information literacy.  We are changing the way we teach library instruction and trying to reach more classes each year.  Our goal by the end of this academic year is to develop a more comprehensive methodology for turning out information literate students by the time they graduate.  This process starts Freshmen year and builds in complexity throughout their four years at Rose.  Since we are starting with Freshman through Seniors all at once, it will take four years before we will see a group of students move through this process.  We are still hashing out this process which we will continue to do throughout this academic year.

The second way in which we are redefining our relevance is by our transformation to a Library 2.0.  While our users may not have any idea what this means, or simply think we are making up some trendy  sounding name for ourselves, they are aware of web 2.0 technology as it is already an integral part of their lives online.  We have done this through the implementation of LibGuides; chat widgets available on our LibGuides pages, Twitter to inform our users of changes to LibGuides and other library news.  We have also added a Twitter widget to our library home page to make our tweets visible to those who are not followers.  We will soon explore uses for facebook .

The transformation is taking slowly taking place.  So far the response has been positive.  We already knew that most research by students is being done outside of the library, so the chat option was implemented to reach students at their point of need.  So far, so good; we are getting several chat reference requests per day.  We have gotten positive feedback from the professors we have conducted library instruction for, and the students seem to be more engaged during the process.  While we do not have the funds currently to build a new library or add a number of new resources, we are in the process of redefining our role within the institution and hopefully increasing our relevance as well.

FINALLY, a use for Twitter

I have finally found a use for Twitter.  Yesterday I created a LibGuide for a Technical Communications class we did library orientations for (6 classes last Friday).  We started seeing students asking for research help the same day and already I have heard students mentioning that they forgot some of the resources that we mentioned.  Unlike in the past, I did not create a paper handout for the students to use as a reference.  Instead, I created a LibGuide just for that class, making this the first class I have done this for.  The email alerts feature in LibGuides only alerts users of new Guides, not changes to already existing guides.  Since I am sure I will be making changes to the guide and adding information, I wanted a way to update our users of new information.  Ahhh, Twitter to the rescue.  I created a Twitter account “loganlibrary” and posted my first update.  I sent all six sections of the class the news of the new guide and of the Twitter account and so now we’ll see how it plays out.  I’ll post an update on usage of the guide and the Twitter account later.