You know, I had actually forgotten that Thing #36 was Flickr Revisited. It's just a coincidence that I happened to choose today to upload my first batch of photos.
So, after all this time, why did I decide to come back to Flickr? Today, I went to the zoo and took so many pictures that I filled the memory card. After deleting the blurry or otherwise low quality images, I still had 162 good pictures. Normally, I pick a couple of my favorites to share on Facebook or my blog, but this time I had so many good ones I wanted to share a larger batch. So naturally I thought of Flickr.
Of course, I realized that few people would care to take the time to view all 162, so I winnowed it down to 50 really good pictures. But when I tried to upload them, Flickr told me that they would put me WAY over my monthly limit. So I canceled out and did two things. First, I weeded even more aggressively, getting it down to the 35 best photos. Then I shrank every one of those 35 images down to 1024 x 768 pixels. When I uploaded the smaller images, the total consumed only about a quarter of my monthly limit.
So the key to managing Flickr seems to be twofold: be choosy about which photos you share (only the cream of the crop), and be attentive to file size.
How could the library use Flickr? The most obvious way is to post photos of the library building and library events. A public library might host a photo contest for their patrons, centralizing the submitted images to one gallery. The Criss Library, where I work, is posting digitized images from the University Archives on Flickr. It's an easy-to-use service with an enormous user base (which hopefully means it's unlikely to disappear), so it could be useful for any person or organization that wishes to make a photo album available to the public.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Thing 34: Online Answer Sites
January and February sort of slipped away from me, but I'm back for Thing #34: Online Answer Sites.
Why do many people go to answer sites rather than the library's online reference service?
One possibility is that people are looking for consensus. Perhaps they think that if they ask a librarian, they will only get that individual librarian's opinion, but if they ask a crowd of strangers, and five or forty people all say the same thing, then that thing is probably the answer.
I can see the appeal of this. When I search Google or Bing, I don't trust the answer I get from the first hit. I check several pages, and if they all say roughly the same thing, then I assume it's "probably" right.
I put "probably" in quotes, of course, because I recognize the possibility that a popular belief may be false. If it were a matter of life and death, I would prefer to consult an expert, perhaps several. I would look for authoritative sources, rather than whatever comes up on the first two pages of search results. But for a general day-to-day question, like "What are QR codes?" (my information quest today), the sum of several websites provides an adequate, satisfactory, good-enough answer.
Some people are more social than others. While I personally prefer to use a search engine and read things that people have already written--without having to log in, create an account, leave a comment, or otherwise interact with the source of the answer--I can easily imagine a more extroverted person wanting to engage in a conversation. They find a forum or answer site or some other venue where they can ask a question or start a discussion. (Note: before you call me on mixing singular and plural in the same sentence, know that I consciously embrace "they" as a singular, gender-neutral pronoun.)
The replies to these questions aren't just information tossed out on the web--they are thoughts, ideas, and information directed specifically at the person who asked the question. So there exists a relationship, or at least the illusion of one, between the asker and the responders. And the more people respond to the question, the more exciting it becomes, because the asker has hit upon something that people want to talk about. They have brought together a community.
So why NOT ask a librarian via IM, text, email, or whatever? Well, when I personally have a question I think I need a librarian or subject specialist for, it's generally a research question, often involving primary sources and other things that aren't easily found in a web search. However, even working in a library and knowing how fun-loving and wacky some librarians are, I would NEVER think to use an ask-a-librarian service for questions like, "What neat things might I do with 31 bowling balls?" or "What's the difference between Solitude and Loneliness?" And if a patron asked me questions like those, I would probably be too stunned to come up with a worthwhile response, witty or serious. (Although after a few moments, I would hopefully regain the presence of mind to help them find some psychology and philosophy resources for the second question, and I'd probably gravitate toward art with the first one.) But on these answer sites, it looks like anything goes. So people aren't afraid to ask something really off the wall.
Yes, I saw a lot of questions on those sites that could benefit from a librarian's knowledgeable answer. However, for any number of reasons, people are asking their questions on these other sites. Perhaps these are people who've had negative experiences with librarians (yeah, it happens) or who simply have never been library users and so don't even think about libraries.
For those cases, I think the Slam the Boards movement is great. With ask-a-librarian services, we're still making patrons come to us, virtually if not physically. The Slam the Boards participants are going out into the world. Librarians who provide quality answers on non-library sites not only help the people asking the questions, they also help the whole library community by making librarians more visible. So people who have discounted (or perhaps simply not considered) libraries will realize that librarians are useful and valuable after all.
Why do many people go to answer sites rather than the library's online reference service?
One possibility is that people are looking for consensus. Perhaps they think that if they ask a librarian, they will only get that individual librarian's opinion, but if they ask a crowd of strangers, and five or forty people all say the same thing, then that thing is probably the answer.
I can see the appeal of this. When I search Google or Bing, I don't trust the answer I get from the first hit. I check several pages, and if they all say roughly the same thing, then I assume it's "probably" right.
I put "probably" in quotes, of course, because I recognize the possibility that a popular belief may be false. If it were a matter of life and death, I would prefer to consult an expert, perhaps several. I would look for authoritative sources, rather than whatever comes up on the first two pages of search results. But for a general day-to-day question, like "What are QR codes?" (my information quest today), the sum of several websites provides an adequate, satisfactory, good-enough answer.
Some people are more social than others. While I personally prefer to use a search engine and read things that people have already written--without having to log in, create an account, leave a comment, or otherwise interact with the source of the answer--I can easily imagine a more extroverted person wanting to engage in a conversation. They find a forum or answer site or some other venue where they can ask a question or start a discussion. (Note: before you call me on mixing singular and plural in the same sentence, know that I consciously embrace "they" as a singular, gender-neutral pronoun.)
The replies to these questions aren't just information tossed out on the web--they are thoughts, ideas, and information directed specifically at the person who asked the question. So there exists a relationship, or at least the illusion of one, between the asker and the responders. And the more people respond to the question, the more exciting it becomes, because the asker has hit upon something that people want to talk about. They have brought together a community.
So why NOT ask a librarian via IM, text, email, or whatever? Well, when I personally have a question I think I need a librarian or subject specialist for, it's generally a research question, often involving primary sources and other things that aren't easily found in a web search. However, even working in a library and knowing how fun-loving and wacky some librarians are, I would NEVER think to use an ask-a-librarian service for questions like, "What neat things might I do with 31 bowling balls?" or "What's the difference between Solitude and Loneliness?" And if a patron asked me questions like those, I would probably be too stunned to come up with a worthwhile response, witty or serious. (Although after a few moments, I would hopefully regain the presence of mind to help them find some psychology and philosophy resources for the second question, and I'd probably gravitate toward art with the first one.) But on these answer sites, it looks like anything goes. So people aren't afraid to ask something really off the wall.
Yes, I saw a lot of questions on those sites that could benefit from a librarian's knowledgeable answer. However, for any number of reasons, people are asking their questions on these other sites. Perhaps these are people who've had negative experiences with librarians (yeah, it happens) or who simply have never been library users and so don't even think about libraries.
For those cases, I think the Slam the Boards movement is great. With ask-a-librarian services, we're still making patrons come to us, virtually if not physically. The Slam the Boards participants are going out into the world. Librarians who provide quality answers on non-library sites not only help the people asking the questions, they also help the whole library community by making librarians more visible. So people who have discounted (or perhaps simply not considered) libraries will realize that librarians are useful and valuable after all.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Thoughts on Purchasing Magazines and Books
I woke up this morning thinking about ownership versus access, with regard to magazines and books, both in my personal collection and in libraries. If this is of interest to you, read this post on my other blog. Cheers!
Thing 31: What is the Future of Libraries and Librarians?
I watched the presentation on New Librarianship by R. David Lankes.
Mr. Lankes made so many good points, I can't possibly address them all. I took three and a half pages of notes while I listened, and I can barely decide what to focus on.
He turns the conversation away from the future of libraries to the future of librarians, reminding us that it is the people, not the buildings or the resources, that make libraries and librarianship valuable to society. He suggests that we do not discover the future; we create it.
I really liked his rock illustration. "The geologist did not discover the knowledge in the rock. They brought the knowledge to the rock. . . . Knowledge is dynamic, it's living, it's human, it's how we understand stuff . . . we can not put knowledge on a stack." He went on to talk about how when one reads a book, one has a conversation, not with the book, nor with the author, but with the self.
That really gave me a lightbulb moment. I've thought of librarians as collectors and curators of knowledge, who provide access to information so people can learn independently. (Collection development, acquisitions, and cataloging.) And I've thought of librarians as guides who lead people to knowledge, who teach them to find and use information, if they are unable to do so on their own. (Reference and public services.) The underlying assumption is that knowledge is a thing--intangible, but still a thing--that people can get. But knowledge isn't in the books or the databases. Knowledge is in the minds of living people.
Lankes said, "The mission of librarians is to improve society through facilitating knowledge creation in their communities." That is a mighty tall order, but it's nobler than simply providing access to resources and directions on how to use them. I will try to keep that in the back of my mind, always, as I progress through life. How does my work improve society? How can I make my work improve society?
What does it mean to improve society? Society is made up of people, so improving society is improving people. What does that mean? I feel that my mind has been improved by listening to Mr. Lankes' presentation. So he has improved me, and thus improved society. So if I improve the knowledge of one person through a conversation (face to face or through my writing or catalog records), then I will have improved society. (That is in itself a major mind-shift for me--the idea that catalog records are not directional signs but conversations between librarians and users. Thinking of it that way really highlights just how bad our catalogs suck, even in the best libraries.)
It goes both ways. In the process of improving society, librarians must in turn be improved by society. Librarians are a part of society, after all. We are part of the community. (Forgive me for including myself in the "we" even though I'm not technically a librarian. But I do believe paraprofessionals practice librarianship, too.)
Lankes stressed that we need a deeper sense of why we do what we do. It's fine to know what you do and how you do it, but it's just as important to know why. This reminds me of the quote by Martha Watson, "I really like to know the reasons for what I do!" (This quote is used as the signature of John G. Marr, a frequent poster on the Autocat discussion list, so I see it often.) It's true. If you don't know why you're doing something, then you can't see if there is a better way to do it. And I've long considered process improvement an integral part of my job, so I'm often asking why things are done a particular way.
I am also reminded of an anecdote my friend Rev. Michael Burgess told in a sermon years ago. A woman always cut off the ends of the ham and laid them along the sides of the roasting pan. One day, someone asked her why. She didn't know, but her mother had always done it that way, and she'd picked up the habit. So she went and asked her mother. Her mother said she didn't know either, but grandma always did it that way. So they went and asked grandma, who said that she had such a small roasting pan in those days that a whole ham was too long. The only way to make it fit was to cut off the ends and squeeze them in along the sides. Two generations after her continued the practice, even though their pans were big enough for the uncut ham.
I’m sure libraries are full of cut-off ends of hams. What do we keep doing out of tradition, that is no longer really necessary because our tools have changed so much?
The future of librarianship is wonderful, so long as we choose the path and take each step with conscious awareness.
Mr. Lankes made so many good points, I can't possibly address them all. I took three and a half pages of notes while I listened, and I can barely decide what to focus on.
He turns the conversation away from the future of libraries to the future of librarians, reminding us that it is the people, not the buildings or the resources, that make libraries and librarianship valuable to society. He suggests that we do not discover the future; we create it.
I really liked his rock illustration. "The geologist did not discover the knowledge in the rock. They brought the knowledge to the rock. . . . Knowledge is dynamic, it's living, it's human, it's how we understand stuff . . . we can not put knowledge on a stack." He went on to talk about how when one reads a book, one has a conversation, not with the book, nor with the author, but with the self.
That really gave me a lightbulb moment. I've thought of librarians as collectors and curators of knowledge, who provide access to information so people can learn independently. (Collection development, acquisitions, and cataloging.) And I've thought of librarians as guides who lead people to knowledge, who teach them to find and use information, if they are unable to do so on their own. (Reference and public services.) The underlying assumption is that knowledge is a thing--intangible, but still a thing--that people can get. But knowledge isn't in the books or the databases. Knowledge is in the minds of living people.
Lankes said, "The mission of librarians is to improve society through facilitating knowledge creation in their communities." That is a mighty tall order, but it's nobler than simply providing access to resources and directions on how to use them. I will try to keep that in the back of my mind, always, as I progress through life. How does my work improve society? How can I make my work improve society?
What does it mean to improve society? Society is made up of people, so improving society is improving people. What does that mean? I feel that my mind has been improved by listening to Mr. Lankes' presentation. So he has improved me, and thus improved society. So if I improve the knowledge of one person through a conversation (face to face or through my writing or catalog records), then I will have improved society. (That is in itself a major mind-shift for me--the idea that catalog records are not directional signs but conversations between librarians and users. Thinking of it that way really highlights just how bad our catalogs suck, even in the best libraries.)
It goes both ways. In the process of improving society, librarians must in turn be improved by society. Librarians are a part of society, after all. We are part of the community. (Forgive me for including myself in the "we" even though I'm not technically a librarian. But I do believe paraprofessionals practice librarianship, too.)
Lankes stressed that we need a deeper sense of why we do what we do. It's fine to know what you do and how you do it, but it's just as important to know why. This reminds me of the quote by Martha Watson, "I really like to know the reasons for what I do!" (This quote is used as the signature of John G. Marr, a frequent poster on the Autocat discussion list, so I see it often.) It's true. If you don't know why you're doing something, then you can't see if there is a better way to do it. And I've long considered process improvement an integral part of my job, so I'm often asking why things are done a particular way.
I am also reminded of an anecdote my friend Rev. Michael Burgess told in a sermon years ago. A woman always cut off the ends of the ham and laid them along the sides of the roasting pan. One day, someone asked her why. She didn't know, but her mother had always done it that way, and she'd picked up the habit. So she went and asked her mother. Her mother said she didn't know either, but grandma always did it that way. So they went and asked grandma, who said that she had such a small roasting pan in those days that a whole ham was too long. The only way to make it fit was to cut off the ends and squeeze them in along the sides. Two generations after her continued the practice, even though their pans were big enough for the uncut ham.
I’m sure libraries are full of cut-off ends of hams. What do we keep doing out of tradition, that is no longer really necessary because our tools have changed so much?
The future of librarianship is wonderful, so long as we choose the path and take each step with conscious awareness.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
The Webbies: 1000 Awesome Things
We're up to Thing #30, a lovely round number. And for this, we get to pick anything off the Webby list, anything that strikes our fancy?
I started with the idea of picking something practical, maybe something from the art section that might be of value to the KANEKO-UNO Library. But my internet connection is too slow to get any of those art sites to load properly. I had particularly high hopes for the Color Chart, and what I saw of it was beautiful. I'd love to explore it sometime when I have access to a higher speed connection. But I had to abandon it for now in favor of something a little more friendly to low-end DSL.
While there's a lot of potentially valuable stuff for libraries, I found myself drawn to the 1000 Awesome Things blog. I don’t necessarily see a strong library application for it, but I like it. Everyone needs a break from the nastiness and misery and meanness that permeates our world. This blog is like an antidote. It's upbeat and uplifting (without being saccharine or glurgy), reminding us to take joy in the simple pleasures life has to offer, like sleeping in our own bed after an exhausting trip or finding something you lost so long ago you gave up on it. I had my own experience with the latter this summer, when I found a turquoise and silver ring I'd lost over a year earlier. It was under the seat of my old car, which I was cleaning out to sell. I wore the ring every day until I lost it again last month. But I'm not worried. If it's meant to be, it'll find its way back to me.
The posts on 1000 Awesome Things are kind of rambling, rather like the above paragraph. They remind me of The Tick's monologues, and starting about halfway through the third post, every word I read, my mind heard spoken in Patrick Warburton's voice. Go on, pick any post, and imagine Patrick Warburton standing by the bus stop coffee vending machine and telling you these things. Bonus points if you imagine him in a blue superhero suit with emotive antennae.
And that just makes me smile. I think that's the whole point of the blog. To cheer you up no matter what kind of day you're having. And who doesn't need that?
I started with the idea of picking something practical, maybe something from the art section that might be of value to the KANEKO-UNO Library. But my internet connection is too slow to get any of those art sites to load properly. I had particularly high hopes for the Color Chart, and what I saw of it was beautiful. I'd love to explore it sometime when I have access to a higher speed connection. But I had to abandon it for now in favor of something a little more friendly to low-end DSL.
While there's a lot of potentially valuable stuff for libraries, I found myself drawn to the 1000 Awesome Things blog. I don’t necessarily see a strong library application for it, but I like it. Everyone needs a break from the nastiness and misery and meanness that permeates our world. This blog is like an antidote. It's upbeat and uplifting (without being saccharine or glurgy), reminding us to take joy in the simple pleasures life has to offer, like sleeping in our own bed after an exhausting trip or finding something you lost so long ago you gave up on it. I had my own experience with the latter this summer, when I found a turquoise and silver ring I'd lost over a year earlier. It was under the seat of my old car, which I was cleaning out to sell. I wore the ring every day until I lost it again last month. But I'm not worried. If it's meant to be, it'll find its way back to me.
The posts on 1000 Awesome Things are kind of rambling, rather like the above paragraph. They remind me of The Tick's monologues, and starting about halfway through the third post, every word I read, my mind heard spoken in Patrick Warburton's voice. Go on, pick any post, and imagine Patrick Warburton standing by the bus stop coffee vending machine and telling you these things. Bonus points if you imagine him in a blue superhero suit with emotive antennae.
And that just makes me smile. I think that's the whole point of the blog. To cheer you up no matter what kind of day you're having. And who doesn't need that?
Saturday, November 14, 2009
FTC Disclosure
Since now the Federal Trade Commission requires all bloggers to disclose whether they received any payment or perks of any kind for reviewing products, this is my disclosure/disclaimer to apply to all of my previous reviews on this blog. It also applies to all of my future posts related to the Nebraska Learns 2.0 program.
None of the web services explored during the Nebraska Learns 2.0 exercises provided any compensation to the participants in the program. None provided me with something complementary for the explicit purpose of reviewing it. The only people who asked me to blog about these services are the Nebraska Library Commission staff members who select and moderate the exercises. I am under no obligation to complete the exercises. My opinions about the services are my honest impressions based on my experiences using them.
I would be eligible for continuing education credits for completing these exercises, but my library does not require them, so I have not filled out any of the forms necessary to receive them. My only benefits from blogging about these services have been knowledge and experience.
Early in the Nebraska Learns 2.0 program, during the original 23 Things, I had permission from my supervisor to do the exercises on work time, if other duties permitted, because this was considered professional development. These days, I do these exercises at home, on my own time, not because permission was revoked but because we are simply far too busy at work to spare any time for this. I expect to continue to do the exercises on my own time for as long as I continue to participate in the program.
I work for the Criss Library at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. My opinions here are my own and do not necessarily represent the opinions of my employer.
For that matter, no one asked me to write this disclosure. But I'm not entirely clear about how the FTC expects bloggers to comply with their exceedingly confusing rules, so I figured, better safe than sorry.
None of the web services explored during the Nebraska Learns 2.0 exercises provided any compensation to the participants in the program. None provided me with something complementary for the explicit purpose of reviewing it. The only people who asked me to blog about these services are the Nebraska Library Commission staff members who select and moderate the exercises. I am under no obligation to complete the exercises. My opinions about the services are my honest impressions based on my experiences using them.
I would be eligible for continuing education credits for completing these exercises, but my library does not require them, so I have not filled out any of the forms necessary to receive them. My only benefits from blogging about these services have been knowledge and experience.
Early in the Nebraska Learns 2.0 program, during the original 23 Things, I had permission from my supervisor to do the exercises on work time, if other duties permitted, because this was considered professional development. These days, I do these exercises at home, on my own time, not because permission was revoked but because we are simply far too busy at work to spare any time for this. I expect to continue to do the exercises on my own time for as long as I continue to participate in the program.
I work for the Criss Library at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. My opinions here are my own and do not necessarily represent the opinions of my employer.
For that matter, no one asked me to write this disclosure. But I'm not entirely clear about how the FTC expects bloggers to comply with their exceedingly confusing rules, so I figured, better safe than sorry.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Visual Bookshelf
Oops, I kinda let Thing #29: Book-Based Social Networks slip by me. I did sign up for Visual Bookshelf on Facebook, but so far I've only added five books (and they were from the same series, so they really should only count as one). I just never had time to really get into it this month, and I had trouble working up enthusiasm because this thing seemed like a combination of two things I'd already done, LibraryThing and Facebook.
I might go back later and try to fill out my Visual Bookshelf. I'm more likely to use it than LibraryThing, because it's integrated into Facebook, so it's in a place I already go instead of another site I have to remember to visit. But since October is over, I'm afraid I flubbed this lesson.
I might go back later and try to fill out my Visual Bookshelf. I'm more likely to use it than LibraryThing, because it's integrated into Facebook, so it's in a place I already go instead of another site I have to remember to visit. But since October is over, I'm afraid I flubbed this lesson.
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