post #11 group project experience
Emily, Jessica and I emailed back and forth to share and critique ideas. Emily had the brainstorm to survey librarians about different aspects of personalizing the library and we all worked on the introduction to the survey, the survey questions, and placing the survey. Michael helped us fine tune the questions as well as advertise and place the survey on the Web.
The number, speed, length and depth of the responses were amazing, as we had over 90 responses to our ten questions. We were very pleased by this because it gave us a lot of data to work with about librarians’ feelings, perspectives, and ideas on library personalization. The number of responses gave our conclusions about librarians’ attitudes more credibility and usefulness. We all agreed Emily and Jessica would analyze and present the survey responses to Michael and the class. I had stumbled onto a few things on the Web and I focused on those for my share of the presentation.
At first I was worried about finding specific tools to show the class about personalizing the library. But luckily I discovered the LibGuide website and I was very intrigued with the power of their widgets and hosting tools to let the library reach out into the world. The widgets are great working advertisement for the library; the only advertisements I know that give the viewer something really useful for free. The Dominican librarian Caroline Sietmann was very helpful in explaining some points about LibGuide and in helping me post the html code for a widget to my website.
The LibGuide widgets led me to publishers’ widgets and these are also free. Anyone can place these widgets on their blogs, twitters, and websites like the LibGuide widgets. Through these little windows you can watch and listen to authors read one of their books or read novels online. Books and authors come to you they’re at your website waiting for you. This is just the beginning of tremendous mountains and tsunamis of content coming at us that we can surf.
The publishers’ widgets led to another business idea, TV 2.0. Libraries can partner up with companies like ZillionTV, which is creating a huge pipeline for all types of content such as TV shows, Hollywood, and independent films and online university classes that will flow to people through their TVs if they choose to click away from pro wrestling. Daniel Pink in, A Whole New Mind discussed the power of story to attract people and that inspired me to search for Storytelling 2.0.
Storytelling 2.0 is using all kinds of web 2.0 platforms to change our idea of what a story is and how it can be told. The library can use people’s natural storytelling ability and love of stories to add content to their sites as well as enrich the existing content of their collections using stories to connect the elements of the collection.
Collection Development 2.0 and new ways to change the look of the online catalog to attract users is also catching on in libraries.
Human history stalled for thousands of years in Life 1.0 but now it’s Life 2.0 and Government 2.0 which are both about the increasing freedom of people to affect the society around them. The mass of mankind is no longer mute and anonymous and powerless. The old 1960’s phrase ‘Power to the People’ has a new meaning and Library 2.0 is a part of this and it’s not going away. People expect more and power to control the ocean of information, images, music, and knowledge around them. The library must respond to that expectation or become a marginalized institution.
Thanks Michael for a class that was exciting, challenging, and opened my eyes and imagination to the possibilities of social networking software for the library and librarian, the businessman, and the writer. It was very satisfying working with Jess and Emily to produce a good presentation. – Bill
