Demonstrating a blog post

Hi, Niki!

Library 2.0 in (more than) 15 minutes: Session 2

Today, we are going to briefly talk about RSS. If we have time, we will also discuss social tagging.

From AmbientLibrarian:

RSS
Really Simple Syndication. RSS is a technology that allows users to stream "feeds" into news aggregators (or feed readers) in a simple text format, to make it easier to keep up with many online resources. Examples of web-based news aggregators include Bloglines and Google Reader.

First, let's look at some library and library-related sites that offer feeds.

The Library of Congress is not necessarily known to be quick to change...yet, they have RSS:
http://www.loc.gov/index.html

Booklist:
http://www.booklistonline.com/

News aggregators are a convenient way to keep up with updates from several different Internet sources. To enjoy this convenience, try signing up with Google Reader.

On to tagging. Again, from AmbientLibrarian:

Tag
In relation to Web 2.0, a tag is a label given to a resource (such as a web page, image, photo, blog entry, etc) by a user to describe that resource.

One of the most well-known sites to use tagging (and possibly the first), is del.icio.us. Delicious is a social bookmarking site that uses tags to save and organize bookmarks on the Web. You can also easily share your bookmarks.

Another cool site that uses tagging is LibraryThing. LibraryThing lets you (anybody) catalog books online.

OK, play time!

Library 2.0 in 15 minutes: Session 1

Welcome to a quick post about Library 2.0. I'll just be using this as an outline to share what I'm calling "Library 2.0 in 15 Minutes," inspired by Helene Blowers 23 Things (or Learning 2.0).

Those of us interested in helping libraries adopt Library 2.0 need to read Participatory Networks: The Library as Conversation (http://iis.syr.edu/projects/PNOpen/). This report was created for the American Libary Association by the Information Institute of Syracuse, of Syracuse University's School of Information Studies. Don't worry, there is an Executive Summary!

Here is what I want to share from this report today (and my own personal thoughts):

"Knowledge is created through conversation. Libraries are in the knowledge business. Therefore, libraries are in the conversation business.”
(Lankes, Silverstein, and Nicholson 2007, 4)

"Library 2.0" is a convenient way to describe a lot of the new technologies (blogs, wikis, etc) that make it possible for us to engage users online. However, the important part of this "movement" isn't the new technology--it's the user. Libraries have been about serving the user long before computers were even in the buildings. This is just the next evolution.

Today, we're talking about blogs.

Libraries that use blogs:

Darien Library
Hennepin County Library Bookspace
Marin County Free Library
Williamsburg Regional Library

Librarians who blog:
ALA TechSource
David Lee King
The Shifted Librarian
Stephen's Lighthouse
Tame the Web

Of course, there are lots, lots more!

Now, you try it!

https://www2.blogger.com/start



Reference:
Lankes, David R., Joanne Silverstein, and Scott Nicholson. 2007. Participatory networks: the library as conversation. Information Institute of Syracuse. Commissioned by the American Library Association Office for Information Technology Policy. Available at http://iis.syr.edu/projects/PNOpen/ParticiaptoryNetworks.pdf

Do public PCs allow for blogging posts?

Not a very exciting post...Just making sure everything will work if I try to show it to someone else. I think that blogging could be a great tool for reluctant writers in adult literacy programs. Or, for library professionals interested in the new technology.

Librarianship, eductation, connections, and theTRLD Conference

Obviously, I stopped blogging when class ended last semester. However, I realize that I should try to keep "thinking out loud," so to speak. I'm currently sitting in another great workshop at the Technology, Reading, and Learning Disabilities conference. We are discussing so many of the wonderful things that we learned about last semester.

Throughout this conference, Rebecca and I have commented on the ways that the issues that librarians are facing are the same issues educators are facing. I've added notes from this workshop to AmbientLibrarian.org (just for Technology for Struggling Writers at this point). I plan to add a ton of information to our new tutor wiki. In fact, I think that we need to present a series of Technology workshops at the Oklahoma State Literacy Conference.

At least there's WorldCat.

Reading "Indexing the Invisible Web: A Survey" was very disturbing, because I know that so much of that invisible web is made up of valuable library-provided content. Even a Google search for "Daughter of Fortune book Tulsa Library" doesn't return any results indicating whether or not the library owns Daughter of Fortune. I get a few links to the TCCL website, but all to seemingly unrelated pages, like the African American Resource Center. As far as I can tell, this book, nor the author, Isabel Allende, are mentioned anywhere on this page.

Our collection is invisible.

But, there's hope, right? The authors say that some web sites attempt to categorize invisible web sites, and that samples are given in the Appendix (Ru and Horowitz 2005, 251).

I decided to check out some of those sites. Now I'm worried that all hope is lost.

I like the idea behind Digital Librarian, but it's just lists. Good lists, but lists. As far as I can tell, you can't even search the site. So, it's sort of like a group of pathfinders. It's like a web bibliography. (I'm sure someone has already coined the term "webliography," right?) Clicking on several of the organized links, I didn't really see how it aided in access to the invisible web. Digital Librarian provides an expertly chosen list of web sites in an organized structure, but those sites didn't really seem to be "invisible."

Randomly, I chose another site from the appendix: Invisible Web. Sounds promising, but a visit to the home page is immediately greeted by that scourge of the Internet: pop-up adds. Subtract a few credibility points there...Once you get past those, the main part of the window is taken up by sponsored links (eBay, MSN--not exactly "invisible" stuff...). I spent several minutes on this site, and I never came across anything that didn't look like pushed commercial content.

The home page for the Invisible Web Directory simply says that it is being refurbished, check back later.

Those just happened to be the first three I selected, so I felt a little disappointed. I also see that Librarians' Index to the Internet is listed, which is credible and searchable, and even warns you when a suggested site may have pop-ups.

Further into the reading, "technologies for searching invisible web sites in real time" are described (Ru and Horowitz 2005, 257-261). These seem to have much more promise. It reminds me of some of our earlier readings, where we discussed the need to bring the search engines to the content, rather than bring the content to the search engines...you know, instead of trying to bring the mountain to Mohamed. Or did I get that backwards?

"The Terrible Twos," on the other hand, was a fun little summary for the end of our semester. I've been wondering for a long time what Ajax and API were, but just hadn't looked them up yet. This might have also been a good introductory article for the class, since it quickly went over so much of the terminology we have discussed. I found several things in this article that I need to add to AmbientLibrarian.

That reminds me--I knew that the wiki pages created by MediaWiki were dynamic, and that they were more difficult to index. I also knew that the ? contained in the URL could be problematic. Ru and Horowitz have now stressed for me what a potential findability problem this could be for AmbientLibrarian. Searching for other help topics for MediaWiki, I occasionally came across:

http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Short_URL and
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Using_a_very_short_URL

I seem to remember that each time I saw these articles, my thoughts went something like this: "Oh! That's a good idea!" *read, read, "uh....," *read,* "huh?" *read,* "Ouch, my brain." Maybe that's something I'll be able to figure out after the semester. You know, instead of celebrating the Holidays.

It's nice to be read.

Someone bothered to post about AmbientLibrarian on LISNews!

That's exciting. Glad I had that site on the wiki already.