Library 2.0 Curious

I really like the idea of NetSnippets as described by Phil Bradby in the second of his 2 articles on web 2.0. Has anybody tried it yet? I've downloaded the software at home but I couldn't do it on my work laptop because the windows service pack is not up to date - typical. I'll try it on another work machine soon because I think it could really help with the presentation of literature search results.

As a library service we used to offer subject guides with information about useful websites. Our trust Intranet site also has many collections of "useful links" (most of them not set up by the library service). I think that a service such as furl or del.icio.us would be a modern alternative to these lists and would encourage user engagement and participation although I would want to retain some quality control over the resources being bookmarked. I know - I still keep failing to trust the user but then that was an issue also covered in the BMC Medical Education article which discussed wiki vandalism.

Hello all.

I haven't had time to have a proper look at it yet but the library success wiki on our reading list looks very interesting and like a source of inspiration for some of our projects.

I think I'll take a proper look at it tomorrow.

I've been having a look at the articles on social bookmarking and I'm thinking it's not that new. I was using Backflip in 2001! I remember then how pleased I was to find a way of bookmarking sites so that I could view them from any Internet connected PC. I was at university at the time and it was very useful to access my bookmarks at home and on campus. Of course at the time the social side of it was an add on that I didn't really think about. You could choose to share bookmarks but otherwise it was kept protected by your password. I didn't really think that there was much point to sharing my favourite sites. That was until I started planning my wedding and thought that it had taken me so much time to find decent sites that perhaps I could share the information. Backflip went bust but it has now been taken over by it's ex-employees http://www.backflip.com/login.ihtml I haven't used it for a long time and I don't know how it compares to del.icio.us but it might be worth a look.

The change is that now the social bookmarking sites default to sharing your bookmarks but you can keep some private if you want to.

The concept of assigning your own tags was something I first came up against with gmail http://mail.google.com I like the way you can assign multiple tags to e-mails rather than choosing which folder to put them in.

As the 7 things you should know about social bookmarking and the ">infotangle discussion mention: there are positive and negative aspects to social bookmarking. Again I think it is an information literacy issue. It is a positive way to make people organise their sources of information and it may lead to them finding other relevant sites. As a way of retrieving information it may lead to popular sites but will be useless for scenarios where a good recall of information is required.

Am I the only person who hates the term folksonomies?

Hello Wendy, Vicky and Richard.

I have added some comments to the group's wiki. Unfortunately I haven't been able to add a new page so they are in the discussion part of the project page.

Is the Wiki the best way for us to communicate? What do we need to get done by tomorrow lunchtime - do we need a real time chat to discuss who's doing what?

Lots of questions, sorry!
Jessica.

Since starting this course I have become aware of the benefits of RSS in terms of organising my reading. I forget about favourites that I have created and so they either don't work when I come to use them again or I just never get around to checking them. E-mail alerts are too "in your face" and always seem to come into my inbox at an inconvenient time. I file them away in a folder to be read and then they get forgotten about. By using an RSS aggregator I can pull this information together and then check up on things at a convenient time possibly once a week or even once a day. During this course I have been using the Bloglines notifier so an icon appears when one of the blogs I'm monitoring is updated. If I start to subscribe to more RSS feeds I may have to reconsider this approach as it can be as distracting as getting new e-mails (I always feel compelled to check). the point is it's great to have the choice.

I'm sure that many library users would find RSS similarly impressive and I think I will have to consider factoring this in with other training and support that the library service offers regarding current awareness alerts. For other library users it will be a step too far (i regularly encounter library users who have issues in using a keyboard and mouse and who need to grasp how to use windows and internet explorer.)

I think RSS offers another potential communication chanel for marketing library services and could meet some users needs in terms of keeping up to date with their reading. I also think that taking RSS feeds from other sites can enrich a library website with interesting current content. I have the hitting the headlines feed on my library intranet pages for some topical interest.

Here are some tentative thoughts and initial reactions about three of the articles I've read. I'd love to hear your comments.

O’Reilly – what is web 2.0.
I found this particularly useful for the first and last pages – overview and summary of web 2.0. I found the brainstorming results of web 1.0 vs 2.0 useful as a way of expressing an otherwise complex and not clearly defined concept. I also liked the 7 core competencies to help assess if a site is using web 2.0 technology / has that ethos. The discussion in the middle varies in usefulness – if you have used the websites then the comparisons are useful. Some of it was a little too technical for me.

One aspect from the article that I’m reflecting on is the “trust the user” aspect. I think that library workers are constantly having to justify their profession and fight against the “I don’t need the library I can just look it up on Google” mentality so we can tend to be critical of sites such as Wikipedia. My first reaction about that site was how can you trust the quality of the information but I can see that collective input has created a reasonably useful resource for quickly looking up some background info. These innovations are potentially threatening to traditional library services (particularly the perceived value of them to our users) so we will probably have to alter how we present our services and use new technologies to engage with users and maintain our relevance.

Ariadne article on web 2.0
An article that makes the link between web 2.0 and library services. I think it addresses the central issue about the changing relationships between library services and the changes in the web. Web 2.0 is partially about the move towards self-service and barriers to information being removed. What can library workers do to move away from the image (note I realise this isn’t how we view ourselves) of being guardians of information and break down the barriers to accessing information?

The amorality of web 2.0
In contrast to some of the praise / hype surrounding web 2.0 this article presents the argument that amateur isn’t better and that “collective intelligence” is often missing the intelligence. The problem is that, from a user’s perspective, “free trumps quality all the time” this is an issue that we often face in libraries (although you could expand this to include barriers other than cost such as form filling, passwords etc).

Hello Vicki, Richard and Wendy. I have just been on the 3cs Blog and I see that we are in the same project group. I've had a very quick look at the project information and I'm wondering if any of you have opinions about the type of service we should investigate?

Personally I am interested in either marketing & promotion or user education as these are priorities for my library service. I'm happy to go with whatever the group thinks so lets talk about this. I thought it might be useful to approach the readings with a particular service area in mind.

What do you think?

Jessica.

Hello all.

I have been reading and enjoying other people's blogs for a few years usually lurking rather than adding comments of my own.

Sometimes I find blogs useful, other times entertaining. I suppose I've always thought that setting up a personal blog without any helpful purpose or without any great literary talent is a bit self indulgent -so I feel quite sheepish writing this!

I am curious to learn about how (if at all) library and information services can benefit from using new technologies and I'm hoping my participation in this course will answer this question.