This looks like an interesting experiment using blogging software, RSS feeds and social media.

For more info:

http://theshiftedlibrarian.com/

Posted by Rich

“On a positive note, the resarch entitled What’s Holding RSS Back?, says that nearly half of marketers have moved to add feeds to their web sites. Further, RSS adoption among consumers is at 11% up from just 2% of users three years ago. RSS feeds usage is more dominant among men.

Here’s the kicker, though. That might be all she wrote for RSS’ growth track.

According to the research, of the 89% of those who don’t use feeds only 17% say they’re interested in using them. In fact Forrester spends much of the report helping marketers better explain the benefits of RSS to their customers. “Unless marketers make a move to hook them — and try to convert their apathetic counterparts — RSS will never be more than a niche technology,” the analysts (who include Jeremiah Owyang) wrote.

Still, while feed adoption may have crested the idea of online opt-in communications is just getting going. The Facebook newsfeed, Twitter and Friendfeed are perfect examples of opt-in vehichles that bring content you care about to you. In each case, you’re total in control. You can unsubscribe from individuals or groups and tailor the stream so that what you want finds you.

For the whole posting:

http:www.micropersuasion.com/2008/10/rss-adoption-at.html

Posted by Rich

They called it a “Swiss Army Knife” program which has everything you need to create an intranet, including Microsoft Office, but not necessarily the best modules in the world. There are better wiki program around. Lotus Notes does not work well with the program.

Not all intranet content requires SharePoint for content management. They developed criteria for utilizing SharePoint through the Internet. It needs to updated frequently, requires group collaboration.
It works only with Windows Explorer. By using the intranet, all information will be online. In one instance, staff didn’t know that storytime was cancelled. Now it will be available when staff boots up the computer.

Here’s a picture of the SJL Intranet site:

Here’s a picture of Sarah showing the Meeting Workspaces module:

Posted by Rich

“This year’s IT Conference – Web 2.0: Where Are We Now? will feature exciting new developments, updates and improvements to Web 2.0 tools in the library world and beyond. Attendees will hear from library professionals and learn how these Web 2.0 initiatives such as RSS, blogs, podcasting, wikis, have progressed since their implementation.”

Speakers include:

Meredith Farkas, Norwich University
Thom Cox, Lead Web Developer, Tisch Library, Tufts University
Ken Liss, Senior Reference Librarian at Boston College
Pingsheng Chen, Electronic Reference Supervisor, Worcester Public Library

Cost: 125 smackers

For more info:

http://www.nelinet.net/eaccount/EventDetail.aspx?eventid=00000818

Posted by Rich

“What is information overload? 27 instant messages. 4 text messages. 17 phone calls. 98 work emails. 52 personal emails. 76 email listserv messages. 14 social network messages. 127 social network status updates. 825 RSS feed updates. 30 pages from a book. 5 letters. 11 pieces of junk mail. 1 periodical issue. 3 hours of radio. 1 hour of television. That, my friends, is information overload.”

“It is also my daily average amount of information received, sampled over a two-week period. That’s right—that much in every category every day. I suppose that is why I was called upon to write an article about coping with information overload (IO). I am still here, I am still alive, and my brain has yet to explode, so somehow I must be finding a way to make it work. At least, that is what other people tell me.”

“There is a unique relationship between librarians and the concept of information overload. Processing information appropriately is key to the success of our profession and key to the success of each of us as professionals. People look to us to help them process information, to pick what information on which to concentrate, and to discard irrelevant information. Librarians are trained to evaluate information, and to choose the best of the best. One would think, therefore, that we would be more adept in dealing with the problem of information overload. We have the skills necessary for evaluating, organising, and collecting information in ways that allow for efficient processing and retrieval. Those skills are central to the success of many of our colleagues, librarians or not.”

“John D. Halamka describes how, at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, they have replaced libraries with information commons and renamed the librarians ‘information specialists’ and the libraries themselves were renamed as the ‘Department of Knowledge Services.’ [6] The renaming itself was most certainly a superficial symptom of the reorganisation and reprioritisation in the institution’s libraries (pardon me, the Department of Knowledge Services). The key was the new emphasis on the importance of information—the focus on the content. As more and more information floods into businesses and other organisations, we information professionals, or whatever we are called, will be indispensable in helping our co-workers and users to process their data, thereby helping the institution overall.”

Sarah mentions Ten Techniques to Manage the Overload:

1. General Organisational Techniques
2. Filtering Information Received
3. RSS Overload Techniques
4. Interruptive Technology Overload Techniques
5. Phone Overload Techniques
6. Email Overload Techniques
7. Print Media Overload Techniques
8. Multimedia Overload Techniques
9. Social Network Overload Techniques
10. Time and Stress Management

For the whole article:

http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue56/houghton-jan/

Info via LibrarianInBlack:

http://librarianinblack.typepad.com/librarianinblack/2008/09/being-wired-or.html

Posted by Rich

Some people think change means: fresh breeze at beach or screaming at the laptop
why pay attention to change
There are best practices to handle change
Why pay attention to Web 2.0 trends
Social networking–Facebook–RSS
Toyota Prius Gas game–tips and tricks to save gas
iPhones
Wireless earphones
You Tube Created in 2005 Has taken off
Right now all industries are involved in Web 2.0

1. The rest of the world is already there
Grandmothers experiencing Web 2.0 Ebay
Guitars–connect with people with similar interests
Participatory models
Amazon–People read customer reviews first Authors now can have blogs on Amazon

USA Today Online

Allows comments No more letters to the editor

Shows his mom’s blog, has pictures Has Twitter account Can customize it. 82 years old!

2. You can be the example:

Lester Public Library

Has blog, gaming night, Flickr account, Wikipedia account, Myspace blog

2 blogs one blog has 3,000 hits Has library blog on town newspaper website

3. Connect with your community
Allow patrons to socialize, start up a conversation with friends, not just take out books

Staff did a wonderful review on CD library owns on library blog 3 comments 1 comment said go buy it Another comment said you can check it out at the library for free

4. Community pulse
Go to rotary meetings Be on a community board
Started digital library Large groups–need to market to them–mail out stuff to them–service all of them
Access town businesses–Chamber of Commerce
Have Gaming Night on the road

5. You set the pace

Instant messaging

Meebo instant messaging Go around their IT depart no,no,no
Who controls the library? IT dept? Director? Board of Trustees? Very important

6. Be relevant
Physically and digitally Each community is different
How to trend watch
RSS Read library blogs Library articles 1.5 years behind
Stuff can be apply much faster That was stupid idea comment quickly

RSS read feeder Too many feeds There’s a delete button

watch listen

time (get over it)
I don’t have enough time to do stuff
Set priorities
If you can deal with patrons, geeks, children, you have the time
Read the non-library blogs
Barnes and Noble blog Maybe they have some good ideas
Change–be ready for it
Who’s in charge?

Best practices on implementing Web 2.0 changes:

Communication
Digital records Digital branch what to do at the branch
Form committees–meet with management
Make people comfortable on where we are going
Staff–20 or more blogs–staff blog guidelines
Tech Services Librarian freaked out about blogging
While working as dj overthought about doing the job
grant writing–instead of emailing–blog
It’s helps to see what going on
Gauge your staff
Start slow Tomorrow we’re starting a new digital branch
Have staff member slowly start up a library blog, then speed thing up
Instant messenging
Meebo Could be started up tomorrow
while the IT dept has to take days to setup Trillan on each public pc
Find staff interests
Match with goals you already have
Give it to the best fit, might be the IT dept, might be Circ staff
Help translate from 1.0 to 2.0
Find champions
Hire or create
who gets stuff done
Good for starting things
Customize to fit
Every champion gets burned out…shared the joy
Not everybody has a staff like Ann Arbor
Training & trust
You can train staff to do a blog
Play time Time to learn a new tool
Chain saw You can read the manual Better to turn it on and handle it
you could read Dummies guide to blogging Better you actually do it
Trust
Spokesman for the library all staff
Management should trust the staff to do a good job
Trust and responsibility
Give 101%
Mobile changing quickly
Starbucks–wifi–People can get to your library from anywhere
Hiring tech people
Hire people with customer training first–better team player–later you can train them in the Microsoft stuff
Had hire person with Microsoft training–bad at customer service

Posted by Rich

Thanks for sharing, Ken!

For more info:

http://www.newsgator.com/

Posted by Rich

I miss being a sound engineer and running radio interviews.

http://mashable.com/2007/06/11/rss-toolbox/

The list includes readers, feed validators, plugins, mixers, and other items for Windows, Mac and Linux systems

Link via the Distant Librarian

http://distlib.blogs.com/distlib/