Wondering about Wondir?

October 13th, 2004

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to chat on the phone with Allen Searls and Matthew Koll from Wondir. If you don’t know about Wondir, it’s a fully open question/answer service. Anyone can ask anything and anyone can answer any posed question. It’s almost like a Q&A wiki. The questions that are asked on Wondir range from the mindless to the eccentric to the meaningful. Some people are looking for the answers to basic questions, while others are looking for advice. No fees are exchanged. It’s actually a bit voyeuristic to look at some of the questions posed from the ticker. It reminded me of the Excite real time question ticker that was popular about 4 years ago.

Anyway, the guys at Wondir were asking me how we can get librarians involved in answering questions that are posed to Wondir, since we are the “answer people” (there’s an attorney in my office who calls me the “answer man” and I love it). My thoughts on the topic were twofold. Sure, some librarians may be interested in helping out with the librarian-type queries (factual, etc), but not the other types of questions posed. Librarians are not into offering our opinions/advice with certain types of questions. It’s not how we do business. Also, since the questions are broken down into categories, maybe some subject specialists would be willing to take a shot at those that fit their specialties.

That said, we are all very busy at our jobs and even though we like to help out others (who hasn’t answered reference questions posed by family members or friends), we may just not have the time. Some may also feel that they should get paid for their research abilities. Wondir is not the place, however, for those that fit the latter category.

There is a neat feature at Wondir that allows the person answering the question to chat with the person who asked it (using Jabber). This conversation is then transcribed onto a unique page that is created when the question is posed. I tried it out and was blown away.

So, take a look at Wondir. Maybe answer a question or two. if you feel that it is a neat tool (which I think it is), then pass it along to your colleagues. If your having a slow day at the reference desk, you may want to assist an anonymous patron.

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