Library Stuff

Steve Mallett has created De.lirio.us; a social bookmarking, tagging, blogging & notes tool:

“What’s really sweet about this is that you can include a long detailed note with each post in addition to a one line description.”

Very cool! This allows for more content in my bookmarks. Here’s an example of a de.lirio.us version of my Skype @ Your Library post from today. Note that you can create a link in the body field. Now, I can cut and paste more content into my bookmark annotations. Suweeeet! You can view all of my bookmarks (only one there right now) and there is (of course) a feed available as well. (Link via Topix)

Beatrice Pulliam, one of the ALA Midwinter PLA Bloggers, has a blog titled edifice ref (cute title):

“I will blog primarily about my frontline experiences in reference, library technology, as well as making libraries more user-friendly (the pesky findability factor”

Subscribed!

Carol Cooke (along with Sherri Vokey) has come up with a neat way of intergrating Skype in the library:

“Most libraries now have access to the Internet but not all are able to afford a toll free line to help patrons living outside their area code. The free or low fee long distance services could be a pretty attractive option for libraries looking to provide this type of service or to expand existing services.”

If Skype takes off and becomes as popular as IM, it could help with virtual reference services even for those near the library. I smell a presentation at a future CIL conference…

If you are in the New England Region and want to learn more about social software and how it can be implemented into the library environment, get over to Providence College on May 3rd. The program is titled, Syndicate, Aggregate, Communicate: New Web Tools in Real Applications for Libraries, Companies and Regular Folk:

“2005 opens with an avalanche of new and maturing technologies. Free tools currently available can be configured and integrated to radically improve communication and simplify information retrieval, storage and sharing. These technologies, however, are currently being developed and presented incrementally and individually, and it is up to the user to keep track, download, install, configure, integrate, learn and determine which combinations will best serve a given individual, project, or organization.”

“NEASIST is pleased to present another timely event designed to make sense of this frenzy of technology and turn the chaos into practical tools for harnessing information and connecting people. Three recognized, early-adopter, information specialists have been exploring and experimenting with these tools in different environments.”

Three great speakers are on tap: Megan Fox, Jenny Levine, and Michael Stephens. (link via Beyond the Job)

He gets a letter from IT manager from the Ann Arbor District Library:

“Thanks for taking the time to contact us with your suggestion about RSS at the library. We are currently in the process of moving to a new library automation system (Innovative Millennium), and it will launch with a completely new aadl.org website (based on Drupal) that will deliver all kinds of new features, including RSS. We’re still in the development phase, so I can’t yet guarantee this specific functionality at launch, but we hope to provide RSS feeds of not only newly-arrived items, but also newly-ordered items, so that you can get on the request list before it even arrives.
We also hope to eventually offer custom RSS feeds of new items, by genre, author, or keyword, but we’ll have to get to know our new system better before we’ll know if we can pull that off.”

“Rest assured that useful, flexible, and broad RSS support is a major
design goal of our new website, and we hope our feeds will find good homes in aggregators throughout the district… and beyond! Watch for the new aadl.org coming in early July [2005].”

Wow! I’m sure Edward was a big library user before he got this e-mail, but now he will probably be a bigger one now. Plus, he’ll tell his friends about what his library is doing with RSS. Can you say free PR? Also, big props to Eli Neiburger at AADL.

I’m going to have to get my hands on this book:

“Is this book sociology, anthropology, or taxonomy? Sorting Things Out, by communications theorists Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan Leigh Star, covers a lot of conceptual ground in its effort to sort out exactly how and why we classify and categorize the things and concepts we encounter day to day. But the analysis doesn’t stop there; the authors go on to explore what happens to our thinking as a result of our classifications. With great insight and precise academic language, they pick apart our information systems and language structures that lie deeper than the everyday categories we use.”

On another note, I’ve just been informed that I will be presenting at the Canadian Library Association on folksonomies as part of their hot topics track. Here’s the description I sent in:

Tag – You’re It!

“The collective intelligence of Web users is not new. We have seen them work effectively in forums, newsgroups, and even electronic discussion lists. Social-tagging tools (also called folksonomies) such as del.icio.us, Furl, Flickr, Digg, and Feedmarker move this collective work into new ontological avenues. The presenter will discuss why information professionals should embrace the unstructured nature of folksonomies and how they can be best implemented into the structured library community.”

Vernica comments:

“ACRL will have blogs for its Virtual National Conference, in conjunction with National Conference in April. Unfortunately, these blogs can only be read by people registered for either the virtual or regular conference, it seems. There is also no indication that there will be a permanent (and unrestricted) ACRL blog after the conference.”

Interesting. Considering that this is a virtual conference, it’s probably not a bad idea to have it only for registered users during the show. That said, I’d open it up for everyone after the conference is over. One of the aspects of blogging from a F2F conference is that those who can’t physically attend can play along at home. Not an issue here. There is no F2F.

On the other hand, a conference blog is there to bring the conference experience to those not in attendance. That’s what we used the PLA Blog for. It’s not supposed to be a replacement for the conference itself.

Jessica Baumgart is being teased with some information:

“We’re pleased to announce that in response to requests from many key customers, an RSS Beta is available to all Factiva.com subscribers. This Beta allows users of Factiva.com to subscribe to Editor’s Choice as channels within their own RSS reader of choice.”

I’ll be darned if I can find anything on their site about this. Factiva has already jumped onto the RSS bandwagon, but this seems like a bigger release. Has anyone besides Jessica seen the new feeds? Bueller?

Update – Stephen Francoeur sent in the following screenshots along with this informative URL.

Update (3/23) – Gary Price suggested that I put up this press release from Moreover which indicated that Factiva is integrating Moreover content. Thanks Gary.

I’m thinking about issuing an e-mail policy for my weblog. I’ve become increasingly busy over the past few months and find that I have little to no time to answer e-mails that come into my gmail account. I read every e-mail that I get, I just don’t have the time to respond to everything. I just feel bad

I’m thinking of the following, which will appear on my contact page:

“If you would like to contact me, the best way to do it is via Skype or IM. I am on both from 9:00AM-5:00PM EST and 9:00PM to Midnight from Monday through Friday. On IM, I’m NYlibrarian and on Skype, I’m stevenmcohen.

The worst method to communicate with me is via e-mail. I’ll usually try to respond to all e-mail within a week (although that’s pushing it these days), but I can’t promise anything. I’d suggest the above methods if you want to hear back from me right away, although I will respond within a reasonable amount of time regarding presentations, contracts, consulting work, and other business-related activities.”

Does that sound unreasonable?

Cindi Trainor on the younger librarian attendance at CIL:

“It was great to see so many younger librarians at a conference; the landscape was hugely different from the major conferences I’ve attended.”

“The Blog Kids stand out, and are very friendly. That I was “mixing worlds” at this conference prevented me from meeting more of them. (so as not to be misunderstood, here, I consider myself a Blog Kid’s slightly older sister, but I could be wrong about where I am relative to the other librarian bloggers)”

Could this be a turning point in the age factors within the library world? We’ve been seeing a gradual turn toward more young librarians as older librarians retire, but this is the first empirical evidence that I have seen that it is actually happening. There was some discussion at CIL as to whether or not there is a librarian shortage. Whether there is or not, with all of these new young faces (Yes, including me) at conferences (I also saw this at ALA Midwinter), I’m a bit more hopeful. (link via stlq)