Being at the Point of Need

One of the most important, if not most important, aspects of screencasting (yes, it is another screencasting post, I swear I have other interests see the Summer Reading series at LISNews) has nothing to do with designing or producing, but where it is placed. Screencasts, to be most useful, have to be at a point of need.

Placing screencasts, chat widgets (thanks David Lee King), or other tutorial at the point of need seems so self-evident (a priori) that I don’t believe I need to make any arguments for it. More important are some of the techniques, hypothetical and production, of putting the screencasts in front of the patron without being annoying.

The Catalog
I can think of many places screencasts could be placed in a catalog. A list in a sidebar, no results found page, place a reserve, review my account page, etc.

My place of work has recently started using Aquabrowser. One of the benefits of Aquabrowser is that it is easy to identify common search terms and return a hyperlink to a resource we want to highlight. For example, a search using the term “business” will get a link to the Skokie Library Business Portal on the top of the returned results. If it is possible to return a link, it should also be possible to return an embedded screencast or at least a link to a pop-up window containing a screencast. I have not yet seen this in the wild. I certainly hope vendors and our open source geniuses are reading this and taking it seriously.

Boutique sites or Pathfinders
Boutique sites/pathfinders/LibGuides/etc. are traditional means of highlighting areas of a collection. Bringing together print items and paid plus free online resources for a particular topic is something libraries have been doing for a long time. Screencasts explaining how to answer representative questions in regards to a particular collection area are well placed in these. The Skokie Public Library has been doing this with our Business Portal and will continue to do so as other boutique sites are designed and released.

Databases
But what about databases? These are the most difficult, under-utilized and expensive resources libraries provide. Eric Frierson,  a librarian at the University of Texas at Arlington,  came up with a brilliant idea (the best idea I heard at ALA 2009 in fact) about how to put screencasts exactly where our patrons are.

Eric designed a frame around UT Arlington’s databases. The frame contains links to to JavaScript popup screencasts pertaining to that particular database. Do yourself a favor and take a moment to see the proof of concept http://omega.uta.edu/~frierson/assisted/ericpub.htm.

So simple. So awesome.

So where are you putting your asynchronous tutorials?


TTW Contributor
Mick Jacobsen