Participatory Culture: Communication & Technology

Noha Adly, Deputy Head, ICT Sector, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Alexandria, Egypt, explored various technologies in use at her library as well as by some insights about the way people are interacting with technology and information. Key areas of importance: search beyond text, user interaction with devices and data, and new representations of data. She also called for an increase in tools that enhance and enable multilingualism for search and retrieval. A favorite quote: should we provide  an “Invitation to spoil the catalog” with user input! – love this idea. Also – library is building a digital archive of Egyptian Revolution: +230K images, +2,8M tweets, videos, FB pages

Susan Hazan, Curator of New Media and Head of Internet Office, Israel Museum,  Jerusalem, Israel, entitled her talk “Crown Sourcing R Us,” and polled the group about their own institutions and if they involve the public in crowd sourcing. She offered some great examples of crowd-sourcing, including

http://rememberme.ushmm.org/

http://www.flickr.com/groups/bbcturnbacktime/

http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/

Outstanding examples of involving users!

This post is a reflection/response to questions posed at the Salzburg Global Seminar program Libraries and Museums in an Era of Participatory Culture, exploring the challenges, solutions and potential for participatory services within libraries and museums.

Special Thanks to the Salzburg Global Seminar  and IMLS for the invitation to participate in this event.


(Photo by Dr. David Lankes: http://twitter.com/#!/rdlankes/status/127290138190548992/photo/1)