http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/161/report_display.asp
I meant to blog this a few weeks ago, but here it is…still timely in my book.
“The average American internet user is not sure what podcasting is, what an RSS feed does, or what the term “phishing” means…”
Pew lists eight techie terms in the report and I kid you not, your public/student/employee technology/internet classes should define and discuss everyone of them!
These did ok:
Spam
Firewall
Spyware
Internet Cookies
Adware
These didn’t:
Phishing
Podcasting
RSS Feeds
(I’d add blogging and image sites too!)
This is important knowledge… every librarian on your staff should be able to define these terms as well as your users. Sorry to preach, but I’m just saying: let’s dive into to our role as info literacy trainers and beef up those classes!
For folks that say “RSS isn’t catching on..” Guess what? It is, really…slowly but it is. What we can do is help push it along by adding Bloglines or the like to our classes.
For those HOT HOT HOT librarians out there actively training this stuff and staying on top – well done! Comment here if you have any good tips…