Yearly Archives: 2005

“Social Software for the Rest of Us” is at the ALA TechSource Blog

This blows me away. It says what I’ve been trying to articulate here and in talks. We need spaces in our libraries for collaboration and experience with Web 2.0 tools. Thomas Frey offers the same suggestion in his piece on the Future of Libraies, that we all should read over and discuss in our respective staff meetings. http://www.davinciinstitute.com/page.php?ID=120 Experiment with creative spaces so the future role of the library can define itself. Since the role of the library 20 years from now is still a mystery, we recommend that libraries put together creative spaces so staff members, library users, and […]

” It seems like at a lot of schools, the IT department controls every technology choice. Rather than educating faculty members on how to create wikis and blogs and use other cool technologies in the classroom, they keep faculty on a tight leash.” Meredith Farkas “One key justification for using virtual reference software rather than instant messaging software, shared with me at the state conference last week, is that many city IT departments don’t allow IM software. Which leads me to conclude: 1. Many city IT departments are too godlike, 2. Many libraries are unable to effectively work with IT […]

http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/blog_detail.php?blog_id=87

When Chris Jowaissis points something like this out in a session, in an IM to me and notes it on the Technobiblio Blog, it’s one to keep on your radar: http://www.opencroquet.org/ From the bit I’ve read, it’s the beginnings of what may become a 3-D collaborative online environment. Imagine, if you will, a cyber library think tank populated by all of our colleagues. There we might create and enhance learning, services and future initiatives. Wowza! The LiB is right: I’ll need to get a stylish avatar to move through these new spaces!

Overheard at CPL, concerning a libarian helping another librarian understand her teen: “I left the ‘Born with the Chip’ article on her desk…” 🙂

I could sit and listen to Stephen Abram (and Jenny Levine) talk libraries all day! Here are some of my favorites from our time together at CPL: Abram-isms: “The next step in libraries is what are we going to do to ‘trick’ our new users to use the library.” “Technology needs to take a step back, like utilities, like heat and light, and let the services and people come forward.” “You must have a vision of the future, or you will always be stuck in the present, over and over again.” “DVDs and CDs will be extinct by 2012.” (See […]