On Tuesday May 17, 2011, my library had the pleasure of hosting a show featuring the wizard rock band Harry and the Potters. The show itself was awesome: the music was great, the band was super nice, and everyone had a good time. The highlight for me had nothing to do with the actual show. Instead, it came from the patrons. The first moment where I noticed that this wasn’t going to be just any old program was when I stepped out to announce to the fans that were waiting for the show to start that the band was just […]
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Via nwi.com: I’ve actually done research on students who are learning game design and about games,” said Jose Zagal, a game development professor at DePaul. “And it is quite often the case that they’ll have a very narrow view of games.” Jim Galbraith, associate director of collections at DePaul’s library, hopes the collection will draw the wider student body while supplementing what’s taught in game design and computer science classes. You can read the rest of the article here. Is your library doing something like this? As a big advocate for video gaming in libraries, I’m happy to see […]
I’ve been working in public libraries for five years now and recently decided to go back and look at the things I’ve done. Part of it was curiosity and the other part was to make sure that I’ve been doing my job and making interesting things happen for my community. Also, sometimes there’s a program or idea that you’ve had in the past that you’ve totally forgot about. Going back through my personal archives has helped me rediscover some ideas that I can now see through to completion. The Library Idea Share is my attempt to get these ideas and tools […]
Last week, a patron came to me needing help with her resume. She’s looking for a job, and she’s desperate. She didn’t want just books on how to write a resume, she wanted someone to sit down with her and help her write it. I’m not good at writing resumes, so I didn’t offer my services and hinder her job search. I recommended another local public library because I’d heard that they had a resume service and I thought they might be able to help her. I was wrong. She came back to me and told me that the librarians […]
A few of my coworkers (Ruth, Erika, and Matt) had some fun this April Fool’s Day. Check out the entire run of images here. You know, there’s something to be said to working with people who come up with fun ideas. Furthermore, there is many things to be said about working under leadership that allows/encourages this sort of fun creativity. Patrons/members/customers can sense when people like what they are doing, it makes a difference. TTW Contributor: Mick Jacobsen
Much discussion has been made about librarians reaching out through social media to our communities and our patrons and rightly so. But, we often overlook the role that social media offers for us internally as a means to strengthen our organizations. One thing to remember is that libraries really do not participate in social networks. People do. In fact, your “library” doesn’t exist. You may have a building. You may have items on your shelves. You may have people who show up to do work. But, there is no “library.” Often, we speak of our libraries as if they are […]
Many technology policies are created out of fear. They are created to protect the organization from its own members. They present a laundry list of illegal activities from copyright infringement, to libel, to harassment, to intellectual property theft, etc. They “protect” the library from lawbreakers and heart breakers. Of course, policies have never done an hour’s worth of work…ever. Policies don’t do anything. People do things, and the best policies should offer guidance to the actions of organizational members. The goal of all policies should be to prevent problems before they occur, not act like “red light cameras” taking photos […]
Administrators face two conundrums with Web 2.0 tools. David Weinberger called the first a “conundrum of control” in his book Everything is Miscellaneous. This conundrum states that organizational leaders have an important interest in ensuring that 2.0 tools are used to further the organization’s mission. However, the more controls that they put in place (such as approval processes for blog posts) the less useful the 2.0 tools become. The second conundrum is what I call a conundrum of adaptibility. This conundrum states that organizations with looser controls allow for more experimentation by individuals as they work to solve problems. However, organizations […]
There are costs to maintaining and fully supporting technologies. For every dollar of software or hardware that is purchased, there are additional dollars that must be committed to implementation and ongoing support. Most organizations have lists of “supported” technologies and much longer lists of “unsupported” technologies. Yet, we continue to innovate. We continue to utilize new tools to solve problems. I stumbled upon this blog post from Rosabeth Moss Kante about innovation in health care, which I think is applicable to innovation in general and libraries specifically: “Innovations always sound good in retrospect, after they’ve worked, and in isolation, when […]
Dr. Troy Swanson has agreed to share with TTW readers a series of four guest posts. I blogged about Troy’s research here: https://tametheweb.com/2011/02/22/interview-with-dr-try-swanson-community-college-blogging-research/ The first post – The Underground Economy of Innovation – will go up today! Troy A. Swanson is Teaching & Learning Librarian at Moraine Valley Community College, where he teaches information literacy and coordinates the library’s online presence. Troy’s research interests include the epistemology of college students, Web site usability, and technology management. Troy’s PhD is in Community College leadership from Old Dominion University where he studied the management of 2.0 technologies. He holds a Master’s Degree in Library […]