TLA 2008 Conference Notes, Day 3: Reference 2.0 session

Title of session: Reference 2.0: Using New Web Technologies to Enhance Public Services
Presenters: Miranda Bennett (University of Houston), Susan Clarke (Stephen F. Austin), Eric Frierson (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor).


This will be brief because I actually walked out of the session. I was hoping for something a bit more substantial, and this boiled down to a "101" session. This is basically the kind of presentation that was ok two years ago, and that I think we should be done and over by now. I will go ahead and be blunt: if you are a librarian who by now does not know what is a blog, what is a feed reader and what it is used for, you have no business being a librarian. Why? Because a librarian should have intellectual curiosity among other things, and such intellectual curiosity would have guided said librarian to find out what those things are. I am not saying a librarian needs to have a blog. Blogging does not work for everybody. I know; there are days when I wonder if it works for me. But at the absolute minimum, a librarian should know what these things are, making yet another session on "This is a blog. This is what you do with it. You can search for them on Technorati, and you can keep track of them on Bloglines" unnecessary. It's called keeping up. I basically stayed out of politeness until the first speaker was done, but had I known, I would have picked a different session or just slept in that morning.

You see, when the program description said "discover practical applications of Web 2.0 in reference and public services," I was expecting exactly that. How are these things used at the reference desk and at service points? Are you using a del.icio.us account maybe to keep track of commonly used resources at the desk? How exactly are you using a blog for reference work, if you are, and what is the success of that endeavor? Internal blogs as knowledge base for instance? Anyone doing that? How's that work and how would it be different than a wiki? And how is patron use being assessed? Because I hear a lot about how libraries set up the tools, but I don't hear any evidence of assessment or whether they have an active audience or not. Sure, your webpage may look slick with 20 blogs and 50 subject wikis on them, but are they being used, how do you know? What feedback mechanisms do you have in place and are they working for you or not? And if they are not working, what would you do differently so the rest of us can learn from that? Now that would be a session worth getting up for at 8:00am. I am sure other librarians better or more experienced than me could come up with better questions of what they would like to know. Just my two cents.

TLA 2008 Conference Notes, Day Two: Alire on Advocacy, plus CULD Business Meeting

(CULD= College and University Division. They combined their meeting with this session, so the business meeting came after Alire's talk. I did stay for the meeting too, and I did introduce myself and offered to volunteer. We'll see if something comes out of it. I think this session was added late since it was not in the first printed program, but it was in the little booklet they give at the conference. Anyhow, here we go.)

Title of session: Academic Library Advocacy from the Frontline.
Presenter: Camila Alire

Notes:

• Advocacy, articulating the value of libraries, librarians, and library support staff. Alire is concerned about our ability to do this. Interested in looking at power of personal persuasion and self-confidence, which needs to be developed.
  
• We need parallel advocacy for academic libraries. Library administrators on one side; academic librarians and staff on the other.
  
• "Action. . .is best implemented by individuals who have a frame of reference on which to build advocacy." --Sandra Kaplan.
  
• (Her bragging moment: getting 700K added to her library's base budget at U. of New Mexico. To which I think, must be nice.)
• Check the ACRL Toolkit. (I think she was referring to the advocacy one, but you can find that and others here.)

(Dr. Alire is running for the ALA presidency, and I have to say she seems sincere about her commitment to grassroots advocacy. I am not quite sure she is inspiring enough to get me to renew my ALA membership, but she made me think about it for a moment, if that says anything.)

TLA 2008 Conference Notes, Day Two: Net Fair I

Net Fair I session (at exhibit hall)
Session title: Keeping up with technology: Top trends.
Presenter: Richard Wayne, of Strategic Information Management Services. He also works for the UT Southwestern Medical Library

Here is the presentation powerpoint, from the Strategic Information site. However, it is either not friendly to Firefox or may not be working.


(I did something different this year, and I went to one of those semi-vendor sessions. I say semi-vendor because Net Fair sessions are either fully sponsored by a vendor or by someone in the IS field not necessarily a librarian. Just making the observation. Anyhow, this was a 50 minute session, and it did get packed.)

Notes:

• Used Surveymonkey with 144 responses this year to the survey on trends (seems like a low sample to me). Respondents were from Texas. 1/2 of the respondents from public libraries, covering a time frame around September of 2007.
  
• The highest rated trend was downloadable/streaming media. This includes e-books, videos, podcasts, lectures. (This is something we are not really talking about at my work. We do have e-books, and I think the term podcast was thrown out once or so, but not high on the radar. To do something like podcasting requires time and equipment, neither of which we have now). As an example, the Denver Public Library was highlighted, see here. Note that in our audience at Net Fair, when asked, only 2-3 people raised their hands that they did podcasts (out anywhere from 40 to 50 or so).
  
• Next trend was social software. This includes blogs, wikis, IM, Facebook, MySpace, Meebo, Twitter, etc. Again, when asked, only one or two people in audience said they had an FB or a MySpace presence (and one of those two was me. I have a Facebook profile. I did open a MySpace on a limb recently, but have not fully worked on it. It is not exactly user-friendly.)
• Number three was Open Source ILS, things like Evergreen and Koha. This seems to be picking up interest.
  
• Number 4 was InfoCommons. This includes computers, services, and comfort. The actual definition can vary. Examples include UI-Urbana and Indiana University (where I worked while in library school).
  
• Number five was gaming.
  
• Number six was technolust. Asking if technology should be adding some value. Should have a reason to have the technology in the library. (This sounds nice in theory, but we know a lot of my professional brethren suffer severely from technolust and want every single toy in libraries. I'll quit here while I am ahead.)
• Number seven was the death of MARC.
  
• Number eight was risk tolerance. It should be OK to try things and fail. People are saying we need to challenge the status quo.
  
• Number nine was mashups. This is combining data from more than one source into one integrated tool. Things like iGoogle and Yahoo! Pipes.
  
• Number nine was SUSHI (Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative). It is a standard for gathering user statistics.
  

(Presentation was alright, though most of it was stuff I knew already. The SUSHI thing I did not know. May need to look into it and check it out.)

TLA 2008 Conference Notes, Day 2: Crawford on Balanced Libraries

Title of session: Balanced Libraries: Books, Bytes, and Web 2.0
Presenter: Walt Crawford, Director and Managing Editor for PALINET Leadership Network and author of Cites & Insights.

(This was probably the highlight of my conference experience. Not only to hear the guy, but actually meet the guy. Is that cool or what?)

By the way, Walt has an e-handout for this session. Find it here. (no, I did not read them before the program, which means I have to read it sometime later).

Notes:

• Though he has notes, he prefers to have a conversation (and once people "warmed up," it did get more conversational).
• Reference to "slow libraries" (this goes to the concept of mindfulness). Pay attention to what you do and your community.
  
• Comment: It may be a good thing federal money to support academic libraries is low. We all know if that money comes, so does the control with the meaningless metrics.
  
• Living vision of your community and what your library does.
  
• If you believe libraries are doomed, you may be better off elsewhere.
  
• Healthy libraries continue to change. Build from strength for a library's continuity and balance.
  
• But who are you not serving? You won't serve 100%; you can't reach all of them (this, by the way, was one of the harsh truths I learned early on as a public school teacher: you teach as if you could reach all the students, but you will always lose a few, and it has nothing to do with you.)
• Public libraries are about the exceptions, the fringes, the ones not served by Barnes & Noble.
  
• Question of mission: target 20% techie, online, rich people or the 20% homeless, on the economic fringe people. It is a question of balance. Walt is not saying to ignore the online crowd but don't lose everyone else in the process.
  
• Learn from failure. Sharing those failures may be tough, but it is needed. Call it then a learning experience.
  
• Tools only help with a plan to use them effectively. Real world is not "build it, and they will come." He pointed out that in the movie, the line actually says, "build it, and he will come" referring to the one baseball player. People have simply kept misquoting the line. Moving on. For example, most library blogs seem to lack evidence of being read by the community.
• A lot of 2.0 tools are free monetarily. But they are not totally free. (Time is an issue for example. This is something I often try to convey to other folks when it comes to things like the library's blog. It takes time to find content, write about it or write the content, and then if any comments come, you have to reply. And you have to be able to do it consistently.)
• Getting people to actively participate is "like pulling teeth."
  
• Libraries should serve their public, but it should also be over time. Need balance between new and long term needs of the community. Patron desires and needs change over time.
  
• Getting patrons involved is always difficult. To some extent, maybe they don't want the library to be their friend.
  
• But do ask what they want and have a feedback mechanism in place (even if it is as simple as a suggestion box).
• Walt talked about telling the library story, prompted by an audience question. Libraries are primarily about the stories and making the community story. How did the library enhance people's stories? Tell how your library story has an impact on other stories in the community.
  
• Understand who your community is. Make sure you are perceived as part of the community.
  
• 2.0 is one more way to stay in touch. It's another interesting way. It is not the panacea. Your library should have something interesting to change. Whether it belongs on Facebook or similar, that's separate and for each library to decide. But the seeming consensus is that people don't want to "friend" the library.
• On new services.
  
• Does it extend your services?
  
• Can the library allow an experiment to fail?
  
• Does it allow you to serve other populations?
  
• Does it increase accessibility?
  
• Are you serving the "haves" at the expense of the "have nots"?
• Does it create a conflict with library norms? If so, can you resolve the conflict? An example is the issue of privacy and circulation records.
  
• Librarians should take a strong stance on privacy issues than patrons may care. This was prompted by a question asking about us caring about privacy when the patrons do not. (This is more significant when it is the kids who do not seem to care about their privacy).
  
• The "shiny new toy" peak was in 2005.
  
• Is the stuff worthwhile (referring to librarian blogs)? Yes. A lot of good stuff not found in the LIS literature is in the librarian blogs.
  
• Do these things matter? Most important literature is not in the professional journals, but in the grey literature.
  
• Most people in the field are trying to make things better (Walt here is responding to negative librarian bloggers). He admits that the Annoyed Librarian is a good writer; the problem are the many commenters on that blog. The ZenFoPro is an example of a good blogger who uses tough language as needed and/or appropriate. (Full disclosure: I read both of those blogs.)
• Check the PALINET site (see link above). It is a leadership resource. Interested in leadership issues. Also stuff for leaders needing to get up-to-date. Read the entry defining a leader.
  
• On fighting negativity.
• Hold on to strengths because they work. The strengths are what works. Build on this and get in contact with the public. Think of "books plus" as a brand.
  
• Public libraries should be uplifting, but also provide for needs. Good pop fiction can give a love of language and get you in touch with your own humanity, and these are good things.
  
• And once in a while, a library may lack support. If a community is not willing to support a library, maybe that library has to close. But maybe, the community might reconsider.
  
• In general, it is troublesome that academic libraries are treating their print collections like orphans (and by the way, this sounds very familiar). Academic libraries trying to restore the love of books to students is hard. (The students lack time to read and have too much stress. They'll probably have more time after graduation. I know that was my experience somewhat, especially in graduate school)
• Food for thought: Circulation numbers are down not due to more electronic resources but because the print collection was neglected and allowed to age out of date (again, hmm.)
• When libraries are defunded and more electronic resources seem to take over, we may as well be forsaking the mission of the library to no more than a mere trade school, like the University of Phoenix. (This did strike a chord with me. U. of Phoenix is the last place I want to work for, and if it came to that, I would go into some other line of work. Yet a lot of universities seem to be headed in that direction).
  

(Overall this was one of the best sessions for me this year.)

TLA 2008 Conference Notes, Day Two: General Session I

Day two is April 16, 2008.

This was the session featuring Dave Barry (his official site) and Ridley Pearson (his official site).

(As I look over my notes, I notice I got a bit snarky on this one. Part of it was that this session is the type of session where you have to wade through the usual business stuff, to use the polite term, before you get to the actual speakers. Add to it that I personally do not like the speakers much, especially Dave Barry, and it made for something akin to torture. Hey, if Dave Barry's humor is your thing, rock on. I like mine darker a la Lewis Black, for example. The initial entertainment I did not find particularly amusing. Anything that usually involves audience participation reminds me of summer camp, parts of which I hated then and I hate now. And don't even get me started on librarians with hoola hoops.)

Pre-speakers:

• The TLA President gives us the welcome. Of course, the mandatory greeting from the mayor of Dallas. Remember to go eat at the nice restaurants and do some shopping while you are at it. (Yes, that is what he actually said. Thank goodness the West End was within walking distance, or I would have starved. Downtown is not exactly brimming with easy eating locations). Of course, the governor had the mandatory librarian anecdote (I think the ones in Houston and San Antonio did too. It must be written somewhere in their "How to run the city" manual that when a conference comes to town, you need an anecdote related to the professionals in the conference. I can only imagine his anecdote had we been the Texas Proctologists' Association instead.)
• There was also the mandatory introduction of the sponsors. This works on levels. Level One are those who get an intro and are given time to give some small remarks. Level Two are the ones they just read the names (holding applause to the end) and then they just get a small applause (i.e. the ones who did not give enough money to get to Level One). Don't forget to visit their respective booths.
  

The speakers: They are promoting their Peter Pan prequel, the Starcatchers series. Find Wikipedia entry here and the official site to the books here (warning, the official site, which is part of Disney kicks in with music and graphics and the music apparently cannot be turned off in a readily apparent way.)

• Barry opens. He jokes about Miami, the bad rep. of the city, that it is outside the U.S. Parenting by embarrassing philosophy. Sing in public for effect. Reason for writing a kids' book with Pearson is that they are both parents. Talked about the Rock Bottom Remainders (official site) and their "hard to listen" music style.
  
• Pearson tells of the band tour; they raised money for charity. Stephen King is described as a well-read guy, like a teen. It's his fans who are psychopaths.
  
• Barry says you need to go buy Ridley's books, which are his outlets for his criminal musings (this refers to Pearson's adult books, which are crime thrillers). Ridley's poison the coffee grinder idea as Barry grinds his coffee beans. (I have to admit; that was one idea that never occurred to me).
  
• Pearson on the Peter Pan sequel, which he collaborated with Barry. There was some babble about some bad waiter in France, which Dave turned into a column (I am still not sure where this fit in other than as a joke, which was only so-so). They did a "ping=pong" method of writing (e-mailing drafts back and forth). Now they do kids' book signings. A Broadway version of the book is coming up. (By the way, at this point, it was only 9:25am, and it already felt like I had been there for a couple of hours).
  
• Barry. Discussing how Captain Hook became the Black Moustache. Then to complicate matters for the writers, some kid then asked what Capt. Hook was called when he was small (sans moustache). The authors discussed other new characters they created and their plotting. They then took about ten minutes saying how wonderful it is writing for kids. Then we had the mandatory librarian suck-up moment (see my note about the mayor above) about how good librarians reach kids via reading.
  

Questions from the audience (at this point, a good number of people left in droves. My guess, confirmed when I left the arena, was they all rushed to get in the book signing line.):

• "Would you consider writing for a high school audience?" Pearson said that he thinks a lot of his books could be read by high school kids, which elicited some laughs from the audience.
  
• A comment from a librarian that they liked the series because they had a strong female character. The authors said this was the case because they both had daughters.
  
• There was the mandatory question of "how did you start in writing?" Barry said he was lucky he had good, encouraging teachers. In newspapers later, he eventually worked up to writing humor after being stuck writing the sewage coverage. Ridley says he taught himself to type at ten, then began writing short stories. He took a course that was influential on the topic of literature and insanity (I want to take that class, hehe). The final exam in that class allowed him to either to an essay or write a short story, and he picked writing the short story. Barry made a crack that at the time of that test, 8 people were killed.
  
• It ends with another mandatory librarian suck up moment for the authors: Please bring your band to Houston (Houston is the next TLA conference site. I hope to see many of you there.)

(I guess for me, after listening to Isabel Allende last year, this was really a letdown. Pearson seems the better speaker of the two, then again, he is the straight man in the duo's routine. I can only hope that overall they are better writers than speakers because I am really curious about the Starcatcher series. I may pick up the first book sometime soon, maybe give Pearson a try. Yes, I have read some of Barry's works, in case anyone says I am just being snarky for the sake of it. Did not like them then, and I don't now. However, as any good readers' advisor will tell you, read what you like and never apologize for it. If I do pick up the book, I will try to review it. We'll see.)