LibrarianInBlack

Using Jott to save time

Web Worker Daily had an interesting post a while back about using Jott to organize your life.  Jott is that neat tool where you call in to their service via phone, talk, and your words are transcribed into whatever format and service you choose--read my post from a while back. 

I've simpy been using it for basic text transcription while I'm driving -- call in with my headset, talk up a storm, and when I get back to my computer I just copy and paste that into an email and send it off after some minor editing and proof-reading.  But as WWD notes, you can use Jott with Google Calendar, Outlook, Twitter, and other sites/systems as well.   I am convinced that I need to play with it more and see what else I can get it to do.  After all, I now have a 90-120 minute commute each way and that's a lot of time to kill.  Some productivity wouldn't kill me.

Using RSS in education

A Feed is Born has an interesting post about how Pageflakes is being used for teaching purposes, once again showing how utilizing RSS, both in syndication info-push mode and in custom-display mode, is offering new and exciting opportunities for teachers to share information easily with their students.

How-To Sites

Josh Catone at ReadWriteWeb recently posted a great list of How-To Sites: websites with resources that teach you how to do things.  In addition to the long list Catone provides, dozens of other sites are recommended by readers in the comments.  Well worth a look for websites to use with reference questions or information-seeking classes for the public! 

Beware though that many of the comment sites are merely people advertising their own sites, some of which are "for-pay" tutorials and others that have nothing to do with teaching. 

My favorite comment-found site, though, was this Custom Google Search: "How Do I...?", that searches video-based how-to sites.  I couldn't find a list of the sites it searches, but perhaps I wasn't looking hard enough.  I did have good success with the searches I ran, though, which is a good sign.

Bookgem

Need help holding that uber-heavy hardcover book open while you're reading it during lunch?  Or that cookbook that never wants to stay open so you precariously balance a can of stewed tomatoes on the corner to keep it open to the right page?

Have no fear, Bookgem is here!  In the ever-growing (it seems) line of book-oriented gadgets, Bookgem is a book stand with a pull-out part that supports the book, pull out legs for standing up, and page clips.  You can use it in a variety of positions and unlike other book holders, the spring-loaded page grippers  and page slots even make page turning easy.  At $15 it sure does sound good.  They are completely sold out right now, but expect more in stock in a couple of months.  You can email them to be notified when the new stock is available.  They do sell in brick and mortar stores though, and you could call one near you to find out if they still have some in stock.  You're patient though, right?

found via Cool Tools

sources for high-resolution images

Presentation Zen offers us 10 Links to Cool, Hi-Rez Images: huge high resolution images, mostly from federal government sponsored sites (which is why the images are in the public domain).  High resolution images are particularly useful for poster-sized marketing, substantial website images, and multimedia presentations.  Have at it!

Pixoo.us

Pixoo.us is a service that is in beta-testing right now, by invitation only, but is worth being aware of (if for selfish reasons only).  It is a photograph enhancement service specifically geared toward profile photos for social networking sites and IM/VOIP services.  Oh yes, that backlit photo you have on LinkedIn, the fuzzy one on Facebook, and the other fuzzy one on MySpace--none of which you like but which you settled for because the photo looked good small.  Pixoo.us will touch up your little teensy photo, make it look nice, and send it back.  What a great idea.  You can register on their site now to be in the latter phases of the testing.

found via eHub

flash drive applications

Looking for mini-applications to run from a flash drive so you can have your favorite settings and software anywhere you go?  Check out this list of 10 Free Mini-Apps Perfect for a USB Thumb Drive.  This kind of information can be invaluable to regular library computer users -- they often have no idea how individualized and enhanced they can make their computing experiences, even on a public machine!  Use photo editing software, VOIP, and a personalized email client so you don't have to hassle with those "mailto" links that don't work.  Sweet!  And all from a flash drive! 

don't ignore your digital users

David Lee King has a fabulous post from last month on the consequences of ignoring our digital communities.  I know that the same arguments have been made in libraries about ignoring senior populations, ESL populations, teens, and many more though the years I'm sure.  It just still surprises me that attention to any user base needs to be justified....especially when it's a medium that has the potential to reach most of our users when we're closed for goodness sake!  OK...I'm calm now.  Anyway, go read David's post.

computer and internet safety information

Has your library taught a class or put up posters or pathfinders on safe online activity?  If not, please consider it.  The argument about whether or not librarians should be gatekeepers of information online is an old one, but the principles tie in to whether or not we should, by extension, be the ones who tell people "how they should act" when online.  People have shown that they are willing to give up a good measure of privacy in order to gain features and functionality - and that's their right.  Personally, I think we walk a fine line with our communities between over-bearing parent and chummy schoolmate. 

In any case, if you're looking for a good example of a library doing education for the public about safe online behavior, check out Computer Safety (doc) by Vesna Gronosky. 

Related to this subject is this document that I created in several iterations over time for different libraries: Security and Privacy on Your Computer and Online (doc).  It's geared toward staff, but can apply to anyone, really.  The text covers online behavior as well as software and hardware set-ups and gives people a checklist of things to think about, as well as resources to tap (and a nice "security" glossary at the end). 

found via the LibraryLaw Blog

virtual reference services articles

It is certainly worth checking out the Virtual Reference Special Section in the latest issue of the Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.  There is an entire special section with a half dozen articles about virtual reference. "Evaluation of Online Reference Services" by Jeffrey Pomerantz covers different evaluative criteria in virtual reference services and how to capture them.  "An Informal History (and Possible Future) of Digital Reference" by Joseph Janes talks about the state of virtual reference services today from the global perspective and how/if libraries will continue to fill a niche market need with these services.  There is a lot more in this special section, and if you offer virtual references at your library you would do well to skim these brief and informative articles.

found via Current Cites

Book a Month Challenge

Take the Book a Month Challenge to keep yourself reading.  They post a general theme each month, you read a book related to the theme, and then post your comments/review.  Easy as pie.

Long list of free online book sites

I am awed by this list of free online book sites from Librarian Chick, the most complete I have ever seen and one that puts my "free ebooks" bookmark file to shame.

found via Sites and Soundbytes

Media Cataloging Sites

Confused by the LibraryThings and Shelfaris out there?  Don't know which online cataloging tool to use to harness the power of organization at home?  Well, this list of over 20 media cataloging sites from Mashable should make your head spin just a little bit more.  It is the most complete list I've run across so far of these amazing tools that are more popular than any paid cataloger would ever have guessed.

MLIS student's pro-librarian site

Embrace your inner librarian, a project website for a LIS student that makes me smile.

Digital Divide Matters

Read the latest of Jessamyn West's thoughts on the digital divide, and why it still matters to libraries.

Library Firefox Lovers Unite

Ellyssa Kroski on iLibrarian has amassed the single biggest list of Firefox plug-ins useful to library staff that I have ever seen.  She broke it into three parts, so as to make it easier on the head!  If you use Firefox (and you should) then you will be sure to find something useful here, and even for you Firefox fanatics like myself, you will probably find at least one new plug-in that has you grinning.  Thanks Ellyssa!

40 Useful Firefox Add-Ons for Librarians – Part One
40 Useful Firefox Add-Ons for Librarians – Part Two
40 Useful Firefox Add-Ons for Librarians – Part Three

free Nielsen report on accessibility in websites

The Nielsen Norman Group has made one of their popular reports available online for free, as they say "as our holiday gift to our loyal readers, as our thanks for your support over the years."  The title is Beyond ALT Text: Making the Web Easy to Use for Users With Disabilities: 75 Best Practices for Design of Websites and Intranets, Based on Usability Studies with People Who Use Assistive Technology."  Wow.  That has to the longest title/subtitle/subsubtitle ever!  The book is 148 pages, and is available as a 7MB PDF.  As libraries, especially those that are part of government organizations, are required to provide services, including their websites, in an accessible format, this report could guide you in the right direction.  After scanning the first 20 pages, I highly recommend this report, to anyone in libraries (or anywhere, really) responsible for website design, coding, and planning.

iPiPi

The unfortunately named iPiPi allows you to use your cell phone (using the inbuilt SMS) to send emails, or to use your regular email account to send out SMS messages to cell phone users.  They offer free trial accounts.  This could prove to be handy for communicating with your text-messaging users, especially if you're sending out event alerts and things like that that only require short messages and could be requested by interested parties only.  Because we all know what happens when you get an unwanted text message on your phone (say, from Verizon at 3am, telling you about some stupid service they want you to buy).  Just an example, that's all I'm saying.

Get somebody to rip those CDs for you

I discovered Riptopia in an article in Newsweek of all places.  Why does Ms. Sarah read Newsweek?  Because it came with my NPR membership.  So there.  So anyway, they were reviewing holiday gifts, and in the "it's technology!" section they had a sidebar that discussed the company.  Basically, Riptopia sends you pre-paid, secure packaging.  Into that packaging you put all your CDs on the spindles they send you (sans jewel cases, cuz shipping those nasty things back and forth is needless), as well as your iPod or other MP3 player.  Ship it back to them and they rip all of your CDs into MP3s and send you your digital music library either on data DVDs or on an external hard drive so you can transfer it to your desktop, laptop, media server, or iPod. 

They also offer two tiers of service--your basic, run of the mill MP3 ripping and their HD Premium Service, which they say is "perfect for home systems and servers such as Sonos, Control4 and Crestron. You can choose high-bitrate and lossless formats."  My musical friend Mr. David Lee King would probably opt for the HD option but I'm a wimp so I'd take the cheaper version.  My ears apparently don't hear what music enthusiasts' ears do.  And I am perfectly fine with that :)  Riptopia still sounds like a seriously appealing solution for the 5,000 CDs in my home that have not been ripped yet.

The Economics of Attention

The Economics of Attention: Style and Substance in the Age of Information, by Richard A. Lanham is a book I recently finished reading and would highly recommend for library lovers interested in information's future in  a digital context.  I hope that Mr. Lanham doesn't mind me quoting the following passages.  They do give a good sense of the tone and focus of the tome.

Text can move in two and three dimensions, creating new relationships with the space around it.  Complex texts can thus be clarified by spatial clues; the visual cortex can enhance conceptual argument.  Moving images and sound can be quoted as easily as text.  Yet the electronic book wants to mimic the limitations of a printed codex.  Why such a disinclination to use the mental, as well as the electronic, equipment?

-and (in a gush of love for libraries)-

Oddly enough, the institution of the library, which preserves these talismans and magical worlds for us, has always operated with a digital, not a fixed print, logic.  Books, the physical books themselves, were incidental to the real library mission, which was the dispersion of knowledge.  Fond as librarians are of books, and dedicated as they are to preserving them, their native generosity of spirit comes from their zeal to make knowledge available to whomever needs it.  Their final loyalty is to knowledge, to the free marketing of ideas, to the cultural conversation....It is not surprising that the ever-shifting interface between books and screen came to them first.  Nor is it surprising that the most fruitful thinking about digital expression has come from the library world.

-and (in a beautiful rail against DRM)-

If I buy a book at the bookstore, I can take it home and read it wherever I want to, and loan it to whomever I want.  Some electronic books allow you to download your e-book onto only one computer, so that if you want to read it on another computer, you  have to buy another copy.  We return to the pre-Gutenberg convention of the monastic library, where the manuscript was chained to the stand.  You can't get more zealous about denying the logic of digital expression than returning to a time when the printed book had not been invented yet. 

Geek out w/ Code4Lib

The Code4Lib Journal's inaugural issue is available now.  If you are at all responsible for new ideas and implementations with your library's catalog, front or back end, read the table of contents at least - you will find something to pull you in.

Is your library healthy or sickly? - and I don't mean the flu.

Read Meredith Farkas's many thoughts about organizational health as it applies to libraries.  She got me thinking, I'll tell you that much.  I thought about past organizations--good, bad, and mixed.  About coworkers, leadership, bottom-up uptarts who revolutionized the way things were done at their libraries.  A lot can change an organization, but it takes a radical shift to make a sickly one well again.  But that doesn't mean you shouldn't try--every little drop of orange juice helps :)

Google wants to take on Wikipedia? Please.

Google Knol...do you say it like "hole" or "doll"?  I don't know.  But it's an interesting intended competitor for Wikipedia, and with the Google name behind it I think they're assuming success.  I wouldn't be so sure though.  Wikipedia has brand recognition now too, guys.

Digital Media and Learning

Also from Helene Blowers, but from just a few days ago, check out the collection of Digital Media and Learning resources that she found from the MacArthur Foundation.

Reinvention or Reiteration?

This well-worth-a-read post, from Helene Blowers from a while ago: On Reinventing Libraries.  In it she questions the very precept that libraries are reinventing anything, including themselves. 

ALA Gaming Member Interest Group

Are you interested in participating in an ALA Members' interest group about games and gaming?  If so, please read this announcement on Infomancy, and collection signatures on this downloadable petition (PDF) to submit to send in for Midwinter lobbying on behalf of gaming in libraries.

Accidental Technology Trainer resources

Did you miss WebJunction's Accidental Technology Trainer webinar in October, like I did (busy, busy people that we are)?  No biggie!  View the archived version of the webinar and/or read up on the top 47 training tips from the webinar, a mighty useful list indeed.  Read the Accidental Technology Trainer, too, while you're at it, because it is a worthwhile read for any trainer--accidental or purposeful :)

Teen Tech Week Contests, courtesy of ALA & Wizards of the Coast

The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) is offering twenty $450 grants for Teen Tech Week 2008 programs, courtesy of sponsor Wizards of the Coast.  The grant also includes promotional materials.  Read the announcement on the ALA Contests site, get the official rules here (PDF), and download the Word document application form.  ALA is also holding a library promotional song contest for Teen Tech Week, which you can also read about on the ALA Contests site.

found via Game On

Arden: Shakespeare in a gaming environment

If you have a copy of the latest Neverwinter Nights game (yay NN!!!), you can install an Arden add-on which adds virtual worlds to your game based on Shakespearean plays.  This world was created by Dr. Edward Castronova and others who work at the University of Indiana in the Synthetic Worlds Institute.  Wouldn't you like to be able to say you work at that institute?  :)

The characters in Arden speak the Shakespearean language they were created to speak.  Dr. Castronova admits that one thing got forgotten--the monsters and puzzles that make gaming an attractive environment.  Right now, Arden is much like Second Life--you can go there, look around, enjoy the scenery, talk to anyone else who happens to be there, but there is no objective as such.  They will be rectifying that with Arden II (yes, that's right, Arden II). 

Movable Type is Open Source

Movable Type made the choice recently to move their products to open source.  Good for them.  Their platform will continue to evolve.  As this blog is hosted on TypePad, basically a simplified version of a Movable Type installation, I am curious to see what other applications and add-ons are created.  Some speculate that this is a desperate attempt to continue to compete with WordPress, which is also open source, for blog users.  A lot of complaints have been leveled at MT, while I see relatively few for WP.  Keep an eye out for future MT developments--I think we will all be pleasantly rewarded by the OS development community.

Being container neutral

Laurie the Librarian has some interesting ideas on the need for librarians to be "container neutral," focusing on the information being provided and not so caught up with the packaging it came in.  What's important is the content--not the pretty wrapping.

Intersections: librarian book club

Looking for an easy way to motivate yourself to stay up to date with what's going on in the library world and to stay apprised of new trends?  Join Intersections, an online book discussion group for librarians (though I'm sure all library staff are welcome) focusing on "emerging trends in the intersection of society, libraries, and technology."  The first book read by the group was The Long Tail by Chris Anderson.  You can still get on board in time for book #2, which you can help pick!

What do Spanish-speaking users want?

Check out WebJunction's blog, aptly named BlogJunction, to read some interesting anecdotal thoughts from Spanish-speaking patrons in Arkansas and Arizona about what they want from their libraries.   Answer?  Many of the same things people who speak English or any other language want :)

Ask Eraser

Ask Eraser, a feature from Ask.com allowing users to choose to delete their cookies and "tracking where you've been on the web so we can sell stuff to you" information from their databases (Google and MSN keep this information for 18 months).  All you have to do to turn it on is click on the button at the top of the Ask.com page (you can also turn it off any time), and then the status lasts for 24 months.  Oh yes, except for any access of Ask's search engine through embedded search boxes.  Since its launch, other exceptions have been found by hole-hunters, causing some to get persnickety.  But all in all, I'd much rather have any promise of privacy rather than no promise at all.  Read some more thoughts from Ars Technica and BBC News.

HTML 5

HTML, like much of technology, is constantly evolving.  HTML 5 has been in the development process for some time now (browsers haven't quite caught up yet) and Lachlan Hunt from A List Apart provides us with a well-written preview.   If you're a coder, check it out--a lot of things are getting a lot easier to code in 5.

w00t!

Merriam-Webster's 2007 Word of the Year is w00t!  No, seriously.  It is w00t.  I mean it.  And as I had a w00t temporary tattoo during Internet Librarian, I feel hip now.  Well, sort of.  In case you're curious, last year's word of the year was "truthiness," (yes, I'm serious), in 2005 it was "integrity," and in 2004 it was "blog."

NPR's treasure trove Music Page

Check out NPR's Music Page, with Studio Session recordings (Dave Gahan from Depeche Mode is featured currently), "Live Concerts on Demand" (a collection of artist-specific photo galleries, interviews, and live concerts), interviews and profiles, and a music discovery section where they link to .  There is also a music news section and the ability to browse by artist to see if your favorites have participated on NPR in one form or another over the years.  This is a wealth of information, and I truly didn't realize how vast a data repository this was until I really got into it.  But one artist lead to another, lead to a happenstance discovered link, and I fell in love.  This is definitely a site to save for future reference.

The Library Software Manifesto

If you haven't seen this on one of the other sites you frequent, then you will want to check out Roy Tennant's Library Software Manifesto--split into Consumer Rights, Consumer Responsibilities, and Shared Responsibilities.  Take this with you on a long piece of parchment next time you have to deal with your ILS vendor and see what happens :)

The Bookaholics' Guide to Book Blogs

A new book that you book lovers might want to check out, especially those with RSS on the brain: The Bookaholics’ Guide to Book Blogs.  At first I was surprised that they had made an entire book out of this topic, but then on second thought I wasn't.  This would also be a good book to review to get good recommendations for your book clubs, or to draw out genre and age specific blogs to recommend with little signs out in the stacks (among other, less print-y places).

via Laurie the Librarian

A Treatise on the Black Market of Holds

There is an underground black market in our public libraries.  There is a substantial hidden stream of materials that the bulk of our visitors never ever see.  This black market is our material holds system.

We have created a two class system in our libraries: those who know about the hold system and are willing to pay the hold fee for the privilege of material-borrowing -and- those who come in to our libraries to browse and/or don’t know about the hold system, assuming that what they see on the shelf is an accurate representation of what we actually have.  Little do they know of the black market that seethes and pulses in the background, driven by limited library budgets and desperate users.  The first group actually gets to read/listen-to/view popular items, while the second group may get the popular items six months later, that is, if the items have even held up that long. 

We all know that the holds system has created a dearth of browseable popular materials in our libraries.  What you don't see on the shelves is what people consistently want to be checking out. Our browsing collections, which we become so proud of with all of the face-out shelving and book store-style marketing we've done recently, simply do not include the popular items people want to check out.  By the time the holds list has been exhausted, that book won’t even be placed on the new book shelf, even though it is the first time that book has ever been shelved.  Why?  The in-the-know users placed these items on hold eons ago, so they are all checked out and will continue to be permanently checked out, shuffled from one greedy set of hands to the next, for months.   

The library itself really is responsible for fueling this black market economy of holds. We have a limited number of popular items that users want. Users have money.  We need money.  So we charge them for the privilege of borrowing a current and popular item from their supposedly free public library and they get to read/listen-to/view the item in a fairly timely fashion after its release.  Can we really continue to claim that borrowing popular materials is an “extra service,” an “above and beyond privilege”?

Let’s say a library buys five copies of the latest Stephen King novel.  A hapless 108 people are on the hold list before the books even cross the threshold.  As we’ve read in the oft-quoted OCLC study on user perceptions, the public mainly thinks of the library as a place to get books.  The sad thing is that we usually don’t have in-stock copies of the recent popular books (or DVDs, books on CD, etc.) that they expect their libraries to carry.  As long as we are trying to compete with bookstores with popular materials we know that we will always fail because we don't have enough supply to meet our users’ demand and the bookstores do, because supply equals dollars for them and that is not the case for us (except for that pesky hold fee).

As an aside, I dare you to do a test that I did at a library I once worked at.  Take all of those lovely best seller lists that you put out in paper or electronic form for the public (New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, etc.) and see if you have any of those titles actually on the shelf.  There may be some you still have on order, too, but for those that are in the catalog, see what is browseable in your collection.  I consistently found a big fat zero for all lists, all titles, all months.  I will guess that if you have any, the percentage will be horribly low.  Which begs the question that has been asked much in recent library discussions—why do we plug the bestsellers so much if we don’t have them on the shelf? 

The people who do know of the hold system come to know it well.  They all probably once experienced the grief of not being able to get an item when they wanted it, so themselves became part of this underground black market so they wouldn’t have to go through the trauma of having to wait 7 months for a book or movie ever again. You know these people: the woman you comes in with a list of five books, neatly copied onto a Post-It from the New York Times.  She knows that she has to place hold if she wants to get a copy of any of these, and happily turns over her nickels and quarters to get what she wants.

There is a huge group of users who are not a part of this system though, either because they can’t afford the hold fees, don’t want to pay them on principle, or are tried and true browsers only.  The last group has a peculiar psychology.  If a book they really want is checked out and they are presented with the option of a hold, we often get the response that they will simply come back to the library the day the book is due and get it then.  No amount of explaining matters to them: how people return things early and late, and that there is no guarantee some other lucky user won’t pick the title up first.  They will come back on Tuesday, and that’s that.  And then they come back, are generally disappointed, and the cycle begins again.  This is a conversation you have heard or partaken in many times: “Oh, I’m sorry—you’re 90th in line for the new Harry Potter.  We entered a temporary record into the catalog months ago so people could start lining up.”  The response is usually something along the lines of “But it just came out yesterday!”  To which the staff member responds (at least in his or her mind), “Yes, but those other people knew our secret little system, so they knew to start looking early.”

The associated hold fees that we have placed on our items is certainly contributing to this two class system we have for our library users.  We know that when we apprise users of the glorious hold system that we have in place they are at first overjoyed (“Oh my gosh!  I had no idea you could do that…how wonderful!  Have you always had that?”) and then dismayed (“It costs 75 cents?  Oh, forget it.  I’ll just go to Borders and buy it.”)  Some libraries charge 25 cents and I’ve heard of one library (that shall remain nameless) that charges 5 dollars.  Some libraries waive fees for children and teens.  At others, the first hold is free each day or week.  And other libraries, ah those glorious few, don’t charge anything at all.  But the end result for most libraries is that those users with money get the popular materials first.  Period.  I don’t want to confuse the real issue of this post, which is that popular materials are not on the shelves to be browsed in our libraries, but the related issue of charging to holds is close to my heart so I felt I had to add it in here somewhere.

Is that really fair that we have created this system where popular items are ne’er to be seen in the daylight until a year after their release date?  Is it right that public libraries charge for the preferential treatment of receiving new items first?  Does this mean that we should funnel our entire budgets into popular materials so we'll have more copies of those on the shelves for people when they want them?  Or does it mean that we continue to try to build a balanced collection, to continue to do what libraries do well and bookstores do not—fill in those long tail gaps?  Frankly, I don’t know the answers to any of these questions, so you will have to provide your own closure on this I’m afraid.

Information Access in a Networked World

The always engaging danah boyd has posted her crib notes from one of her recent talks: "Information Access in a Networked World."  I found it intriguing to say the least, especially her take on teens' processing of information.  Her mind always amazes me.

Google does not equal the Web

A couple of weeks ago CIO published an article on better online information seeking behavior: "Six Techniques to Get More from the Web than Google Will Tell You."  Quoted are Jessamyn West and Amy Cullen, both librarians extraordinaire.  The article identifies business-centered online resources that aren't tapped by Google and other search engines, as well as alternative search engines.  I learned about two resources I hadn't been familiar with before--so I'm confident that there's something there for librarians too :)

good list of free photo sites

For another in my series of "good places to find free or royalty-free images online for your library stuff," check out "10 Places to Find Free Images Online and Make Your Content More Linkable," by Loren Baker in Search Engine Journal.  There were three sites I hadn't used before, but found to be quite useful and content-rich.  Creating an exhaustive list of good sites in this category is pretty much impossible, but this top ten list is definitely a good place to start!

1.5 million books is a whole lotta books

A week ago the Million Book Project completed digitizing 1.5 million books and making them available for free online.  This is a beautiful example of the power of open source, the power of open access, and the willingness of people to dedicate time to projects that further the distribution of information.  The collection includes books in multiple languages from many countries and both scholarly and popular works.  Among the participating institutions are Carnegie Mellon University (the lead institution), Zhejiang University in China, the Indian Institute of Science in India, and the Library at Alexandria in Egypt.

7 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners

If you haven't yet heard about the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenberg County's 7 1/2 Habits of Highly Successful Lifelong Learners, then hold on to your knickers.  You're about to be impressed.  Created for their users by Lori Reed, PLCMC's Training Specialist, this self-paced online tutorial teaches you all about the importance and how-to of lifelong learning as well as how to create a personal learning plan.  This is a great example of both the valuable unique content libraries can provide their communities and also an example of how to effectively leverage technology for learning.  Check it out!

Adding MeeboMe Widget to the library catalog

David Lee King wrote about adding the MeeboMe Widget to his library's catalog.  It shows up whenever there is an unsuccessful keyword search.  This way your users have on-screen access to live help from library staff when and where they often need it--while using our confusing and multi-layered catalogs.  For the sake of argument, let's assume that your library's catalog is perfectly functional and easy to use.  Even then, in this imaginary case, adding a MeeboMe Widget is important.  Why?  Library catalogs are our single biggest point of contact with our users.  They get used much more than our library websites, which is where most libraries have placed their MeeboMe Widgets (which is also good, just not the biggest point of potential contact).

SMS sender service

Is anyone familiar with Nico Cuppen's SMS sender service?  If your phone is down (read: out of batteries), you can use this utility to utilize your own phone service's SMS capabilities to send a message directly to the number of your choice.  It costs the same as if you had actually send it from your phone.  It seems that it would also be useful for those of us who don't keep our personal phones next to us all day, but might want to send on a SMS text message to a friend who prefers that mode of communication. I’m sure there are other services that do this too.  Unfortunately, this would not be a simple answer for a library wanting to set up an SMS service.  Still, it might be useful for personal use!

SFPL's Book a Librarian service

Check out this InfoBlog article on SFPL's Book a Librarian service - giving users the opportunity to schedule a one-on-one research appointment with a librarian.  Nice way to re-professionalize librarianship and let users know that  we actually offer research assistance for anything they might be interested in.  There are many libraries across the country, including many public libraries, that offer similar services.  I'd like to see more libraries start their own!  Minimum investment to start such a service, and while demand might not be high at first, those grateful users who do utilize the service will be ever so thankful for the opportunity.

NYPL webcasts up a storm

If you haven't checked out what the New York Public Library is doing with webcasting, then do so immediately.  While we all don't have the depth and breadth (and big names!) that NYPL has in their programming, the theory stands firm for all libraries: record one-time programming and post it on your library's website.  As you know, programming attendance in libraries is pretty paltry when compared to all the work that goes into putting on a program.  This is one way to expand the audience to people who couldn't attend on that particular date and time, to those who are unable to get to a location, or those who simply prefer not to sit in crowds (like me!). 

Fac-Back-OPAC

Open source makes the Sarah smile.  The October issue of Computers in Libraries featured an article about an open source faceted searching technology that has been implemented in several libraries now: "Fac-Back-OPAC: An Open Source Interface to Your Library System" by Mike Beccaria and Dan Scott.  For an example of what this open source code can do for your catalog, see the implementation at the Paul Smith's College Library Catalog (click here to see the search results for "beatles").  You can read more, and find more resources related to the project, at the Fac-Back-OPAC Google Code project page.