The Audience at "Teach an Old Blog New Tricks"
Sat 12 Nov 2005, 11:28 am
Here is the excited audience of Colorado Librarians listening to me!
Edited to add: I feel like the session went quite well; we had somewhere around 50 or 60 people there. None of my fears about internet or projector problems came true. I think I was reasonably coherent, got some great questions from the group, and I spoke to a few people afterwards who seemed enthusiastic and motivated to build blogs, learn about RSS and social software and how they might use them at their libraries, which is fantastic.
There weren’t many RSS or Bloglines users in the group, which makes me think CAL could use a “keeping current” session next year.
Lastly, I think I did a good job of conveying why this stuff is cool and fun and fairly easy, I think I did less well in articulating why this is important for libraries. Which is not to say that the public and school librarians who spoke to me after the session about reaching their young readers can’t connect the dots themselves. But I think I need a better elevator pitch.
- License:
- File under: Blogs and blogging,Conferences,Presentations,Tutt Library
- Comments? 3
Steve, sure enjoyed your session and it got me thinking. While letting my curiosity wander about blogging and wiki software…I was wondering. Would there be a way to set up a wiki or blogging piece where library patrons could post updated lists of “IF YOU LIKED”?
For example, “if you liked Kite Runner- you might like…” That way readers could submit books and synopsis, update them and contribute. It would save me some research and work…plus it would be extremely current and rich with information. hmmm
pg
Comment by phil g — November 13, 2005 @ 6:53 pm
Thanks for commenting, Phil. That’s a cool idea, and I’m sure a wiki could handle that–wikis are designed to be easily updated by anyone.
The problem would be getting people to use it. Ideally, such a thing would be part of the catalog in the same way that Amazon’s recommendations and reviews are right there on the same page where you can click to place your order.
OpenWorldCat is trying something like this with their reviews. See the record for On Beauty and click the tab for “reviews.” I don’t think it is getting much use yet.
Wouldn’t it be cool if the catalog could recommend books in the same way that Amazon does? “People who checked out this book also checked out X, Y, and Z.” Or let users tag catalog entries like photos on Flickr?
For more thoughts about opening up library systems to input from readers, see the great post The user interface that isn’t on Lorcan Dempsey’s great blog.
Comment by Steve — November 13, 2005 @ 10:07 pm
Steve,
I’m sure I told you good job on Saturday, but if not, good job! I think attendance at your session could have been increased with a better description (from reading the description in the CAL booklet, to me it sounded as though this would have best benefitted academic libraries).
Finally, I agree that a keeping current session, or what’s hot, type thing may be helpful to others.
Comment by Emilie — November 14, 2005 @ 3:51 pm