LibraryCrunch

There has been a significant amount of discussion on some of my favorite blogs recently about getting along effectively with your IT department, and I want to add a recommendation from my own little world.  As chair of my library system’s Emerging Technology committee, I made it  a point to choose two IT staffers to serve on this six person committee.  The charge of the committee is to examine both new technologies and technologies that may be new to the library world (though they are used in other areas).  Many of the products and services we examine are in early beta stages, or they are only being used by a small handful of institutions.  Effectively evaluating these products requires several things, including an open mind, an ability to think beyond the library’s current boundaries and structure, and an understanding of how things will ultimately work (or play) together. 

All of the members of my team are either young in age or new to the field of library science, and all bring with them some expertise or strong interest in an area of technology that I am lacking.  The IT team members bring with them two very important attributes -- a wealth of understanding regarding technology in general, and a firm knowledge of the library’s current technology structure.  Having this knowledge allows them to picture how the product being examined will eventually fit into the library’s technology infrastructure. 

Having IT staffers on the team does something else, too – it puts the IT department on notice that things do change, and that the library’s technology will always need to change.  Having IT on board for this part of the process ensures early buy-in, a much easier job selling the idea when it comes to the budget, and it eliminates the sometimes difficult job of selling the new product or service to the IT department – since they are a part of the process from the earliest stages they are integral players and have an interest in seeing the initiative succeed.

Posted by Michael at 10:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (1)

Netvibes, the browser-based RSS aggregator, continues to amaze me with its offerings.  Besides being a truly simple and flexible feed aggregator, Netvibes now makes it easy to integrate your Gmail account, Writely documents, and Flickr photos into your browser desktop.  If you haven’t tried Netvibes, give it a shot and see what Windows Live has to catch up to.

Posted by Michael at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Take a look inside the web’s premier social networking company – no, not Google or Amazon, or even Facebook, but good old Yahoo. James Fallows, writing in the New York Times, went to the Yahoo campus and spoke with their top social networking people about the future of Yahoo.

Fallows came away with a very vivid picture of what the web will look like in the next few years – something many have been referring to as Web 2.0, and I have been trying to plug into library service offerings.  Discussing the evolution of web search, Fallows writes:

"You can look at the evolution of search as a play in three acts," said Jeff Weiner, the senior vice president for search and marketing. "The first is the 'public' Web, where if different people type the same query they'll all get the same results." The second, he said, was purely personal search - finding a file or photo, usually on your own machine

The third is the one that we are very interested in," Mr. Weiner said. This is "social" or "community" searching, in which each attempt to find the right restaurant listing, medical advice site, vacation tip or other bit of information takes advantage of other people's successes and failures in locating the same information.”

The idea that human judgment can improve a search engine's automatic findings is hardly new. From the dawn of the Web's history - that is, over the last 15 years - companies have invented tools to help users assess the quality and relevance of information, often by relying on others' opinions. Examples include Amazon's user reviews, eBay's feedback ratings and "trusted networks" created on many sites.

What is different is Yahoo's systematic plan to build "community intelligence" into nearly all aspects of its operation - and in turn, to entice users to spend more and more of their time on Yahoo sites, where they can see Yahoo ads.

That last line is enticing: building community intelligence into all aspects of the operation.  Obviously, for a company the size of Yahoo, the idea of community is large – very, very large, in fact.  But in this size comes strength – “with hundreds of millions of users, there is critical mass to create social networks that cover most locations and interests.”

Caterina Fake, one of the original Flickr founders (I love Flickr), ends the article with my favorite quote:

"You can think about the way people will interact, as you sit in the usability lab, but until you put it in front of very large numbers of real people, you don't really know," Ms. Fake said. "So you have to release products early and often, like perpetual beta."

Perpetual beta.  I love it.

Posted by Michael at 05:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

As part of an ongoing conversation concerning the need for public libraries to become more fluid in their ability to change to meet customer needs, I received this brief note from Laura Savastinuk, a librarian and coworker, which I want to post here:

In trying to start a dialog about the future of libraries, and specifically this work-in-progress concept of Library 2.0, we should begin by thinking broadly about what it is we are trying to achieve.  A clear, big-picture explanation of Library 2.0 will allow for a definitive starting point for determining the details and how this concept will apply to individual libraries.  This may seem simple or overly broad, but it will help us figure out where we are and where we want to go. 

As a starting point we should first acknowledge and accept that change is constant and necessary.  This is a simple concept that librarians seem to understand, but it really needs to remain at the forefront when designing and evaluating library services.  The libraries that really incorporate change into their development will be the ones that will best grab their users.  When discussing change, we should not only think about new ideas, but also consider changing what we already have.  Rather than become settled on a specific point, we should continually revisit and reevaluate our services.   If something doesn’t work, how can we change it?  Librarians cannot be afraid to rethink the way we serve our users, even – especially – if it means reevaluating processes we consider fundamental to library service. 

The way we serve our users needs to change continually to reflect the changing way they wish to be served.  With that in mind, for libraries it has become less about what we offer, and more about how we offer it.  We have the information – how are we going to get it to our users?

Posted by Michael at 09:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

And he questioned the call to spend so much on an entity whose future he sees as limited.

This quote comes from an article about the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library and a controversy they are embroiled in concerning a $60,000 expenditure for marketing.  Though the system has seen a 13% increase in circulation, they face criticism for building expansion cost overruns and have sought the $60K in an effort to swing public opinion.  Without getting into the expansion project issue, I think it’s worth looking at some of the language being used in the debate.

The editorial writer, Ruth Holladay, obviously questions the spending when she says, “Consider the word spread, at a fraction of the cost. Also consider the door open for another debate on the library's past, present and future…This institution is in flux. Public libraries nationally are cutting staff, feeling the Internet heat and facing competition from bookstores and film rental outlets.”

Curt Coonrod, a former local politician, appears to be leading the attack against the library with quotes like this: "He questioned the call to spend so much on an entity whose future he sees as limited…Looking ahead to the information age, this is just not the way people get their information…That's true even today, let alone 20 years from now, when the bonds are still outstanding."

And, “Libraries remain as popular as mother and apple pie to the public. We were all brought up to think that libraries are good things -- and they are…But they are changing, and nobody has a crystal ball into the library's future.”

Library system CEO Linda Mielke is quoted as saying, “Google is replacing the professional librarian…Libraries must stock best-selling books and DVDs to keep pace.”

Looking at what’s going on, the language being used, and the opinions being quickly formed, spending $60K on public relations (spin control) may be the best money ever spent.

The language being tossed around is self-defeating.  No library, or library board, should be looking into the proverbial crystal ball for the future of the library.  The library and its leadership need to be shaping that future today.  Perhaps easier said than done, but the power is in the library’s hands to shape themselves and grow to meet user needs.  The tools to do just that are being discussed right now, at conferences and on blogs and throughout the library world.  We shape our own future, but we cannot do that if we sit back and simply watch.

Posted by Michael at 08:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Looking First at Web 2.0 

Yesterday’s public release of Flock has created some reluctant questioning among proponents of Web 2.0, with the best comments coming from WeBreakStuff.  For anyone who may not know, Flock is a new browser – actually it’s built on Firefox – that integrates your Delicious feeds into the browser itself. Flock also makes blogging a bit easier by integrating a blog editor into the browser.

However, WeBreakStuff is spot on when they say, “But being 100% honest, I’m still not sure I’m changing my browser to have a way to integrate delicious and a blogging tool into my browsing experience.”

When was the last time you changed your browser?  I switched to Firefox about twelve months ago and have been with them ever since, leaving IE and Opera behind.  However, I have since added many extensions to my Firefox browser, customizing it to a level I find usable and efficient.  No matter how good Flock may be, it must be able to not only beat my bionic Firefox but it must offer sufficient rewards over and above what I already have – there must be a compelling reason to change the browser itself. 

Products offering incremental improvements in  technology -- like Flock-- can no longer ask the user to make such fundamental changes.  As much as I hate to say it, Flock’s approach is to take Web 2.0 technologies and attempt to push them on the community in a manner reminiscent of Web 1.0.

I would extend this idea of Web 2.0 to any program that requires an installation to the user’s local computer so that the program can run as its own operation.  Simply put, don’t make the user download software – make the application work within the browser itself.  As an example, take a look at Taskable, an “RSS and OPML browser built into the Windows taskbar notification area”.  Taskable is a great product that makes accessing RSS feeds simple and quick, but the fact that it is a separate program, always running in the background, keeps it off my list of desirables.

So how does this all fit into Library 2.0? 

Michael Stephens recently asked several panelists at Internet Librarian 2005 to describe what a Library 2.0 website would look like.  In response he got some very forward thinking replies, my favorite, I think, being Sarah Houghton’s.  Sarah sees library websites following the same trajectory as commercial ones, in that you can no longer really figure out how large a library is by the look of its website – small libraries are now beginning to create websites that rival and often better the websites of larger library systems.  Small libraries are now pushing content via RSS, they are creating methods for users to customize content, and they are creating multiple access points for customer queries such as email, IM, blogs, chat, wikis, etc.

The introduction of these services into public libraries has not been an easy one.  Established orders and outdated operating procedures have made the introduction of new thinking difficult – Library 2.0 is not something that will enjoy a seamless or fluid transition period.   Moving to Library 2.0 will require a rethinking of many models with which we have grown comfortable.  This push will not necessarily come from within.  Indeed, most catalysts will be from outside – financial crises, staffing shortages, user expectations/demands, technological changes/barriers, etc.  Many library system are already somewhere on this continuum of change, breaking through the old pitfalls that include:

• Identity-crisis
• Role confusions
• Goal-fixation
• Over-attachment to successful methods
• Requiring perfection before release/implementation
• Lack of discernment
• Interminable attempts at consensus

Beyond websites, beyond even the world of technology, the concept of Library 2.0 embraces something not yet discussed here at LibraryCrunch: disruptive ideas.  Richard MacManus at Web 2.0 Explorer is in the middle of an ongoing search for disruptive startups in the world of Web 2.0 – companies that, as he says, either create disruptive technologies (like Google did) or “non-geek services built using Web 2.0 technologies”. 

Disruptive technologies rock the boat, they create new expectations and new boundaries.  Disruptive technologies allow the customers, the user, to see beyond the limits of the old framework.  A disruptive technology following the Web 2.0 concept may allow that customer to move beyond the limited role of “user”, and move into the world of designer or moderator – this is where all of those clichéd phrases such as radical trust,  user as contributor, rich user experiences, and user behavior not predetermined (all of these can be found on Tim O’Reilly’s Web 2.0 Meme).

So Library 2.0 is a disruptive idea, that is established.  Feel free to email me your thoughts: mecasey (at) gmail.com.  In my next post I hope to further explore this concept of disruptive ideas.

Posted by Michael at 08:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (2)

Library Stuff refers to a posting regarding the use of blogs and RSS feeds that serve as a crude yet effective content management mechanism for library websites.  Apparently, Zanesville Campus Library started using this blog to serve their website with easily updated content. If you ask me, it’s about time libraries started using free and open resources like blogs to push information to the customer.

Purchasing and maintaining a content management solution is not a viable option for many cash-strapped libraries.  But setting up in-house (behind the firewall) blogs that can serve as conduits via RSS to the library’s external website is a very low cost, effective, and easily managed option for libraries.

Setting up simple RSS feeds to the library website is only the beginning.  Giving customers the option to tailor the information they receive is another step in the long road to Library 2.0.  By creating an environment like Netvibes, where your library customers can choose from both in-house and external feeds, allows the library website to become more of a one-stop location, where customers can get their primary information and make the leap to more detailed research via the library’s catalog and database offerings.

And the step after this?  Perhaps a mashup of customer-driven content with our catalog and databases?

Posted by Michael at 09:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

TechCrunch has an excellent, two-part, listing of what it considers to be Web 2.0 companies. It's worth browsing through this list to see just what is on offer out there.

List 1

List 2

Many of the companies offer applications that our library users will find very attractive. 

Posted by Michael at 12:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last week I found Talkr, a great text-to-speech service, and immediately installed their little bit of code into my Movable Type template.  At first it worked flawlessly – Talkr’s voice is by far the best of any free text-to-speech software (as I said below).  But somewhere along the way things started to go awry.  Old posts continued to work thorugh Talkr, but new posts refused to play, with Windows Media Player saying that the file extension does not match the file format.  Then some new posts seemed to work, and others did not.

Chris, at Talkr, responded to my call for help, and he’s been great at trying to debug my problems.  This is such a new service (and such a great one) that I plan on sticking it out for a while to see if we can get things nailed down.  I can easily see such a service becoming standard on most library websites, with friendly-voiced assistants reading book excerpts and library event news.

So please be patient -- I know some of the Listen to this article links are not yet working. 

Posted by Michael at 10:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I recently heard a sales pitch from a company trying to sell a mechanism that allows customers to store personal information on small, credit-card-sized cards.  It works like this: the library buys a card-reader for every OPAC (at over $90 per unit) and then sells the small cards to customers at the cost of $10 per card.  The customer is then able to save his bookmarks, passwords, form data, etc., onto the card.

Does this help the customer? Yes. Is it cost effective for the customer or the library? No.

There are two primary problems with this idea.  First, the tools are proprietary in nature. Instead of simply using a USB drive to store the data (and thereby allowing the customer to take his data with him wherever he goes), the company utilizes a proprietary interface (ironically, this device plugs into a USB port) and a low-tech yet also proprietary card to store a small amount of data that cannot easily be made portable without the customer also buying an expensive card reader.

The second major issue -- and the one that upsets me most -- is the fact that web 2.0 applications already exist that serve these needs.  Imagine the library teaming with (or simply promoting) Delicious and/or Backpack to serve customer storage needs?  They could save their bookmarks, ideas, notes, to-do lists, etc., at no charge, and accessible anywhere without the need for any external hardware.  Now imagine a savvy catalog provider writing an API to interface the library’s catalog portal to one of these web 2.0 applications.

It certainly may make sense for the library to have a physical mechanism for allowing the customer to store and retrieve such information, but that technology already exists in the form of USB drives that have no need for any proprietary interface. Companies wanting to do business with public libraries should not be creating proprietary hardware.  We need to require a certain efficiency in whatever we purchase.  Library 2.0 is not a closed, immobile future.

Posted by Michael at 10:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

From Forrester Research:

Participation in three of the technologies highest on the Internet’s buzz list — blogging, reading RSS feeds, and engaging in social networking — is climbing, a research firm said Wednesday, but two of the three haven’t cracked the 1-in-10 barrier.

Ten percent of consumers read blogs once a week or more, said Forrester Research at the opening of its annual Consumer Forum. That’s double the 5 percent who browsed blogs in 2004.

Real Simple Syndication (RSS) use tripled in the same period, from 2 percent in 2004 to 6 percent this year, while use of social network sites such as Friendster.com and MySpace.com increased from 4 percent last year to 6 percent in 2005.

Posted by Michael at 08:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Richard MacManus, in his Web 2.0 Explorer blog entry titled The Web-based Office Will Have Its Day, talks about the many pluses, and few minuses, of a web-based office platform. He details the issues surrounding the corporate world’s possible slow acceptance of such tools – security being top on that list. But for libraries, the emergence of these web 2.0 applications means a radically altered landscape for service delivery at our OPACs. Suddenly it does not matter if your library does or does not offer word processing, spreadsheets, and other office apps. Now all of these things are available online – for free.

It is now (NOW) possible to offer customers MS Office-like applications without having to purchase and install them locally. This means no more licensing issues, no more last-minute security update patches, no more local troubleshooting for lost files, misbehaving dictionaries, and malicious macro fears. And while these new apps do not yet offer all of the abilities found within Word (they soon will) they do offer sufficient capabilities to satisfy 90% of our customers’ needs.

There are greater possibilities here, as well. With the development of more and more robust web 2.0 applications, the need for locally based software applications is greatly diminished, calling into question the need even for a desktop and the powerful operating system that runs that desktop. Suddenly we face the possibility of running simply a browser to access all of our applications, thereby reducing the hardware requirements of the average computer users – look at this development project out of MIT for the $100 laptop, keeping in mind what was just discussed. Where we used to think in terms of open source applications like Open Office we can now think of connectivity as the key – universal connectivity is now the holy grail for cheap computers and computer applications.

Browser + Web 2.0 Applications + Connectivity = Full-featured OPAC

Posted by Michael at 01:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Riding the podcasting wave, several new services allow blogs (and RSS feeds) to be easily converted to audio -- on-the-fly conversion that requires only a simple mouse-click. One such service, Talkr, has been integrated into this blog (notice the new "Listen to this article" link at the bottom of this post entry). The Talkr service has been available for a while now, and the voice isn't bad -- not what we remember from several years ago when it was like listening to a drunk (yet still smarter than me) Stephen Hawking.

Imagine this same type of service being utilized on your library's home page, within its catalog, and on all of its blogs (your library does have blogs, right?), allowing customers to listen to your latest audio-book reviews, your teen events blog, and "discussions" about your new books -- all fed through the talking service of your choice to your customer's MP3 player or computer desktop.

Posted by Michael at 08:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)