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Well, seriously considered giving up Cable/Tivo.don't think I could make it without Internet.lolĪnyway, on any given night you can now find me watching Tivo'd episodes of NCIS or Burn Notice, reading/sending email, surfing the web, texting AND IM' IS INSANE! It makes me want to grow my own herbs and vegetables, keep chickens and a goat, plant fruit trees, collect rain in barrels, erect a windmill, install solar panels on my shack, and really work on that compost heap. I find myself in this scene so often I have seriously considered cancelling my Cable/Internet account. So what does this mean to me? Before I could be on my laptop, watching something I Tivo'd, reading/sending email or whatever, and texting on my phone.
Since I have had phones that could text or tweet, I haven't paid much attention to IM.until recently. I used IM with ICQ through AOL more than 10 years ago. And each answer begs the question, is there a real need for this? Will it be useful enough to our patron's to justify it's incorporation into our services? How is this REALLY different from a phone call? Do people often have burning questions for librarians after service hours? We admit that Libraries are losing people to the Internet will virtual reference make us more relevant? If we build it, will they come? All these tools can either help advertise or promote library services, or deliver traditional services via different technologies.
I've been trying to think of something else to say, because that seems to be the answer for most of these tools. And some libraries use cool widgets that will link from a browsing page such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or NYTimes book reviews etc. IM could be used for virtual reference, but I am not convinced that really adds value. They also could be used as tools for patrons to communicate their information needs or suggestions for the collection. Blogs and Wiki's and Twitter could be used to publish events and programs, and using Flickr could show how much fun we have at them. I think that Facebook would be a great place to start. We explored the various tools and played with widgets and avatars, and learned enough to evaluate the possibilities, I think this training experience has given me the foundation to figure out if these tools are helpful, and which will add value. Just use the good stuff to be better at what you do." Forget about names, labels, because it doesn't matter. If it doesn't, go off and find something else that does. If the stuff is helpful, then use it.Your job is to look at it, play with it, explore it and see if the stuff adds benefit and value. Then, when you've got that, decide if, and how it will improve what you do already, or allow you to do something different, or let you do something you've not been able to before. ".some librarians.(are) looking at the trappings of Web 2.0/Library 2.0 and thinking 'that's what we need to do', without thinking 'why do we want to do that?'.You need to look at this stuff to see how it works. I also found this cautionary comment by Phil Bradley interesting () It enables the access to information across society, the sharing of that information, and the utilization of it for the progress of the society." "Of all the social aspects of Web 2.0, it could be that the social network and its successors most greatly mirror that of the traditional library.It is virtual reality of the library, a place where one can not only search for books and journals, but interact with a community, a librarian, and share knowledge and understanding with is of a nature close to the tradition and mission of libraries. But the following are segments I pieced together that I felt summed up why I believe Web 2.0 is important to libraries. As I read them I jotted down some notes if a thought or suggestion impressed me, but in my haste I did a shotty job of recording where they came from. I read several articles on Library 2.0, and was surprised to discover that many were published in 2006.