Author: theweelibrarian

What an amazing panel of experts! Michael Stephens, Amanda Etches-Johnson, and John Blyberg (all bloggers I regularly read). Amanda Etches-Johnson brought up three trends to watch – RSS, websites, and meaningful online outreach. I think she was right on the money when she mentioned that our websites are in dire need of help. This is where many of our patrons start – they are virtual library branches – and more thought and time needs to be put into them. We need to stop organizing them in ways that our meaningful to us and start thinking about how our patrons use our sites.

John Blyberg was also amazing. I had also gone to hear about the great work he has done on his library’s OPAC, or should I say SOPAC (Social OPAC). He has integrated social software into their OPAC successfully – a great model for other OPACs to strive for. He spoke of the importance of open source.

This was the first session that I got to hear Michael Stephens speak. He had been at my library early that week (while I was conferencing) to launch our library’s Learning Library 2.0 session (which is going to be great! More on that later I hope). Michael rose a number of points for us to consider when thinking of library 2.0:

• conversations
• convergence
• content
• redefining LIS job descriptions
• citizen journalism
• openness and sharing
• participation
• experience and play

This session highlighted that we need to think more about what our patrons think about when they approach the library. Is it a place for them, will they succeed, does it fit in their busy life, are they trusted to participate? It seems my library is doing well in most areas but there are always areas for improvment. A couple of the important points:

• information is easy to find now – patrons want information rejection not retrieval
• patron success is important – if they can find 2-3 things on their own, they are 2 times more likely to ask for assistance
• think of reference as “World of Search Craft”
• The final slide was on moving foward and had a number of important points, including plan for success. While this is important, I was particularly found of the last point – laugh a lot. This is a good library and life point. We have to remember that this is about people -that we work with and for – if we can’t enjoy them then maybe we should rethink things. Things won’t always go as planned and the ability to laugh will help us get passed them. Enjoy our successes and be happy.

This session was a panel with Rob Hyndman, Matthew Ingram, and Nora Young – a panel of non-librarians who gave an interesting view point for Web 2.0. The panel was more of a discussion, which I really enjoy. Here are some of the important points I took from this session:

•   Web 2.0 still isn’t for everyone – it is largely those who are already technologically inclined – how can we keep a democracy and not let one group (the techies) have too much say?
• It isn’t all techies though – motivation and passion is extremely important – the desire to get the message out
• concerns about connections – allows for global conversations but there is lack of accountability as you don’t have to look someone in the eye when you disagree -can be solitary but may see that virtual connection is made first and then taken into the real world
• truth and trust are now currencies and are no longer given by default – questioning is the norm and shows us we should have questioned “trusted” sources more
• echo chamber phenomenon – how do we keep from becoming too narrow (ie. rss feeds and the loss of serendipity)

Yes, it’s that time of year again. So many conferences, so little time and money! It’s amazing how energized you can be after a conference and how drained! The OLA (Ontario Library Association) Super Conference has just wrapped up. It was a great conference, so I thought I’d share what I’ve learned. I won’t blog about all of my sessions – I’ll do highlights instead. I hope to mull the sessions over a little more and may have more to post on the sessions later. Here’s a list of the sessions I attended (unfortuantely, I missed a couple due to illness):

• Is Social Software Too Social? – Rob Hyndman, Matthew Ingram, Nora Young
• Information Is Not Enough: Shaping the User Experience – Joan Frye Williams
• Search and the Emerging Social Web – Tomi Poutamen
• Not So Confidential: Exposing Web 2.0 Sites – John Blyberg
• Digital Game-Based Learning and Information Literacy – Christy Branston
• CODOC to LC: The Long and Winding Road – Jim Ford and Cary Daniel
• Solutions for a New Generation – Max Valiquette
• Top Tech Trends – Michael Stephens, Amanda Etches-Johnson, John Blyberg

The next conference scheduled – the Winter Institute for Statistical Literacy for Librarians in Edmonton.