Robin Hastings has joined the long list of illustrious writers for this series with her report Collaboration 2.0. She is the Information Technology Manager for the Missouri River Regional Library in Jefferson City, Missouri, and she has a long list of presentations and publications that further validate her expertise in the realms of cloud computing for libraries. In this report, Hastings walks readers through the basics of online collaboration and cloud computing, followed by a description of the Library Society of the World, to show an example of cloud computing in action. Next, she provides explanations of the different styles of technology-aided collaboration, as well as a host of Web 2.0 tools that can be used to foster collaboration. Last, examples of groupware (collaborative software suites), examples of collaborations, and further resources are given.

As with other LTRs I have reviewed, Collaboration 2.0 is a clear, concise, and easy-to-read introduction to the concepts presented.  Hastings looks at Web 2.0 tools from the perspective of someone looking to foster ease of communication and project-based work in libraries.  Tools such as Facebook and Delicious, traditionally used for social purposes or personal productivity, take on a new light when viewed through this lens.  I don’t want to give away all of the richness of the report, but a couple of features are worth pointing out.

When introducing the collaborative tools, Hastings provides information about (and links to) the Terms of Service for each. This is valuable information to provide in a report such as this, especially for busy librarians.  There are those of us (myself included!) who may not pause to realize that the wiki tool WetPaint claims a Creative Commons license for all displayed content–including your content! The ToS summaries provided in the report enough to warrant taking a look at the work! Hasting’s summaries can be further complemented by subscribing to the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s recently released Terms of Service Tracker.

The report has few omissions, and those that exist are clearly explained. Hastings only provides a short introduction to the social/psychological concepts behind collaboration; readers expecting to find pointers on encouraging buy-in from team members, managing conflict in collaborative groups, or best practices for getting administrative approval should look to the report’s resource lists for more on these topics. Also, since the writing of this report, several tools have emerged or evolved that should be added to the list of available tools. Dropbox has emerged as a synchronizing and sharing tool that can prevent team members from having to mail documents back and forth, while still keeping documents on their hard drives and maintaining a cloud copy at the same time. Zotero has recently added group libraries, making it a great addition to the report’s list of bookmarking tools.

Hastings had a unique challenge in selecting from the innumerable Web 2.0 tools available, and choosing only those that met the needs of librarians working in a collaborative environment. Yet she did so well, provided concrete examples of these tools in use, and clearly explained the benefits and problems associated with each tool. I recommend this report to any libraries looking to streamline their internal and external collaborations. As these tools for collaboration continue to grow and change, I honestly hope that we see another report from Hastings, following up on the success of this one.

(FULL DISCLOSURE:  I am mentioned in the report, since Ms. Hastings put out a call for collaborative usage of Web 2.0 tools, and I supplied a story that was included.)

Hi Cliff:

Someone on my team brought your email to my attention. I want to first
apologize for the confusion over access to this title. American Journal
of Obstetrics & Gynecology is a title which is unique for Elsevier in
that we provide the full-text only online, while the print edition
refers readers to the online version to read the full-text.

This has caused some confusion as the online version, as one of the
online support representatives advised, is accessible by username and
password only. I understand this is not ideal for institutions and most
institutional customers would prefer access via IP range.

While we are working on a solution to this problem, we’re not quite
ready to publicly launch the final version of the American Journal of
Obstetrics & Gynecology website which will be IP range enabled. That
said, as your users urgently need access, I would like to make available
to you and your users access to the new site ahead of the public.

If you let me know the IP range that you would like enabled, I will have
one of my colleagues set up access and contact you with the details.

I hope you find this an acceptable solution and I look forward to
hearing from you.

Regards,

And my response:

I’ll take the IP access to AJOG (it’s the least I can do after complaining publicly). Our range is: [snip]

Let me know when it’s up and I’ll test it to make sure it’s working. I look forward to the day when all libraries’ users can have that kind of easy access. But for now, thank you for your patience and hard work on this!

For a moment I thought of politely declining IP access as an act of solidarity with those folks/institutions who don’t have it, but that would be hurting my users and helping no one. So there you go. Score one for my library’s users. They probably will never know that this went on and couldn’t care less–but hey, us librarians are just supposed to make resources easy to use, right?

And yes, I’d like to thank Elsevier for doing this. They’re making an exception to help my users, and they’re also working on a more wide-spread solution. Hopefully all of us (vendors, users, and librarians) will continue to find and fix problems to make our users’ experiences easier.

Now I do have to say that both times that I spoke to someone at Elsevier I had very pleasent customer service experiences (and anyone who knows me, knows how I rave if I get a good customer service experience).  The folks that I talked to were prompt, polite, and were as helpful as they could manage (which wasn’t much, due to the agreement between the publisher and the vendor).  I am pleased with their customer service, it’s just that my users can’t easily use the product that they are paying for.  Which is bad.

Here’s my take on things.  We pay over $600 for an institutional subscription to AJOG, which includes print and online access for that title.  Somewhere between the publisher and Elseveier, someone made a decision that this title should be available by username & password only, and not by IP range.  Which means that my library’s users have to jump through several more hoops (some of them aflame, it seems) just to get online access to a journal that they are paying for.  This is bad.

Here are my options:

• I can rant about this (done!), and maybe Elsevier would even bend the rules just for my institution (because I’m a loud mouth).  Those are high hopes in the contract-driven, litigious e-resource world we live in.  But that wouldn’t change things for other institutions who have the same type of subscription, and whose users have to jump through the same stupid hoops just to get access.
• I can ask Elsevier to work closely with the publisher, libraries, and Elsevier’s customers (library users, not librarians!) to figure out the easiest way for users to get access to online content (done!).
• I can spend anywhere from minutes to hours trying to create a work-around that would give my users the username and password.  Hopefully before they get to the login screen.  If they notice it.  If they write it down.  If they don’t think they they have to pay for the article.  If they don’t get so frustrated that they give up and move on.  Maybe they’ll need help?  Too bad, no way to put that in there… (not done, yet).

Needless to say, I think that all vendors should take a close look at how their users get access to the resources that they are paying for.  Is it easy?  Is it quick?  Is it clear?  Does it take twelve steps just to get to the full-text?  Look I’m not asking for a price cut, I just want my users to get what they’re paying for.

Please.  Think of the users.

I am writing this email to complain about the horrible user services that are provided by Elsevier.

This morning I was trying to confirm full-text access to the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology for my library’s users.  When I contacted customer support, I was told that access is only provided via a username and password (and not by IP ranges).

This means that when users at my library access AJOG via our full-text index or the publisher’s website, they are confronted with a request for a username and password.  I have no way to provide the user with that information from the time they begin their research to the time they get to the username/password prompt.  So not only are they not given the username and password, they are also not informed of the correct person to contact at our library to get this information, and in fact will most likely give up their research at this point.

This is a shameful display of disregard for your own customers–the library’s users.  You are making it difficult for your customers to access the very resources you provide.  I strongly suggest working collaboratively with libraries and other vendors to provide your customers (again, the library’s users, not the libraries or librarians!) with the best experience possible, including quick and easy access to resources.

I expect a swift reply, and hopefully, a user-centered solution in the very near future.

Thanks,

Cliff

At the same time Clifton explores Wicca’s transformation from a small mystery/magical religion into “nature religion.”  He does this by outlining three types of “nature”:  Cosmic, Gaian, and Erotic.  By making the cycles of nature, the planet, and our bodies holy, the religion of Witchcraft was transformed.   The author goes on to explore the growth, change, and popularization of religious Witchcraft throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s. Additionally, he briefly covers the history of the Church of Aphrodite, Feraferia, the Church of All Worlds, the Psychedelic Venus Church and Druidism in the US.

In some places, the author repeats facts (which made me wonder in if I had lost my place), but this is done to aid in clarity; the history of Wicca and Paganism in the US is as sprawling a topic as the religions themselves.  The author is forced to cross-reference himself in all directions to paint a larger picture, a challenge which he handles well.  For those already familiar with the topic, new analysis of historical figures and themes will enlighten and deepen your understanding of this history.  For those new to the topic, the book’s glossary will prove invaluable; understanding will be further aided by copies of the texts Clifton cites in the glossary (such as Adler’s Drawing Down the Moon and Bonewits’ Real Magic) for further context.

Clifton’s brilliant analysis of the words “Wicca” and “Witch” are worth the price of the volume alone.  Her Hidden Children will be required reading for my students.

The introduction to this report is alone worth the cost. The author succeeds in explaining the benefits and drawbacks of legacy catalogs, the emerging options that users are coming to expect, and how each of these “next-generation” options provide both benefits and challenges. Many of the complex issues that are raised by next generation features (such as relevancy ranking in federated searches) are explained at length, giving the reader a clear picture of the present challenges.

Breeding goes on to highlight various tools for next-generation catalogs, including AquaBrowser, Endeca, Encore, Primo, and WorldCat Local.  He covers each of these in enough detail to answer the technical questions that spring to mind, and yet he succeeds in doing so in an accessible way.  Also lightly covered are next-generation ILSes Polaris, our local hero Evergreen, Koha, and LibraryThing for Libraries.  Although I was hoping that he would review VuFind, he notes on on his blog that it was not available at press time.

This is an excellent overview of the the options that are available, should your library be shopping around for a new ILS or looking at expanding your current catalog.

For those looking for a shorter introduction to the topic, I recommend Breeding’s The Birth of a New Generation of Library Interfaces in the October 2007 issue of Computers in Libraries, p. 34.