With Bebo now the top social network in the UK, librarians on the other side of the pond may want to consider setting up profiles on the site. According to ZDNet’s review of comScore’s data, Bebo had 10.7 million unique users to MySpace‘s 10.1. I’ll be interested to see how this data develops over time, and whether Bebo becomes the UK’s social network the same way Orkut is for Brazil.
[via Mashable]
As librarians, we have taken our users’ privacy rights away. As part of our code of ethics,
III. We protect each library user’s right to privacy and confidentiality with respect to information sought or received and resources consulted, borrowed, acquired or transmitted.
In many cases, we are protecting the user’s right to privacy whether they like it or not. By shredding/deleting/anonymizing user information without the user’s consent, we are taking that right away. If a library user is unable to exercise their right to privacy themselves, do they have that right at all?
At the GGAUG Conference, several librarians expressed concern that the Web is evolving to slowly chip away at privacy, and that “Big Brother” is collecting information on us all. In response, I asked how many people in the room had Amazon.com accounts. Of about 100 people, only two did not have accounts. As a matter of perspective, I pointed out how Amazon.com has my current and former addresses and phone numbers, credit card information, and how it knows what books I read, CDs I listen to, woodworking tools I wish I could afford, and how I’m related to various friends and family members with similar wishlists. How did this corporate monolith gain all this information about me? I gave it away for the convenience of one-stop-shopping online. Many of our patrons are also willing to sacrifice a little privacy for the sake of convenience.
Booklovers are constantly discovering LibraryThing, and are sharing their reading lists with each other. WorldCat.org is developing social networking so that users can create lists of books and articles to share with friends. We are struggling to hold onto privacy that some of our users are actively trying to give away. So why not give the users their privacy rights back, and let them decide for themselves what to do with their information?
My recommendation to librarians as a whole is to give users privacy options–let them choose what information we keep or destroy. Let them pick who they will share their information with. In the post-USA PATRIOT Act world, we have become so scared as to destroy our patrons’ records “for their own good.” Wow. That sounds surprisingly familiar, no?
As a student, I would have loved to have gone into the library’s catalog to write reviews and share booklists with fellow group members from class. In my family, I would love to share booklists with my family’s book club. As a teacher, I would love to share what I’ve checked out of the library with my colleagues. But I don’t have the option to do that. I can’t choose. And therefore I don’t have the right.
I prepared a low-key (and in some cases, low-brow), humorous presentation for freshmen on how to use social networking sites. It’s available here: In Your Facebook! Managing Your Online Identity.
No one showed. For either of the presentations. There could be several causes (foremost in my mind is timing), but it was not for a lack of marketing. We’ll probably just set up to do it again later in the semester.
I note in my presentations that I’ve embraced failure as part of the creative process. And after all, if I have to fail, I want to do it spectacularly. I want to fall on my face in front of a crowd of people who point and laugh at me–just so that I can remember to laugh at myself.
So in that spirit, feel free to have a look at my cheezy-humored presentation (with a few facts thrown in for good measure), and laugh with me. I’m sure that next time the room will be packed. :)
A fellow librarian asked me for advice on getting buy-in from her library administration. She presented a Library 2.0 project to the boss(es), but it was rejected.
My first words of advice were to read chapter 7 of Library 2.0: A Guide to Participatory Library Service by Michael Casey & Laura Savastinuk, and chapter 7 of Web 2.0 and Libraries: Best Practices for Social Software by Michael Stephens. Both of these books give great advice for planning and implementing Library 2.0 projects.
Additionally, here were my few words of advice:
So let’s hear it folks–there are brave librarians out there trying to start up user-centric services all over the place. What advice would you give them?
Last Friday I attended the GOLD/GALILEO Annual Users Group Conference (photos here).
The conference opened with keynote speaker Diane Kresh, Director of the Arlington County Libraries. She was a powerful speaker, and explained many of the values that are driving users in our new information landscape. She explained the role that libraries need to play in terms of Content, Context and Community (as she said, she loves alliteration). I was very pleased to see her continually emphasize a user-centric approach to library services.
In the first breakout session, I presented Library 2.0.1: It’s All About the User. This presentation was geared towards the basics of the Library 2.0 idea, and helped to explain how it evolved from the Web 2.0 concept. Also, I showcased some of the social networking tools that libraries are using to get in touch with their users. As usual, I did a lot of meandering, made a few cheezy jokes, and got asked some great questions by a very inviting crowd of librarians.
For the second session I attended “Library 2.0.5: It’s All About the Input.” Three presenters discussed different ways in which they were getting user feedback, and using it to improve services. Jasmine de Gaia from OCLC is the Senior Project Manager for Social Networking initiatives. She talked about the ways that WorldCat.org is including social networking tools, and what to expect in the future. Currently they allow the creation of lists (only for items in WorldCat–not the un-cataloged Web), and hope to include more social connections between users in the near future. Next, Debbie Holmes discussed the development of tutorials for GALILEO at a system-wide level. This is a University System of Georgia initiative to improve the information literacy tools available for all users. Last, Mike Rylander showed some of the cutting-edge stuff that is going on with PINES/Evergreen, the open source ILS for the Georgia Public Library Service. I was very impressed with the way that they are letting users dictate their own information finding behavior, and then enhancing the catalog to reflect that use (and just not making tools and forcing users to jump through hoops to use them).
For the last session, I presented Library 2.1: It’s All About the Future. Since the library world is changing so quickly, it doesn’t hurt to look ahead to possible changes we may see in the years to come. Looking at the Semantic Web (Web 3.0) and Web4 (Web 4.0), I discussed the possible implication for librarians and library users. Again, the crowd was awesome, asked some tough questions, and put up with my attempts at humor (“We must CONTROL the vocabulary! CONTROL IT! You! User! You can ONLY use THESE WORDS! Of course these words don’t make sense! That’s the point!”).
All around it was an excellent conference. I met some very cool librarians, got to hang out with friends from across the state, and learned about some new developments in Library 2.0. Plus, I finally got to eat at The Grit!
