Steven IMed me about the library director who was suspended with pay because of patrons — including a registered sex offender — allegedly viewing porn in the library. The City Commissioner is recommending that she be fired. I posted it to the Council list and was told the Washington office was aware of the situation. Rochelle wrote a few words about it, and now the entire affair has been slashdotted. The library has filters apparently, but they’re imperfect. The staff does walk-throughs of the computer areas but, apparently, they are imperfect also. Let’s also rememebr that this is Florida, the state that doesn’t let sex offenders into hurricane shelters and perhaps you’ll see what we’re up against.
Tag: libraries
investigating the biblioblogosphere
Very fascinating article and research by Walt about library blogs. Instead of pullquotes and links, he crunches some (admittedly somewhat subjectively chosen) numbers to line up 60 library blogs in some semblance of order. Don’t like his conclusions? You can download his data and fiddle with it yourself. Which reminds me, I need to get my mission statement back on this page. Fiona notes: we need tools, and fast and puts out a call for more non-USian bloggers.
What is your library doing on September 11th?
David and Sarah are ramping up The September Project this year. If your library is doing something on September 11th, let them know. If you haven’t yet thought about it, now would be a good time to get started. If you need ideas, they’ve got ’em. In 2001 librarian.net didn’t even have permalinks yet. Keeping focused by providing access to the content that others were creating was a way of making sense of the chaos that was unfolding, not just on 9/11 but in the world since then. The September Project’s events are “…activities of reflection, discussion, and dialogue about the meaning of freedom, the role of information in promoting active citizenship, and the importance of literacy in making sense of the world around us.” and it takes place throughout all of September, not just Sunday the 11th. You can keep up with the progress of the project on The September Project Blog, of course.
Harris Interactive: How Academic Librarians Can Influence Students’ Web-Based Information Choices
A pretty interesting look at what the “end-user market segment” that is college students thinks about looking for information online. Keep in mind this is not positioned as a study about people look for information in libraries generally, though the argument could be made that more and more people are looking at the Internet as the first, and perhaps the last, destination for information retrieval. However, that point is not addressed in this survey. Some random facts I pulled out
- 80% of students surveyed are bothesred at least a little by advertising within websites though “only one-in-five believes ad-free websites have more reliable information.”
- The survey says “They access the web via high-speed lines, with over 40% logging on via cable modem, T1/T3 line, ISDN, or ADSL/DSL.” which has the obvious follow-up question of how the majority of them access the web, or perhaps whether the response was phrased oddly and is confusing like this sentence nearby “[O]ver 90% access the web remotely from the library via their home computer” which i think means they gain access to the web through the library’s web site?
- Students find librarians assistance with searching online no more helpful than that provided by teachers or friends “The mean satisfaction score for librarian-provided help is 7.8 (on a scale of 0 to 10), compared to scores of 7.9 for help provided by professorsor teaching assistants and 7.8 for classmates or friends.” I wonder if this would have a different result if it asked about print resources, or other in-library resources?
- There are further questions about print resources that show that 89% “use the campus library’s print resources” with books, journals and articles getting 75/70/64% respectively.
The survey also contains recommendations
The data strongly suggest that there are real opportunities for academic librarians to connect students with libraries’ high quality resources. A successful approach should incorporate the following tactics to increase libraries’ visibility on the web:
- Emphasis on students’ and librarians’ common preferences for accuracy, authority, timeliness, and privacy
- Tight integration of the library’s electronic resources with faculty, administrative, and other campus websites
- Open access for remote users
- Clear and readily available navigational guides–both online and in the library.
- Relentless promotion, instruction, and customer service.
The study ends with some questions for further exploration which have a bit too much market-driven speak in them for my tastes, but I know libraries have to start thinking about these things in an academic environment, or at least that’s what people keep telling us. Two examples
- Students expect service providers–both electronic and bricks-and-mortar–to offer convenience, selection, quality, and a welcoming atmosphere. Can librarians create a customer-friendly experience to match the best merchants and consumer websites?
- Students want to know more about the library and its resources. Can librarians execute marketing rules for product definition, promotion, price, placement, and positioning?
I guess a secondary question to these last two is “Should they?” I honestly don’t know. OCLC has the 2005 numbers, I’m curious to know what they say. [iag]
Wired: do we still need libraries in a digital age
Wired magazine asked me, Michael Gorman and Sue Davidsen from the IPL about whether the Internet will put public libraries out of business. Here is the sidebar containing our responses.
Folks who know me know that my general answer to this question is “No, but….” Unfortunately, my ten minute phone conversation was compressed into a soundbyte that I don’t really recognize, and for that I apologize to anyone who has to defend the idea of the public library against evildoers and naysayers who say “What’s the big deal anyhow? It’s all online.” I don’t think the problems the public library is facing have much to do with the Internet, but they do have a lot to do with the idea of relevance, people’s shifting priorities in tight fiscal times and the whole changing idea of community and public spaces.
For the record, the question I was asked over email was “Do we still need libraries in a digital age?” My email response, which I followed up with a phone call, was this.
Yes.
Is your question really “Do we still need books in a digital age?” in which case, the answer is more complicated, though ultimately yes.
I guess my question for you is “Whose digital age?” because where I work, at public libraries in Central Vermont, the digital age is unfolding much more slowly and to much less fanfare than it is elsewhere. In a state where only 15-25% of the residents use broadband, the digital age is as much about hurdles and the threat of being left behind as it is about bold and shiny technological innovation and synthesis. Libraries and librarians help people not get left behind by technology, by democracy, and by people who think that libraries and technology can’t coexist and thrive symbiotically.
We need libraries in any age, they’re the human scale measurement for the information age.
jessamyn west
librarian.net
Clearly I need media training. Thanks to the prophet for the scan of the article.