I know that most public libraries in NSW are thinking about using Web 2.0 tools to reach out to users. One of the questions many people have is why we should be doing it if our community doesn't currently use those tools? Indeed, we are struggling to get much in the way of comments on our blog from the members of our community at my place of work. Comments aren't really on fire on the RISG blogs either (c'mon people, share!). But it's only a matter of time. Clay Shirky puts that argument in an eloquent and entertaining way.
Friday 30 May 2008
Here's a video of Clay Shirky's speech at the Web 2.0 Expo 2008. His recently published book, Here Comes Everybody, looks at the culture of participation that is growing around Web 2.0.
I know that most public libraries in NSW are thinking about using Web 2.0 tools to reach out to users. One of the questions many people have is why we should be doing it if our community doesn't currently use those tools? Indeed, we are struggling to get much in the way of comments on our blog from the members of our community at my place of work. Comments aren't really on fire on the RISG blogs either (c'mon people, share!). But it's only a matter of time. Clay Shirky puts that argument in an eloquent and entertaining way.
I know that most public libraries in NSW are thinking about using Web 2.0 tools to reach out to users. One of the questions many people have is why we should be doing it if our community doesn't currently use those tools? Indeed, we are struggling to get much in the way of comments on our blog from the members of our community at my place of work. Comments aren't really on fire on the RISG blogs either (c'mon people, share!). But it's only a matter of time. Clay Shirky puts that argument in an eloquent and entertaining way.
Monday 26 May 2008
21st Century Library Management Systems
One of the things that Library Catalogues do really badly is ranking search results. In fact, I don't know of any out of the box ILS OPACs that even offer relevancy ranking as part of their search. Even the add-on discovery services like Innovative Interfaces Encore and Sirsi Dynix Enterprise that do offer relevancy ranking base it predominantly on how many times and where keywords appear in a record.
It seems to me that collecting data about which items in your collection get used most and the kind of 'he who used that also used this' data that powers sites like Amazon and LibraryThing could greatly improve the discovery environment of your library catalogue.
So I was interested enough in the report from the JISC & SCONUL Library Management Systems Study to post about it on the RISG New Technologies blog.
It seems to me that collecting data about which items in your collection get used most and the kind of 'he who used that also used this' data that powers sites like Amazon and LibraryThing could greatly improve the discovery environment of your library catalogue.
So I was interested enough in the report from the JISC & SCONUL Library Management Systems Study to post about it on the RISG New Technologies blog.
Thursday 22 May 2008
Beyond 4 Walls: Imagining Reference Services in a 2.0 World
Beyond 4 Walls: Imagining Reference Services in a 2.0 World was presentation given at the Reference @ the Metcalfe Seminar in May 2008. In the presentation I looked at a possible future for reference services and argued the case for starting to plan for that future now.
You can view a version of this presentation below.
If you can't read the text view the presentation on Slideshare, where you can see it in full-screen.
The links mentioned in the presentation can be found on my del.icio.us bookmarks.
If you view this slideshow or saw me present then please leave a comment and let me know what you think.
You can view a version of this presentation below.
If you can't read the text view the presentation on Slideshare, where you can see it in full-screen.
The links mentioned in the presentation can be found on my del.icio.us bookmarks.
If you view this slideshow or saw me present then please leave a comment and let me know what you think.
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