Friday, January 20, 2006

OCLC Symposium: live from San Antonio, TX

Cathy DeRosa kicks off the Symposium, "Extreme Makeover: Rebranding an Industry."
She's introducing the panelist speakers, and explaining what what's going to think together about today...

Is a library makeover extreme or expected?

One cool new thing for this Symposium, we're doing Interactive polling, with immediate results. The first question is, "What would be your top pick for an "extreme" Saturday evening?
Dinner and a Movie wins with 38%.

The agenda:
Imagine an "extreme makeover" of Library Marketing and Services

Q: Top criterion used by users, to choose an electronic information source?
Symposium attendees say "Ease of use" by 44%.
Users said "Worthwhile information" at 77%.

Q. How do your users judge if electronic information is trustworthy?
Symposium attendees say "Personal knowledge" by 24%.
Users said "Personal knowledge" by 86%.

Q. What is the first thing your users think of, when they think of a library?
Symposium attendees say "Books" 72%
Users said "Books" at 69%.

So the gap between "user perceptions" and "librarians perceptions about users" is evident--even in our gathering today.

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