Today's most e-mailed article from the Chronicle of Higher Education

"Snacks in the Stacks: Libraries Welcome Food Amid the Books." (It's
No lie, that was the number one e-mailed article.

I don't know whether to be happy or sad about this fact.

What am I doing?

As much as I enjoy the notions that OCLC is the Death Star, that we who work here dress funny, or that we're poor civilian contractors, I enjoy it ever so much more when somebody actually gets it. (Thanks to my colleagues for pointing this out on our team's delicious feed. Follow along if you'd like to know what we're reading online.)

Meanwhile, I have been very slammed with getting myself back into a worky work type of head space. Some days it's hard to do even though I remain very excited about what I'm working on; difficult because my library land self is stuck back at ALA 2007. It's like I've been time-warped to the present, I'm actively trying to catch up *and* keep up, not to mention try and lead something. Specifically, I'm helping to get a new group of WebJunction staff settled, working very hard on our new, very exciting, and altogether networky platform (coming later this summer, more on that later), and finally, as Alice mentioned, getting ready for Anaheim. Will be my first time out in library land since last year. I'm hoping I remember what to wear. Either way, I'll be there, and hopefully, really, truly be "back" to library land by that time as well.

That all being as it is, I sometimes find it difficult to know what, exactly, to blog about. Maybe I've lost my blogging groove. To bridge the gap while I find it again, I've added my twitter feed to the lower right hand side bar of our trusty It's All Good site. If I'm not blogging, you'll at least know where I appeared last. I'm here! Really, I am. And guess what else? I'm "doing" something! You can follow my tweets on the web, via RSS, or text "follow itgirl" to 40404.

Anaheim

We've just been talking about fun activities we've got up our sleeves for ALA Annual. Booth contests, the blog salon, and the 5 of us all at the LITA President's program. Very fun--I am getting excited already.

I also saw that you can buy passes for Disneyland or Disney's California Adventure for at least $10 off the regular price. Cool.

Economic downturn could be uplifting for libraries

I have been sidetracked this morning, reading the headlines about the economy. I started the track by wondering what retail chains were going bankrupt, then mosied over to read about the "how to pay for college" crunch, and then ended up on biofuel and a global food shortage.

Yikes.

When I think about Maslow's hierarchy, food and shelter have to come before such things as problem-solving, community or eventually self-actualization...many of the things the Library (with a capital L) excels at. At least, the Library sets up the environment to make self-actualization more likely.

But people can't get excited about ideas or the life of the mind if they are hungry.

So it may seem like we as a society are heading into a time where we must hunker down and not do anything (translation: spend money). And of course I know all too well the whole "the library is free" mentality is a double-edged sword--it's free but it must be funded adequately.

But I was thinking that the economic downturn could be just the thing for libraries to use as a springboard to make their case to the American public:
1. We are a vital city service--as important as electricity or clean water.
2. Use us in good times and in bad.
3. We welcome ALL the people of the community here for technology access.
4. Hope lives here, at the library. Hope for improvement.

When all the headlines you see are about closing doors and belt-tightening, we can stand out from all the bad news: our doors are open, we are the place to come for education, entertainment, information...basically we are the place to come when you want to hope for a better life.

Is this realistic or am I just searching for a way out of all the bad news headlines?
Happy National Library Week.

Why Intellectual Freedom Still Matters

Maybe I'm the last person on earth to twig to this controversy, but this week, I had my pride in librarianship refreshed.

Gloria Won, a librarian at University of California at San Francisco medical center, discovered that Popline, a federally-funded health information database housed at Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health was ignoring keyword searches using the word abortion. (Ironically, Popline bills itself as "Your connection to the world's reproductive health literature.") She contacted the database's manager, who confirmed that this had been done to comply with an interpretation of federal rules about making information about abortion available through federally-funded sources.

After the story went public, the dean of the Bloomberg School quickly changed the policy, recognizing that this was an overinterpretation of the rules.

No matter whether you are pro-choice or pro-life, access to information that makes your case and can potentially save lives is vital. Calling out a stupid, misguided and ill-advised policy that limits this access is part of long tradition of librarians fighting for intellectual freedom. I salute Ms. Won for her actions, and hope that we can all embody her attitude in our work.

The Human Touch---in Wired?

Wired magazine features nine "Wired Business Trends 2008" in April. Number 9 is called "The Human Touch: Algorithms are terrific, but to search smarter, find a person." The article is specifically about websites such as Brijit, which publishes summaries of 125 magazine and newspaper articles and audio and video programs daily, rating and classifying them so readers can quickly decide what's relevant; Mahalo, a "human powered search engine" that hires freelancers to compile search results; ChaCha, which offers live guidance on analyzing results; and Squidoo, which allows users to create their own pages on specific topics of interest.

These sites leverage the amazing abundance of the web to allow personality and individuality to emerge. So where are libraries in all this? Is there a way we can begin to capitalize on the fact that the web magnifies the importance of personalization? Why do we keep the vast majority of our services on such an impersonal level? The old verities simply don't hold water any more.

prediction markets

Hey look! I'm blogging!

There's a special section in the NY Times today on technology innovation. The cover story is about prediction markets and their usefulness for business decision-making. Something about it unsettled me, at first, but then I started thinking about the possible applications a little closer to home. What if we could use such a tool to help direct the features we choose to build at WebJunction for our members there - it's a smallish set of the library profession (30K members, 70K visitors a month) or even help direct decision-making at OCLC with the wisdom of the membership of our vast, global cooperative. Would you make "bets" on what's coming and what's next if you could win an iPod? It has such a lovely tone of fun and gaming that I think people might actually 'play'.

I'd love to hear if anyone knows of any library-related application of prediction markets *in libraries*. If our patrons could bet on the future of the library - where would that be?

Flickr has video!

Oh, I am so excited about Videos on Flickr. Not that YouTube doesn't cut the mustard, but I've had trouble uploading a few things to YouTube.

Plus I do prefer Flickr's more visually pleasing, clean interface. (90 seconds or less...this is microcontent at it's finest!)

Mr. Sustainability

This morning among other stalling tactics I have been practicing while I stubbornly resist finishing my now-overdue article for NextSpace, I scanned the interesting articles in the latest two print magazines to hit my desk: American Libraries and Governing. Both had cover stories on environmental topics, which was not surprising as Earth Day is in April, spring is finally coming, etc.

So after I mopped up the drool from all the great green library architecture featured this month, I flipped over to Governing, to see that Fayetteville, AR has hired a person to help them be greener in the city government. And the guy has become known as Mr. Sustainability. AND he's all of 30 years old. How cool is that?! Nice that he's gotten some recognition for his work, and I hope it inspires some of us to be greener in our workplaces, too. Do you turn your monitor off at night? Flip the lights out? Walk occasionally, instead of always riding the elevator?

It strikes me that libraries are part of a not-so-big, green lifestyle by implicit design: you don't need to own the book in order to read it, absorb its knowledge and share it with others.

May be we should start capitalizing on our built-in green-ness, in addition to our beautiful new LEED-certified buildings. Can you appoint a Mr. (or Ms.) Sustainability for your staff? Or maybe it's a rotating distinction, that different staff members (or a volunteer!) wears for a couple of weeks, notes behaviors, and then suggests easy changes.

If you have a cotton/canvas library bag available for sale, why not team up with local grocery stores and make you bag available for purchase at the grocery store check-out? Whole Foods is aiming to be plastic-bag free by Earth Day. If they can do it, so can your grocery.

April Show-ers

April is a busy month for conferences and other events, so all of the library highwaymen and highwaywomen are loosed. OK, I'm not as busy as the guys from Unshelved, but here's where I'll be in April:

April 4, webcast for Infopeople in Cupertino, CA, with Joan Frye Williams (Fixed the "P," per Mia)
April 17, Library of Virginia, Richomond
April 22, Oklahoma Library Association Annual Conference, Tulsa
April 24, Kentucky Library Association, Academic Library Section, Cumberland Gap State Park
April 30, "From Center City to the Exurbs: Trends in Public Library Realities," Columbus

The webcast is limited to California viewers on Friday, but it will be archived the following week.

I like that last one in Columbus; any program I don't have to fly to seems like a vacation.

I'm also hosting the annual OCLC talent show (a blatant takeoff on American Idol) in April, but we sure don't open that one up for the public!

The Lost Podcast

Many of you who read this blog know that Joan Frye Williams and I do a regular podcast on library issues called "Thinking Out Loud." The backfile is available here.

So why has this previously unreleased entry suddenly appeared on a totally different web site with no attribution? If anyone figures out what's going on, I hope you will a.) tell me; and b.) enjoy your day.

PLA: A Long Summary

Joey Rodger, the former Executive Director of the Public Library Association and President of the Urban Libraries Council, used to refer to library conferences as being like Brigadoon. All of a sudden, a whole community appears out of nowhere, flourishes for a few golden days, and then disappears back into the mists. This year's PLA National Conference was a perfect example of her wonderful simile.

The conference attracted nearly 10,000 people to a cold but sunny Minneapolis, and for the most part, I think nearly all of them went away pleased by their experience. There was a well-crafted selection of breakout sessions, a large and varied exhibit hall, and simply the best wrap-up speaker I've ever heard in my career. Just a few examples:

Thursday morning, I attended "The Game Studio: 21st Century Technologies for 21st Century Teens." The Minneapolis Public Library created a Teen Tech Squad, a cadre of young people, age 14 or so, who were carefully trained in helping people (adults as well as peers) learn about technology. According to Christy Mulligan, the Teen Central Librarian, the program was about "broadening the spectrum of opportunity...to build skills and assets that are going to make (participants) contributors to our community." The Tech Squad Members then worked in the Game Studio, helping their peers create and share their own online games. The best part of the program was the contribution made by the three Teen Squad Members who spoke; these are funny, well-spoken, and knowledgeable people who would do credit to any library. (Full disclosure: I serve on an advisory panel for the Minneapolis Public Library in an IMLS grant proposal to take the Game Studio program nationwide as a means of improving 21st century skills.)

On Friday afternoon, there was a good presentation on the new approaches to reference service that the Columbus Metropolitan Library is taking. The title alone tells you what they have in mind: "Off Your Seat and On Your Feet!" The idea is to get staff people circulating in their branch facilities, to help where the people are, instead of sitting back and waiting for the customers (their word) to come to a service desk. Jodi Lee is a delightful and engaging presenter, and she and her co-presenter, a somewhat more laid back Christopher Korenowsky, handled the many questions with aplomb. Most of the questions, unfortunately, seemed to fall into the category of "here's why we couldn't do this at our place," but Jodi and Christopher never missed a beat, nor did they back down. Well done!

Saturday, I got to hear WebJunction's own Michael Porter talk on a panel with two other speakers about coping with new technologies. Since Michael seems to be adept at every technology from Model T Fords to the next generation of robotics, he was a good choice. His bright, self-deprecating manner and his excellent graphics choices show why he's an in-demand speaker on the library circuit. Kudos to the other speakers, Janie Hermann and Stephanie Gerding, for matching Michael stride for stride.

I promised not to do any more shameless huckstering for the program I did with Joan Frye Williams, but why not? There were 300+ people in the room (at 8:30 on Saturday morning), there were a ton of questions in the Q-and-A, and I'll be posting the revised slides to the PLA web site shortly.

There were hundreds of exhibitors. I was especially impressed by two exhibitors that I probably can't mention by name here. One showed an amazing new microfilm to computer file converter. It can move 25 images a minute from roll film to jpg, pdf, or other image formats. The other exhibitor is a not-for-profit group that is creating online training programs to help elders (their term) learn how to use computers.

The WebJunction reception has been written about over at Blog Junction, so I won't go into that here, except to say that it's always great to see so many of my WJ friends and colleagues in one big room.

Paula Poundstone was the closing speaker for the conference. I don't know why she got to substitute for the announced speaker, but the gods of conference planning were certainly smiling upon us when this substitution was made. (Think of Lou Gehrig coming in to replace Wally Pipp in the Yankees line up in 1925, and you get the idea.) Paula came out and asked what seemed to be an innocuous question about the PLA conference, and just like that she was on her way. From the eliteness of having a "public" library conference ("I'm sorry, but you can't come in here. This is for the public."), to why we have to meet so often ("Librarians meet? Why? And you have to have minutes? Oh, my God..."), to the deeply puzzling reasons behind our ambivalence about the Dewey Decimal System ("You love the books, but you hate the way they're organized. Life must be hell for you!"), she skewered sacred cows with the abandon of a four year old. For years, the late, lamented Molly Ivins was my ultimate conference speaker; now, I gleefully award the crown to Paula Poundstone!

National Library Week in South Africa

Meant to post about this a couple of weeks ago (ahem!) but better late than never. I was so cheered to hear that OCLC's latest advocacy ad subject, Neal Petersen, was picked up and used in South Africa for National Library Week 2008. I was looking around quickly for other national library week celebrations from other countries...anyone know where a good list might be?

In like a lion, out like a polar bear

Isn't that the saying for the month of March? Seems like it should be, up here. It's been snowing on and off all day. But yesterday all the high school kids were out in shorts, running for the track team. "Spring" is a relative term, I guess.

I've been away in lovely North Carolina. We visited friends and basically enjoyed ourselves for a full week. And before that, had my mother-in-law up for a visit. Lesson learned: give yourself a day or two between having guests visit you and leaving to go be a guest yourself. All those little things like laundry and packing and eating up all the perishable food can be a real pain when you're trying to entertain. (Even though my mother-in-law is about as easy-going as anyone I've ever met...she was a good sport about all of it.)

We visited the Davidson, NC library. Very cute. Little. Beautifully windowed, light and airy. Nestled in the middle of the town green, right across from a hipster coffee shop and a soda fountain that is vintage 1950's Americana, it's now a branch of the Charlotte and Mecklenburg County system. Very cool. Everyone in Davidson was watching the NCAA Tournament, it seems. That or waiting for the Easter bunny.

On an unrelated note--I saw that there's a company doing a road show for their downloadable audiobooks. It sounds like they're basically tricking out a big truck and driving around to cities, to help make sure people know how to use the online resources the libraries have purchased for their communities. This is a great idea! The library gets some free publicity about how up-to-date they are, users gain a better understanding of the new technology, and staff can basically enjoy the circus (or so it sounds...). Someone in one of those cities, you'll have to let us know how it goes! (OR someone get the scoop at PLA.)

Speaking of PLA...did anyone see John Wood? Was he as awesome as I would expect?

"It Ain't Necessarily So:" The Trailer!

If you want to get a sense of what Joan Frye Williams and I will be presenting at the PLA conference next Saturday, March 29, from 8:30 to 9:45 am in room M101 of the Minneapolis Convention Center, you can find an abbreviated set of our slides on the PLA handouts page.

And I promise this is the last shameless plug for our program!

WebJunction Welcomes Bloggers to PLA Reception

Hey, library bloggers---

If you're attending the PLA Conference in Minneapolis next week, please consider yourself invited to the WebJunction Member Reception on Thursday, March 27, from 5:30 to 8:00 pm at the Hyatt Regency.

I hope to see you there, and maybe even at my program with Joan Frye Williams, "It Ain't Necessarily So: Challenging the Assumptions of Legacy Librarianship" on Saturday morning at 8:30 am (gulp) in room M101 of the convention center.

Hulu is here

If you're a TV, movie or a YouTube junkie, now there's a new place for video content: Hulu.com.

There's not a *ton* of content here yet--but scanning through I saw enough Simpsons, Saturday Night Live and House clips to make for some fun doodling over the weekend. Not to mention the smattering of full-length movies.

I wonder if you could write a little script to capture the metadata for each episode and list it (like a journal article) in WorldCat or your local catalog, so the user could find it, click and get right to the content. It doesn't sound that hard.

That usually means it's next to impossible...

Rewire your Life Day

But whoops, we already missed it. Rewire your Life Day was yesterday, according to a Michigan State University professor, Ellen Ernst Kossek.

But contrary to what it sounds like (take a day to sort through all the old chargers, USB cables, hard drive folders, and straighten out your iTunes to mobile phone synch, once and for all...), she's saying to take a break from your iLife and switch everything off.

Go to lunch with a friend, talk face to face, etc.

Maybe I have the crackberry addition, because it feels almost the equivalent of saying, "This is a pencil free day," because your hand needs a break from all this writing it does.

Almost, but not quite. And looking through Kossek's Work-Life Web site, I am drawn in. The CEO of Me sounds appealing. Okay, I am changing my mind about this crazy person who is proposing I stop blogging e-mailing chatting texting powerpointing videoing for a day....

Now, can I get that title in an eBook, so I can read sections of it to my lunch friend?

Setting aside the fact that it would promote the wrong brand message for your library (a connected, totally wired space for the future)...what do you think of Rewire Your Life Day, as a personal empowerment strategy?

Our hearts go out to Jerusalem mourners

[Note: this is not a political post.]

I am reminded of the bit in the Charles Stanford work (sorry Dr. Delcamp--I don't remember which one!), "Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem."

The news yesterday would have been a passing blip on the radio, had they not included that the shootings happened in the library. For some reason, that factoid reverberated right down to the pit of my stomach.

I will not urge you to beef up security. I will not urge you to create an emergency evacuation plan. (Although both of those things would probably be smart undertakings.)

I urge you to set aside time today to reflect on how much we all take the sanctity of the library for granted. As if somehow, whether we have vast expanses of steel and glass, quiet nooks of burnished copper and dark-stained wood, or simply plastic chairs and some makeshift computer tables--somehow, being in the library makes us immune to danger.

And then pray for peace throughout troubled lands.

Trendspotting and PLA

The round of spring conferences is starting to gear up.

A week from Friday, March 14, I'll be speaking at the Connecticut Library Consortium's third Trendspotting conference at the University of Hartford. My title is "Unlocking the Walled Garden," and will focus on how libraries can move content into the public sphere more effectively, including through the use of open source software.

Joan Frye Williams and I will present "It Ain't Necessarily So: Challenging the Assumptions of Legacy Librarianship" at the Public Library Association conference. This program will begin at 8:30 am on Saturday, March 29 in room M101 of the Minneapolis Convention Center. (Believe me, we didn't pick the time!)

I hope to see you at one of these events, or at one of the four programs that I'm speaking at during April.