I’m following 51 people on Twitter. Today one of them “tweeted” that it was Shawerma Wednesday at Shaherazad, our local mediterrenean restaurant. I love Shawerma Wednesday, but I’d forgotten all about it.

When I signed up for Twitter it was an experiment. I looked for everyone at MSU and in Starkville–there weren’t many–and “followed” all of them. And then they “followed” me. I started getting updates about when exams were happening (and what people were doing to de-stress!). Then MPBOnline and the Clarion Ledger started following me. Mississippi Public Broadcasting is doing some pretty cool things, it turns out.

Then I went to ALA in Anaheim this year and found some friends to follow there. I roomed with warmaiden who was hooked in with lots of cool library-type twitterers. So now I’m following folks that are doing really interesting emerging technology library-type things. And they twitter about them. It turns out you can get a lot of information–or at least a tiny url–into the 140 character micro-blogging limit.

Now I get updates on emerging technologies, news from public radio in Mississippi, along with a peek inside the undergraduate’s mind. And I got my shawerma today for lunch for just $3.50 thanks to willbryantplz.

So now I have to figure out if it can work for our library. What kind of information would people want who are following a library’s tweets? Who would be following them? Or would it just be an RSS feed we could put on our site somewhere with updates? The Clarion Ledger and UIUC Undergrad Library both do that. But what would our patrons want to know? Here’s a list of potentially good information:

1. When anything is closing early or closed for a holiday, etc.
2. When the network is down.
3. When we have an event in the library (?).
4. When we have an interesting workshop in the library (?).
5. When we post pictures on Flickr (?).
6. When printers are down or other equipment.
7. News at the library.
8. When podcasts are released.
9. Major new resources/databases at the library.
10. New blog entries?
11. Hmmm…?

Next…who would keep up with it?

Amanda

This is me furiously blogging as Cindi Trainor talked about her experience with implementing LibGuides at Eastern Kentucky University Libraries, where she is the Coordinator for Research and Instructional Services. I hadn’t watched the Vimeo Presentation yet (all the BIGWIG presentations were recorded in advance–the meeting was just to ask questions, etc.–very cool), but I had lots of questions since MSU is in the process of implementing LibGuides.

Here are my notes from that session:

GENERAL INFORMATION:

• LibGuides is a tool that is being used to create dynamic subject pages for libraries. Using LibGuides it is possible to pull together content from many sources, including RSS from aggregators like Google Reader, Bloglines, or del.icio.us, making the content dynamic. Librarians are able to easily insert links to recently created and/or updated sites.
• LibGuides are built by assembling functional boxes. Some boxes can be created to have dynamic content that users can contribute to, adding comments or starring reviews for database links [WOW!]. It is possible to imbed links to any LibGuides page in other websites (including course management software!), as well as build links to jump to certain portions of the page. Additionally, LibGuides generates tagclouds which can also be embedded on other sites or tagclouds can be imported from del.icio.us.

IMPLEMENTATIONS:

• Scottsdale Community College is using LibGuides as it’s entire library interface.
• Eastern Kentucky University Libraries are also using it for other purposes or topics like “Copyright Basics.”
• Tagcloud (tags done by librarians in LibGuides) – didn’t work well at EKU because librarians were creating their own tags—they are working on creating a taxonomy so that the tag cloud will be an effective search tool.
• Several libraries have put a picture of a librarian on the main page which changes when refreshed—gives a sense of the library community for the user.
• EKU is creating course guides—it was suggested that they be attached to related subject guides, so that a student would have access to general information as well by linking to the guide. It is possible to link directed directly to the subject or course tab.
• According to Cindi, it is easy to generate statistics. Stats can be exported into excel, and it is possible to see stats on how many hits specific links are getting.
• Cindi reported display issues in IE6 on Windows
• Cindi (and others) reported that the developers are responsive to suggestions from librarians.

SUGGESTIONS:

• For implementation it was suggested that libraries create template guides for librarians to use (also to make guides somewhat uniform). It is very easy to take content from one guide and copy or move it to another guide, so standardized guides are useful for staff and can include pre-formatted boxes and canned content (videos, lists, etc.).
• Some libraries have made LibGuides about how to create LibGuides for staff. In some implementations of LibGuides they have done live training sessions, then supplemented with the how-to guides.

FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS:

• LibGuides is supposedly working on link-checkers, but right now content creators must check their own links.
• It is not currently possible to subscribe to a LibGuide via RSS–it would give too many updates if the guides were modified slightly. It may be something that could happen in the future.

Originally posted July 7, 2008.

Virtual Reference is a hot topic at ALA this week–maybe because I keep going to meetings about VR, lol… And the big news (which I have been spreading!) is about libraryh3lp–an open source meebo being developed by North Carolina librarians. It’s in beta right now, but UNC Chapel Hill and Baylor (among others) are using it. I met Ellen Hampton, the E-Learning Librarian at Baylor and got a look at the back-end. It’s Java-based and allows queuing sessions, multiple accounts (so you could transfer IM sessions to Circ or ILL if they wanted to have IM) and it’s an aggregator (like Meebo) for all your Instant Messengers. And, like Meebo, it’s got a widget you can put anywhere. Unlike Meebo, it’s ADA Compliant (!) and it has the ability to pop out of the browser so patrons can CHAT while searching without losing the session. You can also send files and patrons can have the transcript emailed to them. They are currently working for a way to integrate it into Facebook, too.

It looks really exciting, but still in early stages. Ellen has requested that they have a way to download IM sessions in batches (currently they are stored online individually), and they are also working on statistics. It’s being developed by Pam Sessoms, a librarian at Chapel Hill, and her husband, who is a programmer. You can host it for free on their servers, too…or download the code.

Again, it’s still in Beta, but it’s worth taking a look at. They’ve got a wiki and a blog that I’ve been following…

The consensus seems to be this is one to watch. They are still in development, but there hasn’t been an IM solution designed for libraries–and we need one.

What do you think? Is anyone beta-testing it? Pros/Cons??

Originally posted June 30, 2008.