Twitter Takeover: @VoicesLibrary

Guest post by Shona Thoma (@shinyshona), MLIS student UCD SILS, 2012-13

I read recently that to describe Twitter as ‘social media’ along with applications such as Facebook, is to vastly underestimate its power – and I would have to agree. Twitter is having a huge impact on the way that we exchange information, and I recently had the opportunity to experience this on a larger scale than I normally would with my personal account. I took over the Twitter account @VoicesLibrary, which is a Rotation Curation account, voiced by a new library professional each week. This was the first time that a Library and Information Studies student had curated the account, but given the interest in LIS courses and qualifications, Jo at Voices for the Library agreed that Tweets from a current student would be welcome.

As a student currently looking towards the jobs market I was interested in what working librarians had to say about the use of LIS qualifications in their current roles. I posed questions relating to this throughout the week and the wide community of information professionals following the account offered their views. Some felt that it was just a necessity, adding extra letters after their name. Others spoke about both the practical and theoretical lessons they were glad they had learnt. Looking at the responses would seem to confirm that as with most things in life, you get out as much as you are willing to put in. I don't know if I would ever have the opportunity to speak with people from such a broad spread of places about this in 'real' life. In addition, the succinct nature of Twitter can possibly attracted more contributors to a discussion as people don’t feel they need to expand on their point or get bogged down in detail. Ideas and opinions are quickly shared, making it an ideal breeding ground for further investigation.

In addition to exchanging information and ideas, I realised that Twitter is really useful for gauging the reactions people might have to topics. I shared an article about library marketing, which led to a debate on ‘marketing’ vs. ‘promotion’ as appropriate terms. It was interesting to see that people had quite strong opinions on terminology alone, let alone carrying it out. In relation to measuring reaction, Bitly proved to be really useful tool. You can input any web address to Bitly and it will make it shorter, thus saving characters; but it wasn't just space saving I found it useful for - it also records how many people visit the links you share. Not everyone will reply to a tweet, but via Bitly I could see that people were clicking through to the articles I shared.

Although followed by an international audience the @VoicesLibrary account is focused mainly on the UK. I think it would be fantastic to see a similar rotation curation account for Irish Information Professionals, promoting all aspects of what we do. It would be fantastic as a way of strengthening the librarianship network, and ideally would attract interest from non-librarians too!

*Guest blog posts represent the personal views of the poster and do not represent the official opinions or commentary of libfocus.com

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Social Media Strategies for Libraries

Following some recent talks I have given on Twitter, several people have asked me how they can use Twitter and other social media tools to really engage and connect with their user communities. Good question! It's difficult to do well, and difficult to do right.

I would also go as far as to say, if you aren't going to use these tools effectively, it might be better not to use them at all. There is possibly nothing worse than an inactive Twitter account or one that is used solely to broadcast one-way information. What's the point? Ask yourself, why are you using? Is it just because you feel you have to (well all the libraries are doing it now so....) or because you actually believe it can deliver value to your users and ultimately improve and enhance service delivery?

So what can you use these tools for and how can you 'justify' their usage to management? I am speaking mainly in the context of Twitter as it is the tool I believe is most important right now. But what should you tweet? Twitter is a great opportunity to promote your events and services to a captive audience. If people are following you on Twitter it means they are already tuned-in to some extent at any rate. Actively seek out those who may be interested in your service and follow them (not just users, but potential collaborators, competitors and so on). This is how you can build your network.

Twitter can also be a really valuable customer service tool. I think libraries should encourage its use in this way, as many commercial companies already do. Many users may tweet about problems or other feedback, rather than sending more formal complaints. However, this kind of informal feedback can be so valuable in informing and improving service delivery and enhancing your users' experience. Twitter can also help to build your reputation and virtual presence, show your followers that you understand and embrace new technologies, engage your users and strengthen relationships

You should always be thinking about your social media strategy and how you are using these tools in terms of your overall service. Some strategies to keep in mind include:

Innovation - be the first to do something, experiment, use Twitter as a testing ground for new ideas and services, investigate the potential for new services like virtual reference, collaborate with other departments by promoting their research through Twitter.

Streamlining and Integration - libraries have so many access points, services and resources today. Just like with discovery services, tools are generally more successful if they are integrated with overall service delivery. Don't think in isolation; your Twitter account should not be seen as something standalone. You should be displaying your tweet feed on your website to increase its visibility to your users. Focus on one tool if you have to and do it well. Always think of the user experience!

Be Proactive - share information that is of real value to your users by anticipating their needs. This will keep them interested. Initiate conversations; don't expect them to come to you. Show faculty the value of concepts like altmetrics before they start asking you about them.

There are obvious things you can tweet about: library events; new titles and acquisitions (why don't libraries do this more?); solicit recommendations/requests from followers; links to useful external and internal resources; obtain feedback (and don't censor negative comments, address them!). You always need to think of social media and networking tools in terms of building relationships with your users; if you forget this, it won't work.

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2013 Horizon Report

The latest edition of the Horizon report was unleashed on the wider public last month which, as every year, represents a forecast about technological developments that are likely to mainstream in teaching, learning and research within the context of higher education.

This year, six trends were prioritised according to three distinct time-do-adoption horizons that cover a total of five years. The report introduces each topic by definition including its particular relevance in teaching and learning. This is followed by a brief discussion (which very much represents the most beneficial aspect of the report) and specific examples, i.e. how the particular technology is already used. An annotated list of suggested readings concludes each area.

Time-to-adoption horizon: One Year or Less 
Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCS)
Over the past year, MOOCS have gained massive traction in terms of public awareness. They’re free of charge and generally of high quality reaching thousands of learners who engage with them in a suspended time- and space continuum. The crux here is that the MOOCS model combines and leverages a mix of pedagogies and learning tools through blended learning, open education resources and crowd sourced interaction. Presently, Coursera, edX and Udacity are the main operators out there.

Tablet Computing
Tablets are distinct from smartphones, e-readers or tablet PCs. They are intuitive in their functionality and lend themselves quite well to teaching and learning environments due to their portability and variability. Check out "How a classroom of IPads Changed My Approach to Learning".

Time-to-adoption horizon: Two to Three Years
Games and Gamification
Recreational interactive games have proven themselves to increase critical thinking, creative problem-solving, and teamwork. The same skills are required in the education setting. A working example would be the game "10 Downing Street", which simulates economic policy making. A library example would be the HML-IQ Library Orientation Game.

Learning Analytics
The idea here is to tap into large student-related data sets (e.g. derived from student information systems and course management systems via sophisticated tracking tools) in order to build better pedagogies, target at-risk student populations and provide more personalised learning experiences. An example here would be the Open Learning Initiative at Carnegie Mellon.

Time-to-adoption horizon: Four to Five Years
3D Printing
This refers to the creation of physical objects from three-dimensional digital content (e.g. compute aided tomography (CAT), computer-aided design (CAD) and X-ray crystallography). Its potential rests in "a more authentic exploration of objects that may not be readily available to universities" (Horizon Report, 2013: 29). An example would be the field of Architecture and Design.

Wearable Technology
This represents devices that "integrate naturally" with its carrier (person). Google's Project Glass would be a well-publicised example. Another interesting example is the Robotic Suit that supports its wearer when carrying out physically demanding tasks.

Make sure to check out the Horizon Project Navigator; the site refers to a variety of specific projects and examples that exploit emerging technologies.

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Open Access LIS Journals

I'm fortunate that I work in an academic library that has a great selection of subscriptions to LIS journals. However, those working as solo librarians or in smaller, special libraries may not have access to such resources. Thankfully there are some great open access journals out there. Below are just a few that I read frequently myself, I would also recommend submitting your own research to them also - keep it open so everyone can read it :)

As an aside I really recommend journal tocs for managing your TOC alerts. There are 242 LIS journals included in the service and it specifically highlights those that are open access also.

Journal of Information Literacy
Evidence Based Library & Information Practice
College & Research Libraries
Library & Information Research
Information Research
Journal of the MLA
Journal of Librarianship & Scholarly Communication
Journal of Library Innovation
SCONUL Focus


If there are any I have missed, please do add a comment! It's unfortunate we don't have an Irish OA LIS journal. I wonder if An Leabharlann will consider making research articles (not necessarily the whole publication) available on an OA basis when they go online? I know that authors can self-archive, but not all LIS professionals have access to an institutional repository for archival purposes.

The research-practitioner divide in LIS is lessening I feel, and I think most of the above titles do a good job of eroding any such differences. Good articles with good results are worth publishing; it doesn't matter whether they primarily address theoretical aspects or issues for practice. However, LIS journals have not traditionally had as prestigious a reputation as other fields (I always say, there's no NEJM in LIS!). This makes journal rankings and impact factors even less relevant (or even meaningless) in LIS than other fields in my view. Instead, I think who your intended audience is, should probably drive where you publish, and by publishing OA you can ensure than everyone you are targeting can potentially read your work. There is an interesting paper from 2012 that explores the position of OA titles in a ranking of LIS journals by Jingfeng Xia which is also worth a look!

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#irelibchat summary - Publishing & Presenting Research in LIS - 12th March 2013

Don't be afraid to share your work! (Photo by Rusavia)

Many thanks to all who participated in a *very* busy #irelibchat with several hundred tweets on the night. It seems that there is real interest in undertaking and sharing research in LIS, so hopefully we will see more librarians in Ireland blogging, publishing and presenting their work in the near future.

Below is a quick round-up of some of the main threads of discussion that emerged:

There was a mix of participants from all sectors and locations (including New Zealand, Vermont and the UK - thanks guys :)) including some current library postgrad students. Several participants recommended that students should consider trying to publish their theses and capstone projects when finished as it is a great opportunity to get your work to a wider audience.

Whilst many stated that they are interested in researching and publishing, a number of challenges were raised. For instance, there was some discussion about whether LIS and other 3rd level qualifications sufficiently prepare LIS professionals to undertake research in the field. This was just one of the barriers mentioned, along with time pressures, a lack of confidence in research skills, and uncertainty as to whether people would be interested in reading your work (i.e. the feeling of "do I have anything worth researching?").

There was a lot of discussion about what kind of research LIS professionals should be publishing and where they can publish, and most agreed that blogs, newsletters, case studies and other less formal formats can be a great way of starting to share your work and ideas. The importance of conferences was also highlighted:  "Different publication types have different outcomes (often). Conferences are sometimes the best/quickest way to get your msg [message] out" - @acarbery. Indeed, the growth in live tweeting and blogging from conferences now has increased their potential impact significantly:  "The immediacy of conferences is astounding, especially if tweeted and blogged - and leads to a lot of interesting work" - @AnneMurphyAnne. Book reviews were also mentioned as a useful gateway into publishing (@ajwillemse91)

Several advantages of publishing were discussed also. Aside from sharing information and improving service delivery, it can be valuable for opening up career opportunities, and "can go a long way to building credibility with faculty". There was also discussion about whether we should be publishing exclusively in Open Access publications, as it seems many still publish in subscription journals. This raised the issue of creating a new Irish OA LIS journal - a great idea, and one worth considering. In fact a number of people also expressed a desire to see more Irish-based research published: "I would love to see more Irish-centric research published. So hard to find Irish examples in the literature"- @JenbearDublin). The journal Evidence Based Library and Information Practice joined in and said "we love the Irish here at EBLIP! Send us more of your work!"

So the message is clear, get out there and share your work with others - publish, present, blog!

Three "librarians as authors" - including myself - will be speaking at next month's LAI HSLG conference in Dublin (#hslg2013) conference in Dublin - a great opportunity to hear more about how you can publish your work in peer-reviewed journals.

Some useful resources mentioned by participants included Helen Fallon's (NUIM) excellent blog, Academic Writing Librarian and A Library Writer's Blog.

We always welcome guest blog posts (on any LIS-related topic of your choice!) here at Libfocus - simply drop us an email at libfocusguestpost [at] gmail.com.

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Taking Libraries to Wikipedia / Wikipedia to Libraries

Guest Post by Gerard Gregory 

Wikipedia is very open about its lack of credibility as an authoritative source. Libraries sing from the same hymn sheet, but in doing so often seem to unnecessarily distance themselves from or appear antagonistic towards the resource. The reality is that libraries and Wikipedia share very similar goals around providing public access to content. Wikipedia presents real opportunities for Irish libraries, and new developments in the world of Wikipedia could potentially increase the level of public engagement with library collections. They could also help improve basic research skills and even provide professional development prospects for unemployed graduates who might be locked in the unforgiving cycle of being unable to get a job without relevant experience.

John Mark Ockerbloom, a digital library architect and planner at the University of Pennsylvania. has developed an experimental service for Wikipedia pages called Forward to Libraries that allows you to click from a Wikipedia article to related resources on a library catalogue. The “Resources in your library” links will perform a keyword or an author search of the library catalogue of your choice using authority-controlled headings. Users can register their preferred library (which will set a cookie in their browser recording that choice), or select it for each individual search. The documentation for the Library resources box template is online. From a user’s perspective the registration feature would benefit if it was more like the Library Links option in Google Scholar which personalises your Scholar results much more seamlessly and links to up to five library collections, but on the whole this addition to Wikipedia is a really innovative way of connecting the hundreds of millions of people who consult Wikipedia every month to libraries. It might still be in an experimental stage but the opportunities for Irish libraries are quite clear. Once a library is registered people in the locality will be able to link to the library catalogue from a Wikipedia page of interest. Onsite or on-campus browsers could pre-install the cookie and default to the library when a user follows one of the links.

The Forward to Libraries project is not the only project that connects Wikipedia with libraries. The GLAM-WIKI project introduced the idea of the Wikipedian in Residence. GLAM stands for Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums but the project also incorporates other cultural institutions such as theatres, zoos, botanical gardens, public broadcasters etc. A Wikipedian in Residence is a person who dedicates time to working in-house at an organisation and, amongst other things, facilitates content improvement in partnership with the organisation and the Wikipedia communities. In their profile of the work undertaken by Liam Wyatt, the Wikipedian in Residence at the British Museum in 2010, The New York Times wrote that “in today’s Wikipedia there is renewed value in old-fashioned expertise, whether to provide obscure details to articles that have already been carefully edited or to find worthy topics that haven’t been written about yet”. Librarians are well positioned to offer such expertise.

A very original example of work done by Wikipedians in Residence is the VIAFbot project coordinated by the OCLC Research Wikipedian in Residence Max Klein and the British Library Wikipedian in Residence Andrew Gray. The VIAFbot linked authority file records to biographies on Wikipedia. You can see the VIAFbot at work and watch Max Klein discuss the project here. You may have already seen the Authority Control links paced at the bottom of Wikipedia articles by the VIAFbot over the last few months.

Wikipedian residencies need not be as technical as the VIAFbot project. A project could involve creating Wikipedia content to include articles on topics or items from a collection that so far have not been contributed to Wikipedia or it could involve putting Forward to Libraries links into high profile articles using either library activity data or Wikipedia statistics as a guide. You could also use the case studies from completed projects available on Wikipedia for direction. To my knowledge there have been no Wikipedians in Residence in Ireland. This means that there could be opportunities for recent graduates here to proactively develop a residency idea and try to work as interns or volunteers in any type of GLAM organisation. The British Museum residency, the very first of its kind, was self-initiated. The level of engagement with Wikipedia by high-profile organisations ought to get Irish organisations curious at least.

If traditionally the problem with Wikipedia has been its amateurism and unreliability then the inroads made by the likes of the VIAFbot project in applying authority control and the Forward to Libraries project in bringing library catalogues into articles mean that the scepticism of some librarians towards Wikipedia is becoming increasingly harder to defend. Libraries need to be where people will use them and these types of projects are really great ways of doing that.

*Guest blog posts represent the personal views of the poster and do not represent the official opinions or commentary of libfocus.com

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