Week 3 Case Study Comments and soooo much more ;)

I really liked the layout/organization of the Darien Library Blogs.  I found it easy to navigate, appreciated the “Latest Post” note underneath the Blog title, and the listing of each blog which was specific to a service, etc.  I had a look at the Darien Library Directors Blog and thought it was an excellent way for the busy directors to communicate directly with the public, making themselves more accessible to more people in the community.  It was timely, as blogs should be, and there was even a post that went up minutes after a morning meeting, followed by a comment moments later.  While it looked like it was used most often by the internal library staff as a forum of communication with the director it is accessible to anyone.  I found it a bit difficult to initially identify who was talking but was able to figure it out after clicking on a comment.  The only critique I’d make here is to make it clear who is posting, even if the audience is made up mostly of people who know you, there is a good chance someone like me or the general public may want to know who’s talking without digging.  Harping a bit on the Darien Library blog I have to say I enjoyed the way they used it to track, or in their own words Chronicle the progress towards a new Darien Library.  Though there were not many comments the option was there, and of the few comments some were humorous (I wonder if they’re moderated). 

I looked at each case in the order they were posted and the first thought I had when I got to the Garfield County Public Library blog was WOW that’s long, you scroll forever to get to the bottom!  The next thought I had was WOW so is mine!  So I’m going to get going on using my categories better and make sure that the posts are getting archived once the main page gets too long!  Okay back to
Garfield, I can’t say this blog did much for me.  It wasn’t clear to me until after I read the first few postings that we are dealing with an internal blog for staff members, I’m probably a little slow on the uptake and it may have been clear to everyone else, but it wasn’t to me L  I think the crazy amounts of scrolling you had to do to see everything on the main page was too much and overwhelming.  Can’t say I enjoyed this one.

However, I did enjoy the Lamson Library catalog of books and more.  While it suggested that it was underdevelopment I was thoroughly impressed.  If all catalogues were this fun more people would use them   I loved the reader reviews of the books, it was like Amazon without Amazon. The “find more like this” option and the “most popular” list made this a lot of fun and easy to spend more time than you planned on it.  I look forward to seeing how more libraries use this idea in the “next generation of library blogs”.

Okay they seem to get better and better (maybe they were intentionally ordered this way Amanda? )  I love the way the MabryOnline.org blogs are used to put students, parents, and teachers in contact.  I remember when the only way my parents got to talk to my teacher was on parent-teacher night and when I was in trouble and I can’t tell you how many nights we’d return from school, and when our parents asked you what you did you’d reply “nothing”.  With ever increasing home internet access this seems like a fantastic way to keep parents informed about what’s going on in the classroom, not to mention the ability to communicate in an open forum with the teacher and other parents on current issues as well as what’s happening in the classroom.

This is getting super long so I’ll be brief with the last two (oh the irony!).  St. Joseph County Public Library Gameblog was totally unexpected for a library, I know that sounds terrible coming form a librarian, but lets face it this is just too cool! I think this is definitely an innovative new way to bring the teens and the “tweens” back to the library scene, though it is a totally different capacity than expected.  It was also interesting to see that it was a multi-author blog, while I didn’t notice much difference from regular single author blogs (aside from two consistent voices).  So far my thoughts on multi-author blogs is that it is a fine idea so long as they authors are compatible, and I don’t mean they agree on everything.  So long as both authors follow the generally accepted “bloggers ethics” guidelines and clearly identify themselves.  Perhaps my views on multi-authors will change with further exposure to this type of blogging.  As for the VCU Libraries blog, I would chalk it up to be rather typical and practical.  Got a suggestion? Post it here, kinda stuff.  I’ll be interested to see what others have to say about this site in terms of “next generation library blogs”.

Week 3 Reading Response Continued: Ethical Blogging

Karen Schneider hears warning bells when she thinks of librarians and blog technology.  Do they really understand the new technology or is this to be the next “filtering wars” of the 90’s?  As Karen states, “the stakes are even higher, because we’re creating highly visible, globally available content.”  But maybe we don’t have to experience the “filtering wars” again, maybe all we need is a code of ethics, which for librarians should really be an extension of our existing ‘information best practices’.  As Karen suggests it is the librarians’ task to provide accurate, reliable, and unbiased information, regardless of the medium.  If we follow some common sense principles like: be conscientious of copyright (if you didn’t write it cite it or in the case of blogs link it!) and disclose the potential of all biases, and distinguish between opinions and fact, there may be hope of a future for libraries in the blogosphere.

Just a quick thought about disclosure of biases.  I got thinking about some of the articles from the first week, when we talked about learning more about yourself and your biases as you blog (I think it was another Rebecca Blood article).  What if you have biases that you are not aware of and you, unintentionally of course, project this into your blog without notifying your audience?  (Yes, I’m a tad paranoid.)  I suppose you’ll find out pretty quickly when your readers respond, but what about your “blogger reputation”? Well lucky for me I read on before I became too paranoid about my subconscious biases!  It’s so simple, when you’re wrong, ADMIT IT!  You will hurt your reputation less if you admit you were unaware of your bias, or if you change your stance, or you were down right wrong about something!  So there is always hope for saving face, so long as you blog ethically!  Okay so now we know how to save face, but how can we avoid the need to save face whenever possible?  Well, Rebecca Blood is so smart because she suggests writing each post as if it couldn’t be changed!  Imagine that, don’t treat it as “just a blog” like Schneider warns against, treat it as a final draft, don’t post it unless you are sure you won’t want to change it, and like Blood suggests don’t be sneaky either, don’t just go in and change a past post because you changed your mind, own up, fess up, talk about it in a new post!  That’s what these things are for right, conversation, and intellectual growth?

On another note, I was sad to find the cyberjournalist.net site was temporarily unavailable by the time I got to it.  Not only was it a posted reading but it was also a recommend link from Schnieders article L  Guess we’ll have to just keep watching to see when it is up again.

Last note for this post I swear!  I just finished reading the “Why and How to Use Blogs to Promote Your Library’s Services” article and it emphasizes in a number of places the importance of brevitiy for a library blog.  Haha it made me giggle because I just realized I an not going to be the worlds best blogger since brevity is something I’ve yet to master