Thing 21--Sudent 2.0 Tools

For the overachiever, these will be a wonder, replacing all sorts of schedule books and timelines posted on the walls of one's room, illegible notes scribbled on syllabi, and various calendric devices. If instructors go with the bit for them and librarians/libraries are brought into the picture, they have possibilities. Of course, those of us who have tried to help a student who was assured that 'every' library has a particular title the teacher demands be used might be a wee bit skeptical that the same instructors who didn't bother to check if we did are going to bother with anything else. I am wicked enough that I get a kick out of telling a kid where teach got it wrong. I always counsel silence with the pedagogue but to treasure this little bit of knowledge as a moment of superiority. The Homework Mommy will adore these, as it will make doing her kid's homework a lot simpler. If you are a working librarian you know this. If you are an administrator, academic or technophile, you will just have to take it on faith.

For those comfortable with a computerized schedule, this is a good thing. For those on another path, it is something that might come in handy some day.

Note on the cartoon: I am up to 21 and still utterly lacking in glam. At the end of 23 if I am still me, I cannot decide whether to sue for false advertising or simply diminish, go into the West, and remain Technoskeptic.

Thing 20--Books 2.0

There were over 50 sites suggested for examination. I don't do 50 of anything, so I dipped in here and there. Some made no sense, like the 'future of the book,' link, and the rest of the articles seemed to suggest we might as well burn all books now as they were as dead as the dodo. I dunno. The puff video on Kindle didn't answer the question, 'how much is that in dollars?' I admit to blowing off the telephone stuff as I have a cheap cell and no features. Several of the book sites wanted you to sign up before you looked at their stuff. No way. Others, like Book Trails probably have possibilities if you have the patience to read through all the commentary, and I don't. I have been using KDL's What's Next for years and swear by and not at it. Who would ever pay $2 per book stumper with Fiction-L and Project Wombat at one's disposal? I subscribe to both and recommend them without reservation. Online book groups and 'communities' do nothing for me. Reading a book is between the author and the reader, and letting other people in does for that relationship what Princess Diana said her husband's mistress did for her marriage--makes it a bit crowded. No, thank you. By the time I got to audio books and lit crit, I gave up with a headache and crossed eyes.

Will the computer destroy the book? I doubt it. It's too handy and requires very little effort to use. Will other formats become part of the world of the book? I certainly hope so. The recorded book, LP format, etc., certainly didn't do the plain-vanilla book any harm. If the computer and its associated technologies make it possible for more people to have access to information for both entertainment and practical use, that's fine with me. I will continue to prefer the Mark 1 carbon-based book because it can be toted and read almost anywhere with no auxiliary technological needs. But that's me. There are others like me out there, and there are others who are more comfortable with devices. Let's leave it to the readers what formats are available. The book can stand many formats.

Late-breaking observation: Interesting cartoon. I, alas, am still old, fat, homely, and dowdy. Perhaps when I have done all 23 things I will become gorgeous. Or perhaps my lack of faith will doom me to remain myself. This prospect does not devastate me.

Thing 19--Other Social Networks

Gather has a certain refreshing honesty in proclaiming it wants to bring publishers and people together. I wonder how many Gather posts booming a title originated in a corporate office not in a booklover's head? However, as long as it's all screen names and personae, we'll never know, will we? I looked at some sites that say they are interested in things I'm interested in, and they were OK, a little heavy on the feedback and a little light on the content, but aside from my concerns about stealth commercialism, not bad. However my reservations expressed previously still apply. People who function well in groups will probably love these. Those who function better alone won't. One can only hope that libraries and their administrators will recognise the difference in operating style and let the staff member choose how a task will be done and what tools will be used.

I am not group-oriented, so I doubt I'll ever use any of these sites, but it is useful to know that they exist.

Late-breaking news. I see on the BBC this morning that the UK government wants to monitor social networking sites for gang-related activities and terrorists. Read it for yourself: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7962631.stm And what happens on their side of the pond could happen tomorrow on ours--or maybe already is. Consider that next time you become somebody's "friend"--you may get some nasty guilt by association by someone who gets his information on due process from Kiefer Sutherland's writers.

Thing 18--MySpace and Facebook

I was surprised to find that I had a Facebook page until I remembered getting notices from a couple of people I know slightly that they wanted me to be their 'friend'. Since none of this required me to shoulder the burdens of a real friendship, why not? If I get excessive e-mail from anybody, he or she gets on my spam list and vanishes into the aether anyway. It was the first time I'd been on it since these people invited me, and may be the last. I am not that interested in developing online relationships with people I don't know from a hole in the ground and probably wouldn't want to know in person.

Mr. Perkiness from Commoncraft assures us that this is all networking and very valuable stuff, which will get you anything from a good job to a new house to a hot date. Maybe and maybe not. It will also allow collective wisdom to be combined for the Greater Good. Maybe and maybe not, because a lot of the 'wall' stuff I looked at was inane and uninformative. I find listservs function better for that sort of thing, but if others prefer this way, that's fine with me. It's more a matter of style than substance, and people should be free to have their own style.

Any of this useful for libraries? Looks as if some libraries have one or both kinds of pages, so it must be working for them. If they bring people into the building or bring them to databases or other library services, and the library keeps the pages current, they've served their purpose. If they aren't kept current, they're useless, but anything that isn't kept current is useless, whether it's on paper or online.

Inter-Thing Observations 2

I've gotten static about my 'attitude' towards the Things. Nobody has actually ordered me to embrace them without reservation, but it's tending that way. This is not going to happen. Some things, like podcasts, wikis, and YouTube have interesting possibilities, as does instant messaging. From what I have seen of the Things to date, some libraries have taken commercial products designed for individuals and cleverly adapted them to library purposes. If it works for them and their patrons, I am all for it.

Now for the reservations. A lot of these Things are .com, which means that a commercial entity is involved. Despite the Google motto of 'don't be evil' which has been adopted by other services, I worry. Google, after all, is complicit in internet censorship in China, possibly elsewhere. All of these .coms collect sign-up data which they supply to their advertisers, even if they don't supply individual information. Do we want our patrons' information collected? Remember how contributions to NPR dropped after it was discovered they were selling mailing lists? Do we want this to happen to libraries? Has anybody explored whether any of this violates library confidentiality statutes? Do we want to find out the hard way when some library is sued out of existence because of .com collaboration?

I have reservations about posting library historical collections on Flickr, and I don't care if LC or Smithsonian are doing it Can you imagine the flap if somebody donated a collection of historical photos including well-loved kin, and that person saw the inane and sometimes unpleasant comments that get posted? Historical photographs donated to a library should be properly cataloged and posted on its website not just posted. Having said that, I do think that it would be a great place to solicit identifications. You'd have to read through a lot of 'weird hat, dude,' profanities, and irrelevancies, but you might find some answers. However, if you already have the ID, for goodness' sake, catalog the pictures, and if you don't have a historical photographs section on your website, get one. And find some secure physical storage for the originals.

Twitter may even have its possibilities, but anybody who read Doonesbury for the first two weeks of March when Roland Hedley III Twittered himself on-camera rather than reporting his story might conclude that it is exclusively the province of the self-involved twit (and yes, I wrote that intentionally). I rarely even have my cell on my person let alone turned on, so a library tweet would never catch me. It might catch those who do twittering, though.

I won't be silly enough to say that any of this is just a passing fad and would never work. I say that an uncritical embrace of anything is a bad idea. After Library 2.0, there's 2.1, ad infinitum. Find the things that work in your community, invest in those, be aware of the rest, and don't let yourself be hustled into anything.

Message to my surrealists: You are the weirdest of the weird, and I am proud of you.

Thing 17--Podcasts

Again, I am underwhelmed. Why? Well, I wandered around a couple podcast sites, and tried searching a few topics I'm interested in. 'Chocolate' for instance got me a ton of links to sites that were either selling it, selling franchises a la Amway, or selling equipment about it, and the annotations were so cryptic, that nobody could tell. I found a video podcast about, it said, Duck a l'orange, but it ate up so much bandwith loading that I gave up. I can do better on paper in 641.5944. An audio on agnosticism would have been wonderful if it didn't want so much bandwith that it sputtered like a dirty CD. I can do better in the 211s. For something that is promoted as a freebie, I ran into a lot that wanted upfront money to click in, especially music, and an awful lot that were commercial productions. So much for productions of the masses, although the amateurishness of a lot of the ones I eyeballed suggested they were indeed of the masses. Some were awfully slick, though. Perhaps they were like those Committees for the Prevention and Furtherance of Things that sponsor initiatives purporting to spring from the local community and upon closer examination turn out to be funded by somebody from somewhere else with deep pockets and a cause. Many wanted you to subscribe before listening, and frankly I get enough crackpot e-mail for enlarging body parts I don't own, acquiring a real estate empire, or outfoxing the Nigerian finance authorities simply by having an e-mail address, thank you. Oh, and did we mention the ads on the pages? More ads than content--although the ads may be the true content.

I wasn't particularly interested and certainly not inspired to inflict my wisdom on the masses. However, perhaps a program, speaker, or other presentation that a library put on that it recorded and was particularly pleased with might have a use, just as observed in my previous post.

Thing 16--YouTube

Ah, YouTube, the repository of wonders, weirdness, and egotism that makes me look self-effacing. You can see The Last Lecture, cheap porn, concerts, old TV, and an infinite inanity of self-display that reminds me of the adage about fools' names and fools' faces being seen in public places. Obviously the people who strut their stuff here never heard that one and never had that talk with Mom about not telling the whole world your business. There are also artistes manques who couldn't get a contract with a record company, a gallery show, or a movie role with blackmail and unlimited access to controlled substances at their disposal. Perhaps this will be enough to keep them from making a nuisance of themselves to the rest of the world. Perhaps this will save the rest of us from having to imperil our souls by lying about liking whatever their particular Art is.

Having said that, I can see where a video presence might be useful for a library, besides the in-group jokes we make about patrons and the Visual Tours. Got a first-rate book-talker? If you've got the tools, record some talks and post them. Record other presentations, and if they went over well, or you're really proud of them, post them. You can edit out the sight of all the empty chairs when 8 people showed up and you thought it would be 80. Fortunately, YouTube does not require strict veracity.

Thing 15--Rollyo

I am underwhelmed. I visited the sample site to look for a public domain e-book, and lo, and behold what were the top 2 entries? Items from Amazon. Didn't get to Project Gutenberg until later. A book I know is rare wasn't even listed, and the quote page started with a couple commercial sites that weren't even quotation sites. Even the non-starter had an ad for 'free' downloads. After looking at their 'about' page, I could see that they have an active PR machine, with a real gift for archiving complimentary quotes from celebrities--didn't see any librarians quoted, but a lot of glitterati, political chatterers, and similar members of the fab and fribble. I can't imagine needing to bother with yet another account to keep track of my preferred websites. One can create favorites lists in both IE and Firefox, the most common at-work browsers, which you can keep on a jump drive if you somehow feel the need to answer reference questions while on vacation.

It is another .com site to which we are encouraged to entrust information on our work and our patrons that is probably covered under most states' library confidentiality laws. This is another freebie that could get us into a lot of trouble somewhere down the road.

14--Online Productivity Tools

Do people HAVE lives that are so complicated they have to use stuff like this? And if they do, don't they have any worries that a whole lot of their personal and professional information is in the hands of .com sites? You can't tell me that they aren't going to use that data to their profit sometime, somehow. The countdown clock is a perfect example. Before you get to the how-t0, you have to sign up on a dating site. No, thank you. I'd prefer to talk to somebody in our computer group. They would be able to find me something that wouldn't merrily download viruses and goodness knows what else into our system and add insult to injury with tracking cookies.

I can't think of a single way any of these would be of any use to me personally or professionally. I have a calendar on my desk where I have appointments, vacations, and projects marked out, and a cheap notebook calendar in my purse that has the same things marked out, and they do everything I need them to do. I haven't had to learn any new programs, to clutter my mind with any more passwords and usernames, or to give personal or professional information to a total stranger who may not be quite nice.

I am not sure whether these tools really improve productivity or merely create the impression of busyiness, which to some people is the same thing. If others feel the need, that's fine with me, but I don't. I measure productivity by the quality and quantity of output not by the clutter of a calendar.