Digital "Telephone"

Remember that game of Telephone where the original message gets wildly distorted? Blogs (like any means of communication) can also get things wrong, even after three degrees of separation. Here's where library and information professionals can step in, and remind folks to verify their sources!

From the Young Go-getter blog: http://tinyurl.com/yt2mmp

Blog of the Moment

Hello iSchoolers and friends,

Here's what I hope will be a fairly regular "column" on this blog this year (or at least this quarter)--"blog of the moment." (I thought about doing a blog of the day or blog of the week segment, but prefer more spontaneity.)

Over the past year, I've been tracking many blogs (413 as of tonight!), most of which are library-related. So I figure I'll highlight which ones seem the most useful or interesting or just plain fun.

First up is one of my favorites, Information Wants to Be Free, by self-proclaimed "librarian, writer and tech geek" Meredith Farkas. She writes thoughtfully about issues of technology use in libraries, and is one of the main bloggers in the so-called Library 2.0 movement. This year, Information Today published her first book, Social Software in Libraries, which is well worth checking out if you would like to explore using blogs, wikis, and other web technologies to enhance existing library services.

Three words that describe her blog posts: reasonable, balanced, and diplomatic.

Usability Issues

From Smashing Magazine's blog, here are "30 usability issues to be aware of." Not so compelling post title, but compelling principles to remember (such as the 3-click rule: "users stop using the site if they aren’t able to find the information or access the site feature within 3 mouse clicks").

Library Potties

Have you visited any magnificent bathrooms lately? Did said bathroom(s) reside in a library? If so, the bloggers at Checking Out and Checking In are calling for your photos as part of the Bathroom Blogfest.

19th Century Mustaches

This is too good not to share: the Mustaches of the Nineteenth Century blog is...just that.

Here is a photo from said blog which is described as "Pazyryk Horsemen, some 300 years before the birth of Christ."


Found via BoingBoing.

Noteworthy Info Type Web Sites & Blogs We're Reading

Compiled with much help from iSchooler recommendations...

When Cars Run on Information, creators, contributors and 2007 iSchool MLIS grads Tim King and Kathleen Walsh post on “innovation, community and libraries.”

Jessamyn West
www.library.net/
putting the rarin' back in librarian since 1999

http://libraryjuicepress.com/blog/

Library Thing
www.librarything.com/


http://seattle.metblogs.com/
From the site: "Written from the perspective of people who live, work, and play here every day..."

Lifehacker
http://www.lifehacker.com/
'don't live to geek; geek to live'

David Weinberger's Joho the blog
http://www.hyperorg.com/blogger/

It's all good
http://scanblog.blogspot.com/
5 OCLC bloggers

WebJunction
http://blog.webjunctionworks.org/

Many 2 Many
http://many.corante.com/
group blog on social software

Librarian Revolution
The Library Status Quo Must Go!
http://libraryrevolution.com/

From Ms. Card: I was just reading over this word-of-mouth marketing web site that is all about the consumer, but is also all about ethics and using technology to involve people. The case studies are particularly applicable to libraries/LIS. Here is the link to the case studies, but the whole web site is pretty interesting, and I think applicable to info pros:
http://www.womma.org/casestudy/

I found the above site because of this post by Michael Stephens in his blog:
http://tametheweb.com/2007/03/5_blogs_outside_libraryland.html

One of the blogs Stephens mentions is the "church of the consumer" and the name sucked me in. I think this blog is also really relevant for librarians because libraries suck at marketing themselves and creating advocates. I think this is because a lot of people already really love the library and so libraries are complacent.

Something I have been using everyday lately is WorldCat/OCLC beta:
http://worldcat.org/


Thanks to Kathleen Walsh, Kara Fox and Heather Card (all three 2007 iSchool MLIS grads--congrats!) for the smart suggestions and commentary. --The Ed.