Ning

Ning is an interesting service. I could see this being useful in a work environment (or any environment) where you need to create your own customized network. Facebook and MySpace have a lot of apps and features that are not really necessary for "serious" networking or collaboration (and could even distract from it). Ning allows a group to focus on things that are important to it, not on an outside site's standard interface.

I think all these services raise the issue of the security of data and information that's stored somewhere outside of an organization, however.

boyd readings

After reading the danah boyd readings assigned for class, I found the blog post most thought-provoking. In terms of libraries, I think one possible message to take away is the following:

Facebook is widely seen as being a more "respectable" site, and therefore would probably be the site a library would gravitate to in order to set up a social networking presence (all other things being equal). However, boyd's description of the teens who tend to use MySpace is a list of those who are socially-ostracized for one reason or another. Those teens may not have much support in their everyday environment; meanwhile, libraries have a mandate to serve all, especially the underserved. Arguably, the teens who need libraries the most are on MySpace rather than Facebook. In any case, since both are such popular sites, it's impossible to ignore one in favor of the other.

It's also a matter of knowing what the local community uses. If a library is in an area with a large Latino population, and Latinos have a strong presence on MySpace, then that library needs to be on MySpace. A library that hosts musical events might want to be on MySpace for the huge musical community to be found there. In any case, these decisions about where and how to set up a library presence in cyberspace need to be based on something more than hype and misunderstandings, and the work of boyd and her colleagues provides a good lens through which to view these trends.

Facebook screencast

Getting this week's screencast homework done was more problematic than it was last week. Jing seems to like to quit at inopportune times. My screencast is about becoming a fan of a radio show (or tv show, or website, or what-have-you) in Facebook. You can find it here.

Sticky?

The question is why social networking sites are "sticky," encouraging people to spend lots of time on them. I have to say that I've been on Facebook in my "real online life" (well, one of them) for close to a year and although I've fooled around with it some, I haven't spent much time on it. In other words, it hasn't been "sticky" for me.

However, some of my offline friends (longtime friends dating back to my college years a long time ago) have started migrating to Facebook in the last couple of months. I think I might've been the first one on Facebook, then another one joined and now she's been successful in getting several more to join. And, guess what? Now I'm spending more time on Facebook (other than homework for this class). I'm not really interested in the goofy little games and such, but now that people I know and care about (and some of whom never check their e-mail^) are pitching their tents there, I'm more interested. So, for me, I'd have to say what makes a site like Facebook sticky is the opportunity to be in touch with my friends (which dovetails nicely with the article by boyd and Ellison).

Although it isn't a social networking site in the sense of Facebook or MySpace, Flickr is the site I find stickiest. Number one, it's networking around something other than myself (namely photos). I'm a shy person, and it's always been easier for me to bond around shared interests rather than throwing the spotlight on myself.

Number two, more of my offline friends found Flickr sooner; some have very active lives on Flickr and absolutely no interest in Facebook.

Number three, it's a less-threatening way of meeting new people. I also prefer Flickr's language of "contacts" over Facebook's "friends;" to me, the title "friend" is not something I hand out lightly. Another thing I prefer about Flickr is that relationships can be asymmetrical; friending on Facebook seems like such a commitment.

Number four, there are oodles of things to do on Flickr in terms of discovering what pools to add your photos to (ok, so my spice rack isn't alphabetized, but I used to reshelve my books for fun) ("Hey, let's do them in chronological order this time!"^); games you can play (I'm not big on Facebook's games but Flickr's Free Association pool is loads of fun); refining your tagging protocols (yes, I really do this!); geotagging your photos; seeing what your contacts have posted; looking for photos of specific subjects...the list goes on. I don't know if Flickr counts as a social networking site for the purposes of this week's classwork, but to me it's way stickier than Facebook.

If my friends continue to gravitate to Facebook, I'll probably find it to be sticky for the opportunity to stay in touch with them. But Flickr offers me the opportunity to stay in touch with my photographically-inclined friends and also offers me lots of geeky little toys and activities into the bargain. What's not to love? :)

Oh, and here's Germany Schaefer

[Germany Schaefer, Washington AL (baseball)] (LOC)
Originally uploaded by The Library of Congress

Schaefer would be called a flake today. He played for the Washington Senators ("First in war, first in peace and last in the American League."). Here he is clowning around with a camera. The photo comes from the Library of Congress and is part of Flickr's The Commons project.

How to add a note in Flickr

This screencast finally ended up being about how to add a note to a Flickr photo. You can find it here.

I like Jing's original-styled interface, but the downside of that is that things aren't where you expect them to be. I think that helped lead to the loss of an absolutely brilliant screencast I did about how to post to a blog from within Flickr; I somehow managed to not save it. :( This was after several false starts on the topic, mostly because I was hit with unexpected twists in the process. It was so annoying; I picked out a great photo of Germany Schaefer...ah, enough of my whining.

I can see how screencasting would be a great tool to create presentations, but there's definitely a learning curve!

SCILS598f08 on YouTube

It's been great fun looking at everybody's videos. Here are some of my favorites:

Gabrielle's vid is priceless! A great tweaking of the librarian stereotype, and the little bounces in the cardigan photos are perfect.

Tara's recipe video was very well done; the music builds, the photos build, all the while you're waiting to find out what the recipe is or waiting for instructions. Finally, you get the punch line at the end. Great job!

I also loved Jen G's How to clean your house in a minute or less. Great flow and cinema verite look; sans the helping hands, that's basically how I clean my condo.

Steve's Aramaic lesson was short, sweet, and to a Star Wars fan, hysterical.

Finally I have to give Renee's second episode of Dr. Hannah thumbs up, because it irresistibly reminded of a friend of mine who really needs to find his own happy place. ;)

All in all, it was great to see the range of topics and approaches everyone used in their vids.

Education vs. entertainment

I think the idea of education vs. entertainment is a bit of a misnomer. Educational videos can be very entertaining in their own right, and the more entertaining they are, the more likely they are to get their message across. I suppose you could make the argument that it's wrong to hold good educational content to the standard of being entertaining: just because a presenter doesn't speak well or know how to make a flashy video doesn't mean that person has no worthwhile knowledge.

The Pew internet report found that educational videos were more or less equally popular across all age groups and both genders, so that suggests a steady demand for such videos. Entertainment videos may fluctuate in popularity, especially those that are related to some trend, but people are always looking for information on how to do things. This steady demand suggests that though educational videos may not be at the top of the ratings, they will have an ongoing demand and sustained popularity.

"Educational" video

I figured I'd do a video about how to chop an onion, but it's impossible to film oneself in the act of chopping. Therefore, this is not as clear as a "how to" video really should be. The narration is also not the most focused in the world. I guess it demonstrates the basic idea of the vid assignment, though.



You can also find this vid on blip.tv here.

"Entertainment" video

This was meant to be an educational video, but once I threw some dynamic music behind it (which I kind of have cold feet about), it became way more entertaining (at least to me). Photos of moths, with music more suited to a thriller. It plays much better on my hard drive than on YouTube, at least, to me.



You can also see this on YouTube here.

Flickring the class

Looking at the photos in the scils598 and scils598f08-edexperience pools reveals some striking commonalities. I think just about everybody had book-related photos, mostly books in a large quantity. Transportation and technology were also popular; I link these because in this case, on-campus students drive or take mass transit, while online students use their computers to "travel to" class (in other words, photos of the RU campus itself were actually somewhat scarce, given that everyone in class is a Rutgers student). Family and/or pets were also popular, an indication of the social networks that keep us going. Food got lots of attention, whether it was a cup of tea during a study session, the vending machines at SCILS that are forced to substitute for real meals, a home cupboard, or takeout menus.

However, there was evidence of some differences (perhaps more evidence as one looks through everybody's own photo stream as opposed to the groups). Pursuits such as skiing, wandering the NJ pine barrens, mushroom collecting, and kayaking were all represented (though, now that I think of it, these are all "outdoorsy" activities). There was also some evidence of travel, as well as a tendency to stay home in comfort.

All in all, it seems like a group of students with more in common than not.

Telling a story

My story is a classic tale of the road not taken, featuring a relatively innocent American in the cosmopolitan city of Helsinki.

Jen H's story

Podcasting vs. blogging

A few thoughts about podcasting vs. blogging as an information source...

Podcasting's huge plus is the sound of the human voice. Text, particularly text on the internet, is subject to misinterpretation because of the absence of the inflections found in the human voice. Any topic where personality is as important or more important than content (perhaps a "Meet Our Librarians" feature), or even when a dry subject may be given more life by an enthusiastic speaker (scientists in the business of popularizing science know this well), could benefit from podcasts.

Subjects where specific facts are important and need to be retained may do better with text, however. A text-based blog post allows the reader to take in the information at his/her own pace, rather than trying to keep up with a speaker's pace by jotting notes and almost inevitably missing information. Searching within text-based blog posts is much better developed than search within audio files, as well, which is another factor in favor of text as a way of expressing information that needs to be remembered.

Another question (no answers here, alas)

Rather than doing another "librarians and The Long Tail" kind of post, I decided to look at it from a somewhat different perspective. I decided to wonder about "authority."

My dad once said to me, when we were talking about opera, "If you're not obsessed, you're not paying attention." Or words to that effect. Opera is a niche that leaves many people cold, but many other people are totally enthused about it and, yes, obsessive about their interest (when I say obsessive here, I mean eagerly seeking out new information about an interest, not stalker-type bad behavior or OCD compulsiveness).

Having such a wonderful role model (and I do mean that sincerely), I grew up to be an obsessive about my own array of passionate interests (some of which I share with dad, others not so much). He introduced to the joy of stores filled with obscure and intriguing possibilities, mostly in the literary and musical realms. He also introduced me to the idea that if you were interested in something, it was always worth digging deeper and learning as much as possible about it. You didn't need a degree or a formal program of study: you just needed to go out and learn.

When the web came along, it was a godsend to obsessives of this model. It became relatively easy to set up a webpage or, later, blog about your very own passionate interests. Better yet, you could find others who cared as much as you. No matter how fringe your interest, your community was just waiting to find you (and each other) on the web.

So, how does a librarian deal with this?

When I was researching genealogists for a project in Human Information Behavior last semester, I came across a number of comments that could be reduced to the title of a paper in Oregon Library Association Quarterly by Anne Billeter, Ph.D., "Why Don't Librarians Like Genealogists?" Genealogists are very demanding library users, and for a librarian with no particular genealogical expertise, dealing with them can be daunting at best.

The social software trend puts more authority and power in the hands of users. For librarians who are seeking to create the next generation of libraries, this can be a mixed blessing. In a nutshell, is there a place in libraries of the future for the passionate amateur, and if so, where? Would there ever be a library where an obscure musical query got sent to the local musical maven with no library degree, rather than sent to a reference desk librarian?

I got to wondering about this after a historic house tour, when I asked a question of the guide, got an answer and then went home and researched it further. It turned out the guide's answer wasn't completely accurate. On one hand, erroneous information was being given out. On the other hand, it was an obscure topic. Is there a way to bring the amateur knowledge of the obsessive together with the professional knowledge of the librarian? Should there be?

It seems to me that both librarians and passionate amateurs/obsessives care about accurate knowledge on a wide range of topics. It would seem that there should be a way to bring them together, but given the fraught history of professional-amateur relations in many fields, that may not be possible. Still, librarians engaged in creating systems that give their users more of a voice in the library community may want to consider these concerns.