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September 28, 2005
Offline for a week
I'll be offline for a week starting Thursday in the Rockies at Emerald Lake, BC for the Northern Exposure to Leadership Institute (NELI). There's poor web access deep in the mountains and we mentors are supposed to focus on the learners at the Institute so I'll try to stay focused.
SirsiDynix is a long time sponsor of NELI. You can learn more about NELI here.
This is my 4th time attending this transformational experience. It is just awesome. One of the library world's great lesaders and mentors, Ernie Ingles of the University of Alberta, is the founder of the Institute. Here's what NELI tries to do:
THE VISION:
To contribute to the vitality, growth and success of the library profession well into the 21st century, by positioning professionals to be proactive, effective and consequential voices in a dynamic and sophisticated information environment.
THE MISSION:
To motivate professional librarians in order to assist them in developing, strengthening and exercising their individual leadership abilities so that they are better prepared to create, articulate and achieve organizational visions for the benefit of library service, initially, and society at large, ultimately.
There have been a few dissertations and theses on NELI showing it has a strong positive impact on the profession in Canada. I am always energized by the new colleagues I meet at NELI so I am quite excited to be going again.
Anyway, I'll emerge from an overnight flight to give the keynote at the Ohio Library Association Conference on Oct. 5th as well as a Millennials conversation there on the 6th. If you're in Columbus at the conference, say hi.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 9:58 PM | Comments (0)
Movers and Shakers
My good friend Marylaine Block of Neat New Stuff I Found on the Net This Week fame, reminds me that it's time to nominate our colleagues for the Annual Movers and Shakers issue of Library Journal.
The editors of Library Journal need your help in identifying the emerging leaders in the library world. The fourth annual Movers & Shakers supplement will profile 50-plus up-and-coming individuals from across the United States and Canada who are innovative, creative, and making a difference.
I was in the first set of Movers and Shakers and can testify that this is a great experience and a cool honor. You even get an annual luncheon at ALA along with the plaque! I'll even bet that there are quite a few SirsiDynix clients out here worthy of nomination. So put your thinking caps on and fill out the simple form.
From librarians to vendors to others who work in the library field, Movers & Shakers 2006 will celebrate the new professionals who are moving our libraries ahead. The deadline for submissions is November 1, 2005.
To nominate someone for Movers & Shakers 2006, please print out the PDF form here and return it to Ann Kim, Library Journal, 360 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10010 or fax to 646-746-6734.
Movers & Shakers 2006 will be distributed with the March 15 issue of Library Journal.
It's a nice thing to do for someone working in the trenches of our profession without enough recognition and reward.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 5:07 PM | Comments (0)
September 27, 2005
Boot Time @ Warp Speed
When I was a kid (yes too many years ago and actually in the fifties and not just the ironic 50's of those sixties kids) we used to turn on our televisions and watch a warm fuzzy white glowing dot grow ever larger in the middle of the screen until it wobbled a little and the picture appeared. The TV took minutes to "warm up". Sometimes only to be rewarded with a test pattern. Eventually TV's got better with 'instant on' technology and they actually turned on when you turned the knob (yes, a knob, before remote controls!).
Well I'd love that instant on experience whilst turning on my desktops and laptops. Doesn't it just burn you when you spend minutes staring at your glowing monitors waiting for them to be 'ready' for you? And having to reboot for repairs and new software is so last century! Ha! I still remember when Bill Gates was promising faster boot times - instant on and off - for PC's back in the 80's! It's gotten longer not shorter.
Well now Microsoft Vista (old name Longhorn) is promising stuff on their website. One of those promises is:
"Fast On and Off: A Windows Vista computer starts and shuts down as quickly and reliably as a television, typically within 2 to 3 seconds. Windows Vista processes login scripts and startup programs and services in the background so you can start working right away. You'll also shut down and restart your computer less often by using the New Sleep state, a simple one-click on and off experience which not only reduces power consumption, but also delivers and protects user dat. (sic)"
Sure hope it comes true. Maybe this is MS's 25th anniversary present for us! Grin.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 4:14 PM | Comments (1)
September 26, 2005
Student Like Me
Then again, a propos of the last post, perhaps the real insights come from methods from social anthropology. Here's an article about a University of Arizona professor who immersed herself in first year to find out what it was really like from the student's perspective.
``I'm trying to get really to what student culture is doing and tailor my teaching,'' said Dr. Cathy Small, who wrote a book on her research under the pseudonym Rebekah Nathan called ``My Freshman Year: What a Professor Learned by Becoming a Student.''
Interesting,
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 11:27 PM | Comments (0)
Professors and Students - Do they use the Internet differently?
First Monday has a nice summary of some research done by Steve Jones who is Professor of Communication at the University of Illinois–Chicago, and Adjunct Research Professor in the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. He was first President and co–founder of the Association of Internet Researchers and a Senior Research Fellow at the Pew Internet & American Life Project and Camille Johnson–Yale who is a doctoral candidate in the Institute of Communications Research at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.
"This paper reports on findings from a nationwide survey of Internet use by U.S. college faculty. The survey asked about general Internet use, use of specific Internet technologies (e–mail, IM, Web, etc.), the Internet’s impact on teaching and research, its impact on faculty–student interactions, and about faculty perceptions of students’ Internet use. There is general optimism, though little evidence, about the Internet’s impacts on their professional lives. The findings show that institutions of higher education still need to address three broad areas (infrastructure, professional development, and teaching and research) to assist faculty to continue to make good use of the Internet in their professional work."
Here's a half dozen teasers from the report:
"1. College faculty are active users of the Internet. Nearly two–thirds (60 percent) of the respondents to the survey stated they use the Internet from four to 19 hours per week. Another 40 percent reported being online for 20 or more hours.
2. College faculty have logged many years online. Over four–fifths (82 percent) of college faculty respondents reported having used e–mail between six and 15 years. Fewer than five percent have used e–mail five years or less, and they are heavily represented by respondents over 55 years of age. Some 92 percent reported accessing e–mail at home, and 89 percent access it at work. Yet, a significant number, one in five, reported using public locations like labs or Internet cafes for e–mailing.
3. In terms of quality, two–thirds of instructors surveyed felt e–mail had improved their communication with students, while only six of the 2,316 reported that it had worsened their communication.
4. When asked whether the quality of their students’ overall work had improved with use of the Internet, nearly half (42 percent) of college faculty felt their students’ work had worsened in quality and another 24 percent were undecided. Just 22 percent felt the Internet had improved students’ work.
5. Most (83 percent) faculty surveyed felt they spent less time in the library now that they have access to the Internet than before. However, as one faculty member pointed out, libraries are — still — the corner stone of the research process. "I know that people believe that use of the Internet is impeding people’s frequency at the library (which I know it is), but it is not because of sheer laziness. It is also because one is able to access scholarly journal articles via the library’s Web site."
6. Faculty attitudes can also be an obstacle to change. One respondent wrote, "Using the Internet for classes takes time. I might use it more if we had better support on campus and/or if I had teaching assistants." But another noted, "I don’t think most faculty in my department successfully exploit the Internet’s possibilities." Both statements are likely true and illustrate the bind in which faculty may find themselves. According to one respondent, "Faculty use of the Internet is only limited by their knowledge/ability and by their imaginations," but institutional and professional barriers may limit their use of it, too."
This is worth reading. Combine it with their Pew 2003 study, The Internet Goes to College, and you find complementary reading.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 11:10 PM | Comments (1)
September 25, 2005
Web Search and Libraries
I just reviewed the Lycos list of their most popular search terms from 1995-2005 released in celebration of their 10th anniversary. Here's the Lycos Top 50 (September 1995-September 2005):
Rank Search Term
1 Pam Anderson
2 Dragonball
3 Pokemon
4 Britney Spears
5 WWE
6 Tattoos
7 Las Vegas
8 NFL
9 September 11
10 Christmas
11 Princess Diana
12 Jennifer Lopez
13 The Bible
14 Halloween
15 The IRS
16 'N Sync
17 Final Fantasy
18 Star Wars
19 Backstreet Boys
20 Marijuana
21 NASCAR
22 Baseball
23 Anna Kournikova
24 Janet Jackson
25 Golf
26 OJ Simpson
27 NBA
28 Tupac
29 Harry Potter
30 The Simpsons
31 Sailor Moon
32 Eminem
33 JonBenet Ramsey
34 Selena
35 Mariah Carey
36 Carmen Electra
37 Howard Stern
38 NASA
39 Christina Aguilera
40 War in Iraq
41 KaZaA
42 Osama bin Laden
43 Madonna
44 Oprah Winfrey
45 Poker
46 Diets
47 Nostradamus
48 Napster
49 JFK Jr. & Carolyn Bessette
50 Star Trek
Source: Lycos, 2005
Now I ask you, do we need any greater proof that the questions asked in libraries or through our OPACs, portals, and licensed resources are different in a fundamental way?
These 'most popular search' lists always generate press and interest in what the world is interested in. How about offering (sanitized just like Lycos)lists of the most popular online searches at the local library to the local press? This could make it clear the wide range of help - homework, life, health, culture - on a ongoing basis. Just an idea.
Stephen
(Still happy that the #1 search continues to be a Canadian!)
Posted by stephen at 10:40 PM | Comments (2)
September 24, 2005
A Google WiFi Network
Well it's speculation time again.
Read this article in Business 2.0. And this is neat too. And this.
If Google did any or all of the following:
1. Provided free continent-wide broadband access?
2. Offered TV through this new network?
3. Offered movies or TV series like Lost or Sopranos on demand through the network?
4. Delivered ads to cover some or all of the costs? (Remember when movies were free on TV (covered by ads)?
5. Offered VOIP telephone and integrated it with e-commerce? (Remember when we talked to people when we bought things?)
6. Provided an iTunes on steroids service that was compliant with the law(s) of commerce and ownership? I'm old enough to remember when my 45's costs 45 cents!
7. Expanded its alliance with Amazon and the A9 search engine to provide e-books and book access through Google Print as a finding tool?
8. And allied with Amazon and others to enhance Froogle.
9. And settled in for a strong local experience using their 3D maps of your town and defaulting to a local.google.com homepage?
Soooooo - what would this do to local libraries of any type or stripe? What are the opportunities? Where will smart libraries position themselves in their communities?
Barbara Quint and Jane Dysart have asked me to moderate the famous Tuesday evening debate at Internet Librarian in Monterey on just this topic. We have a great panel including Steve Arnold, Adam Smith from Google Print, Rich Wiggins from Michigan State U and Mark Sandler from U Mich. Maybe even bq will call in...
Look forward to seeing you there!
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 6:55 PM | Comments (0)
September 23, 2005
Generating Ideas
Martin Leith has a neat website. It is called "All Known Idea Generation Methods". Hefty title. You can see it here.
The methods are listed alphabetically and each is linked to a description, and in some cases you will find full instructions for using the method to generate ideas.
Looking to explore some techniques for your next library management retreat? It's a place to start.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 11:00 PM | Comments (0)
It had to happen
Well you knew this would happen. Maybe it's already happened and I'm just seeing this now. However, cel phone addicted K-12 students can now get nuggets of learning delivered to there phones. Gotta say this sounds like remarkably fun and cool content to draw the young'uns into the world of libraries. Can our first hit be free?
Here's the press release:
Beyond Ringtones and Games – Students Might Just Learn Something-- Cellpup Launches Study Tools for Cell Phones
San Francisco, CA (PRWEB)September 22, 2005 -– Startup company Cellpup, the only company dedicated to making educational software for cell phones, launched its Web site and debut line of language learning tools today. Cellpup takes advantage of the way young people use cell phones in their daily lives—between classes, on the bus, during brief windows of time—to help them memorize words, facts, and concepts.
Faster paced and broken into shorter activity segments, students’ lives are structured differently than they once were. The reality of students’ mobile lives lends itself to a different way of learning too, but learning applications have not kept pace. The few mobile learning applications that exist are built for business road warriors using higher-end platforms such as Palm OS or Windows CE—not for students and the cell phones they carry with them every day.
The idea for Cellpup came to Christopher Salemme, Co-founder of Cellpup in charge of management and technology, as he waited for a meeting to begin. Bored, and a student of Italian, he found himself wishing he could use the time to study his Italian vocabulary. He thought of his cell phone—a mini computer that can play games—and wondered why tools for learning couldn’t work on it as well. Cellpup (http://www.cellpup.com) was born. Mr. Salemme quickly built a prototype and enlisted the help of his friends to build a company.
“We met weekly around our dining room table, with our 17-month old twins on our laps—and on long walks with strollers through the East Bay hills,” said Rose Castorina, Co-Founder in charge of content and strategic partnerships. Through the development of Mr. Salemme’s prototype and subsequent iterations of Cellpup products, the Cellpup team developed a method for the systematic memorization of discrete bodies of knowledge.
Keys to the Cellpup concept, Ms. Castorina explained, are ease of use and entertainment value—both of which increase the likelihood of frequent exposure to new material—and thus its storage in long-term memory. The team began with languages, where repetition, ease, and frequency of study vastly increase success in vocabulary memorization. They are now extending this approach to other content domains such as test preparation, history, and chemistry. “The goal is to help a student to pick up her Spanish, SAT prep, or Chemistry wherever she is—standing in line, waiting for a bus, or in the back of her parent’s car,” said Jennifer Taylor, Co-founder in charge of marketing.
Why the name Cellpup? “Because puppies are smart, mobile, energetic, and learning all the time,” said Ms. Taylor.
About Cellpup
Cellpup is the only company dedicated to streamlined learning tools for cell phones—the next step in students’ mobile lives. A startup, Cellpup goes live September 22, 2005.
###
Press Contact: Jennifer Taylor
Company Name: Cellpup
Email: jennifertaylor@earthlink.net
Phone: 415-305-9788
Website: www.cellpup.com
More Information: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/9/prweb288106.htm
Posted by stephen at 3:28 PM | Comments (0)
September 22, 2005
Smartphone as Scanner
This New Scientist article talks about a new technology is really neat. Entitled, "Camera phones will be high-precision scanners" you can read it here.
You can already buy pen-sized personal scanners for $29 to $49 in airplane magazines. Now you'll be able to point your phone at documents (Holy James Bond, Batman!) and get a copy to read or print later. Neat.
My favourite quotation in the article is "Commuters in Japan already anger bookstore owners and newsagents by using existing cellphone software to try to take snapshots of newspaper and magazine articles to finish reading on the train to work." And to think the music industry was upset by P2P MP3 file sharing through a few servers. Imagine what it means when every phone (billions of 'em) can get a fair use copy of any article? Pat Schroeder and Jonathan Tasini will be grinding their teeth down to nubs in their sleep!
So much for warning notices in libraries over the copiers. I hope that your library's hearts and flowers fund isn't funded by the photocopy change. Why pay 10 cents when you can beam it to your home printer and print it later?
More grist for the mill.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 3:15 PM | Comments (0)
Google Broadband
Hmmm- ubiquitous broadband - what would that mean for libraries?
The U.S. president has asked that the entire U.S. have broadband connectivity by 2007. There are reports that this is ahead of schedule. Our Gartner reports show that this will be a transformative development. North American is starting to catch up.
Then, along came Google's $150 million plus investment in broadband connectivity through the electrical grid. Interesting - just plug in a wireless POP into any home electrical outlet and you've got a personal or home wireless broadband network. Cool. And if it was free - Google could own a pretty rugged commercial network for e-commerce and retailing. Free works well for the frugal (or is that Froogle) customer.
Now if Google chooses to default its search pages to a local town or city presence (like it does for national versions) . . . then we've got an interesting environment in which to play. Local libraries would need to make sure they had a virtual presence in this localized space. See the initial view of it here. And academic libraries shouldn't feel too safe. Look here and remember that Google (and the others) knows your longitude and latitude too! Either way it broadens Google's advertising base to include local ads just like Yellow Pages and newspaper classifieds. As Google Local is populated with enterprises and businesses, it's worth your time to check to see how you and your books, libraries and information services turn up in Google Local for your area.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 2:44 PM | Comments (1)
Hurricanes and other disasters
It's really nice when your company does the right thing.
"SirsiDynix Offers Emergency Hosting and Consulting Services for Libraries Affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita" More here.
The neat thing was that my colleagues surveyed our customers who had been through these horrors before (especially some Florida libraries from last year's hurricanes but also a few impacted by earthquakes and floods) in August and on Sept. 1st to determine what would be most helpful. Experience is the best teacher.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 2:55 AM | Comments (0)
September 21, 2005
Worth Reading
OCLC Vice President, Research and Chief Strategist Lorcan Dempsey, along with OCLC researchers Lynn Silipigni Connaway and Brian Lavoie have loooked at the Google Print project in the latest issue of D-Lib magazine here. They were able to provide preliminary estimates of what parts of the initial five collections were unique and where they overlap. Collections at Harvard, Stanford, the University of Michigan, and the University of Oxford as well as The New York Public Library were reviewed using WorldCat.
In the latest OCLC newsletter there some cool summaries of the Google Print Library Project (GPLP) results such as:
"The proportion of the system-wide collection covered by GPLP, once duplicate holdings across the five institutions are removed, is about 33 percent, or 10.5 million unique books out of the 32 million in the system-wide collection.
The pattern of cross-collection overlap implies that if each collection were fully digitized, about four out of every ten books would be re-digitized at least once, or in other words, the GPLP project reflects a minimum redundancy rate of about 40 percent.
Only 3 percent of the books in the 10.5 million GPLP collection are held by all five libraries.
More than 80 percent of the materials in the Google 5 collections are still in copyright.
The resource created by the GPLP may be far more culturally diverse than originally anticipated, given the fact that more than 430 languages were identified and that English language materials are slightly less than half of the books in the Google 5 combined collection."
Of course, by now you're already aware of the Author's Guild class action lawsuit against Google to stop them from digitizing works still in copyright. At this point they have acknowledged that they can't find proof that Google has done this yet.
Obviously this suit will have far reaching implications for the library world just as the Tasini case before it. We'll need to watch it closely.
Now, it would be interesting to use the Library Normative Data project and see the unique circulations and overlap in library use beyond just static collections. I am intrigued.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 2:14 PM | Comments (0)
September 20, 2005
Wireless Hotel Models
I end up using the wireless links in hotels a lot. Sometimes, rarely, it will work from your room. Usually it is free in the lobby, bar and coffee shop. Maybe the profit on the coffee you purchase is higher than the hotel's share of the wireless link.
I tend to agree with this rant here about the hotel Internet access nightmare. I can add another. Hotels usually travel in packs, I've often left the hotel I am staying at to take advantage of the free lobby access next door. Tellingly, I'll frequent that other hotel the next time I visit. (I also find that when you phone to book your room that the staff have little idea of what kind of access they have.)
Despite these nightmares, I think there's much to learn for libraries from the hotel model. For example, when I use the hotel wireless they somehow highjack my preferred homepage settings and display local news, weather, and ads for other hotels in their chain. Hmmmm. How many libraries do this? Can we force a library homepage as recompense for providing wireless access in our spaces? Can we promote our services, localize information like weather and sports? Can we be so bold as to promote events in oter branches? Can we be so in their face as to blog library marketing?
Also at hotels there is an access policy that you need to click through to use the free (or fee) wireless. I suspect more of us do this - always with the rules.
Last week I heard a great story from a librarian who had to deal with reduced hours in her branches due to budget shortfalls. As she drove by a closed branch early one evening she saw folks sitting on the front steps of the closed branch. Upon closer examination she saw they were all working on their laptops. Weird - until she realized that the library's wireless access was on all the time and people were using the library from the stoop. Out came the digital camera for the photo op of a lifetime for her politicians and budgeteers! Libraries - filling local needs and delivering value. Maybe they need picnic tables out front under a wireless symbol. Cleveland Public Library told me that the access in their sculpture garden was excellent which seems like a cool place to surf, research and study.
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 1:50 PM | Comments (0)
September 19, 2005
32 Tips - Part Two now available
Well - I am finally back in the land of the livin' after a long road trip. I've been remiss in not pointing you all to part two of my article "32 Tips to Inspire Innovation for You and Your Library". It's here. If you missed part one, it's here.
Enjoy,
Stephen
Posted by stephen at 9:40 AM | Comments (0)