Stephen's Lighthouse: November 2005 Archives

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November 29, 2005

How many clicks?

Over on the business2blog, my attention is drawn to the fact that online visits to Walmart (4.85% of net traffic) last Friday passed those to Amazon (2.80% of net traffic).

Hmmmm.

Now, I really wonder if we combined all the visits to library websites, where would libraries rank?

According to the old OCLC (OCLC, “Libraries, How They Stack Up”, Copyright 2003 OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc.) report Fedex sends about 5.3 million parcels daily comparied to Libraries circulating about 5.4 million items and another 5.7 million online items a day - just about double. Amazon did about 1.5 million items a day. We estimate that SirsiDynix software handles about 2 million items a day.

Hmmmm.

In the US there are about 1.1 billion visitors a year - about nine times the number of US major sports attendees (about 0.2 billion). SirsiDynix estimates that about 250 million folks see our software in libraries.

Hmmmm.

There are about 6 times more people with library cards than drivers' licenses! SirsiDynix software manages more patron records than there are drivers' licenses globally.

Hmmmm.

The number of library locations vastly outnumbers McDonald's and Starbucks combined.

It feels to me like we vastly underestimate our community power and influence. We also underestimate the talent and complexity to manage this "presence". Maybe we need to craft a better commnuication of our role and complexity....

Just some random thoughts for a busy day ...

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 1:25 PM | Comments (3)

November 23, 2005

Happy U.S. Thanksgiving

Happy Turkey Day to All!

I am spending the day in Ottawa chatting with Library and Archives Canada. (Canadian Thanksgiving was long ago - before the temperature dropped below harvest levels here! It's 17 below with the windchill today. First time it's felt like real winter to me and I saw my first ice pond on the sidewalk in front of Parliament.)

Brrrr.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 2:45 PM | Comments (1)

Just what does Google have?

I thought that I would try to make a list of Google's products. Hmmmm. Seems they're averaging a new product introduction about every two weeks since they came out of their quiet period after the IPO. Some on this list are fully-formed products, some are beta and some are tools and features. It's a pretty interesting list.

1. Blogger
2. Froogle (and Froogle Mobile)
3. GMail (or Google Mail)
4. Google AdSense
5. Google Alerts
6. Google Analytics
7. Google Answers
8. Google Base
9. Google Blog Search
10. Google Book Search (formerly Google print)
11. Google Catalogs
12. Google Code
13. Google College Life
14. Google Compute
15. Google Deskbar
16. Google Desktop
17. Google Directory
18. Google Earth
19. Google Firefox Extensions
20. Google Glossary
21. Google Groups
22. Google Homepage
23. Google Image Search
24. Google Labs
25. Google Language Tools
26. Google Local
27. Google Maps
28. Google Mobile
29. Google Movie Showtimes
30. Google News
31. Google Personalized Search
32. Google Personalized Webpage
33. Google Reader
34. Google Ridefinder
35. Google Scholar
36. Google Send to Phone
37. Google Sitemap
38. Google SMS
39. Google Special Searches
40. Google Suggest
41. Google Talk
42. Google Toolbar
43. Google University Search
44. Google Video and Google Video Upload
45. Google Web Accelerator
46. Google Web Search
47. Hello
48. Picasa
49. Google Moon

Anyway, they're about to hit 50 on my list. I haven't included the worldwide stuff either - language or ownership stakes. This is a picture of the future but it's more like an unassembled mosaic. The mosaic tiles are there, they're on the floor and we don't know what the picture will look like when it's done. Howver, something is emerging from the fog of creativity and innovation here. Add in Google's interest in providing free wireless to San Francisco and their investment in broadband access through the electrical wires and you get an inkling of an intereting future direction.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 12:40 PM | Comments (7)

November 22, 2005

Doing Research About Libraries for Yourself

EBSCO is providing free access to their database Library, Information Science, & Technology Abstracts for free on their website. You can find it here.

This is a great gift to the community of libraries. Use it.

Here's their blurb:

"LISTA database Free to all Interested in Libraries and Librarianship

EBSCO Publishing is proud to provide the Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts (LISTA) database as a free resource to anyone interested in libraries and information management. This world-class bibliographic database provides coverage on subjects such as librarianship, classification, cataloging, bibliometrics, online information retrieval, information management and more. Delivered via the EBSCOhost platform, LISTA indexes more than 600 periodicals plus books, research reports, and proceedings. With coverage dating back to the mid-1960s, it is the oldest continuously produced database covering the field of information science.

Note: Be sure to set a bookmark for http://www.libraryresearch.com or here. This link takes you directly to the LISTA database. Make it a "favorite" so this free resource is available whenever you need it!"

I have also been surprised at the number of fulltext articles on library issues in FindArticles.com. You might find it to a useful free resource too.

Anyway, if you're in a small library and don't have access to, or budget for, all the resources you need to make your library decisions, these two free links might help.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 12:28 PM | Comments (1)

Generation M

A national Kaiser Family Foundation survey entitled Generation M: Media in the Lives of 8-18 Year-olds found children and teens are spending an increasing amount of time using “new media” like computers, the Internet and video games, without cutting back on the time they spend with “old” media like TV, print and music. Instead, because of the amount of time they spend using more than one medium at a time (for example, going online while watching TV), they’re managing to pack increasing amounts of media content into the same amount of time each day.

The study examined media use among a nationally (U.S.) representative sample of more than 2,000 3rd through 12th graders who completed detailed questionnaires, including nearly 700 self-selected participants who also maintained seven-day media diaries.

You can find the 41 page executive summary as a PDF here.

The full 145 page report is available as a PDF here.

If your library serves school age kids, then this is a must read. it shatters some of our perceptions about the role media (gaming, TV, DVD's, music, and more) plays in their lives.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 12:00 PM | Comments (1)

Search engine use shoots up

Another Pew study showing things are moving faster and gettng bigger.

I wonder what the results would be if we included the use of library website searches?

Washington -- Search engines have become an increasingly important part of the online experience of American internet users. The most recent findings from Pew Internet and American Life tracking surveys and consumer behavior trends from the comScore Media Metrix consumer panel show that about 60 million American adults are using search engines on a typical day.

These results from September 2005 represent a sharp increase from mid-2004. Pew Internet Project data from June 2004 show that use of search engines on a typical day has risen from 30% of the internet population to 41%. This means that the number of those using search engines on an average day jumped from roughly 38 million in June 2004 to about 59 million in September 2005 - an increase of about 55%.

comScore data show that from September 2004 to September 2005 the average daily use of search engines jumped from 49.3 million users to 60.7 million users - an increase of 23%.

This means that the use of search engines is edging up on email as a primary internet activity on any given day. The Pew Internet Project data show that on a typical day, email use is still the top internet activity. On any given day, about 52% of American internet users are sending and receiving email.

These findings have considerable consequences for the way people gather and use information online and the way e-commerce is conducted.

"Most people think of the internet as a vast library and they increasingly depend on search engines to help them find everything from information about the people who interest them, to transactions they want to conduct, organizations they need to deal with, and interesting factoids that help them settle bar bets and backyard arguments," said Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Internet Project.

"The evolution of search engines as everyday consumer Web tools has made them a vital resource for marketers," said James Lamberti, vice president of comScore Networks. "Search engines are obviously a critical vehicle in reaching consumers during the buy cycle, but they also offer a rich source for consumer profiling, segmentation, and measurement of product demand. To-date, we have only witnessed the preliminary impact of search engines on e-commerce."

The latest data from comScore show that Google was the most heavily used search engine in October 2005 with 89.8 million unique visitors, followed by Yahoo! Search (68 million unique visitors), MSN Search (49.7 million unique visitors), Ask Jeeves (43.7 million unique visitors), and AOL Search (36.1 million unique visitors).

The Pew Internet Project findings cited in this report come from a nationally representative telephone survey of 2,251 American adults (age 18 and older), including 1,577 internet users, between September 13-October 14, 2005. The margin of error on the internet user portion of the survey is plus or minus 3%.

The comScore data cited in this report come from comScore Media Metrix, an internet audience measurement service that uses a massive cross-section of more than 1.5 million U.S. consumers who have given comScore explicit permission to confidentially capture their browsing and transaction behavior, including online and offline purchasing.

Original here.

Stepen

Posted by stephen at 6:40 AM | Comments (0)

November 21, 2005

New Educause Study on Student Use of IT

The EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research (ECAR) has made available its 2005 study on students and information technology. Here's the link to the PDF.

The title is: ECAR Study of Students and Information Technology: Convenience, Connection, Control and Learning.

Some findings:

- Information technology in the higher education experience adds convenience, connection, and control for students.
- Students believe that IT in cources enhances their learning.
- Ownership levels of laptops and cel phones rose over 2004.
- Dependence on the university for broadband access dropped over 2004.
- The curriculum continues to be the prime motivator for IT skills adoption.
- The percentage of students using media intensive applications rose.
- Students appear to prefer a 'moderate' amount of IT in their courses.
- Students appear to like course management systems.

88% of students report using a library online resource to complete an assignmment. The results are higher among seniors.

I love the quote, "I've had an online catalog since my first year of grade school. I don't know how to search a library without a computer."

Worth a read.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 6:15 AM | Comments (0)

November 13, 2005

Hurricanes and Libraries

My fellow SirsiDynix blogger, Dr. Data (Chief Statistician Bob Molyneux), has been busy over at the Normative Data Project. One thing that was created was map of Public Libraries Affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. This map presents information on the libraries that were substantially damaged by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Libraries with minor damage are not included. You can view it here. It's sobering.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 8:19 PM | Comments (1)

November 12, 2005

Board Presentations - beyond bored

Most library directors and their staff have to make board presentations and management presentations regularly. I like this new blog from Cliff Atkinson, the author of Beyond Bullett Points.

The Blog is called Beyond Bullets: People Communicating WIth People. Sounds like he gets it right - right off the bat.

I think about this a lot since I present often to groups of decisionmakers. We also spent a lot of time in the design of Directors Station and the Normative Data Project thinking about how to make plain numbers leap off the page to help libraries infuence the people holding the purse strings. This book and blog has some advice to help with that.

With busy, senior decisionmakers, if you can't get your argument or justification down to a few PPT's with strong visuals you're not half way there yet!

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 4:00 PM | Comments (1)

Latest OneSource Article

My latest column in SirsiDynix OneSource newsletter is available here. The title is "Five Big Questions to Drive Strategic Thinking" and it's based on a few of my recent speeches.

Also, the SirsiDynix Newsletter is open to all. You don't have to be a customer. You can subscribe here.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 8:13 AM | Comments (1)

November 11, 2005

Can it get any more ridiculous?

Amazon Gets Patent on Consumer Reviews. Read some commentary here.
http://internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3563396

Hmmm. . . shall we avoid letting users post reviews of library books on library websites? Will OCLC be paying Amazon for the right to Wiki post their reviews in OpenWorldCat? Can freedom of speech be abrogated by this patent? What's next - a patent on putting information into columns?

Honestly, could it get any sillier? Why, yes! Something like over 20% of your genes are already patented. Yes - owned by someone or some corporate entity already. I thought that at least the one thing I owned was my own pathetic body.

Oh well,

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 10:20 PM | Comments (0)

If newspaper reading is down . . .

I commend to your reading this article:

Average age of newspaper readers: 55
by Eric Black of the (Twin Cities) Star Tribune
It was published on October 11, 2005

"Newspaper readership is down. Fewer young people are picking them up, and the average age of a newspaper reader is now 55, according to a Carnegie Corporation study. Many papers have been losing circulation at alarming rates across all age groups."

Indeed most newspaper readership is down - a lot.

This doesn't mean reading is down. It also doesn't mean that people are reading news less. It just means that shift is happening.

It's not just the web. I read somewhere that Jon Stewart's Daily Show is on of the primary sources of news for younger folks. And you have to recognize that you can't comprehend fake news or satire unless you know a fair bit about the news in the first place.

I wonder what this means for libraries and our news collections (fax, paper, microforms, online, web, repositories, etc.)? And what is the balance between current news and its new containers and our mandates to collect and protect history's first draft (pictures and all)?

Hmmm....

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 3:27 PM | Comments (0)

More from Pew

Our SirsiDynix 2006 Nashville Users Conference loves what we hear from Lee Rainie who is the director of the Pew Internet and American Life project. He's always interesting and right on the mark and up to the minute with his targeted research. You can subscribe to their RSS feed on their site too! Anyway, here's a recent intriguing stat:

Two-thirds of American adults go online and one-third do not
In Two-thirds of American adults go online and one-third do not
Washington, October 5, 2005 - Sixty-eight percent of American adults, or about 137 million people, use the internet, up from 63% one year ago. Thirty-two percent of American adults, or about 65 million people, do not go online, and it is not always by choice. Certain groups continue to lag in their internet adoption. For example:

26% of Americans age 65 and older go online, compared with 67% of those age 50-64, 80% of those age 30-49, and 84% of those age 18-29.
57% of African-Americans go online, compared with 70% of whites.
29% of those who have not graduated from high school have access, compared with 61% of high school graduates and 89% of college graduates.
60% of American adults who do not have a child living at home go online, compared with 83% of parents of minor children.

Those who are currently offline have had varying levels of exposure to the online world. According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project's May-June 2005 survey, one in five American adults (22%) say they have never used the internet or email and do not live in an internet-connected household. These truly disconnected adults occupy essentially the same percentage of the population as in 2002, when 23% of American adults said they have never used the internet and do not live with anyone who has access.

"Americans who are over the age of 65 or who have less education are the most likely to be completely disconnected from the internet," said Susannah Fox, associate director of the Pew Internet Project. "If they needed to get information from a Web site or other online source, they probably could not easily do so."

Fifty-three percent of internet users now have a high-speed connection at home, up from 21% of internet users in 2002. Not surprisingly, the groups who were initially most likely to lag in adopting the internet now lag in access speeds. Those with less education, those with lower household incomes, and Americans age 65 and older are less likely to have embraced broadband than those who are younger and have higher socio-economic status.

Previously, Pew Internet and American Life Project surveys showed that internet experience - the number of years a person had been online - was a major predictor of both the frequency of internet use and the activities pursued online. Now that a majority of the internet's heaviest users have upgraded from dial-up to high-speed access at home, broadband access is becoming a stronger predictor of online behavior than a user's level of experience.

"There are three degrees of internet access - cold, tepid, and hot," said Fox. "There is a group of Americans for whom the internet remains a mystery. They live lives far removed from the online world. Then there is the larger group of dial-up and intermittent users who are connected, but are not necessarily daily users. Finally, there is the broadband elite who are likely to go online every day and be devoted to their online pursuits."

The Pew Internet and American Life Project is a non-profit initiative of the Pew Research Center and is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts to examine the social impact of the internet. It does not advocate policy outcomes.

I wonder how many offliners actually go online but use others? I know quite a few who ask their kids or another family member or their local libary to get the stuff for them.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 3:15 PM | Comments (0)

Library 2.0

Having just spent four days with Jenny Levine and Michael Stephens, my brain is full of new ideas (or at least their ideas!). Gotta say that this Library 2.0 lingo is intriguing me.

Publish, published by Ziff Davis, had an article by Jason Boog - "Library 2.0 Movement Sees Benefits in Collaboration with Patrons," features interviews with the cool trio - Jenny Levine, Aaron Schmidt, and Jessamyn West.

According to Boog, "These innovative librarians realize that some Web 2.0 technologies, such as blogs, wikis, and online databases like Google Print, are already competing for the attentions of library patrons...The librarians aim to build a participatory network of libraries using Web resources like blogs, wiki tools, and tags."

Worth reading and thinking about. You might want to read up on Web 2.0 (that new - but imaginary - standard version that is a castle in sky - which is, of course, where all castles start!) These 2.zeroes seem to be Siamese twins.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 2:59 PM | Comments (0)

My Presentations

A few people are having difficulty finding my recent PPT's and articles. I sometimes take a while to post them since I have to be off the road (which is almost never!) to make a CD (I use so many graphics that they are usually to large to e-mail) and send them to our wonderful web development folks. Anyway, you can find the PPT's and PDF's and word docs here or paste this into your browser:
http://www.sirsi.com/Resources/abram_articles.html

Enjoy.

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 2:41 PM | Comments (1)

November 10, 2005

Which bloggers do I read?

People are aways asking how to keep up with new technology or library trends. I subscribe to a few key periodicals and newsletters. I find blogs the best though. You just let the postings wash over you and remain open to patterns and repeats. I suppose there's a bit of the wisdom of crowds in this method. At the CODI Directors Day last Sunday, I promised the group that I would blog my list of blogs that I read in my aggregator (Bloglines). So here's the list I promised at CODI. No secrets here - I am truly a bigtime library geek. Although it looks like a lot, it never takes more than 20-25 minutes a day (usually just before falling asleep) to scan and review. If you see any great blogs missing, tell me and the rest of us in the comments.

Stephen

Subscriptions

Bloglines | News

Library Stuff

ONLINE Insider

Wigblog - Things Internet and Otherwise by Richard Wiggins

LISNews.com

The Pod Bay Door

librarian.net

walking paper

The Shifted Librarian

ResourceShelf

Tame the Web: Libraries and Technology

Catalogablog

Lorcan Dempsey's weblog

Pop Goes the Library

Library Journal | Reed Business Information

It's all good

Internet News

Kenton Good

dave's blog

Shore News Commentary

The Days & Nights of the Lipstick Librarian!

http://www.google.com/googleblog/

InfoBuzzz

Free Range Librarian

LibrarianInBlack

Neat New Stuff on the Net - Weekly Reviews of New Sites by Marylaine Block

ResearchBuzz

TechnoBiblio

blogwithoutalibrary.net

The Kept-Up Academic Librarian

Digital Reference

Outsell Now

Confessions of a Mad Librarian

Unshelved

technogeekery for librarians

open-ils blog

Information Today, Inc. Blog

Quædam cuiusdam

scitech library question

Cites & Insights: Crawford at Large

Lessig Blog

Engadget

Gawker

Drawn! The Illustration Blog

commons-blog

LibraryTechtonics

Wireless Libraries

Wanderings of a Student Librarian

Information Wants To Be Free

Library Voice

Many-to-Many

Gullible.Info

Librarians' Rx

eclectic librarian

all noise all the time

PubSub: libraries or library

The InfoMan's Blog

Creative Librarian

Libraryman

Open Stacks

A Wandering Eyre

Library Dust

Pew Internet and American Life Project: Reports Feed

Pew Internet and American Life Project: Releases Feed

Pew Internet and American Life Project: Presentations

Pew Internet and American Life Project: All

Infotoday Newsbreak RSS Feeds

ALA | American Libraries

Confessions of a Science Librarian

InfoShare

LibraryCog

LibrarianActivist.org

Library Boy

Inforumed - The FIS Inforum Blog

Loomware - Crafting New Libraries

ILL News

Librarian Toolkit

Library Grrrls

Library Web Chic

LIScareer News

NexGen Librarian

Open Access News

The Reflective Librarian

Retrofitted Librarian

Young Librarian

Baby Boomer Librarian

::schwagbag::

Feel-good Librarian

The Distant Librarian

Connie Crosby

The Ten Thousand Year Blog

Walt at Random

Christopher Kupec's Weblog

Listen Up!

The Handheld Librarian

How to Save the World

Rambling Librarian :: Incidental Thoughts of a Singapore Liblogarian

LibraryPlanet.com

lbr weblog

Biz Stone, Genius

Fast Company Now

Charlene Li's Blog

Alan Meckler

JupiterResearch Analyst Weblogs

SIVACRACY.NET: Opinions, Rants, and Obsessions of Siva Vaidhyanathan and his Fri

explodedlibrary.info

EdTechPost

tinylittlelibrarian.blog-city.com

Stephen's Lighthouse

Boing Boing

Doc Searls Weblog

PLA Blog

Gadgetopia

Jenny Levine: Libraries

blogdriverswaltz.com

Digitization 101

APM's Future Tense

j's scratchpad

Library Supporter

EFA Blog

INFOhio Symposium 2005

Library Conferences Blog

Outgoing

You're It!

The Well Dressed Librarian

Digital Odyssey Blog

Chief Blogging Officer

Official Google Blog

weblogs.ucalgary.ca - Sharing the knowledge that makes up the University

Dilbert

RFID in Libraries

FREAKONOMICS BLOG

pamryan.info

Ypulse

Canuck Librarian

Librarian

Kenton Good: Life

Normative Data

SLA 2005 Conference Blog

TeleRead: Bring the E-Books Home

beSpacific

Hidden Peanuts

Library Marketing-Thinking Outside the Book

Random Access Mazar

Christina's LIS Rant

The FRBR Blog

A Librarian's Guide to Etiquette

LITA Blog

libdev Comments

MSN Search's WebLog

Yahoo! Search blog

OH!Libraries: Spotlight on Ohio library services

Normative Data

Musings of a High Tech Hick

LibTalk Blog

Library Bitch

Sirsi Corporation - Stephen Abram Articles and Presentations

Pew Internet & American Life Project

Silkworm Blog

panlibus

Serendipity

Talis Infrablog

The Wonderful World of Mr C

Seth's Blog

Creative Commons Blog

ongoing

stevenberlinjohnson.com

The Snotty Girls Book Club

New Urban Legends

http://www.theonion.com/

Library Juice

The Red Ferret Journal

hangingtogether.org

Slaw

Weibel Lines

Librarian Avengers

Creating Passionate Users

The Information Literacy Land of Confusion

Libraries for Dummies

InsideGoogle

Search Engine Watch Blog

Darlene's Blog on the Side

AL Online News

Canadian Electronic Reserves

Library Technology NOW

Search Engine Strategies

IEBlog

Librarian Way

ALA Techsource Blog

The Industrial Librarian

Game On: Games in Libraries

Tribulations of a Public Librarian

ACRLog

Change of Subject

Uncover the Net Blog

mamamusings

The Gordian Knot

Scobleizer - Microsoft Geek Blogger

Thinking about the Future

Fiddling Librarian 3.0

The Long Tail

November and December Travel and Talks

I am a little late getting this out but just in case you're around any of these sessions, I'd love to chat.

Nov. 3-4 The Charleston Conference (Charleston SC)
Keynote on Measuring Libraries like Wal-Mart

Nov. 6 SirsiDynix CODI Directors Forum (Minneapolis)
Keynote on Key Strategic Questions for Libraries

Nov. 7-10 Chicago Public Library and Chicago Area Libraries
Scholars in Residence

Nov. 11 SirsiDynix Institute (webcast)
Google Inc. and Libraries
(We hope to have this repeated soon- and podcast!)

Nov. 14 PALINET (Philadelphia, PA)
Keynote: The Information Tornado:
Toto, I Don't Think We're in Kansas Anymore!

Nov. 15 Connecticut Library Consortium (Hartford, CT)
Keynote

Nov. 16 Illinois Unicorn Users Group (Joliet, IL)
Keynote

Nov. 17 IMLS LSTA Conference
Endnote

Nov. 22 OLA Education Partnership Tech Talk Tuesday
(Teleconference)
Tech Trends

Nov. 23 Library and Archives Canada (Ottawa, ON)
Tech Trends

Dec. 5-6 Coalition for Networked Information (Phoenix, AZ)
New ways to Measure Libraries

Dec. 8 Old Colony Library Network (Brainerd, MA)
Staff Day Workshop

I might even try to fit in a few days at the office!

Stephen

Posted by stephen at 2:46 PM | Comments (0)