Wonderful world of wikis (case studies)...

Wow, thinking about my comment about the readings and questioning a point from Farkas and then going to the "Butler Wiki Ref"....I kind of take back my comment! After looking at the directory and browsing through and finding even student's personal entries about themselves, sort of user identification, wow'ed me! They really make it work. Then looking at the Wyoming author's wiki, that's kind of interesting also, and a neat idea. Great way to keep track of authors, their works, etc, and a good tool as a librarian to go to if anyone is ever looking for literature (of any kind on Wyoming!!).

As for the Princeton Public Library review site, I found it pretty neat, but I wondered if any user could add his or her comments to the books/reviews. Also what was neat with this site, if you clicked on the book, it brought you right into the catalogue, and you could see the item call number, location and if it was in or signed out.

The BizWiki is also interesting, however, when I saw the user list, I was surprised that it was so low (36). It made me wonder if students could not add to the wiki, and/or is the wiki limited to staff only for adding content? It is clear that the target audience is the university of Ohio: students, faculty, staff, and other library staff, etc. Overall, I like the chat widget that was added to the Main page, good idea/use of social software in an information tool.

Farkas is ahead of the game..

Farkas seems to be ahead of the game. She seems on top of uses, and has good practical examples of how Wikis can be used in libraries. Her suggestions are good, however one of them made me wonder how practical, or how serious would adding a wiki to a library catalogue be? Would students vandalize (ie: add junk/spam, etc) to the wiki/comment on books or would it be controlled, having all students/users log in and know who is writing what, and where. Part of the wiki ideology is that anyone should be able to contribute, no matter who they are, and "Wikipedia" has worked that way as anyone can create an alias and write about what they want. So how could you control who is writing in the wiki-catalogue/opac? However, Farkas seems to be on top of uses, and practicalities. When I did my coop with NRCan, we went through a lot of ideas and uses of wikis and I had read some material by Farkas a while ago, so I am not surprised to read these articles. Also, she has a book that has been long awaited (it might be out now) on Social Software in Libraries.

The Schiff article is also quite informative, and a good description of the history and progress of Wikipedia and the role that wikis can have in society. How information can be accessed, and added to a database, and also show how much information can be attained, when there seems to be no or very limited barriers.

cases for this week...

I am not really sure what to say of these cases...One thing that does come to mind, which is not really off topic I guess. While doing my coop at NRCan, RSS was suggested to some patrons/scientists who could take advantage of RSS to have updates on different searches that they did. Basically, you could save your search (ie: Lit Search- For those of you who had J. Noon, you know what these are, and how much time they take), well by using the RSS feature, you can save your search and anytime, something new comes up that would be in your search, the patron can get a notice of it. It is really neat, and a true time saving tool.

week 5 readings...

Overall the readings were interesting, but the one that caught my attention the most was the one by Randy Reichardt, who writes about how undergrads do not know about RSS. I don't want to seem to critical of the readings, but a lot of the content seems dated, and his article dates back to Fall 2005. I am curious about today, if we were to run the same survey, how many students would you think would know of RSS. I am sure a lot more than none! Also, I think a majority of students would know about blogging/blogs. The information age that we are presently in, is growing at a very rapid rate, and for example the large use of Facebook I think says a lot about how technology, online communication and sharing of information is growing at a rapid speed. At least in the North American market. In Europe or Asia, I'm sure they are probably going through other phases, possibly even ahead of ours, and the dated "Facebook". All to say that I think more people are aware of these tools and possibilities as was mentioned on the article.

In Hollenback's article, I agree that RSS can help blend different tools and make access to information easier and more efficient.

cases for this week...

It is very impressive to see at what level of distinction that some libraries have their RSS feeds. Some are very particular and have RSS for each genre and or group of interest like that Tacoma Public Library. I also found a drawback from the Tacoma Public Library's page, and it had to do with its presentation. It had information on RSS and what it can do, etc at the bottom after the long list. If I was a patron looking at that page, I might be lost, and on a usability scale, it's not too friendly as you have to scroll down low to find more information, which is really pertinent for a new person desiring to know more about RSS.

There was only one library that had an RSS function for personal account updates which was that Hennepin Public Library. I think some organizations might have this function already installed through email, as I have experienced that in the past with previous academic libraries, but it would also be nice to see the opportunity to see it come from RSS. The University of Oklahoma even had an RSS for job opportunities which I also found neat and useful if you were thinking of working there. It would save the user from going back to check all the time to see if a job has been posted.

Week 4 readings...

The Lee Feever video was pretty cool and interesting. It makes it simple and easy to understand. It is also very pleasing and I think it could be very appealing to a large audience. It's a good informative way of doing it. His recap is also a great as it informs the viewer of the steps to take. His drawing the house is neat and the other images also make the video really to the point and informative. It breaks it down to something really simple, which it should be as RSS is not really complicated.

The Cohen article is also very interesting, and the practicality that he brings into it is great. However, I do find some of his information a bit hard to read over at least at a first glance, when he gets into “default query URLs”, it is not that easy to read, and could have maybe been written in a different way which could have been clearer. Also, the article seemed a bit dated when I finished it, then I scrolled to the top and realized it had been written in 2002, which made some sense.

The article from “Content Publishers and Webmasters” uses a lot more geek talk and is intended for a mature audience, more techy or for people doing coding. The information is good, but I would not suggest this article to just anyone, as the content could be easily overwhelming. However, if someone really wanted to know the roots of things, it might be a good place to start.

The Robin Good article offers a lot of good information with his list of 17 positive aspects, and 11 possible problems and limitations. He points out a lot of good information and things to consider. His title, which infers to email vs RSS, Good makes an interesting case around this topic. He brings out a good point in ”Electronic inter-personal and business exchanges will still largely utilize traditional email”. This point is very true as too much information is private, and meant only to be seen by some people, not everyone. There are differences between RSS and email and Good presents a good case on their difference and that they won't ever beat each other over for one to win the race as they seem to serve two different purposes.

week 3..cases...

Week 3 case studies...

These blogs are for the most a step down from the previous week's case studies. Most of them, except for one seems really casual, and nonchalant. The Library Lounge blog was the one that seemed to stick out, and was semi-more professional. The “Save Point” blog seems really youth/kid oriented, at least from the posts that I looked at, the target audience is for young people. Saying this, now it makes me think it does still have promise even on a library webpage, as there are different target audiences, and if I was in a public library, I may want to try and have a more appealing blog for youths if I was in charge of youth programs, etc. Depending on the audience, your blog should attempt to cater to it. So I think I should recant my first opinion on the professional look of the blogs, and rather say that the “casual” look is all about the purpose and the intended group that it is constructed for.