#16: Library 2.0

From the tools we've seen in these exercises, I think the most salient feature of Web 2.0 is the social aspect, specifically a democratization of creating, selecting and evaluating resources. Opposed to traditional library modes, Library 2.0 would seem to indicate a shift to more public participation in areas where we have had near-exclusive control. What, if any, control of these traditional library functions would libraries be willing to relinquish? Which could we relinquish and still feel that we are true to our mission as libraries? Or, does our sense of what is core to being a library need to change?

Of the other articles I read, the points that I feel are most realistic to our situation are about ways we can be "out there" or engaged and participating in the Web 2.0 world. I think of examples like the tools created by librarians to work with browsers and Web 2.0 services. I also think we could have more of a role in adding content or tags to Web 2.0 services. Couldn't librarians be editing Wikipedia articles or at least adding notes and links giving authorative sources? Shouldn't we be adding authorative content to del.icio.us?

I contrast this perspective to suggestions that we fit existing library functions within the more constrained online environments. What I've seen of online "libraries" is that they are all poor substitutes for the real thing. For instance, in the one demo I've seen of Second Life, "books" were kept in trunks and your avatar had pass nearby in order to see the titles contained there. A text- or Web-based catalog is so much more powerful than these constrained virtual worlds. Should we settle for such shallow solutions just because they are the current thing?

Instead I think we should be trying to raise the quality of Web 2.0 resources. For instance, I've been adding bookmarks from my user guides to del.icio.us and finding that in many cases I'm the first person to add an important link. I think librarians should be concerned that there are 25,000 links to a video of a dog skateboarding and none to the Census Bureau.

Similarly, when searching for pre-exisiting searchrolls in Rollyo, I found one created by another library. To me, that had some authority. I'm guessing other users might feel the same. Yet, it isn't possible at this point to find searchrolls created by source, specifically by a library. Maybe we -- librarians collectively -- should be working with services like to this to get library-generated sources acknowledged and weighted accordingly. I'm sure there are dozens of such opportunities where libraries can have a visible role in Web 2.0 and make a corresponding difference in quality.

For even more ambitious projects, we could be looking to the information science side of the house for ways to make sense or consistency of some of the more chaotic and unbalanced aspects of Web 2.0. For instance, "folksonomy" has some benefits but the debit side is considerable. Is there some way to automatically classify items based on popular tags (perhaps combined with other elements of the record)? What about the way interest groups get their sites better rankings by "bombing" (I think that's the term) the search engines. So Dianetics and Atlas Shrugged always make it into the list of the 100 greatest books of all time. Pollsters know how to measure "generated" responses and compensate for them in their analysis, so why can't we do the same?

I like that we could display librarything tags within our catalog records. librarything already pulls records from LC. Why not try to use some of the overlap between popular tags and ossified LC classification to come up with something both current and structured?

I think there are a lot of opportunities in Web 2.0 for libraries but I'm concerned that most of the discussion is marked by two wrong-headed responses: throw aside all traditional library functions in order to pursue the latest shiny geegaw or ignore anything that we can't control absolutely no matter how irrelevant we may become. I'd like to see a strong, concerted contingent of librarians who are not afraid of new modes (but not easily distracted by things just because they are new) and respect what is still valuable about traditional library functions (but won't cling to every dusty artefact of the profession out of misdirected loyalty).

#15. Custom search engines

I think the concept is good and in practice I'm seeing better results than I might without the CSE function, but there are still problems. My litmus test with any search engine is "John Gay" (the 18th C. English playwright). Years ago, when doing work for my Gulliver's Travels site, I tried this search and retrieved lots of "sponsored-site" ads with oiled hard bodies and very few links to men in powered wigs and silk brocade. I tried a few pre-rolled searches on Rollyo for John Gay and the CSE hits were consistently good but the sponsored sites are still of a different nature (e.g. ""Get Blown" Away by Hot Guys on Gay.com"). If someone is going to promise custom searches, I want better control.

One thing not discussed in the lesson is that you can search SearchRolls in Rollyo, to see what CSEs others have created, test them, edit them and/or add them to your account. I couldn't locate an existing 18th Century searchroll but the English literature searchroll created by Simmons College Library works like a charm. There is a good area for libraries to explore.

#13: IM

I have used chat a few times for technical support and I've found it helpful. (You can type error messages and bad links and not have to deal with being understood on the phone.) Oddly, after these experiences, I remember having talked with the other party as if we were on the phone, instead of typing. It is far more personal and immediate than you might imagine. I did try the Meebo chat but the Library team has been "off-line" so nothing happened. Not the most exciting lesson.

Pipes

I just came across an article -- it was featured on the del.icio.us homepage -- called "Replace Facebook Using Open Social Tools" from Wired. Being inclined towards open source, I had to investigate. It outlines a whole world of social networking tools that aren't dependent on a single site/vendor/interface. And it introduced me to "pipes," a new tool launched by Yahoo last February that looks very powerful. I haven't figured it out so I'm looking for some help if anyone else has gotten anywhere.

Wikis: 2

Edited the "About the Library" wiki page. It was pretty easy.

Is there an intermediate point between private/password-protected content and public/no-holds-barred access? I was wondering whether you could give a selected group write access and prevent public editing. Maybe it is a feature of one of the paid upgrades.

Wikis

I've been interested in wikis as a technology for a long time, both as a general Web content management tool -- can't you see the whole of the Library's Web site within a wiki framework -- and also as a tool for creating and maintaining library guides. However, in each case I have encountered hurdles to making this happen. Following up on this lesson, I've been exploring pbwiki.com. It is looking very interesting.

folksonomy

Just a quick thought about folksonomy (I get it: folk + taxonomy = ). I appreciate that there is some opportunity for libraries to enhance our rigid tagging scheme (LCSH) with something more fluid but I see problems in surrendering this responsibility to the masses. I've mentioned some racist tagging I've encountered in del.icio.us. What happens if we pull those sorts of tags into our catalog displays through librarything or a similar system? I suppose that you have to accept a certain level of stupidity with any scheme that depends on the masses. And I also hope that people will filter out the fringe material and focus on the core ideas represented by the majority. But I can't help but feel that we're surrendering our authority and the public's diminishing faith in libraries by following this development.

"Once again, the Internet proves that if you put an infinite number of monkeys at an infinite number of keyboards, they will NOT produce Hamlet."

Week 7: LibraryThing

I love librarything and have been a lifetime member for about a year and a half. Since my first burst of adding titles in the beginning, I don't check in a lot these days and I haven't paid much attention to new developments. I'm vaguely aware that there are affinity groups forming on the site but I've ignored any invitations (in fact, all messages) I've received. I take the "social" part of social networking with a grain of salt.

I enjoyed being reintroduced to librarything and some features I was not aware of. I've added the javascript applet to my blog, as you can see. And I'd really like to see us add the librarything tags to our catalog.