Participation – it’s a powerful word

I know I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again… "it’ a very exciting time to be an 'information professional' ” Information is changing all around us. The channels it travels on are changing and now even the way it’s promoted by mainstream media is changing. Just last week Gannett (publishers of USAToday & 90 other newspapers) announced that they were going to start using crowdsourcing to help gather news stories and tonight I stumbled across this at the Wisconsin State Journal site -------------->

Participation is a powerful word these days. It seems users are no longer satisfied with just being consumers of information, they value participation in the creation of it too!

So here's a question, how can we make libraries and services more participatory too? Last week one staff member in the 24th Thing shared this new idea ... why not survey patrons and allow them to submit and vote on best books? Her point was that there are all these expert lists out there touting what books people like best and what they should read, so why not let library users participate in a poll that they create which becomes your library's own list of best reads?

It's a great idea and an even greater way to help promote and elevate your library as a community resource. Invite your users to participate in the creation and they feel a sense of ownership.