Pages

7/28/2009

The Future of Public Libraries

Seems the folks from NowandNext (those that developed such future casting timelines as the Extinction Timeline and the popular trend maps) are working on a new trending project which involves mapping scenarios around the Future of Public Libraries. The work and scenarios their outlining in their working blog are fascinating and it’s interesting to follow their process.

Here’s some links to follow their process:


I’m not sure what the overall end result of this planning will look like, but from the process so far, my interest is definitely peaked.

Which scenario do you think is most probable?

7/24/2009

DOK's Surface app goes deeply local

When I was in Delft in April for the UGame ULearn conference, I heard about this fascinating local history project that DOK was developing. Seeing this recent video, I’m even more impressed.



I totally love seeing the concept of connecting community members to “deeply local” (a phrase I first heard from used by Kathryn Greenhill) information and resources come together in such a dynamic and playful way. This is a direction that libraries really need to be paying more attention to imho. Going “deeply local” allows libraries to not only shine a light on community value; it, more importantly, provides a very tangible context for libraries to actively engage the community the creation and sharing of new knowledge.

Thanks DOK for providing and sharing another great project of inspiration.

7/14/2009

ALA Recap - Short, sweet & of course, my slides :)

I spent the weekend in Chicago along with 13,000 other librarians meeting with vendors, traveling back-n-forth across town from the hotel to convention center (& every time, I find myself wondering why the McCormick Center was built in area lacking so many conference amenities, like enough nearby hotels and restaurants) and participating in two sessions. The slidedecks from both my talks can be found on Slideshare and linked below.


Thanks to those who attended!

7/08/2009

Learning 2.0: 23 Things Survey

In going through some old posts still in draft, I realized that I had never shared the findings of the Learning 2.0: 23 Things survey that I had conducted last summer specifically with coordinators of other programs. In conducting the survey I had hoped to find out what was the program's success related to several factors, specifically use of incentives and presence of active management participation. Once the results were compiled, I found the findings interesting. I hope you will agree.

Here is a short slidedeck providing a high level view of the findings. In total 68 program coordinators responded to the call I made last August. The results of 62 of them are included in this report. I did not include the results of six respondents since they had not yet finished their organization's version of the program at the time of survey, hence their results were incomplete.



And equally interesting are the comments to the open ended questions 6, 7 & 8 on biggest program impact, customer benefits and tips for others. Here's a pdf of the survey data report.

I plan to share some of these results as part of the panel discussion at ALA on Life After 2.0. If you’re attending, please be sure to stop by and say hello.

PS: Many thanks to the 68 program coordinators that participated in this survey. The impacts that you shared as a result of this program are inspiring!

7/06/2009

Shirky on the "largest increase in expressive capability in human history"

"What matters here is technical capital, it's social capital. These tools don't get socially interesting until they get technologically boring. It isn't when the shiny new tools show up that their uses start permeating; it's when everyone is able to take them for granted.“"

Must see viewing ----> Ted Talks : Clay Shirky -- How Twitter can make history



After watching this video, the question the rises to the top of my head is how can libraries adjust their organizations to support the "many to many" when our core services have always been (basically still are) designed to support the "one to one" ?

Personally, I think the answer lies in Shirky's last example to "convene and support groups, not to control" them. :)

How about you?


7/02/2009

Share your library love

This feature for our website was actually planned and developed weeks ago before the current budget crisis to coincide with summer reading. And although the funding for public libraries from the state is still unknown, you can't help but be uplifted by the stories and images shared by our customers. :)


Share Your Library Love