It is all about balance

With shelf space being a "fixed" quantity, pushing collections into the long tail requires balance. By lengthening the tail in each library that would require shortening the head. There is only so much physical space, so the more that libraries play into the niche's, the less they can provide for the masses. But is a niche in one library a part of the mass in another? The best way for libraries to effectively represent the entire tail is the use of consortium's and inter library loans. Page 148 of Anderson's book says it all about the balance between heads and tails:

" If you just have the products at the Head, you find that very quickly your customers want more and you can't offer it. If you just have the products at the Tail, you find that customers have no idea where to start. They're unable to get traction in the marketplace because everything you're offering is unfamiliar to them. The importance of offering the stuff at both the Head and the Tail is that you can start in the world that customers already know: familiar products that tap into and define a space."

Libraries have to work hard at balancing the head and tail as well as locating for their patron's things they cannot immediately provide. Then they can tap into both the Head and the Tail.

The pop-in

So it was pretty cool to pop a little mp3 in my blog - I can see how this could enhance the whole blogging experience. There are some things that just are better communicated with sound...imagine blogging about your new favorite musical artist.... now imagine blogging about said artist AND including an mp3 podcast of them. Or how about those bragger blog's where people talk about all the wonderful things their kids do...and including the trumpet solo or soliloquy from the school play. I can definitely see where an occasional podcast popped into a blog would be an enhancement.

Where I see a problem is if you are a text based blogger who learns a new trick and includes podcasts in every blog - that would get tiresome and not serve the purpose of the blog. People are not always in a situation where they can listen (think cube farm at work and no headset...) when what they are expecting to do is read.

So podcasts in blogs are kinda like pop-in's from people - no big deal that you didn't know ahead of time for the occasional pop-in...but really quite annoying when it becomes habitual!

I hate Halloween

I know, I know how can you hate Halloween? Well let me tell you a little story...

click player to hear more....





click link if you prefer....

Halloween Story

Make It, Get It Out There, and Help Me Find It

Where do libraries and librarians fit into the "Make It, Get It Out There, and Help Me Find It" equation?

Make It --> Libraries provide the tools and training to assist patrons to become new producers. Workshops on how to publish, how to use new technologies, etc have been part and parcel of the public library domain for a long time. They have also lead by example. The number of libraries that are creating content on the web grows everyday.

Get It Out There --> Looking at the aggregator aspect of providing materials for public use - isn't that really what a library is? One big aggregator providing content to the marketplace? By sharing resources with others, libraries are able to provide inventory on demand, no matter how small the niche market.

Help Me Find It --> According to Anderson new tastemakers are "people whose opinions are respected" (pg. 107) and a librarian is typically used as a filter of information because their opinion is respected. They are also reaching out beyond just their own opinion by providing methods for other patrons to share their views. The use of surveys, book reviews, and book lists of frequent library visitors are providing community based recommendations as well.

When looking at these three forces, you can see that libraries and librarians have always been a part of the Long Tail.

Drank some more of the Google Kool-Aid

So I checked out the Google Analytics and the nerd in me was pretty impressed! I couldn't believe how much info you could actually get to - now I just need a reason to care! (I do understand that I would care if I hosted a website or blog read by more than just my classmates who *have* to - but I don't, so really there is not a lot of relevancy for me today on this. I will care some other time though....)

What I did learn is that Steve has trained us all pretty well and the Firefox visits beat the IE visits 70% to 30% - apparently you can only drink so much Kool-Aid from the big guys before you have to try the Delaware Punch. (does anybody else remember Delaware Punch? OMG it was good!)

Also there are alot of people on T1's - so I am guessing that several people might be doing some blog reading at their "day job"!! T1's beat out DSL, but only by a hair. And I am so sorry to the 2 people who accessed via dial up...life must be very painful over dial up.

Online and loving it

Here I sit in my third semester at Rutgers in the SCILS program. In that time I have changed my commute from the living room to the basement, upgraded my backpack from a stack on the floor to real shelves, and learned more than I ever thought possible without setting foot on a college campus. I am an online student who fits school in with all the other things that make up a life and I never have to drive to New Brunswick to do it. It has been odd to adjust to not seeing people but it hasn't impeded my ability to get to know my cohort. Of course I could trip right over them in the street - but that is a whole 'nother story! When I talk to non-students about the program the typical reaction is "wow - you can do that? how does that work?" and I always answer the same way...if I wasn't able to get my degree online I couldn't be going to school right now, so no matter the potential issues it is worth it!

Here is a picture of the building that I travel to for classes....



If you want to take a look at some more of my classrooms, my backpack, and what keeps me going go here --> my SCILS life

If you want to check out what my classmates SCILS life looks like try here --> my classmates

So go ahead - take that online class, it won't hurt you (much).

Heads or Tails?

When thinking about the long tail vis-a-vis (that's a fancy word for in relation to - for you "Fancy Nancy" fans out there) the library I am pondering the space versus potential use continuum. In order for libraries to serve their communities they need to provide a balance between "head-y" things and "tail-y" things.

Everyone that walks in the door is equally capable of asking for the latest James Patterson novel or a book published in Mexico about the Mexican Army and specifically General Miguel Lamego. So the trick is in the balance, because while there may be more people looking for "The Dangerous Days of Daniel X", they can readily find it if you happen to be out. Whereas the user looking for the book on Miguel Lamego probably doesn't have anywhere else to turn. The library can prove its ultimate usefulness in being able to provide materials (either in house or via ILL) that are clearly the tail end of the spectrum.

Are they ready for some collaboration?

In every class you hear the dreaded words "group project" and your palms start sweating, heart starts racing, and eyeballs roll all the way back in your head...why? ... because until now it was just such a pain to parse out the duties and keep track of the work involved in group work. Collaboration tools like Google Docs and spresent can certainly take some of the pain away and should be used for both on-campus and online students for their group work. I have only been in this program for a year and thinking back to my first group project and the weekly phone calls and 3 trillion emails back and forth to put together a PowerPoint presentation literally gives me hives.... If only I, or my professor, had known about these tools life would have been much better (shout out to Sue for our weekly phone calls!). So the short answer to "would it make project creation easier/faster?" is YES YES YES YES YES.

But the real question..."would professors accept them"...
I think within our academic community there is as big a mixed bag of skills as anywhere - there are some professors who are completely on top of all that is new and helpful and some professors who may as well be taking notes on a stone tablet. Each professor has the apparent flexibility to set their own technological requirements so trying to get some to think outside their box just wont happen. The best case scenario would be teaching the students the value of the tools and making it so easy for the professors to view the final work that they would not care how it was created.

the virtual me

So I was/am brand new to delicious so you are more than welcome to take any comment I have with a grain of salt...

I thought the bookmarking exercise as a means of getting to know more about each other was only okay for that purpose...because there are ding-dong's, like me, that didnt put anything in the description to say why the site was important, some of the bookmarks, like mine, just didnt grab my attention. The other thing that I got very confused about was who was marking what...if it is meant to represent "us" as a "whole" I think it does that fine - but if it was meant to have me get to know Tara, for example, not so much...as I struggled to piece together who was marking what and building a profile for that person.

So if you want to use this tool as a "virtual introduction" for another class setting then I think there have to be a few more ground rules...
1. you must provide some insight as to why that site was important (I WAY more enjoyed those bookmarks than anyone could have enjoyed mine...)
2. I think you have to tag each with the user name ...tascils... etc and then look at the lists individually as well as a group tag ...fall08... to see the overlap.
3. you would have to assume that there is the possibility that there are users unfamiliar with delicious and account for that in the beginning

so that's my .02

PBWiki I still like you better

So I took a look at WikiSpaces this week and found it very similar to PBWiki in most of the functionality. The editing, inviting, linking pages and files, etc etc etc all looked very similar. Though I must admit that WikiSpaces seems to have more flexibility in changing the themes, colors, look and feel, logo type things. I do not think the free version of PBWiki is all that flexible in "look" issues.

Okay - now for the big guns.... the free version of WikiSpaces has the dreaded ads that you have to pay to turn off - now $5 a month ain't bad if there is some compelling reason to do it - I think the PBWiki upgrades are most costly than that - but I wonder if $5 really accomplishes what you want? I didnt go down that road to determine...

I also really missed my sidebar - I like my sidebar - I use my sidebar - I need my sidebar - the WikiSpaces navigation on the left is okay but it just seemed like if you had a really big wiki that list would get cumbersome.

So ultimately I think I like my PBWiki better still but it might be worth looking at what $5 a month would get you if you are ready to start giving up the "free"dom.

Interestingly enough, my son's high school Media Center uses WikiSpaces for their "Assignments and Pathfinders" here is a link if anyone is interested --> http://hvcentral.wikispaces.com/

Brown and Duguid

Brown and Duguid bring up several interesting points in this week's reading. One of the implications for the educational system that I see if the re-training of the American ideal of a college education for outbound high-schooler's. The reality of getting your education online is a very different reality than people have ever experienced. Parents are in no way prepared to even think of that possibility for their child and the high school's are probably not well versed enough in what is available for students that could and would thrive in that environment. It is easy to see a "fit" for adults returning to school after years in the workplace, convenience alone makes online schooling viable. But what about 18 year olds that have struggled to fit in the school environment already? Could they be a candidate to get a degree against the odds? How about the kid who really would like to go to college but for some circumstance (home issues, health issues, etc) just cant get to the campus they would like to attend? There are a myriad of reasons that a graduating senior may not go to college, but is your average high school guidance counselor prepared to think out of the box to find solutions for kids who could be successful in the digital environment? I really doubt that they are - but would love to be proved wrong!

honestly - Magnolia is not intuitive enough

Even though I am completely new to social bookmarking/tagging etc and the first time I ever tried Delicious was this week (Steve - you aren't reading this right? I found my "new to me" other ways!!) I can quickly tell I prefer Delicious over Magnolia. I signed up for Magnolia and honestly was at a loss - there is just no easy way to start. Okay, I gotta admit, I like the Magnolia graphic, it is peppy and my favorite color scheme but beyond that - not so much... I found a group that is in a class a little like 598 and using Magnolia, in case anyone is interested in what they are doing at San Jose State -> http://slisweb.sjsu.edu/classes/coursedesc.htm but beyond that I am bouncing around and not getting anywhere. It could be I am not concentrating, or it could be that it just isn't as easy to get going, I don't know! I must admit, I didn't add the buttons to my toolbars etc, as I already have more than enough junk going on for my personal, spare aesthetic tastes, but really it should be self explanatory what to do! So after its 15 minutes of fame I am giving up. Did I give it a fair shot? probably not. But in today's busy world with the myriad of choices at our fingertips I have to learned to move on if something just isn't clicking with me! So I am moving on and hoping that another classmate can better describe a product that I just didn't get!

Shelfari - my thoughts

Okay before I start let me make it perfectly clear that I know I am "different" than most when it comes to visual vs. text... I prefer the written word to pictures almost all the time, a picture does not always paint a thousand words for me! For whatever reason all the new *visual* stuff like visual dictionaries, visual displays of search returns, etc etc etc just confuse the heck out of me - give me a good old list any day!

Shelfari is designed to display your book collection virtually. I use (not very regularly) GoodReads currently so I understood the premise before signing up. Shelfari is definitely made for those people who like a visual representation of the topic. There is a customizable bookshelf that can display the covers of your virtual library. There are lots of ways to share your books and ideas with others, discussion groups, friends, etc. Each process seems very easy to set up, even for me! The only thing I had some trouble with is figuring out how to add new books. I found the button to do it, figured out the search, but did not get the feedback I was hoping for that I had correctly selected the books. Some of the cool things that I noticed were.... there is a tag cloud (like in delicious) for linking to book ideas, it seems very easy to move your books around to different shelves, there are tons of book reviews, there is an area that you can ask for recommendations, etc.

Overall - if you like the big visuals this is the one for you. If you are a more text based person then give GoodReads a try!

Information Overload got you down?

Try using an RSS aggregator to mitigate the problem! Used properly RSS aggregators can really help individuals facing information overload. By creating your own feed of the information you want to read you can eliminate, by never even seeing, things you do not have any interest in and focusing your limited attention to those items you *do* want to see. I think it takes some time and experience to determine how much and what you want to be fed every day but the ability to tailor your inputs to the number and type you can handle is a very powerful tool.

Looking to learn a new language?

Try Livemocha --> http://www.livemocha.com/

According to their own documentation...Livemocha is an exciting e-learning Web 2.0 startup founded by a group of experienced and successful entrepreneurs based in the Seattle area. Livemocha addresses a $20 billion worldwide language learning market fueled by rapid globalization, immigration and travel. Livemocha is a first of its kind web based language learning solution integrating online instructional content with a global community of language learners.

Basically - you sign up and can take lessons in a foreign language - then they will help you find a partner to practice with so you become more proficient. I thought it was very interesting. Maybe I will learn Italian in my spare time?! Oh right, I don't have spare time.

Enjoy!

Slogged thru the rest of Feed

While I did not particularly enjoy reading Feed, it was an interesting study in possibilities. How close are we to that society? Close but no cigar yet...The idea is there though. The notion of having data constantly updating and feeding to you is a reality - the receiving device just isn't implanted in our head yet. It is not that big of a stretch when you see a trio of kids walking down the street texting each other instead of actually *talking* to each other. And really, the consumerism is already there as well, just not in the same technological framework.

Most striking? That still has to be the inability to write any longer. Again, not that far from reality! My teenage son can barely print anymore much less write in cursive.Those skills are just no longer promoted in school because their reality is most things are turned in electronically.

As an aside, my 6 year old daughter asked me the other day to buy something or another (don't recall...) and I said they were all out. Her easy answer... "just go to dot com and buy it, you can get anything there." I can only imagine the society she will be a grown-up in!