Christina's LIS Rant
Monday, May 02, 2005
Knowledge-at-work: KM in the library
(rant forthcoming...) ARGH! This post got me so mad I just had to post my response here on my rant as well as leaving it in the comments section.
DG thinks that libraries:
1) are only worried about "things" and physical collections
2) are big into inventory
3) only add value by organization
That is so... what? 70s? 80s? Never?
His ideas at improving libraries:
1) provide alerts
2) keep usage statistics
3) involve the users in the selection of materials
4) library as place
DUH! When was the last time he was in a library? Of course we do all of this.
So here's my response:
Too strong? I do still believe in being an intermediary and I see nothing wrong with that. I guess I feel better now. ¶ 3:04 PM| |cites (technorati) |
DG thinks that libraries:
1) are only worried about "things" and physical collections
2) are big into inventory
3) only add value by organization
That is so... what? 70s? 80s? Never?
His ideas at improving libraries:
1) provide alerts
2) keep usage statistics
3) involve the users in the selection of materials
4) library as place
DUH! When was the last time he was in a library? Of course we do all of this.
So here's my response:
Your mythical library folk do not reflect the views or activities of most professional librarians.
We actively involve our customers (no, we don't call them patrons anymore).
We believe in the library as place (meeting rooms and group areas to support collaboration, programs and events to build networks...)
We have vibrant, customizable portals and personalized services for our customers. These include blogs, feeds, e-mail alerts, sharepoint spaces.
We are out in our communities, offering services where and when needed.
We do environmental scanning for our customers and suggest items of interest to them.
The collections are our foundation. The place we jump off *from*. Our services are what we offer.
Too strong? I do still believe in being an intermediary and I see nothing wrong with that. I guess I feel better now. ¶ 3:04 PM| |cites (technorati) |
Comments:
Results of self-test:
1) collaborative filters? Yes.
2) wireless hub? Being installed within the next 30-60 days. The issue was security, and that we're in an old building so they had to run new power and new ethernet or we would have had it already
3) yes, you can easily network via the library
4) ephemeral communities -- the actual nuts and bolts are done by IT, but we support the content and use with the exception of tagging. Several libraries are working with their ILS vendors to add some sort of tagging overlay, but we aren't as of yet. In a manual sort of fashion, we ask our customers what keywords they would associate with a certain record in our portal, and we add them in a free text field -- but that's different.
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1) collaborative filters? Yes.
2) wireless hub? Being installed within the next 30-60 days. The issue was security, and that we're in an old building so they had to run new power and new ethernet or we would have had it already
3) yes, you can easily network via the library
4) ephemeral communities -- the actual nuts and bolts are done by IT, but we support the content and use with the exception of tagging. Several libraries are working with their ILS vendors to add some sort of tagging overlay, but we aren't as of yet. In a manual sort of fashion, we ask our customers what keywords they would associate with a certain record in our portal, and we add them in a free text field -- but that's different.
