Web 2.0 Untangled: Peter Godwin, Web 2.0 and Information Literacy

“Web 2.0 Untangled” was a day-long conference organised by CILIP’s UC&R BBO and CoFHE MidWest Circle, held at Wolfson College on the 24th November 2010. It featured 7 speakers on a variety of topics. I attended thanks to Oxford staff development funding. A condition of this funding is to write-up your experience of the session to pass around your colleagues in Oxford- which is what I'm doing here!

The first speaker was Peter Godwin (http://infolitlib20.blogspot.com/, http://twitter.com/touchthecloud), talking about the impact of Web 2.0 and the information literacy issues it raised. This talk was exciting and enthusiastic, looking at the possibilities Web 2.0 raises. He begun by wowing us with stats- did you know there are 50 million tweets a day, 500 million Facebook accounts and over half of US students have a handheld device that can access the internet? Web 2.0 is mobile and social, focussed on user participation.
To be a librarian in 2010, according to Peter, means focussing not on books but on people and technology. But how far have we actually changed? Is the change just superficial? The early adopters of Web 2.0 in libraries went over the top claiming it was the solution to all our problems, now is the time to reflect.
Web 2.0 means more and more information is flooding towards our readers- we can help teach them search skills, information literacy, scoping the topic and the importance in seeing both sides of the argument.
Peter also introduced us to lots of interesting Web 2.0 tools I hadn’t seen before- the ones I’m planning on investigating are Netvibes http://www.netvibes.com/en, Screenr http://screenr.com/ (for making short video tutorials- “how to use the online catalogue” etc) and Quick Response Codes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_Code (these little box barcodes that people with smart phones can use as URLs that then immediately load on their phones).

The Future of Librarianship

Well, I went to the group discussion with CILIP’s Chief Executive Bob this morning. We were discussing our future: what are the big issues in librarianship, where do we see our profession in 10 years time, and how should CILIP change? It was very informal, lazing around on big comfy chairs and discussions in groups and so on.

My notes are rather fragmentary, and I was getting carried away so forgot to write and so on. Still, some of the issues / changes in librarianship the group I was in came up with were:

There are stereotypes of what librarians are all about, which need to be tackled

• We need to show people that being a librarian isn’t just telling people to be quiet and shelving books, it’s not something that you can just get volunteers to do like Oxfam shops
• The back office stuff is huge, but people don’t realise it’s happening
• We need to update the librarian brand
• Also, what being a librarian means is changing dramatically
• A new skill-set is required now

Information access is such a huge part of modern life

• Librarians have a key role to play, as we always have
• We need to become navigators not gate-keepers
• People think Google can find everything, but it can’t! Research into information seeking behaviour shows most users aren’t actually good at searching
• Librarians need to be indispensible

The Death Of Books

• Or maybe not
• Certainly big changes are happening, and some print media are moving online
• This could be a complete paradigm shift, as big as the invention of printing or even of writing

Money woes

• Financial constraints, Credit Crunch, etc
• Economy shrinking by 30%,
• We need to find things to cut as well as things to promote
• Public libraries are doing better because of the credit crunch- free books!

Then we discussed CILIP. It has bad points!

• Too expensive!
• It advertises some jobs, but it isn’t comprehensive
• The training courses are too pricey, need to be cheaper- or videoed and put online for free
• There was some Newsnight debacle recently- they wanted a librarian, but everyone high-up in CILIP was away from London and they couldn’t find anyone to go on. Hence they need to be more media-savvy, need to get up-to-date and have Library Spin Doctors
• Conversely, they’re too London-centric, everything revolves around their lovely offices in Central London
• University courses vary a lot in quality, if they’re going to say courses are CILIP approved they should do it more rigorously. Should they just do course accreditation and not chartership, focus their efforts? But then how to do centralised CPD- should library schools become CPD hubs?

But also good points

• It’s useful to have a representative for our profession to go on Newsnight / to talk to ministers
• People like having a central information source, although we argued over print or e-newsletters
• The page with all the 1-year graduate trainee schemes on is good (the job adverts could learn a bit from it)
• It has good potential, but needs to do a lot of become actually exciting and interesting and useful!

If you want to read lots of snappy 1-sentence versions of the meeting, see http://twitter.com/laurajwilkinson as she was tweeting the meeting.

If you want to join the CILIP conversation about our future, see http://www.cilip.org.uk/interests/conversationsurvey/cilip.htm

Completion confirmed

Hurrah, just got my completion confirmation email!

See you all at the prize giving...

And now, the end is here...

All good things (and all 23 things) must come to an end. It's been fun!

I've had a good time, chatted to some fun folks, and I look forward to putting some faces to names at the awards ceremony. It's been a good opportunity to explore some Web 2.0 things: some I've always meant to (like Flickr), some that I didn't think I ever would try (like iGoogle, Google Reader, Twitter and Delicious), and some old favourites (Wikis, Facebook, YouTube).

Hmm. How to summarise my views? I think mini reviews of the various Things makes sense, especially focussing on whether or not I'll keep using them and whether I'll use them for work... And then give my verdict on each- Yay, Meh or Nay?

Things 1 & 2, Google ID & iGoogle: I was initially wary of iGoogle, but soon came to see it as a great access point to all the Web 2.0 information I wanted - I'm now hugely keen on it, and use it as my homepage at work and at home! YAY!
Things 3 & 4, Blogger: I'd used Livejournal, so was hard to convince, but the ease of the gadgets is starting to win me over, and I'm considering starting a personal blog on it. I already blog for work, but on Wordpress not Blogger: http://oiloxford.wordpress.com/ YAY!
Things 5 & 6, Google Reader: A great way of keeping up to date on news and updates, which I'm planning on using more and more as it integrates everything into my iGoogle page. I'll use it for work, in that I'll keep watching Phil Bradley's blog... YAY!
Thing 7, Flickr: I've got a paid account and uploaded hundreds of photos- it's so much better than Facebook as you can share the original full-size pics. I've used it for work to share photos of things we're advertising to other OULS libraries. YAY!
Thing 8, Picnik: It's nice, but not as nice as a proper image manipulation program. I'll probably use it more at work than at home, as we can't install programs here. But I don't need to edit many things at work. Meh?
Things 9 & 10, Delicious: I love the idea of keeping all my bookmarks online, so that part of it won me over. But I don't like the community aspect, and I don't like the layout. So Google Bookmarks won me around instead. I've got lots of cataloguing bookmarks on my Google Bookmarks now, so yes I use it for work! Google Bookmarks gets a yay, Delicious gets a nay.
Thing 11, Podcasts: A neat idea, and I've used them a bit. Haven't used them as much as I should- maybe I'll revisit these in my own time later. They've certainly got the potential to be yay, but I haven't really connected to it so it gets a Meh?
Thing 12, YouTube: A great time-waster, but I doubt I'll ever really use it for work. Still, I love it for play so it gets a big Yay!
Thing 13, Facebook: I already run the work Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Oxford-United-Kingdom/Oriental-Institute-Library/137472003754, and I have my own Facebook page. Despite this, I'm getting a bit jaded with Facebook. It's great at tagging photos? That's about it, really. Meh.
Thing 14, LinkedIn: I put my CV on here, but never really intend to look at it again. Nay.
Things 15 & 16, Twitter: Radioteletweeting with the Bunnies was fun, but I don't really like Twitter and have removed the Widget from my iGoogle. Nay.
Thing 17, Wikis: Ace tools for collaborative projects, I use them for work and play. Yay!
Thing 18, Wikipedia: A huge and amazing resource. At work I use it for cataloguing- it enables you to get a brief overview of a subject, essential for making LoC Subject Headings. Yay!
Thing 19, Google Docs: Quite a fun way to work on documents together. Still, the Q drive is better for work. Meh.
Thing 20, ThinkFree Office: Whatever, I preferred Google Docs. Nay.
Things 21 & 22, Gadgets & Widgets: Lots of useful tools here, wonderful for customising your online experience. Yay!

So that's 9 yays, 4 mehs and 3 nays. Apparently in total on this blog I've used the Yay tag 12 times, Meh 9 times and Nay 9 times. So 23 things was definitely a worthwhile program, and I learnt lots, and it's inspired me to the possibilities of Web 2.0. But not everything won me around!

Go Go Gadget Gadgets!

So, last week I was on holiday and missed playing around with gadgets and widgets. I'm catching up with them now!

They're useful. There are so many Web 2.0 tools, it's nice to have something that makes it possible to pull them all together- to put my flickr on my blog, or my bookmarks on my iGoogle, or my RSS reader on my iGoogle or whatever. The whole interplay of the different platforms is something I really like about Web 2.0. So yes, this was a good week.

First I put my Flickr photostream at the bottom of my blog, then changed my mind and put it on the sidebar. It's not a very interesting display at the moment (pictures of a card catalogue we were offering), but it should be better when I upload my Easter holiday snaps! I also changed the colour scheme for the blog, as I decided the black background was a bit irritating.

I didn't fancy having Google headlines on my blog, so didn't bother with that additional thing. Oh, how rebellious!

I don't like the delicious gadgets, and I don't really like delicious. So I fiddled with them a bit before abandoning them in favour of my trusty Google Bookmark widget. I took this chance to put in two new Google Bookmark widgets- this way all my links tagged "Cataloguing" will be in one widget, all my "House hunting" ones in another and all my "Re-enactment" ones in a third. Excellent!

But although the Delicious Widget is a Nay, Gadgets and Widgets in general are a big Yay!

Office 2.0

I've used Google Docs quite a lot already among my friends, so there weren't many huge surprises. But I hadn't used their forms before, and they're quite funky.

I decided to actually do something useful with my 23 Things for once, and made a LoC Cutter Number Generator as a Google Spreadsheet: http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Anv66HmLQMiZdFlsTmJyb18zV3ZaSkZWMWNPa0JaRlE&hl=en

The main problem is when several people try to edit something at once. You get fights- "I want to type in this word! I want to type in this word!"
Also, I'm terrified someone's going to edit something important and it won't work any more. So I've got the formula stored in a Notepad file. Which means that I'm not storing all my information there, I'm not fully embracing the mindset of these things. Oh well.
I do like how many functions you can nest in their spreadsheets- Excel refused to run my formula as it's too long!

So I guess that's a meh. I'm not over-the-moon, but I can see it has uses.

Wasn't hugely impressed by ThinkFree Office? It's ok, I guess. But I'm used to Google Docs already, and I'm not convinced enough to switch. The verdict is nay!

Oh dear, I'm on holiday next week. I'm going to fall behind on my 23 things for the first time! Ah well, it's almost over...

Wikis

My work computer only has IE6. What's up with that?

Anyway, it's meant I can't edit the SocialOULS wiki. But I've done that before- I made this page for our library last year: http://socialouls.wetpaint.com/page/OIL That page does need to be Bodleian-ised tho, maybe I'll try to do it whilst on the front desk over lunch (the front desk has Firefox, thankfully!)

I've done lots of wiki editting in the past- Wikipedia, the Social OULS wiki, and most of all on a wiki for Viking Age Re-enactment I'm a member of.

I think wikis are great ways for people to pool knowledge. I love the way they get contributions from all sorts of people with all sorts of areas of specialist knowledge- it's the ultimate peer review. Obviously they're not perfect (containing a mixture of mistakes, deliberate misinformation, a general Western/American bias, and problems arising from the fact they're often written by enthusiastic amateurs not professions), but nothing is. And Wikipedia at least tries to acheive "Neutral Point Of View", even if that's a bit ridiculous and rather impossible.

The Wikipedia page about Wikipedia may not be the most unbiased source to find out about the problems with Wikipedia though!

Wikis get a big Yay from me!