05.04.08
Overwhelmed!
If anyone was following this blog regularly, you’ve probably wondered what happened to me or maybe even given up reading it. If you were disappointed in my poor performance, you have my sincerest apologies. It’s just that I’ve been super-busy lately. I’ve started at least 5 different posts, but have been unable to perfect and publish any of them. So rather than finish writing even one of them, my solution is to write a new one! What else would a packrat do? If I can’t accumulate unwritten blog posts, then I’m not a true packrat.
One of the things that has overwhelmed me lately is my accumulation of new blog subscriptions. For the longest time, I had a manageable collection of blogs to read– somewhere around 65. But in the course of keeping up with my professional readings, I’ve discovered more blogs and subscribed to them. Being the packrat that I am, the number quickly jumped to 92 (I just added another today http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/). I don’t want the number to rise any higher, so I need to review the list and prune the deadwood. (I also need to learn how to speed read.)
Before I pruned any blogs from my reader, I decided to read through some of them. Of course, I didn’t get very far before finding this post from Steve Rubel about attention crash and managing email, blogs, and everything else our in digital world. He referred to Inbox Zero, which offers tips on keeping your email inbox empty. A colleague of mine already recommended this same link to me, but I’ve failed to spend enough time investigating or implementing it. Maybe it’s because my own inbox is so overwhelmingly stuffed that I feel there’s no hope for ever getting it to zero. Inbox Zero could more accurately refer to my attention span, which is hovering around zero these days.
Steve wrote about investing in search tools, although he didn’t mention a new tool called Twine, which I’ve signed up to beta test. Twine is a semantic web application that’s supposed to tie everything together, meaning you tell it what you’re interested in and it searches the Web for that information. It can make recommendations and even link you up with like-minded people who share the same interests.
Steve’s blog also mentioned the book The 4-hour workweek by Timothy Ferriss. I just got a copy from my library over the weekend, so I have yet to read it. Hopefully I can work it into my piles of nonfiction books awaiting me on my hope chest at home (how appropriate!– they’re hoping to be read). When I figure out Twine and read Tim’s book, I’ll let you know if either of them are useful, whether or not you’re a packrat.
02.06.08
Maxed out
I’m not going to brag and say I get more emails than anybody I know, because there’s somebody out there who likely gets more than I do. But I probably have a harder time than most folks with getting through all of them each day. Reading, replying, or forwarding them to others seems to take up hours of my time, if I let it. Sorting them according to whether or not they’ve been read only adds to my dismay when I see how many fall into that category. Sorting by other groupings, like subject, author, or size turns up all sorts of interesting emails that are otherwise lost in the daily flood.
When I can’t read emails from discussion lists, I scan their subject lines, sort them by subject, then drag and drop them into folders on my hard drive, where they can live relatively undisturbed forever. I have good intentions to read them someday, but usually never do. Deleting them isn’t the answer. I can’t delete them for fear I will miss some nugget of wisdom or a byte of information I could have found useful. We packrats keep everything, from piles of physical papers to files of digital junk.
Subscribing to and reading blogs is another thing I struggle to keep up with. If I’m not tuned in to blogs and emails, I would miss out on what’s going on and what’s upcoming in my profession. I subscribe to 64 blogs and I thought that was a lot. Then I heard Stephen Abrams say he reads 650 blogs and just lets the information wash over him. I think I would drown.
I’m thinking of cutting back on my non-essential committee involvements at EVPL. I’ve simply got to find more time to get my work done during work hours and let others serve in my place. I’ve been on the Wellness Team long enough that it’s time I step down and let someone else take my place. They need branch representation and I need to get more work done. I think that being at work (unplanned) until 5:50 pm today (and most other days) made me realize it was time to let go of something.
02.03.08
“25 Technologies to Watch, and How”
I sat in on a SirsiDynix Institute webinar with Stephen Abrams last week to hear about his “25 Technologies to Watch, and How.” Stephen is the Vice President, Innovation, at SirsiDynix, a library automation company. He’s tuned-in all things technological and super excited about each and every one of them. In fact, his presentation was supposed to be about 25 technologies; instead it was closer to 30– and he said he could have had more.
Here they are:
1. Mobile- it’s the dominant device outside North America. GPS coding is also big and getting bigger
2. Open Handset Alliance Android- the ability to connect all phones on the same standard, like the Open Content Alliance standard
3. Tagging- the Pew Internet Study said 28% of the population was tagging
4. Scrapbooking- searching web articles in databases like EBSCO; capturing references & citations for research. It allows you to find your original article on your PC
5. SaaS- Software as a Service- Application hosts; using a server farm to store software. This makes it easier to keep software updated and saves money when shared by several institutions/organizations
6. Microblogging- Facebook, MySpace, Twitter & other SNS are running events through these social networking sites. They are popular with groups running events
7. Social content- a genaration of people have bookmarked information; how can we capture & share this content?
8. Public social networking- we (librarians) can’t ignore it as a tool to network with users. We need to find ways to use it to promote the library
9. Private social networking- for classrooms, groups of people with similar jobs, committees, etc. It becomes a virtual meeting room
10. Social networking integration- (F8, MySpace, Developer, IBM, Google OpenSocial); the idea of conecting library web pages to social networking and gaming sites
11. e-books- they need to be combined with other e-content and integrated into other formats
12. e-book devices- devices are still a problem; we need to get e-books on phones
13. Personal homepages- a library homepage has too much focus; libraries need to link to personal homepages in order to make ourselves more relevant
14. Cloud software- Google Docs, Zoho, etc. provide integrated software online. Libraries can offer more integration of software & content
15. RSS groups & readers- (Bloglines, Google Reader) we need to use them to our advantage to cluster similar topics together on our websites– one possiblity would be a local news ticker
16. iTunes, SpiralFrog, LimeWire- music/video collections; both pay & free models are supported; we need to offer them in libraries– the market is too big to ignore
17. Podcasts- libraries need to create and offer podcasts to users, especially teens, who could make podcasts themselves. We can post them on our website– maybe make local stars out of youth services staff reading storytimes
18. Streaming media- DVDs are going away; streaming is in. Sets of streaming media are already available to libraries, but the technology isn’t perfect. We shouldn’t wait for perfection, but should work with it now.
19. Pandora channels- millions of songs & artists available on the Internet. You add content and create channels of your favorite music
20. Presentations- the book Beyond Bullet Points discusses why PowerPoint presentations are so dull; they should be spiced up with visuals, maps, more style
21. AppleTouch, iPod, merged gaming- they are easy to use, so libraries should use them to attract users.
22. Local dominance- is very important. Is the school searching the local public library catalog? Google will default search results once it knows your geographical area. Geocoding is becoming more important; libraries need to explore more mashups with Google maps
23. Custom search MicroFederation- use Google custom search for things like grouping library blogs or certain databases by subject. It’s best built locally in the community you’re serving
24. Open ID- the ability to have one secure ID that allows users to have one ID rather than multiple usernames and passwords
25. Presence management- having different identities, such as parent, librarian, researcher, student. How do I manage my identites in a multi-dimensional way?
26. Avatars- fun to play with; are related to presence management
27. eLearning- spend 15 min. per day learning Internet 2.0. How do we build multi-dimensional learning styles? E-learning is the expansion of learning modality, the removal of the distance barrier. Libraries should partner with colleges using software such as Blackboard, Atomic Learning
28. Web-based collaboration- using software such as Google Docs, a secure shared collaboration creates a virtual room
How? How do we figure out all this technology? We should watch how people are using it, but without making value judgments about the technologies. We should play with new technologies. It’s the best way to learn and free up energy in an organization. What makes play fun? No agenda! Start up a technology petting zoo, where staff can come together and play with cell phones, MP3 players, camcorders, and other new technologies. Read blogs. Stephen reads an astounding 650 blogs per day! He recommended reading blogs every day and letting their information wash over you. Attend conferences and unconferences (he attends 150 per year!). Sign up for Google Alerts and watch technology and social forecasts. Read widely– everything from professional journals to popular magazines, especially the advertisements. Watch Google Trends and Google Zeitgeist; they’re especially helpful for collection development information. Watch YouTube. There’s professional, educational stuff on it, as well as entertainment. Watch a kid. Kids are remarkably adept at texting and creating videos and podcasts. Watch how their group behavior and how they are using technology and physical space. Schedule time to play and learn. Spend just 15 minutes a day learning new technologies and software. Get a buddy, because it’s more fun to learn with a partner and you can push each other to learn more.
To follow Stephen’s blog, subscribe to: http://stephenslighthouse.sirsi.com/
