According to a study being presented at a society conference in Glasgow, librarians have a very stressful job. Some excerpts from the BBC article: The study surveyed nearly 300 people drawn from five occupations. They were firefighters, police officers, train operators, teachers and librarians and were intended to cover the spectrum, with the librarians first-thought... Continue Reading →
Sometimes I Feel Like Arnold
From the ACRLog: I’ve found that although male librarians often tell people they became librarians for the girly reason of “helping people,†the real reason is that they’re in it for the power. Who among us hasn’t felt the surge of testosterone after sitting at the reference desk, taking on all comers, and summoning up... Continue Reading →
Screensavers as marketing tools
Many libraries and computer labs use screensavers to protect burn-in on computer screens when they are not in use. This past quarter, we've been using the screensavers as a marketing and advertising tool. At the beginning of the quarter I created a few images to advertise services and collections in our library. I've posted a... Continue Reading →
Using Social Software to Understand Patrons
Scott Douglas' latest writing is sure to grab some attention, especially since the post was highlighted on Library Stuff. I am sure many will raise issues about the stereotypes of librarians. However, I was more interested in Scott's exploration of a social software called Myspace. Scott describes his first experience with MySpace: I saw many... Continue Reading →
Some Ideas About Radical Reference
Rochelle Mazar has a nice post about providing radical reference in which she states: The future of reference service is not behind a desk. Truly radical reference is coming out from behind that desk and bringing that crucial resource of answers into real life, into that space between having a question and the topic shifting... Continue Reading →
IM, Virtual Reference, and Podcasting Survey
While the details have yet to be ironed out, sometime this summer the Ohio University Libraries will have a pilot program of providing reference via Instant Messaging. We have been thinking about this for some time, and by now my colleagues are probably getting very tired of me forwarding links from Michael, Aaron, Bill, Sarah,... Continue Reading →
Just Another Manic Monday
My son has been ill for about a week, so my wife and I have been swapping on/off days. As a result, neither one of us has been able to get much work done, even with trying to stay on top of email from home. I have been attempting to play catch-up today which, at... Continue Reading →
Good Article on IM in Libraries
Aaron Schmidt and Michael Stephens have put together a good write-up about using Instant Messaging in libraries. Once you read this, you'll want to try IM at your library. Link via LibrarianInBlack.
Librarians as Teachers
Michael Stephens at Tame the Web writes some encouraging words about the future role of librarians as teachers. I agree with him in that as long as there are new technologies, databases, interfaces, resources, and information needs, librarians will still make a huge impact as teachers.