MMORPGs/Online Gaming as Social Networks
Sure, Myspace is fun in the fact that anyone can make a thousand friends. You can even add music, videos, customize the backgrounds and, did I mention, make a thousand friends. Eventually, it all becomes a little static. Ultimately, it is a personality profile… a really cool one at that, but all communication is done through typing and emails.
But actual Cyberworlds, now that is where the fun is to be had!
Massively-Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Game-sites (MMORPGs) like World of Warcraft or Runescape (a free version of WoW) are not as much a collection of social introverts as people think. It’s not about sitting in their chosen room of darkness and defeating dragons of varying levels of difficulty… well, not completely.
The success of these games has little to do with storylines. There are challenges offered in order to advance a character’s levels and abilities but there really isn’t a true definitive end, just harder and harder challenges. The worlds are more about the social encounters, creating clans, rivalries, and alliances. It’s social cliques along with the action; real-world interactions within fantasy settings.
But it is more than that. Business deals have been made and sealed within the realm of WoW, marriages have been acted out here and then taken place in real life, virtual funerals have been held for teammates who died in real life but were too far away to pay respects. In fact, some of my friends from high school are held a reunion in WoW a week ago.
So, its not just about challenges, it is community as well. People’s personlity plays a big part in whether or not they are part of one clan or another, connections build a large part of success. Social networking is as integral as it is fun for players in these games, in obth the cyberworld and realworld (remember the business deal?).
Is it time to start changing our premonitions of gamers as social introverts?
Teens in the Library
“Why don’t we just turn the library into an arcade!?”
I tend to get this response from the more, umm, veteran professionals when I bring up gaming programs in the library. Truth is, I’ve gotten similar cynicism for other non-traditional teen programs as well (and I know I am not alone). I’m not completely sure what the issue is but it seems an odd reaction. Why hate programs that bring people into the library?
Or is the issue that these programs bring teens in the library?
Teens are not always seen as an asset in the library community and, sometimes, they are viewed as an outright nuisance among our co-workers. At my previous job, also as a YA Librarian, I had several co-workers flat out state “they do not work with teens.” In fact, a great crux in my job is battling for our teens’ rights to be wherever they please in a library.
I hear many of my cohorts express the same difficulties.
But why teens? Why teen programs? Why the feeling that teens have no place in the library?
When I asked my coworkers why they had issues with teens, I heard a lot of the same answers. When I asked them what their greatest frustrations were with patrons in general, I heard pretty much the same answers as before.
The following is a list of general complaints I have heard. As you read them, ask how many of these are exclusively teen issues and how many actually apply to the general patron population:
They are loud
They are rude
They use bad language
They only come here to use computers
They only come here to rent videos
They look at inappropriate sites
They steal books
They only read magazines
They sleep in the library
They disrupt other patrons
They smell
Feel free to add your own list, but ask yourself… are any of these really just teen issues?
“The Future of the Internet II” New Pew Internet Survey Released
As I am sure many of you have heard, on Sept. 25th, 2006 Pew Internet & American Life Project and Elon University released their latest survey “The Future of the Internet II.” If you would like to see a pdf of the full report click here. Results, including quotes and biosketches from the 750 tech savvy respondents can be found on the Imagining the Internet Web site.
According to the press release, themes in the predictions made for the year 2020 include:
- “Continued serious erosion of individual privacy
- Improvement of virtual reality and problems associated with ever-more-compelling synthetic worlds
- Greater economic opportunities for those in developing nations
- Changes in languages and the rise of autonomous machines that operate beyond human control.”
My favorite quote from the experts:
“It is better to be actively, thoughtfully and humanly adapting technology than to be creating inertia to resist it.”Scariest quote:
“Losses from internet-related crime and terror will exceed losses from all natural disasters.”Most hopeful quote:
“Enhanced communications and access to information are on the evolutionary path to freedom.”Click here to view more select quotes.
Library as Place
Posted by Peter Bromberg
Note: This piece originally appeared in slightly different form in the NJLA Fall (2006) Newsletter.
We are currently experiencing a unique convergence of three societal trends, and that convergence is creating an unprecedented opportunity for libraries.
The first trend is that people are increasingly using the internet in the privacy of their home for activities that were previously conducted in public spaces. Shopping, banking, conversing, researching, listening to concerts, and watching movies are just a few examples of such activities.
The second trend, pointed out by Robert Putnam in his insightful book, Bowling Alone, is that Americans are experiencing a marked decrease in social interaction as we become increasingly disconnected from our family, from our friends, and from each other.
The third trend is more subtle and presents a threat as well as an opportunity: Businesses are increasingly embracing the value of being a “destination of choice” and modifying their environments and their services accordingly. For example, we used to go to the hardware store to buy grout or drywall; now we go to learn how to tile our bathroom or put up a wall. We used to go to the bank to deposit our checks; now we go to attend a retirement planning seminar. We used to go to the bookstore to buy books; now we go to hear music, drink coffee, and, dare I mention, bring our children to story time…
Our customers have a greater need for shared spaces and social interaction than they ever have before, but they also have more options regarding how, and where, they choose to spend their free time.
LIBRARIES ARE TRANSFORMATIVE PLACES
Libraries are transformative places. By our very nature we offer people a “third place” (not home, not work) where they can come to explore, imagine, think, learn, play, and reflect. Our function as a “third place” has never been more important to our continued health and relevance. If libraries are to survive and thrive we must redouble our efforts and refocus our energies to ensure that we are not only “third places” but destinations of choice.
Thinking of “library as place” goes to the heart of the matter. It invokes the big question: Why would someone in our community choose to spend their time here rather than somewhere else? Related questions might be: What does the library look like, smell like, feel like, and sound like? What do our signs communicate? What kind of environment are we offering to the community and how do library staff contribute to the creation of a friendly, welcoming environment?
The thriving library of 2010 will have thoroughly considered these questions and be guided by the answers they have discovered. Many NJLA members are probably familiar with Mount Laurel Library’s success with their use of retail merchandising techniques. Those techniques were implemented as part of the “Trading Spaces” project. A do-it-yourself kit, replete with documentation, signage, photos, furniture vendor contacts, prices, and more is available at the project website http://www.sjrlc.org/tradingspaces. Taking a look at this resource page is a great place to start if your library is interested in becoming a destination of choice in your community.
SIX THINGS YOU CAN DO TODAY
Detailing a strategic direction for your library is outside of the scope of this short piece. But in the interest of practicality, here are six things you can do today to enhance your library’s status as a true “third place” in your community:
1. DO A SIGNAGE AUDIT: Have everyone on your staff, and maybe a couple of customers, walk through your library with these questions in mind: What makes it easy to find something? What makes it difficult to find something? Are signs readable from a distance? Are signs jargon-free? Do you use Dewey numbers instead of natural language? (Don’t.) Get rid of ripped signs and visible tape. Eliminate handwritten notes. Use positive, respectful wording and avoid parental tones.
2. OFFER FOOD AND DRINK IN THE LIBRARY: (Notice, I don’t say “permit”.) Having food and drink in your library helps create a welcoming environment. The role of our olfactory senses in creating a positive or negative impression of our environment cannot be underestimated. Translation? Coffee smells like comfort.
3. OFFER A VARIETY OF PROGRAMMING FOR DIFFERENT AGES/INTERESTS: This fits in very well with our traditional role and mission, and many libraries already do a wonderful job with programming. Do more. Take some risks. Ask yourself who’s NOT coming to the library and try to offer a few programs for that demographic. Think of five new places to advertise your programming (bulletin boards in laundromats, the Y, the Rotary Club, the carwash, etc.)
4. MAKE THE COLLECTION THE STAR: Use themed displays of face-out materials to highlight and promote portions of your collection. Tie themes in with current events, pop culture, current library programs, or anything else that seems relevant, playful, or fun. Make your collection browseable and your customers will reward you by circulating materials in record numbers.
5. INVOLVE YOUR CUSTOMERS: Ask your customers what they would like to see in the library. Ask them for help with walk-throughs and signage audits. Ask them for display ideas, or enlist their help in creating displays. Any way you can involve your community directly will pay off tenfold by giving you an inexpensive and highly effective marketing tool: a cadre of invested community members who will promote the library through word of mouth.
6. GO WIRELESS: Wireless Internet access is a must-have infrastructure. If you’re not offering it already, do it now. It’s cheaper than you think, and your wireless customers will come out of the woodwork.
Bibliography
Oldenburg, Ray. The Great Good Place. New York: Marlowe & Company, 1999.
Rippel, Chris, “What Libraries Can Learn from Bookstores”. Webjunction Marketing Forum. Dec 10, 2003 <http://webjunction.org/do/DisplayContent?id=1191>.
Rockwood, P. E. and Koontz, C. M., “Media Center Layout: A Marketing-Based Plan”, School Library Media Annual 1986, Volume Four. Ed. Aaron, S. L. and Scales, P. R. Littleton, Colorado: Libraries Unlimited, Inc., 1986. p. 297-306 <http://www.geolib.org/pdf/slma.pdf>.
Stanley, John, “The Third Place: The Library’s Role in Today’s Society”, MLS Marketing Library Services. Nov.- Dec. 2005: 1,8.
Expand Your Home Library with a Lifetime of Reading!
“It’s like having over 500,000 books in your living room”
“Enough for several lifetime’s worth of reading”
“500,000+…single file PDF ebooks by original authors”
“Fully searchable, quotable text”
Any of the quotes above spark an interest in you? If so, you will very much like the fact that The World eBook Fair site opened the International Book Fair Month of October earlier today with an offer that you probably cannot refuse–at least that’s how I feel about it! That’s right–1/2 million ebooks await you for your personal reading pleasure (most free) this month!
The World eBook Fair, a very large showcase for ebook authors and publishers, beginning today and continuing throughout October, will allow us to download our selections from their collection of 500,000 ebooks. I actually think this is only fitting, since according to the Fair site, we are now celebrating the centennial birthday of the public library system, which probably enabled many of us and our parents and grandparents to read their first free book and continue to do so today.
Anyway, I blogged late last month about the Google Book Search-WorldCat link-up, providing us with an improved way to find the book we want within the libraries near us, which I find very useful. I also very recently published a short article in MultiMedia & Internet at Schools (a great magazine/guide to K-12 technology and education resources), where I listed some of my favorite places to go on and via the Web to get free full text books, articles, and more, but due to the limited scope and length of the article, I could not mention more there. And although I have updated my original Wow!–Full Text and Free?! hotlist site with more “places” to explore, especially Open Access directories and sites, this World eBook Fair site can lead you to a much more organized listing of free ebooks.
This World eBook Fair site is truly one you must visit. For instance, while browsing it, I visited the Classic Literature Collection there and, being a sci-fi fan, immediately downloaded one of my favorites highlighted on the first page as one of the most popular selections–The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. I then downloaded an MP3 of a favorite by Poe–The Telltale Heart. I also really liked browsing the Online Educational Resource Collection, especially since I am library liaison to faculty and administrators in the School of Education at Rider University–I knew that many there would be interested in the full text of the Innovative Pathways to School Leadership report, by U.S. Department of Education and the Office of Innovations and Improvement, listed on the “favorites” page.
I am very impressed with this entire World eBook Fair Consortia site and, of course, for the free offer to search or browse and download or read online. By the way, although I liked browsing the 112 collections, and Michael Hart with Project Gutenburg recommends this, too, you can also find the title you want by using their full text search option. Note that Michael Hart’s Project Gutenburg is partnering with, among others, The World eBook Library, Digital Pulp Publishing, and the Internet Archive (my favorite digital library “place” to frequently visit for free full text) to bring us today’s World eBook Fair.
I also found that the World eBook Library site lists some other interesting tidbits that I wanted to share, including the following:
“Each year, the World eBook Library nearly doubles its entire digital holdings. Boasting over 500,000+ eBooks and eDocuments, making the World eBook Library Consortium the world’s largest eBook site. More than one 15 million Internet patrons have visited our library, making us one of the most visited libraries in the world. Since our initial launch time our webservers have had a 99.98% up time 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and in all of that time our programs and files have been free and open to the public.”
Time to get back to my family, but I must say that I was so happy to be able to search, browse, and now blog about this site today. I highly recommend starting your browsing or searching experience immediately as this is such a tremendous collection! I hope you like it as much as I do–enjoy and share it with others!
Technorati Tags: digital library, book search, ebooks, World eBook Fair
CNET News and the Importance of Librarians
Posted today on CNET’s news.com.com is a great article entitled Most reliable search tool could be your librarian written by Elinor Mills. The title is catchy (it certainly caught my eye) although not quite right in my estimation as I would like it to state boldly “is your librarian” instead of the wimpier “could be your librarian”, but the tag line is perfect:
Web search engines may hustle up quick results, but librarians dig up online information you can trust, say experts.
The article starts with the now infamous example of the white supremacist site about MLK Jr. which consistently ranks in the top 3 results of many search engines when looking for information on Martin Luther King Jr. To the untrained eye this site appears to be a good source of information. [note: I won’t link to the site as I do not want to improve their page rank] In any event, this is one of my favorite examples to use when teaching the importance of evaluating search results and I know many other librarians use this example as well. Hopefully the word will spread about this site, people will stop linking to it and the page rank can be altered. But I have digressed…
Despite my minor semantic quibble over the title, I am very happy to see a well-known techie site publish such an article promoting and validating librarians. What makes this article even better is that they found the perfect people to interview and quote — the biblioblogosphere and librarian search guru crew are well-represented. Here are a few highlights:
“There’s a problem with information illiteracy among people. People find information online and don’t question whether it’s valid or not,” said Chris Sherman, executive editor of industry blog site SearchEngineWatch.com. “I think that’s where librarians are extremely important. They are trained to evaluate the quality of the information.”
“For some people, if the answer isn’t in the first few results it might as well not be there,” said Gary Price, founder and editor of the ResourceShelf blog and director of online resources at Ask.com. “No matter how smart and helpful search engines get, they’re never going to replace librarians.”
“The idea of the 1950s librarian, that’s outdated,” said Sarah Houghton-Jan, information Web services manager at the San Mateo County Library in Northern California. “You find people who are expert at searching the Web and using online tools; high-level information experts instead of someone who just stamps books at the checkout desk.”
And librarian created resources get a good plug as do subscription databases thanks to Gary Price:
A lot of people don’t know that they can get access to much of the walled-off information in specialized databases for free if they have a public library card, said Price, of Ask.com and ResourceShelf.
Other helpful sites are the Librarians Internet Index, which offers quick lists of carefully vetted, reliable Web sites, the Internet Public Library and Infomine, a collection of scholarly resources on the Internet, according to Price.
Consider posting this article your library intranet, staff blog, or bulletin board to remind your staff that although our roles may be changing our skills and abilities are still valued and very much needed (and that sometimes the media get its right).
Blog-based library websites: An interview with David Lisa
I recently sat down with (ok, meebo‘d) David Lisa, Director of the West Long Branch (NJ) Public Library, to discuss how he recently converted his traditional library webpage to a blog-based webpage.
Pete: Thanks for joining me this afternoon.
Dave: Always a pleasure!
Pete: For starters, tell me a little about yourself and your library.
Dave: My name is David Lisa and I am the Director of the West Long Branch Public Library. We are a small municipal public library. West Long Branch has about 8700 residents. We have three full-time employees and 7 part-time, 3 pages (PT) and one volunteer. I’m the only professional on staff. Other than that, we are your normal small burg PL.
Pete: Thanks Dave. So tell us a bit about your decision to make your webpage blog-based.
Dave: I had worked on several different templates for the new version of our website and nothing was working. Then I attended the Web 2.0 seminar led by Michael Stephens and Jenny Levine and took what the speakers said to heart. It really seemed to me that if we started with a Blogger.com format and expanded upon that, we would be able to accomplish what we wanted to do. Namely to be able to give our users news about programming, spotlight our collection and keep them up to date on new additions to our collection. It also dawned upon me that we could utilize Blogger’s template structure to organize our website by listing the links to the various pages on our site in the right column and be able to provide an archive etc. It did everything we needed! So, I set to work setting it up, then “adapted” our extant pages to the Blogger template format.
Pete: Yes, the built-in archive feature is wonderful. Are there any other specific benefits that you see with a blog-based website? Any drawbacks?
Dave: Well we are getting lots of great comments about how up to date our site is. People really like seeing the latest news on the front page in reverse chronological order. And, of course, one big benefit is being able to offer an RSS feed through Feedburner. We like to stress that we can bring the news about the library to you on your schedule rather than you having to come to us all the time. One drawback has been that we have found that not a lot of people are acquainted with RSS feeds and we have to explain how to subscribe a lot.
Pete: That leads into my next question (or series of questions): Do you find that your customers understand the RSS feed? Are they using it? Have you done anything to promote the feed and/or teach your customers how to use it?
Dave: As I mentioned, there is some confusion about RSS still. I see that as being general initial confusion amongst the public at large. We really wanted to get the feed through Feedburner since they do a good job explaining it. We are pleased to have the feed in place and are actually waiting to see how it works out…right now.
Pete: Well, I think you’re ahead of the curve. I believe the next release of IE will have built in RSS detection and reader. At that point, knowledge and use of RSS among the general population is likely to grow quickly and exponentially.
Dave: That’s a good example of the confusion…try setting up an RSS feed with Firefox and IE and it’s a different experience. We wanted the user to be able to click through the experience and know little about what they had to do to make it work. Feedburner does a great job enabling that.
Pete: And of course Feedburner gives you great stats and bunch of other nice benefits!
Dave: Feedburner has a nice page that you get after you click on our Subscribe link and it explains the variety of choices of RSS readers.
Pete: How much technical ability is needed to create a blog-based website? Is it something anyone can do or is a certain level of technical know-how necessary?
Dave: Good question. I believe that the approach we took to revamping our website takes little web publishing knowledge and could be mounted by people with little experience. And I think that is the direction web publishing is taking. Jenny [Levine] and Michael [Stephens] mentioned that web publishing software (Dreamweaver, FrontPage, etc.) will be outmoded by this approach soon… and I believe them.
Pete: Well, Blogger, Typepad, WordPress really make it easy!
Pete: I see you have multiple authors. Who gets to post, and what do they get to post about? Did you and your staff come up with a blogging policy?
Dave: Glad you asked that question. From the get -go, I wanted our library website/blog to be a collaborative effort. I met with my Administrative staff and indicated that since we were re-creating the website in this fashion, I wanted them all to be involved. I also involved key members of the part time staff too (Book Discussion group moderator, etc).
Pete: That’s great!
Dave: I also wanted staff members that are posting to be recognizable by name to library patrons that read the blog and could answer questions. We crave a fandom. [smile]. This is a truly collaborative experience.
Pete: I salute you! The research going on in virtual reference shows that customers really like to have a name associated with the librarian (as opposed to being served by ‘librarian34’). Using names is a great way to bring about more of a sense of personal connection.
Dave: I wouldn’t have it any other way…I want it to be a personal experience for the user. We want to hear this: “Wow, Janice recommended the new DVD Lucky # Slevin. I checked it out and I loved it. Thanks Janice!”
Pete: OK, since we’re on the topic of collaboration… It doesn’t look like you have comments enabled. Any plan to enable comments?
Dave: We purposefully disabled it for now. We do have plans to enable them at some point, but we want to plan for it so we can handle it correctly.
Pete: Well Dave, I think you’ve done a great job with the site, and I appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with us. Is there anything you’d like to add before we conclude?
Dave: I’d just like to say that we actually stumbled upon this idea by accident, and it was all due to the seminar… so thanks for sponsoring it. We’re always looking for new and different ways to do things here at WLBPL and we are having lots of fun with the website/blog.
Pete: Credit for sponsoring the seminar goes to Princeton Public Library and CJRLC (although we also had Michael Stephens present for SJRLC members that same week.)
Dave: Thanks for interviewing me!
Pete: You’re welcome Dave. Thanks again for your time.
Something Fun to Brighten Up a Dreary Saturday
It is raining here in NJ and my two-soon-to-be-three year old son was climbing the walls wanting to go outside this morning. I needed to get the house cleaned for his birthday party tomorrow, so I set him up on my laptop with Kneebouncers — aka “The Bouncy Place” as Alex calls it!
This is a great site for the toddler set — 6 different activities that will each entertain them for several minutes and it does not matter what key they push as they still get the desired result! Go try it out… it is addictive and fun even for adults (especially the “Jump and Float” game, which is the favorite in our house). While you are at it consider adding a link to it from your library web site on the kids page. Let those 2 and 3 year olds experience cause and effect and get comfortable with how to gently use a keyboard to get a result that is entertaining.
I got 20 minutes of free time for laundry, all I had to do was start a new game every few minutes. Once he learns how to manipulate the mouse we are set.
Enjoy!
Finally!!–Google Book Search links widely to WorldCat’s “Find this book in a library”
AND
Google Book Search has provided a relatively small amount of links to books held in WorldCat-participating libraries for some time now, even though Google has been allowing those searching the regular Google search engine to find books in libraries by providing the “Find this book in a library” link within some book search results pages. But, finally, today it was announced that this valuable library book finding tool is now highlighted within the Book Search service. Once you conduct a search for a book title in Book Search, look for the “Find this book in a library” link on the bottom right-hand side of a results page, directly under the “Buy this book” section. Click on the link and enter a zip code (or other location info) to find which libraries nearby carry your title.
The best news, however, is that Google’s “Advanced Book Search” let’s you immediately limit your search to this WorldCat search page by searching within the option “Library Catalogs,” which is located to the right of “All books” and “Full view books” options, directly above the “Return book with the title” limiter box (see example here). Once you do the search, click on the “Find libraries” link under the book title, and enter your zip code, state, province, or country information to find nearby libraries owning the item, such as the book Libraries and Google. I must say that I have been asking for this since the Internet Librarian 2005 conference last fall, and, finally, it’s here—and it’s about time! Take a look and try a search yourself.
Tags: WorldCat, book search, library catalogs, Google, Find this book in a library
A Test of Leadership–Charting the Future of U.S. Higher Education
I just blogged about this on my personal blog, but I thought that Library Gardeners would like to read about it as well, so here it is:
In September 2005, “Secretary Spellings formed the Commission on the Future of Higher Education to launch a national dialogue on the need to strengthen higher education so that our students and our nation will remain competitive in the 21st century.”
It is stated here that their report and the response plan associated with it will be of interest to and respond to the “needs of all consumers of the system—educators, institutions, taxpayers, parents, and students.” Certainly, academic librarians and other educators will want to read this–don’t you agree?
Anyway, in case you did not know, for about a year, the Commission met, discussed, debated, and came up with conclusions and recommendations, important for all of us. They determined that the current system of higher education within the U.S. does not work well for some, especially low-income and minorities; financial aid needs a lot of work; and better information on our institutions is needed—certainly seems accurate.
Yesterday, the Commission presented its report to the Secretary, listing “recommendations designed to improve the accessibility, affordability and accountability of higher education,” quoted below:
- Student academic preparation should be improved and financial aid made available so that more students are able to access and afford a quality higher education.
- The entire student financial aid system should be simplified, restructured and provided with incentives to better manage costs and measure performance.
- A “robust culture of accountability and transparency” should be cultivated throughout the higher education system, aided by new systems of data measurement and a publicly available information database with comparable college information. There should also be a greater focus on student learning and development of a more outcome-focused accreditation system.
- Colleges and universities should embrace continuous innovation and quality improvement.
- Federal investments should be targeted to areas critical to America’s global competitiveness, such as math, science, and foreign languages.
- A strategy for lifelong learning should be developed to increase awareness and understanding of the importance of a college education to every American’s future.
On the 4th item above, I would like to insert after “universities” and before “should” this: “including their libraries,” or maybe even, “especially….” Adding “libraries” to the 6th item would work for me, too, especially if it stated how we are already assisting in this endeavor–what do you think?
Follow this link for highlights of the Commission’s report, for the entire full text report, and info on the Commission itself, all on the ed.gov site, and I recommend looking for the Secretary of Education’s action plan/response soon in the press.
Tags: higher education, lifelong learning, competitive future, improvement, academic librarians, U.S. Department of Education
Library Garden 