Usually I am a fan of the old fashioned game. I like me some cards on a table. I never liked video games because it was the only toy that I could not pull my brother’s attention from when I was little (or my mother for that matter, when Tetris was on the screen).
It’s for this reason that I think the new games that are coming out are terrific. When my boyfriend brought the Wii into the house, I rolled my eyes. But I found that it actually has so many features that encourage interacting with other people rather than the screen. And what’s more is that everyone can play it and there are games that everyone will be interested in. A biased video-game hater ruined by the harsh childhood trauma of being ignored (mua) can actually win at a Wii boxing once in a while without having had years of gaming experience. My father, a 60 year old man with advanced arthritis that does not allow him much mobility, found a new way to get physical activity or to play the sports he can no longer play virtually.
The other games, which I experienced during our game night last week, have interactive elements as well. I played tetris on a handheld but against two other people. I played a guitar although I had no actual guitar skills. And although I remain a big proponent of children getting outside of the virtual world and literally outside, I think that DDR is a good way to at least get them moving if they are going to be in front of a TV all day.
I think that these games could do a lot to bring people into the library. And not just teens. Think of the family nights, especially for those who cannot afford these appliances at home. No more Trivial Pursuit or Gin Rummy? I hope that’s not the case, but I think that these games will be a healthy addition to game night among libraries and households.
I thought that Stephanie Mills’ lecture on the future of our ecosystem was both informative and insightful. She was right in saying that global warming and our overuse of natural resources is something that everyone needs to be aware of. I especially enjoyed her conversational tone. That being said, I did not see how much the lecture had to do with libraries.
As I said in class, I felt as if Ms. Mills had the lecture already prepared and tacked on the bit about libraries. If anyone is aware of how to conserve and protect, I feel, its libraries. I wished that she would have spoke more about how libraries can inform the public of these future (and some present) crises.
Specifically, I had problems with a few of the analogies (is this the right word?) that she made such as when she said buying a book on Amazon was like burning a lump of coal or that embracing digital technology was like marrying a drunk and giving him the checkbook. She also talked about “Dewey serendipity” which she explained as walking through the aisle to find one book and stumbling across another one that was of interest. Ms. Mills talked about that with a bit of melancholy and I wanted to tell her that “digital serendipity” is 10 times that feeling. Online, you can find things even libraries may not be shelving because they are too “niche”.
In the end, I found the lecture did teach me some things that I didn’t know earlier about the effect of technology on the environment. From a library perspective, though, I didn’t find the link as easily as I would have hoped.
I spoke with a librarian from the Livermore Public Library in California about the IM Reference that they had implemented just six short months ago. The librarian (I have to stop myself from referring the librarian as she because I have no idea the gender of the person I spoke with and caught myself assuming) surprised me by telling me that the staff had the idea to have Online Reference instead of it coming from the top down. One of the librarians recommended it and the administration ran with it.
So far, the new feature is working well, the librarian mentioned that, although it does not bring new patrons into the physical library, it has made those people bound by health concerns, time, or distance able to access the library and she/he believes that more people have recognized the library when they otherwise wouldn’t have.
Most of the time, whoever is answering the IM Reference also has to answer questions from the phone and in person, which can get hectic but has been manageable so far. There has also been some pranking but nothing as serious as harassment.
All in all, I had a very pleasant experience with the IM Reference at Livermore. My first comment was answered within the minute and the librarian was very prompt and polite. As they are only six months in, we can’t know the long term effects, but it seems this new feature is off to a good start with lots of support behind it.
Did Maricopa really rock the world of libraries? Seriously? I think that changing and evolving according to patron needs should be procedure and I reee-aly don’t see what all of the hub-bub is about.
It is surprising because librarians, I think, are kind of radical by principal. Public libraries are “the people’s universities”, people being the key word here. It was surprising to hear that librarians were upset about the abandonment of Dewey when it has proved itself less than perfect in the past (space devoted to Western European history and Rest-of-the-World history anyone?). As the director said in his NPR interview, sometimes a book might be in two or three places within the Dewey system. It’s still early, but if this new BISAC system is user-friendly and less complicated for users, if circ is up, and patrons are happy, I don’t think we should be complaining, I think we should be gettin’ with times, folks. Bandwagons a’comin’. Hop on.
The only argument I would have is if we began to have the opposite problem and the reference and history books were all lumped together instead of the popular fiction. I must admit that seeing self-help books in the “Psychology” section at Barnes and Nobles had me shaking my head. But if that is where the majority of the community thinks to look, maybe that is where it should stay. I think this is a good system at getting the patrons in and “giving them what they want”. Perhaps after they are in the doors, we can lead them to other items they may need as well.
Our group had an interesting discussion about the Buckland’s writing on redesigning libraries (acquisition, storage, delivery, and searching being key changeable features) and how the rise of Google may have an impact on it. We found that it helps acquisition and storage because, through features such as GoogleScholar, we can retrieve documents without having to store them on shelves and most often for free. In general, electronic databases are positive because they don’t take up space, but Google is particularly easy for patrons to use.
Google and all its additions make searching easier because of their format. Yet, we discovered, it could also make it harder because patrons may not be searching the right way and, because Google is more convenient than going to the library and asking a librarian to search, they may be getting the wrong information. Furthermore, if a patron sees a librarian using Google, they may be apt to think “Why am I asking a professional when they are doing the same thing I would be doing?”. It seems that Google and Amazon as well as other user friendly search engines get a bad rap from librarians. We had all heard librarians cautiously “own up” to using these sites, as if they were embarassed not to be using the more complex databases.
Last week, a librarian friend from Michigan told me a funny story that got me thinking about more ways to promote librarians. She said that an elderly lady had called the library because she was writing a letter and forgotten how to make a cursive ‘Q’.
“I don’t think I need to come in but if you could just describe it to me,” she said.
What a great reason to call the library! How wonderful that that woman thought of us first when she couldn’t remember how to make the letter ‘Q’!
What if, in a Library 2.0 fashion of course, libraries could find a way to let people know we can answer all their questions, library related or not? The library’s webpage could feature an “Ask Me Anything?” logo and librarians could respond to questions by blog or by email with an attached list of the materials we have access to that might give them further information. To reach even further, we could have an advice-column like section in our local paper or city’s website minus the crappy advice and plus all the authoritative knowledge you can handle!
I’m only brainstorming of course. Who knows what an outreach idea like this might do to one’s workload or how many inappropriate questions we would have to delete off of our webpage. But if the library could get people to think about them when they had a question they couldn’t answer through their own means, maybe they would think about for other reasons as well. Like where to take their kids for playgroup, where to learn to knit, and where to donate money to for all their good deeds…
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