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.
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…
