Jason Puckett.net

Looks like I’ll be at Educause in Seattle next month.  I’m happy that my boss singled me out and said “you should go to this,” but not thrilled about a 4-day trip in the middle of the semester.  Oh well.

Anything I should look forward to at my first Educause, and/or anything cool to do in Seattle near the convention center?

I’ve been thinking a bit about my use and abuse of Powerpoint in the classroom. I don’t use it much, but I taught a new workshop on RSS this week and found it useful to organize my thoughts with new material. I ran across this blog post on iLibrarian: 4 ways to spice up your presentations. If you use Powerpoint at all, at least watch Meet Henry and Death by PowerPoint for some great ideas and examples of PPt done right and wrong.

(Wow, Henry gives me a Clark from Smallville vibe.)

My institution just announced a contract with iTunes U. I’m going to be as involved as possible with the pilot program this fall, and I’m really excited.  I’ve really felt like there’s a bottleneck in my team, as far as producing a/v materials goes — there are only two or three of us doing it, and I think there’s a sense that it’s hard and mysterious.

My sense of how iTunes U works is that it will make the publishing part very easy, and I’m hoping that this will get the ball rolling and inspire more people at my library to record instruction materials.  As I’ve mentioned before, our real problem with producing podcasts has been the lack of an easy publishing platform, so this should remove that hurdle.

This afternoon I gave a presentation on library services to a group of student residence advisers.  I wasn’t quite sure what to show them — my directive was “a sampling of library services that they might find useful.”  So I made a slide show called “Ten things you (or your residents) might not know about library services.”  I went really broad, and showed them everything from placing storage requests, to interlibrary loan, to borrowing agreements with other local schools, to EndNote.  Since these were sophomores to seniors, I didn’t do any of the real basic stuff I might show to first-years, but tried to pick out tips and techniques that students often seem not to know about.

I was anxious about it, because I have a lot of back-to-school work going on this month (we all do!), and I didn’t feel I’d done as much preparation as I’d like.  Then again, I never do, and I rarely bomb completely.

Everything went great.  They were mostly a very outgoing bunch, asked intelligent questions, and kept the session going with some good back-and-forth discussion.  They loved EndNote and I got some “whoa”s as I created a bibliography out of thin air.  I put in a plug for them to request library programming in their residence halls, took them on a visit to our archives and technology centers, and I dare to think they even enjoyed themselves.  A very encouraging way to start the semester’s instruction work.

Has been published yet again.

I’ve read one or two of these, years ago, that I thought were interesting and amusing. For the last few years I haven’t even understood most of their entries — and I don’t think it’s because I’m getting old.

For example: “Classmates could include Michelle Wie, Jordin Sparks, and Bart Simpson.”

Um. What?

I will admit to you that I had to google Michelle Wie — I have never had, and will never have, any interest in golf. But I can’t even understand what they’re trying to convey with this sentence.

Some entries just show that the list’s authors are old. “They grew up in Wayne’s World.” Mmm, no, I don’t think so. Wayne’s World is way too old to be relevant to our new freshmen.

“They have no idea who Rusty Jones was or why he said ‘goodbye to rusty cars.’” Me neither, frankly.

I hereby pledge not to read the 2008 edition — it’s just making me cranky.

This has been in the works for a while, but I couldn’t blog about it publicly until the official announcement came.  As of September 1, I’m being promoted.  My new job title is Instruction Program Developer.  I’ll be the go-to guy for instructional technology resources — producing video/audio materials, recording podcasts, “Web 2.0″ stuff… and, um, other duties as assigned.  I’m very excited about my work for the coming academic year.

I’m very proud of my colleagues on our instruction team.  We had been teaching about the same batch of workshops for several years now, and we typically get very lackluster turnouts for most of them (except EndNote — I’ve occasionally had to turn people away from full EndNote workshops in the fall because there weren’t enough seats).  We put out a call for some new and revised workshops this semester, with a particular eye to some new technology-related content.  I’m really pleased with some of the new stuff we’re offering.

I’m going to teach one about using RSS in research; it’ll be an intro to what RSS is and how to subscribe to a feed, and I’ll lead into some databases that offer RSS feeds.  Our brand-new GIS librarian is offering at least three different ones (!) on digital mapping tools.  Another colleague is doing one on collaboration using del.icio.us, Google Docs and wikis.  Someone else is planning a Zotero workshop for next semester.

I really feel like this will revitalize our workshop program.  I’m just hoping we get some good turnout for these.  I had to restrain myself from offering to teach every new workshop idea I thought of.  I’m also going to be offering a new EndNote Web workshop this semester, and I was afraid of making a commitment to create too much new material and running out of time.  (I’ve got a heavy instruction load the first few weeks of the semester already.)

A podcasting first?  Comic book distributed via podcast.  I’m always surprised to be reminded that one can podcast PDFs, not just audio/video files.

Library applications?  Tons of them.  If you’re podcasting video tutorials, include an instruction sheet in the feed.  If it’s a library tour, include a map.

How have I not heard about this until now?

We have a few individual licenses for Camtasia, the software we use for creating video tutorials.  It’s fairly expensive, so a couple of us have it installed on our personal workstations, and everyone else has to go to one of a couple of shared computers or over to the technology lab in order to use it.  The result, of course, is that almost no one creates videos.

At the GOLD GALILEO conference on Friday, I learned of the existence of CamStudio, a free open source equivalent.  I haven’t played with it much yet, and I think it lacks a bell and/or whistle here and there compared to Camtasia, but it seems like between CamStudio and Audacity, that would cover most media production needs for free.

Diane Kresh, Director, Arlington County Public Library
Keynote presentation, GALILEO/GOLD Annual Users Group Conference

(Introduction featured Librarian 2.0 Manifesto video by …, which obviously some in the audience had not seen before — laughter at “some of my colleagues will be resistant,” “I will not fear Google,” and “I will encourage my library’s administration to blog.”)
This is the beginning of a sea change in libraries

[slideshow link will go here]

“When you are growing up, there are two institutional places that affect you,” the church and the library — Keith Richards

Libraries do what they have always done — collect, describe, preserve materials; provide free access, support lifelong learning = serve the public good

What will libraries do? Users/needs are changing, so change already — “Dot. Period.” You don’t have to know all the answers; be comfortable with your discomfort re change, but accept it.

Ask the users what they need so that we can help them

Themes:

• Content
• Context
• Community

Content:

We are all creating content: e-mail, text if nothing else

Young users text like crazy; librarians need to be comfortable with it (85% of college students use text messaging)

Context:

70% of Americans extremely or very satisfied with public libraries

92% believe libraries are needed in internet age

People are doing research on their own, though, without the library being in the loop

Crowdsourcing: put questions out to the web for collaborative answers instead of going to an expert

Libraries can do this — again, don’t have to have all the answers

Some change drivers: ubiquity of communication tools, new workplace structures, blurred distinction between production and consumption of information, changes in other media industries

Evolving workforce: preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist

People don’t care where the information came from — they just want the info, now. They are willing to settle for less, and want self-service. “Find it, get it, get out”

So who needs libraries?

OCLC 2005 study: People are as likely to trust search engines as libraries

Libraries must be willing to complement what people are finding on their own

Millennials Rising (author Neil Howe?)

Millennials expect instant gratification — library web sites are very organization-driven, and millennials will give up if they can’t find what they need right away

We are stuck in ruts about how we find information

Google gets it — feeds the information addiction, gets all the media attention. This cannot be said about libraries that are doing many of the same things.

Wagging the long tail

• make everything available, more choices
• centralize inventory, control costs
• cut the price
• Libraries must help “find it”
• Amazon: personal recommendations are excellent, and libraries should learn from this

Cool stuff

• open worldcat meets google
• creative commons
• 43things.com
• LibraryThing
• Social Networking
• These are things that will influence future library services

What would happen if Dewey disappeared? Arizona library that has removed the Dewey decimal system

Change the paradigm

• lose the insularity, scan the horizon
• keep what works, chuck what doesn’t

Community

Discussion of Arlington programs; Arlington Reads, partnerships w/ public schools, local businesses — don’t do it all ourselves, but start with a vision

Your customers: we think a lot about what our patrons need, but we’re not so good about asking them

Communicate with them in spaces they use: blogs, IM — but it’s not the right fit yet; young users won’t want to communicate  with librarians

Find out what you’re not doing

• Stalk the non-consumers
• surveys, focus groups
• Local media reports
• Walk and talk
• test, try, transform
• Do what they (google, amazon) can’t do
• find the white space and fill it

Library as third space

• where people can gather, hang out, engage in community

Library as destination

• amenities
• support local business
• improve accessibility
• change with the calendar
• community and “place making”
• Co-location, co-location, co-location
• Be a catalyst for creativity

Competitors: they’re offering different services from us, and there’s room for both

Brand your library, identify partnership, be opportunitstic, assess progress continually

Take risks, try something new

New job skills, customer focus, technology awareness, risk tolerance

Staff development: encourage experimentation, find growth in failure

Technology is the easy part

Little Richard: “It’s not the size of the shp, it’s the size of the waves”

Dilbert: “Change is good; you go first”