PVLD Director's Blog

Web 2.0 and the Read/Write Library

I came across a couple of interesting items on the subject of Web 2.0 and libraries during my blog-surfing over lunch today.

First, courtesy of Michael Sauers at the Travelin' Librarian blog, is this video produced by British innovation and creativity expert Charles Leadbeater and colleagues about "Web 2.0" and its implications.

It's a good description of the social web and how it is transforming society, and while the Annoyed Librarian might call it another piece of "twopointopian" propaganda, it does at least acknowledge that for all of the opportunities it provides the social web also raises as-yet-unanswered questions and possible concerns.

I was just reflecting on the video when I got an email from Jackie Siminitus, "E-Rate Specialist and Library Advocate" of AT&T with a link to this very interesting post about how libraries in Chile are moving "from cataloging books to training users how to blog" from  the PBS Idealab blog.

In a world where all too often civilians (i.e. non-library people) think that the Internet is making libraries obsolete it was great to see a "non-library" blog recognize "...a larger trend taking place at libraries large and small from the southern tip of Chile to the Siberian tundra of Russia. Public libraries are no longer just points of reception; they are transforming into centers of transmission and communication, where local users take advantage of increasingly affordable digital cameras and free online tools to write and share their own local stories."

It was also inspiring to read that "nearly every library - from the southern tip of Patagonia to the northern border with Bolivia and Peru - will be equipped with wi-fi by the end of the year."  Wouldn't it be great to be able to say that about libraries in the U.S.?

Most inspiring of all was this video of Enzo Abbagliati of of Chile's national library network talking about how Chilean libraries are embracing the world of Web 3.0 (not 2.0!) as a catalyst for social change and to support participatory democracy:

Enzo Abbagliati from BiblioRedes

And his term "Catalysts for opportunity" is about the best description of what libraries and librarians can provide that I've heard!

Another bit of evidence that Web 2.0 et seq. is something to be embraced, not feared!

 

Redefining Information Literacy

"Information Literacy" is a topic that we think/talk about quite a bit here at PVLD. We have an active program to take information literacy education into the schools, we have until recently participated in a group of librarians from all kinds of libraries with an interest in this topic, and some of the librarians and I have been guest contributors to a University of Illinois Library School class on the topic. We've tended to take a pretty narrow view of what is meant by the term, though - something along the lines of this definition from The American Library Association's (ALA) Presidential Committee on Information Literacy, Final Report "To be information literate, a person must be able to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information" (1989).

It's an ok definition, although I'm not sure it goes far enough in today's Web 2.0 world where individuals are increasingly able to create and publish information. As applied by most librarians it also has a kind of dry, academic feel – we tend to think of information literacy in terms of teaching students about "sources" and "research skills". That's why I loved this post on Sexy Librarians of the Future from "The Read Write Web" which offers a whole new spin on information literacy and the role of librarians. (And thanks to the folks at Library Garden for pointing me to this item!)

I especially loved the paraphrased comment attributed to Jon Udell of Microsoft -"the librarian of the future will help a growing number of citizen media producers to classify their online media and get it connected to other related content in ways that will increase its discoverability". I couldn't agree more with Read Write Web author Marshall Kirkpatrick – that is HOT!

The staff here at PVLD is getting pretty adept and learning and applying some of these Web 2.0 tools – as witnessed by our Meebo widget, various blogs, and soon-to-be unveiled new website. Now we need to figure how to help our customers gain these skills. Should be fun!

Shift Happens

I first came across an earlier version of this video a year or so ago, and rediscovered it over the week.  The whole video is thought-provoking, but I particularly loved the statement "We are living in exponential times"...what a great way to sum up the changes swirling around us.

I also like the questions at the end of the video and would add one more -

Ask your Public Library what are you doing to help prepare members of your community to thrive in the 21st century?

More on "The Cult of the Amateur" and other stuff

Rosario Garza, Executive Director of the Metropolitan Cooperative Library System sent me this link to the "Travelin Librarian" blog as a follow up to my post on the changing nature of information.

http://www.travelinlibrarian.info/2007/06/cult-of-amateur-partial-response.html

My post was based on a radio interview with the author of "The Cult of the Amateur".  In his post Michael Sauer describes his experience of actually trying to read the book.  In the process of pointing out a number of instances of inaccurate information or faulty logic, Michael also does a great job of articulating the value of Web 2.0 as a supplement to more traditional forms and sources of information - much better than my somewhat rambling post! 

Thanks Rosario for introducing me to another interesting and thoughtful library blogger.

On a largely unrelated topic, my husband discovered this tool for "unlocking" the digital rights management technology that prevents music and other files from being shared between IPODs and other non-Apple devices.  We often get questions about why someone can't listen to one of our downloadable audiobooks on their IPOD - maybe this will help!  http://www.soundtaxi.info/

Finally, I will be heading off for a few days of vacation later this afternoon.  We're going to Canada for my niece's high school graduation (which makes me feel very old!) and a few days of visiting family.  I probably won't post again until I get back to work on July 5th :)

 

The Changing Nature of Information

Over the past couple of weeks I've encountered some thought-provoking news and blog items about how technology is changing the nature of information.

On Saturday, June 16th NPR ran the following interview with Andrew Keen, author of "The Cult of the Amateur" - http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11131872&sc=emaf  Mr. Keen decries what he calls the "cacophony of amateurs" using "web 2.0" tools such as wikis and blogs to broadcast their opinions and their version of the news and describes this "information" as "unreliable and often corrupt".  Mr. Keen concludes that he prefers the "wisdom of experts" to the "wisdom of crowds".   

I had mixed emotions as I listened to the interview.  The librarian in me wanted to cheer Mr. Keen for supporting the role of professionals in creating, evaluating, and disseminating information, while as a blogger and blog-reader I have come to appreciate the way Web 2.0 has allowed me to learn from and exhange ideas with people in a way that would not be possible through the professionally-mediated  media journalistic process that Mr. Keen espouses.   As someone interested in personal investing, I also thought about the contrast between Mr. Keen's views and the well-accepted view that in general investors are better off with broad market indexes (the wisdom of crowds) than with managed investment funds (the wisdom of experts).  I also had to chuckle at his implication that traditional newspapers unbiased!

Yesterday I opened my local paper, The Daily Breeze,  to see a front page article about the challenges newspapers face as they experiment with Web 2.0 tools such as blogs but wrestle with how to manage the implications of an open and uncensored dialogue with and between readers.  The article began -

"Imagine you were run down by a hit-and-run driver, your local newspaper reported on it and, along with the article on its Web site, you saw this:

"I am so tired of people making excuses for their actions. What are they doing crossing a busy street in the first place? …

"Don't get me wrong, I feel really, really bad for the guy, but come on, be RESPONSIBLE!"

Or imagine your doctor sexually assaults you, and readers who commented on a story about his trial called you a "whore."

Or you're reading an article online about a drunken driving fatality, and the dozens of comments that follow are mostly hateful, profanity-laced and racist, based on assumptions and not facts.

Imagine no more, it's all real. These comments were posted on the Daily Breeze's Web site by readers.

The article was a sobering reminder that with powerful tools comes a responsibility to use them wisely.  In the days when commentary on the news was limited to the editorial pages and letters to the editor the ill-informed and downright nasty comments that are appearing on the Daily Breeze website would never have seen the light of day.  Does that mean we should go back to those days?  I'm not sure... 
Finally, I just came across this posting by Helene Blowers of the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County (and originator of the Learning 2.0 concept) - http://www.librarybytes.com/2006/08/library-20-its-more-than-flickr-and.html   

This is a much more optimistic view of the Web 2.0 -driven changes to the way information is created and shared, but raises some excellent questions about the role of the library profession in this new world.

"As my husband and I tuned into CNN over the two week course of our vacation to catch up on world events, we were surprised to find a good deal of their news coverage showing and acknowledging the power of “soft information” as they shared quotes from bloggers caught up in the conflict and videos posted on YouTube about the crisis in middle east. Why, because information is time sensitive.... because CNN didn’t have enough reporters in the area yet to cover the complete conflict... and because human interest/frontline experiences are worth their weight in advertising gold. (It might also help that they don’t cost the network a cent to air.) Anyway, CNN was very upfront about the airing of these videos as undocumented news sources, but even so they were information and they filled the great need for the “first person” experience.

So what am I getting at?? Simple, it’s this … 2.0 is radically changing the way users get information and that means big, BIG, BIGGG fundamental changes to the information profession and libraries as a whole. As I said to a group of librarians attending a recent presentation I gave … "I believe right NOW is the most exciting time to be a librarian in the information profession because information is changing!!" And not only is it changing, the channels are changing too!!! And what’s most important about this change is that users now are not only able to consume information while it’s still “soft”, they also have a way to participate in its creation and validation too! If that’s not earth-shattering-exciting to an information professional, then I can’t imagine what is!

I agree with Helene that it is a wonderfully exciting time to be an information professional  and that the benefits of the new forms of information outweigh the risks... and we're going to continue to have some great discussions at PVLD about how Web 2.0 and the way it is changing the very nature of information can help us transform our services.  But what do YOU think?  Do you agree with Mr. Keen that news and information creation should remain in the hands of "experts"?  Comments welcome!

Information Literacy

Information literacy is a topic that many librarians are talking about - usually in the context of teaching people how to effectively use the many online information resources now available.  Through our partnership with the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District PVLD librarians have been delivering information literacy training to middle school students across the Peninsula.  Our focus has been on topics such as how to tell whether a website is likely to have reliable, authoritative information, the traps of relying on Google and Wikipedia, and how to use the library's subscription databases. 

Given our involvement with information literacy I was very interested to read an interview of Henry Jenkins, director of the Comparative Media Studies program at MIT that appeared in this month's American Libraries magazine.  Mr. Jenkins was asked "Where do you rank traditional information literacy among the proficiencies millenials need?"

His response gave me one of those "aha moments"! He said

"Young people absoultely need to acquire very traditional research skills that will allow them to discern the quality of information they are acquiring from various sources. But in a world where itis often difficult to determine the source and status of the media we are consuming, traditional literacy skills are no longer sufficient.  We should no longer consider young people to media literate if they can consume but not produce media.  It's like confusing penmanship with composition'.  Wow!

This message was reinforced when I turned to last Sunday's New York Times magazine intending to start the crossword and the following caught my eye in a letter to the Editor -

"I am a high-school student dismayed by much of the content my peers routinely exhibit through their blogs and MySpace profiles.  In his advice to the college interviewer who Googled a prospective student, Randy Cohen....wrongly equates an online profile with the traditional "pen-and-paper" diary.  When we teenagers allude to illicit activities and display revealing photographs, our chief motivation is exhibitionism, not secrecy.  We want to attract attention from friends and strangers.  If profiles produced by potential students and employees already reflect poorly on their authors, then universities and employers have every right to worry about other distasteful statements that may find their way into inappropriate posts in the future"!  Double wow!

What a wonderful role libraries can play in giving people the skills they need to create media responsibly!  Some libraries already get it - elsewhere in American Libraries was an article about Cheshire Public Library in Cheshire, Connecticut which uses teens to create the Cheshire Public Library Podcast (www.cheshirelib.org/teens/cplpodcast.htm ).  The same article highlighted Denver Public Library's recent contest where teens created videos on YouTube about how they had fun at the library, with  the winner receiving an MP3 player.

Talk about Win/Win - programs such as these give kids vital skills in media creation and help promote the library too!  Now I'm thinking about what we could do here at PVLD to stretch into this new dimension of "information literacy"...any ideas?  any volunteers?