What goes around comes around.

/ Listening to today's episode of Spark about proto-versions of today's online and often "2.0" technology:

1. Pirate radio (e.g. "Pump up the Volume") as proto-blogging/file-sharing;
2. Removal of toll booths (e.g. "Roads to Power: Britain Invents the Infrastructure State") as proto-net-neutrality;
3. Prince's song titles (e.g. "U Got The Look") as proto-texting slang;
4. Ham and CB radio (e.g. "Ham Radio's Technical Culture (Inside Technology)" or "Smokey and the Bandit - Special Edition") as proto-social networking tools; and
5. Eighteenth century coffee house communication (e.g. "Flesh and Stone: The Sociology of Richard Sennett") as proto-status-updates and the explosion in Renaissance Europe of letter writing (e.g. "") as proto-information-overload.

This is an interesting concept and one that speaks to me personally.  When faced with many criticisms of modern tools (facebook, Wikipedia, ereaders, etc.) my response often includes something about how what we have now is not completely unique and has connections to things we've done in the past (why and how).

The criticism of facebook and Twitter in the style of "I don't want to know about what you had for lunch and when you go to the bathroom," earns the response "So why do you talk about similar things over coffee with your friends?"  Social communication in person is often (and has often been) trivial and inane.

The criticism of Wikipedia that "Anyone and their uncle can fiddle with an entry at will," is met with "Yes, that's the strength of the tool."  That's why there's a rather extensive entry about my home town when there will probably never be one in a more traditional encyclopedia.  We have often valued socially generated and grounded information over more objective sources.  In studies about information seeking behaviour, we tend to start with our friends and family before going to the library or other potentially authoritative sources.

And I just read a thought-provoking article about how reading digitally may result in lower retention than print reading (I'm not convinced that it's an important point given such early days).  My immediate response is, as the author agrees, the benefits outweigh these possible negatives.  The reasons why print might allow greater retention than digital apply even more to say pre-printing-press material compared to the "sanitized" and "stream-lined" movable type versions.  And, to make a huge generalization, you have to pay for progress with some loss.

[ Listen to the complete broadcast and the full interviews at CBC Spark. ]

Algorithmic culture is just culture

Interesting Spark interview from Ted Striphas, associate professor in the department of Communication & Culture at Indiana University. (It's only about 16 minutes so go ahead and listen to it.) He's talking about our algorithmic culture and the danger and issues surrounding the use of our technologies that are so often at the foundation of our current cultural activities: recommendation algorithms, search engines, etc. Unfortunately, I think a lot of what he says fall into some typical traps in the fields of technology versus society.

There's the usual fallacy of treating human culture and ability as somehow magical and valuable and resulting in quality always if not always obviously. I get the feeling that Ted and Nora (the interviewer) both think that injecting "the machine" into the cultural process flattens the results, makes it die a little inside (to be a little overly dramatic in my description). There's the assumption that technology is somehow going to control everything, that using these algorithmic tools will keep us from something we don't like. We've always avoided what we don't like and we've always had to face what we don't like because those efforts fail. Technology has ALWAYS limited our use of culture and experience with others. Because of how the printing press spat out the words, how the horse-and-carriage distribution network could reach people, how roads were laid out (due ultimately to limitations of technology and workload) and so on, news could only travel in so many ways to so many people in so many formats.

Practices like SEO (search engine optimization) is seen as somehow changing the authenticity of the results, making things popular which are not REALLY popular. I'm not even sure what that's supposed to mean. What's the difference between what the numbers say are popular due to usage and what is REALLY popular. Perhaps, if things were different, other patterns of popularity would arise. But that's always been true. What rises to the top has always been biased. We just understand that bias a little better because we are intentionally controlling the tools that these biases are flowing through.

And finally, there seems to be a narrow definition of "culture" being used; as something governed by or enjoyed by a minority. Culture is created and experienced by everyone. It's the average of all our tastes and activities, it's the successful memes that have survived society. Often "high culture" are those aspects of culture that are enjoyed by the minority and/or had been enjoyed by the majority in times past, but culture as a whole is a description of entire social groups. What we're doing is affecting culture. What gets remembered as culture has typically been those parts of culture that have been lucky enough to have been recorded somehow: in print, on records, as oral tradition, etc. But sitting in the middle of present day society, looking around, anyone can see how much more complex culture is while being experienced.

Sure, algorithms are affecting culture more and more, but it's always been the case that non-cultural tools and processes have affect culture. Don't worry about it. Don't run from it. Understand it.

Just Google It

Just like all librarians, I'm on the fence about Google and other search engines. Very useful - irreplaceable in some situations - but not always used appropriately and certainly not understood well enough to properly judge appropriate use.

I just came across another specific disadvantage of the "just google it" phenomenon. People in institutions with large websites seems to think that it's ok not to organize their site well since you can just site-Google what you want anyway. Even those who are invested in a specific area of an institution think it's just fine to have the primary (pronounced "easiest") access to their pages be through the Google search engine limited to the site's pages.

By itself, this is not necessarily a bad thing. It DOES provide quick and easy access to what users want without having to find their way through a long and complicated site structure, particularly for complex issues that aren't important enough to warrant front page real estate.

The problem is that it relieves us of the job of having to think about our desired information goal on a broader level. But is this a problem? Thinking is hard. It takes effort. And when we want information yesterday, we don't want to waste time thinking about something only tangentially related to our want/need. Having to think about, say, what KIND of thing is the thing we want to find, or WHY would the institution be providing this information and therefore where would they have made it available, is complicated and requires effort. But I think it's important in almost all situations.

Actually, I think there are only two situations: either it's easy to do this since the answer is obvious, or it's not so obvious and therefore is going to take some time and energy to figure out. The first case is not a problem. Finding information about "Dogs" should be in a book about "Animals" or in the "D" section or in the area related to "Pets". No problem. Find that section/chapter/link/section and go there. Problem solved. However, what about something like "Student Initiatives"? What is that exactly? The searcher themselves may not understand what exactly they are looking for. In fact, that may be WHY they're looking for information in the first place, because they don't know what that phrase really means. And without that information how will they be able to find what they are looking for if (a) the site is not using that phrase exactly, or (b) the phrase is being used in two or more different ways? Spending some time before searching to think about what the topic being searched for actually means, or even just COULD mean, would ensure that the searcher will be able to find the information faster and, when finding it, more quickly identify it as the information being searched for. Mere "phrase recognition" can lead to dead ends or mistakes.

Of course, all this relies on the pile o' information being searched is well organized in the first place, which, I guess, is the intitial stumbling block. This too is hard work and requires a lot of time and effort. This is certainly why it doesn't always get done in anything but those "piles" for which information searching is the primary purpose of the pile (e.g. journal article indexes). Web sites are not usually primarily about find each piece of information they contain. They are usually marketing tools to some degree. Communication of pieces of information chosen by the owners is the focus. But if the owners of this information want it all to be found, not just the pieces they want, then IMHO then need to ensure more finding tools that Google Site Search.

My 2.0 cents.

Do I want to be more mobilized?

Damn.

And that's just part of this infographic. (Click here to go to the original post with the full mile-high image.) I am one of the workers that don't NEED to be in the office to be productive, but I still prefer it. My office is nice. I have two monitors, a second computer (so really three monitors, I guess) and a printer. Ok, so I have all those things at home (although I could use more monitors around the house) but the most important thing I have at work is quiet. I can shut my door and work until my head explodes with productivity. I like quiet. And I don't get enough of it at home, even with the kids out and about. I am easily distracted when at home so working at work is best.

The next best thing is the fact that I have my colleagues and coworkers around me. Although I work mostly alone, I do need to consult with some one now and again and it's just better in person. The truth is that I don't really enjoy talking on the phone. Text-based communication is good but inefficient for many productive topics so that leaves in person conversations. Nothing beats it.

However, I am feeling a little left out. I don't really have a mobile device: no cell phone (Skype fits my communication needs almost 100% and my wallet perfectly) and no tablet (although I like the shiny, I have not felt the need and again, my bank balance dictates my gadget balance). I have yet to hear of the perfect device although smartphones are getting close. I want something smallish, flexible, powerful, online... "But Mr 2.0! What about..." and cheap. I already pay enough monthly bills. I would like something a little less leech-like.

And of course, I haven't really done the in-depth research so perhaps there's an option out there that would fit my bill perfectly... Anyone? But honestly, I have yet to feel the motivation to bother. I like the connectiveness I have. At work, at home, nary in between, with some potential on the go. The only reason I feel to bother with plugging into something else is to experience that part of social togetherness. The infographic that started this certainly helps. But it's not strong enough yet. Anyone want to nudge me a little more?

[ The Rise of the Mobile Workforce [Infographic] from Information on the Move ]

Cane 2.0

Cane 2.0 refers to a new technology to assist the visually impaired: "The Tacit, a hand-mounted system that pings surroundings and transmits distance information to the user..." So, 2.0 in this context refers to a technological advancement beyond something very physical and traditional.

[ Cane 2.0: The Tacit Is Hand-Mounted Sonar For The Vision Impaired from TechCrunch ]

2.0 hits the Shore

"Soaps 2.0"? It caused me psychological pain to read through the entire article "Soaps 2.0: MTV's New WatchWith App Enables Your "Jersey Shore" Addiction On A Second Screen". It was mostly industry talk so it wasn't as bad as the title suggests.

In fact, there was an interesting "2.0" aspect to it. I'm not used to reading of Jersey Shore et al described as "soaps" but there were two things that seemed to have contributed to the use of the phrase. It talks about the "'second screen experience,' an industry term used to describe the smartphones and tablets people turn to alongside TV". So it's a reference to the use of technology, and mobile technology in particular, in the context of these shows. Then it adds the engagement aspect of it when it talks of "[MTV's] WatchWith and VH1's Co-star app, fun, interactive platforms that enable viewers to engage with each other during live broadcasts."

Oh, and sorry for the title. Just try to imagine giving the Shore a couple left hooks of your own.

The problem with classification

There's a problem with classification systems (e.g. DDC, LCC, etc.). And it's not a secret. I certainly didn't discover this problem but it's not going away and classification will still be important enough in the near future that it would be nice if it were solved.

The problem lies in the two pressures on the system: change and resistance to change. The resistance to change is obvious: in a library of any decent size, change means work. More change means more work. Libraries do not tend to re-classify every item that would otherwise get a new call number every time OCLC and/or LC decides that the system needs expanding or restructuring. And consistency is good for the user as well; if they've become accustomed to the system as it is, then altering the system will be a little stressful. Not too much but a little.

But on the other hand, classification systems, at least the currently used and practical ones (i.e. the ones we like) are founded on something that does change, and quite rapidly nowadays: subject terminology. The words we use to describe what books (mostly) are about, the hierarchies that we put these terms into, the disciplines studying or working in these subjects, and the relative popularity of all of these, all change over time and therefore push the classification system in the same direction.

War 2.0: What is it (good for)?

The title "War 2.0: China Suspected in Massive Cyberattack on U.N., U.S. Gov't, and More" from DailyTech (http://www.dailytech.com/) is all that refers to this particular 2.0ed phrase. But it's obvious what the 2.0 is referring to without getting into the article at all:

2.0 = cyberstuff

I guess this is a case of constant conjunction confusing meaning. Just like the word "alcoholic" leads to tacking on "-oholic" to refer to someone who is addicted (or more often "addicted") to something, such as a chocoholic is "addicted" to chocolate. 2.0 in common conversation is seen often in the context of either Web 2.0 or in second versions of software. Ergo, 2.0 is seen as something to do with technology and specifically web/online "stuff". It's also got the "point" in there so it's mathematical, which makes it nerdy, which in turn makes it computer-related.

New life for MySpace?

From "Internet: How to make a small fortune in Web 2.0":

The Wall Street Journal has reported that MySpace has been unloaded to an internet advertising company for a mindboggling USD35 million in cash plus some unspecified number of shares (WSJ speculates it's less than 5%)..

As its social networking functions were taken over by Facebook, twitter and Linked-In, and dozens of clones of each variant, MySpace refocussed itself as an adjunct to the entertainments side of the Murdoch empire. This is, after all, a company which is one of a handful that dominates the global entertainment industry.

I'm quietly rooting for MySpace.  Although I don't really use my profile there, I like the idea that there is no big, obvious winner in any race.  It's good to have competition.  I like the idea that there could be one primary method to streamline our social identities for efficiency's sake, but there's always the "all your eggs in one basket" issue of there being only one for-profit company that does the streamlining.  And competition eggs on (Get it, "eggs"?) progress.  Not that I really see where the new MySpace is competing.  The article says YouTube but I don't see much connection except tangentially.  But whatever it is, it's still crawling along.  Go, MySpace!  You can do it!

Bubble 2.0, that's ok

Just read Here Comes Bubble 2.0, Which Is Just What The Economy Needs, another article about the second bubble since the Dot com bubble. But unlike most that I've read, this is relatively positive about the affair. It will stimulate the economy, if only in the U.S. Silicon Valley at first, but that should spread. And it won't be a bad when it pops. Hopefully the value it brings will last.

I'm not an expert in economics or business so I'm never sure what these "bubbles" are exactly beyond economic upswings. I guess large systems like economics are often seen as coming in cycles, even if the cycles aren't exactly cyclical, symmetrical, or predictable. But it interests me to see the acceptance of purely technological, and some would say frivolous, endeavours in the economy and in society in such a large scale. It suggests to me, perhaps obviously, that we are truly becoming an information-based society, at least in part. But how will this manifest itself? Will we learn to use information and the tools that we use to manage information better? More wisely? More effectively? Or will we simply play more games and transfer a lot of the stupid mindless things that we do over to the new techno-platform? I'm not saying games and whatnot are useless. I just wish that there was some sign that the general public was getting the idea that reading, learning, preserving, thinking, and creativity are all even more important in an information-filled world than ever before. Stop being sucked in by nicely packaged lies, stop jumping to conclusions because it's easier, and stop dismissing the exact things that are supposed to be helping us: schools, libraries, research, etc.

[ Inspired by Here Comes Bubble 2.0, Which Is Just What The Economy Needs from Forbes ]

We get no respect, no respect at all.

"Without effective communication, some institutions will just see the library as a repository for books or as a supermarket: they think if you put self-checkout machines that's an automatic librarian which, of course, it's not. Further down the line when the collections gone to pot and the machine can do nothing about it, the institution recognises that the librarian's job is more than just stamping books."

Age old problem. But how to other professionals and/or academics handle it? Well, usually they don't care. Everyone knows what doctors do. We don't know how but we do know what. Same with lawyers and nurses and teachers and professors. Why not librarians? Well, mostly because people don't really understand the THING that our profession revolves around: Information. Nothing's really changed about our bodies, the law, learning, research, etc. But information, or rather the information containers, which are the things that most people think about when they think about information, have changed. Drastically.

Books are still books but not when they are ebooks. And books don't play the role they used to play in learning and entertainment. And newcomers to the post-secondary environment are shocked to learn about all the new info containers there are.

These changes are what librarianship is responsible for managing but it's hard to explain the changes and their effects on users when it's hard to understand them yourself. It would be as if the human body started evolving inside at an incredible rate into something most people don't recognize as what it was before. The difficulties doctors and nurses would have to deal with would be just as difficult to explain as to deal with. Increased failure rate would translate, in the user's mind, as incompetence on the professional's part. Anything new promising success would be very appealing even if it didn't deliver.

What do you think? How do librarians convince everyone else of our worth? Does the analogy work? How do you see the predicament librarians face?

[ Inspired by "Behind the job title: university librarian" from guardian.co.uk ]

Is Wi-fi harmful?

Important conclusion quotes from an article regarding the potential harm of wi-fi:

"...it is possible to select the results of individual research studies in support of a variety of opinions [regarding exposure to RF energy]; which may range from no risk of health effects on the one hand, to a clear need to reduce current exposure limits on the other."

"...there is emerging evidence that long-term frequent use of cellphones may be associated with an increased risk of tumours on the side of the head where the cellphone is used. This is an active area of research and additional studies may confirm or refute this association."

"...Wi-Fi exposure are not only well within recommended limits, but are only a small fraction (less than 1%) of what is received during typical use of cellphones."

In other words, it isn't clear whether wi-fi is harmful, but cellphones, however harmful they may be, are almost certainly much worse.

[ Quotes from "Wireless Technology and Health Outcomes: Evidence and Review: Are there human health effects related to the use of wireless internet technology (Wi-Fi)?" from the Ontario Agency for Health Protection and Promotion ]

Web 2.0 Basics. Again.

Another Web 2.0 article.

Not that I have anything to do with Carnegie Mellon -- other than that I love watermelon. This just came up in my general "2.0" Google News search feed. Most of what gets picked up is not relevant or even interesting but this is exactly the kind of thing I was looking for. This article is filled to the brim with the key concepts of Web 2.0. It mentions facebook (et al). It labels social networking tech as groundbreaking. It talks about the evils of social networking tech. And it even garnered the standard "don't worry about it" comment.

I don't know about you but I'm getting tired of the constant "it's awesome but it's evil" coverage of all things web 2.0-ey. Of course it's awesome. It's a technology (and are therefore awed by it's magical-ness) that's popular (which we all strive for). And of course it's evil. Or at least has the potential for evil. It's a technology (and should therefore be feared and questioned) that's popular (so it's a haven for all the worst kind of people).

Talk about something else! How about it's potential to help with education? No wait, that's been done. How about it's potential to bring us all closer together? Oops, done too pretty much. Or maybe that this is just a normal extension of our age-old desire and ability to communicate and socialize? Bah. Too boring.

(Oh, and one more thing... The subtitle is "Learn about the pros and cons of online social networking and how to ensure your profile is clean". The article may include SOME of the pros and cons but not THE. And it certainly doesn't show you in any detail how to ensure that your profile is clean. I would have been disappointed if I had actually read it before getting into the article.)

[ Inspired by "Web 2.0: Social networking in a college setting" by Katie Chironis from The Tartan ]

Reading for dummies

Peter Rukavina has a new e-book reader. No, it’s not an iPad, or a Kindle. It’s not a Kobo, or a Sony Reader. Rather, Peter’s new ebook reader is a human being named Shawn, who runs a local copy shop.

In the interview of Peter, he explains that he has tried several e-reading methods but, at least for now, cannot get past the need for a visceral connection to the physical book itself, i.e. page turning. Not even the sweeping motion used on his iPod Touch is good enough. So he's printing out ebooks at a copy centre and reading them that way.

As soon as I heard this I thought of an analogy to show the silliness of these kind of argument. Scribes writing out texts by hand by candlelight complaining that authors today typing their work on a computer just doesn't have the same feel. No one would argue that we should go back to hand-writing as the primary method of book
production. (This example is somewhat coincidental: I thought of it during the interview before Peter said that he was a printer by trade. Printing. The necessary middle step between manuscript and "compu-type". I used a computer keyboard as a bigger contrast to hand-scripting but I could have used the printing press and the argument would have been the same. It may actually be ironic in the true sense since he claims his bias against ereaders is based on his love of printing.) And we're not trying to replace typing with some sort of light-pen writing simulator (although many mobile devices have hand-writing translation tools, they're usually for quick notes not trilogies).

Too often people make these snap, emotive judgments about new ways and new technologies. The argument "it's not what I'm used to" may be ok for some, but isn't missing out on a new way worse? It's one thing to "triage" change so you can actually get on with your life, but it's another to consciously use that as an argument to do things the old way.

[ Initiated by Full Interview: Peter Rukavina on paper e-books from CBC Radio's Spark ]

"Amazon remotely deleted... books from the Kindle devices of readers..."

The New York Times online has an interesting article about "Animal Farm" and "1984" being deleted from Kindle users after Amazon realized they did not have the right to have sold it in the first place. This is interesting in two ways, IMHO:

1. "Owning" something digital is not always clear cut: This is something that librarians have come to realize with the advent of online content. In the past, we have purchased journals and books comfortably knowing that whatever we bought we would have until it was destroyed beyond repair which, if care was taken, would be quite a long time. With electronic journals and books, ownership of content disappeared, to be replaced with something more like renting the works. We can purchase a whole run of a journal with back files and everything, often for not much less than the print would have cost, but if the distributor decides that something needs to be changed, anything from a typo to our access to it at all, we have very little control and sometimes no knowledge of it even. My suggestion: we should refuse to "buy" anything that we don't have actual control over. If it's digital, we need to factor in the cost of hosting it on our sites if we want to ensure future access at all.
2. Our concept of rights is confused: In this Amazon case, the reason for the deletions was that Amazon had mistakenly sold something they should not have sold. Do we really think we have the right to something just because we spent money on it? What if someone stole your TV, then sold it off the back of their truck to your neighbour? If you COULD get it back, wouldn't you think it was your RIGHT to have it back? Just because we haven't been able to return "stolen" merchandise to its rightful owner in the past, doesn't mean we shouldn't ever do so in the future. And they got their money back. No one lost anything (except the poor shmuck who lost his notes saved in the ebook - remember, keep control of your digital property). There are millions of copies of these books, some you can get for free, say, at your public library for example.

Both of these issues are summed up in a great quote from the article:

"I never imagined that Amazon actually had the right, the authority or even the ability to delete something that I had already purchased."

So either accept other's rights along with yours or hold on tighter to your stuff. Or maybe I'm wrong... What do you think?

[ From Amazon Erases Orwell Books From Kindle Devices by Brad Stone at NYTimes.com ]

Free for the price of one

Library Journal has reported on a new deal between the University of Michigan and Amazon where hundreds of thousands of digitized public domain books will be made available through their print on demand business.

Sounds good. Hopefully UMich is getting tons of moolah for the deal. And it's good to see efforts made to support the interests of the long tail, those people looking for works otherwise out of print and therefore much more difficult to obtain. I only have two problems with this. One, I see nowhere in this article any mention of any efforts to make this huge pile of etexts available to or through other academic or public libraries. They said that a lot of them are already available through UMich's catalog and Google Book Search but that limits the potential discoverers to those at UMich (and maybe a bit of the outlying area) and those who actually know that Google Book Search exists (I'm always amazed that people don't even try there). Make it easy to link through or host the content elsewhere and make those works supposedly owned by the public available for use by the public.

My other problem is in regards to Roy Tennant's comment that this is a sign that print is not dead. Well, no it's not but this doesn't suggest that it's going to live any longer than we thought before. Print's got it's place but speaking for myself, if it's a choice between paying for something in print and getting it for free online, I'm taking the latter. Even if the fee is nominal. But I'm a geek, so... All this will do it delay print's demise for certain otherwise doomed genres because the majority of those searching for books will pay Amazon not knowing that it could be free somewhere else.

[ From Michigan Deal A New Twist on Access to Scanned Book Content at Library Journal 7/23/2009 ]

Tobacco report to be 'socially networked'

A major U.S. government agency utilizing Web 2.0 methods and tools. It warms the heart.

The CDC is hoping that the next Surgeon-General's 2009 report on tobacco will "go viral" through using such tools as "Facebook, Twitter and MySpace" and RSS and devices like "iPhones, BlackBerrys and other personal digital assistants", and are going to try to make it possible for the public to share the information easily. It's certainly a good sign, but I have to say, not really a surprising one. We've all seen the effects of such simple technological tweeks enabling smoother communication, sharing and mixing, and how quickly a good portion of the public has taken to absorbing it into their lives and enriching the global society. It seems quite obvious by now that to not utilize this phenomenon would be to bury yourself and whatever information you are trying to get out to the world.

Now if only Canada would follow suit. lol

Anyone hear of any other group doing something similar? Do you think that efforts like this will succeed?

[From "Surgeon General's next tobacco report to get Web 2.0 push" by Doug Beizer at FederalComputerWeek found via Google News]

Tweet my own horn...

So as some of you may have noticed, I've been using Twitter for a while now. Everytime I mention it in conversation to a person not twit-lightened (lol), they shake their head violently and laugh about reading about whenever people go to the bathroom (and it's not because I used the word "twit-lightened"... I swear, this is the first time!).

I really like it actually. I find I'm thinking up a kinds of new types of tweets to put up. I've started listing the children's books I'm reading to my son every night (as well as the books and stories I'm reading), linking to them and (since I'm at finding the link at Amazon anyway) writing a little Amazon review about them (example). I'm always complaining about the dearth of book reviews out there to inform librarians in their collection development efforts so I figured I could do my small part to help out.

I've enjoyed Twittering so much, and see it as so potentially useful as an information dissemination tool, as well as a networking and archiving tool (I actually back-up my tweets myself, not being confident in Twitter's own willingness to store my inane statements throughout the years), that I've put in on my daily to-do list. Crazy, I know. Anyone else been using Twitter lately? Or something similar?

No more "beta" in Gmail et al.

As of yesterday, Google has removed the BETA label from Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs and GTalk.

Wow. What a time to be alive... Where was I, at, uh, 8:02 am?!?! Asleep? Eating breakfast with the kids? Well, I didn't notice until Lifehacker told me yesterday when I checked my RSS feeds at around 10 am. And it didn't really sink in until tonight.

But it is somewhat of a big thing. On the Google blog entry about this, they talk about the issue of our new "world of rapid developmental cycles where products like Gmail continue to change indefinitely". The beta label could have suggested that these tools were not "perfected" yet, possibly meaning that something could go wrong at any moment. I know I thought about that recently when I noticed the beta sticker on Gmail a few weeks ago and mulled over what that meant. Should I go with something else? What else is there really? Does that word really mean that another free tool lacking the label would be any better? And there's always the issue of data back-up. Should I be doing that? Do I want to? Do I have the time? Is it even possible in all the tools I may want to do so for?

Although the removal of the beta label from these Google products is virtually meaningless directly, it makes a kind of sense to be done around now. The nature of these tools are not really changing - they will still be improved and changed as Google sees fit - but it was probably past due keeping it as a conspicuous issue in these tools in comparison with the other new things Google is and will be producing.

What do you think? Was it a good move? And what does it mean for them or for us users?

Some pros and hows of adding Wikipedia articles to the catalog

I already commented on the potential problems of adding Wikipedia articles to a library's catalog in the Distant Librarian blog entry that brought up the subject for me here, so I won't go over them again. What I want to do here is consider the benefits of doing so and doing it in the best way possible.

One benefit is that since an assumed good number of users see them as valuable and worthy of usage already, we can somewhat "ride the wave" of Wikipedia's success. Having their content linked to in our collection might say to a good portion of our patrons that, "Yes, we are hip and we can help you get to the resources we know you want." That may not sound like the best reason, but survival of an institution that most of us believe is worth saving may also be worth pandering a little to ensure continued appreciation. I'm not sure what the long term results of such pandering might be so this is probably not a sufficient reason but it does have a certain amount of short-term appeal at least.

Another benefit is that actually, many Wikipedia articles are valuable and include content not included in other resources to a sufficiently similar extent if at all. A venue where anyone anytime can add topics and start filling them up with content will always include more same-level topics than one that must pay authors to develop content. This is saying nothing about the quality of such content but if we assume some bare minimum level of quality that is sufficiently higher than neutral, or worse yet, outright falsehoods, then something is better than nothing. There will be somewhat informative articles in Wikipedia on topics that a for-fee or author-restricted resource will be able to provide. The benefit to a library catalog is that it can be filled with some content not available elsewhere.

A third benefit is that it is free, at least in terms of direct cost. Libraries do not typically have infinite budgets for collections and anytime a minimally worthy resource can be added to the collection for not outlay of money, it must be considered. Of course, the disadvantage of online resources such as Wikipedia articles is that they don't come with handy pre-made MARC records, requiring a certain amount of expertise and effort on the part of those who want them added.

Given these three benefits, how can the addition of at least some Wikipedia articles (and perhaps other similar online resources) be made easier particularly for those libraries with little time or smaller staff complements. First of all, they need to be linked to at the specific version level. This solves the issue of quality control that we tend to pride ourselves on in our collection (as mentioned in the comment mentioned above). Also, when a library/librarian has decided that a specific article version is worthy of addition, the metadata created needs to be shared, made available to other libraries considering it in the future. As a profession we tend to share well so let's use our large numbers to solve our general lack-of-local-resources problem. Finally, if we go down this path, we should go all the way down the path: if we're adding Wikipedia articles to the collection, advertise that we're doing so. One of the big problems with the library catalog as a tool is that users don't know what's in there. We need to tell them. It needs to be made clear all the kinds of resources are included in the collection and why. Not all at once though. One at a time.

Still not sure it's a good idea... May get too messy. But it seems to have a few useful positive side effects and is doable at least on a small scale. What do you think?