One Week In My Librarian Life #libday8

This is a blog post for the “Library Day In The Life” Project. This project is a semi-annual event where librarians, library staff and library students from all over the globe share a day (or week) in their life through blog posts, photos, video and Twitter updates.

As a bit of a background, I’m a Technical Librarian for a public library service in England and also a founder member of the Voices For The Library campaign.

Monday (30th Jan)

A day off work, but still I’m doing library based stuff. I’ve got a few things going on at the moment around Voices For The Library, so I’m trying to keep on top of them. This includes:

  • Preparing for a meeting on Wednesday about public library cuts with MP Ed Vaizey, the Government minister responsible for libraries. Julia Donaldson (Children’s Laureate) arranged this and, as a representative of Voices, I will be part of a delegation that includes Julia, Alan Gibbons (children’s author and Campaign For The Book founder) and John Holland (Friends of Gloucestershire Libraries campaigner). I’m currently trying to condense all that Voices For The Library want to put across into a 5 minute slot.
  • Helping plan the Parliamentary lobby/rally on 13th March – got to admit I’m not doing as much as I’d like to with this, as other much closer deadlines keeping popping up.

Activities I tend to do daily with Voices, includes:

  • Keeping an eye on the news, blogs, Government related sites and Twitter for anything of interest and posting it on Twitter. It seems like a bit of a slow news day today for libraries in the UK, but plenty of stories about libraries in Canada and USA! I tend to feed all my news into Google Reader, as I can share it in a variety of ways, but I also use Newsnow.co.uk as well, because that also picks up more news that Google news doesn’t.
  • Adding or writing the odd blog post for the site. (Added one today)
  • Responding to email discussions.
Tuesday (31st Jan)
August 20th 2008 - Inspiration pt3 by Stephen Poff

August 20th 2008 - Inspiration pt3 (c) Stephen Poff/Flickr

Not in the office again today. This time I’m on a half day “Writing for publication” course at CILIP, organised by the LIRG (Library and Information Research Group). I do a lot of library focused writing for this blog, the Voices for The Library blog and on rare occasions for other sites. However, I feel I want to improve/develop this side of myself  and I’ve also got a thought in the back of my mind that I want to do some formal research around public libraries – to put my efforts to wider use. So, this course seemed a good starting place. I was hoping that it would help me write more clearly, get focused and get those ideas written down more quickly, and, as my brain is sometimes like a sieve, I hope that it helps me remember what I’ve written too!

After the course I worked on a Prezi to promote an event for National Libraries Day. Hopefully it will get tweeted a few times by our library service Twitter accounts over the next few days.

I also tweeted a few relevant library news stories and finalised my thoughts for  the meeting around library cuts on Wednesday.

Voices For The Library were also given permission to publish our response to Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee’s inquiry into library closures on our website today.

Wednesday (1st Feb)

A day’s leave again, but still doing library related work.

Bit of a strange day really – as a representative for Voice For The Library, along with Children’s Laureate Julia Donaldson, author and Campaign For The Book founder Alan Gibbons, and Friends of Gloucestershire Libraries campaigner John Holland, I’m going to meet Minister with responsibility for libraries, Ed Vaizey to discuss the mess public libraries are in and if he or Jeremy Hunt ever intend doing anything to sort them out?

I posted two reactions from myself to this meeting.

Here’s my personal “:-O Is this really happening to me?” reaction.

Here’s my professional Voices For The Library blog post.

As I say in the Voices blog post, I hope the meeting made a step in the right direction to sort things out, even if it just seems like a tiny one.

The rest of the day/evening was spent finding/tweeting library related trying to catch up with Voices For The Library emails, etc.

Houses Of Parliament by wendyfairy

Houses Of Parliament (c) wendyfairy/Flickr

Thursday (2nd Feb)

I’m actually back in the office today and I spent the first part of it dealing with emails. These included:

  • Preparation for our library service conference
  • Tying up the loose ends so that we can implement our new public facing catalogue/circulation system. It’s nice a whizzy and I’m particularly excited that it will include RSS feeds for search results! I know that sounds sad, but I really want to mashup some of our catalogue data.
  • Got a thank you for putting together the National Libraries Day event Prezi. :-)

At lunch time I signed up for “Brighton Lib Teach Meet 2012“, which is “a fun and informal way for librarians and information professionals to share new ideas.” The focus of this event is ‘Outreach, marketing and promotion’. I’ve never been to one of these before, but it sounds a bit like a Library Camp or Mashed Libraries style informal event. It also sounds interesting and I thought I could share some ideas around its focus (especially as Voices stuff crosses over into that area), so I put myself down to give a 5 minute presentation too.

Today was my monthly one-to-one with my line manager. We covered what I’d been working on in the past month and what I need to focus on in the coming month. Mostly e-books; downloadable audio apps; the Arena project (the public catalogue I mentioned earlier); future business plans; and marketing/promoting the library service online in a new way (for us).

I also took the time to fill in the survey for stage 1 of the CILIP Body of Professional Knowledge consultation. When I joined CILIP I wanted to get involved with what was going on, because I feel that if I want the organisation and profession to develop I’ve got to make an effort to get involved. I’ve not had the time to do anything with CILIP groups, but at least I can get involved in other ways and this is one of them.

Friday (3rd Feb)

Before work I put together a short pre-National Libraries Day (Saturday 4th) blog post for the Voices site. It was really just to remind people that N.L.D. was happening, how it came about (a follow on from Save Our Libraries Day last year) and that even though it was a day of celebration of libraries, library services were still under threat.

I spent 99% of my “day-job” today in a meeting with representatives from our library system supplier and our local authority web team ironing out outstanding issues with our new public facing catalogue/circulation system. We got most things sorted out, but it isn’t yet ready to go live. I typed up the log to highlight the outstanding issues and circulated it to those who attended the meeting and the broader contract team.

For the rest of the day (about an hour) I dealt with some emails and was also given another project to think about – an assessment of wi-fi in libraries.

When I got home I had an email discussion about the oral evidence Voices’ Abby Barker will be giving to the Culture, Media & Sport Committee Inquiry into library closures at the beginning of next week.

Saturday (4th Feb)

National Libraries Day logo

National Libraries Day

National Libraries Day. This is what I got up to – a librarithon!

Whilst out and about, being with a couple of techy type librarians, we ended up discussing social media, websites and cuts in relation to libraries… as well as other things.

I tried to retweet what others were saying about National Libraries Day, but the sheer number of tweets made it difficult.

Came back after a couple of drinks in the pub and typed up a blog post about my day.

Sunday (5th Feb)

Retweeted quite a lot of post-National Libraries Day tweets and news. It was great to see so many people getting involved.

I also worked on an article I’m putting together about ifttt.com and how it can be used for information sharing and productivity.

The rest of the month

Other aspects of my role include dealing with cataloguing, classification and EDI issues; assisting in the running of social media workshops for staff; liaising with data suppliers; current awareness of technology and I.T. in libraries.

Even though it hasn’t been a typical week for me –  I generally spend more time in the office and have never had a meeting like the one on Wednesday before – it’s a good example of the variety of work I do.

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by garygre on February 5, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on February 5, 2012

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My National Libraries Day Out #NLD12 #Librarithon #LoveLibraries

Yesterday was National Libraries Day in the UK – a celebration of libraries – not just public, but also academic, specialist, business, health, schools, etc… all libraries!

I was hoping to celebrate in the week building up to today by taking part in my own librarithon – ie visit as many different interesting libraries as possible. This was inspired by Zoe Toft who, along with her children, took part in her own charity librarithon last year. In the end, due to the fact that I had to complete a major project in work and had a major meeting to prepare for and attend, the librarithon didn’t happen. :-( Oh well!

Instead I took part in a mini-librarithon today in London with a couple of other librarians - @usernametaken10 and @misshelved - who fancied exploring a few new places. The aim wasn’t to take in as many libraries as possible just for the sake of visiting them. We decided to visit the Dickens & the Supernatural exhibition at The British Library, two new libraries in Dalston and Canada Water and an ‘Idea store’ in Whitechapel, which was running an author event.

As we were in London, and as it’s a national library, The British Library seemed like a really good place to start. I’ve visited this library a few times. Every time I’ve been there it’s to visit an exhibition.  Exhibitions in a library are a great way to provide focus on information/resources held by the library that might have otherwise been hidden away – hidden away in terms of location, and in Dickens case, hidden away in his body of work. He’s probably more widely known for fiction that touches on social history, rather than the supernatural. Exhibitions such as this get  potential readers thinking about the author in a different way. It was quite a small exhibition – took us about 20 minutes to look at it – but it was interesting to find out about how his early childhood and the people in it influenced him. He was sceptical about ghosts and the paranormal, but that didn’t stop him from writing classic ghost stories, such as The Signalman.

Book sculpture at Dalston C.L.R. James Library

Book sculpture at Dalston C.L.R. James Library

Next, we took the bus over to Dalston and wandered around the newly built C.L.R. James Library. This public area was spread over one and a half floors, broken up into glass partitioned walls. The local archives and history service was situated above it. I thought the use of the foyer area was interesting – a place for those who just want to dash in and out, to make a quick choice from a limited set of popular books. Even though I couldn’t borrow them (as I not a member of that library service), I did spot a couple of graphic novels that interested me. It made me think, “I wish we had a national library card and I could borrow this book this book right now.” Hopefully my local library will stock them. *Goes off to check the catalogue* Yes, I’ve found one of them! (Mike Carey / God Save The Queen)

Then we took the train to Canada Water Library. Again, this is another brand new library and has great views overlooking Canada Water itself. The building itself is pretty funky – as @misshelved said, on the outside it looks like a Jawa Sand crawler.

Canada Water Library

Canada Water Library or Jawa Sand Crawler?

Inside Canada Water Library

Inside Canada Water Library (c) usernametaken10/Flickr

Inside the library there’s a coffee shop and quick choice section (like Dalston Library’s foyer). A set of stairs in the centre of the ground floor leads up to the main part of the library, housing the children’s library, computers and fiction. Up another set of stairs is the non-fiction section on a balcony area that over looks the rest of the library. It goes all the way around the library and up here they also have study spaces and meeting rooms. I’m not sure whether “a day in the life” of the library as shown here is actually how it is, but I could imagine spending a couple of hours a week in there just relaxing and browsing/thinking if I lived closer to it – it’s got a pretty relaxed positive feel to it.

Finally, @usernametaken10 and I headed to Whitechapel and visited the Idea Store there. It’s a few years old and is based over a number of floors (4, I think). Our aim was to go to a free author event (Austerity Writes Back) which was on for an hour and a half. We only managed to catch the end of the event (last 20 minutes or so), but what I saw/heard was really interesting, especially as some of its focus was the austerity cuts and protest. That’s sort of why National Libraries Day exists (on the back of Save Our Libraries protest day last year) and is also relevant to Voices For The Library activities. One of the authors (and publisher) Bobby Nayyar made a comment that made sense to me about the current state of affairs with the economy. It was along the lines that there’s nothing wrong with businesses making a profit, but some businesses seem focused on making an obscene amount of profit and do not understand the social impact this may have on the world around them. I also want to mention that while I was mooching around the Idea Store I spotted on the end of a shelf a biography of Andrew Carnegie. It made me smile to think that, as a philanthropist who funded so many libraries, he has a lot to be thanked for on National Libraries Day.

Andrew Carnegie book

I wonder how Andrew Carnegie would have felt today about library cuts?

I really enjoyed today’s little adventure as part of National Libraries Day. On top of visiting a handful of libraries (old and new), I had a laugh and mulled over a few library related ideas with @usernametaken10 and @misshelved. I also got to explore parts of London I’ve never been to before, and I listened to a few authors talk about their books and how they were inspired.

As I sit here writing this, I also wonder if anyone using any of those four libraries I visited today was struck by some great revolutionary or genius idea that will change the world forever? It would be great to say I was in THAT LIBRARY at THAT PRECISE MOMENT when it happened… and you may well laugh, but it could happen, because that’s the sort of thing that goes on inside the minds of people who use libraries. :-)

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by garygre on February 5, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on February 5, 2012

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Thoughts On Library Membership Charges

This article about the introduction of membership charges at Bexley Village Library caught my eye today.

The article states:

BVCL is planning to introduce three levels of membership to the library.

- Reader’s Ticket – Free membership and free loans of stock, with some limits to the numbers of items which can be borrowed. Due dates and fines will apply.

- Library Member – A £24 annual fee will see people join as full members of the wider charity. Benefits will include being able to borrow a higher number of books, keeping books for an unlimited time, a free period of use on the public computers, discounts in the cafe and priority booking for events.

- Gold Membership – Customers can join as a ‘patron’ for a £75 annual subscription. Members would be making a donation to the running costs of the library and attracting additional funds to the charity through Gift Aid. BVCL will reinvest income earned through membership in new library stock. 
Two things (Edit: Three things now) struck me about this membership scheme and membership schemes in general:
  1. I’d consider free access to online information as part of the core functions of a comprehensive public library service – a large proportion of reference material you would regard as trustworthy that was previously held by public libraries in hard copy and was accessible for free, has now been replaced by online  resources, some of which can’t really be accessed by casual users – due to high cost of subscriptions.
  2. Apart from  Central Government funding cuts, another reason local councils are having to save money is because Council Taxes were capped. This ensured local residents didn’t have to stick their hands in their pockets any deeper to pay for local services. Membership schemes like this mean that residents are still going to have that money taken out of their pockets anyway.
  3. (Edit) If you have more money you’ll receive more library services. This is at odds with the ethos behind public libraries, which provides services for free because it’s recognised that some people can’t afford or don’t have access to these services/resources via any other means.

I’m not pointing the finger at Bexley Village Community Library for doing this. At the end of the day they have stepped in to provide a service the council has a responsibility to provide free of charge.

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by garygre on January 4, 2012  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on January 4, 2012

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2012/01/04/thoughts-on-library-membership-charges/

Thoughts on: Richard Watson “In praise of public libraries – and librarians”

I came across this post on Richard Watson’s Top Trends blog today: In praise of public libraries – and librarians.

In it, Richard comments on the fact that he predicted the extinction of public libraries some time ago, “because, in an age of e-books and Google who needs them.” and since this prediction he has changed his mind.

“I got it totally wrong. Probably.

Whether or not we will want libraries in the future I cannot say, but I can categorically state we will need them, because libraries aren’t just about the books they contain. Moreover, it is a big mistake, in my view, to confuse the future of books or publishing with the future of public libraries. They are not the same thing.”

His blog post highlights why he believes public libraries will still be relevant in the future.

He emphasises the public library (and public library services) as…

  • A place that is “more than mere facts, information or ‘content’”
  • A social hub
  • An information resource that is accessible to all
  • An ideas hub where…
    • existing ideas are valued,  stored and made freely available to all
    • new ideas are created and developed
    • the right setting is provided to nurture ideas
    • librarians act as a catalyst in helping develop these ideas. They are “sifters, guides and co-creators of human connection.”
  • An information resource where personal/human interaction is an important part of the service
  • An influential method of delivering information – library services are still regarded as trustworthy information sources.

This quote about lack of use by younger generations really appealed to me:

“…admittedly many younger people still see no need to visit a library… But this could be because they still see libraries as spaces full of old books rather than places full of new ideas.”

And in summing up, Richard’s quote makes a clear point.

“There is a considerable amount of discussion at the moment about obesity. The idea that we should watch what we eat or we will end up prematurely dead. But where is the debate about the quality of what and where we read or write? Surely what we put inside our heads – where we create or consume information – is just as important as what we put inside our mouths.”

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by garygre on December 29, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on December 29, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/thoughts-on-richard-watson-in-praise-of-public-libraries-and-librarians/

Thanks From A Public Librarian To Anyone Who Said No To Library Cuts #savelibraries

This year has been a bit of a bummer in some ways in the world of public libraries, mostly caused by the threatened closure or handing over of libraries to volunteers, by local authorities. Lots of people have been working on fighting against the cuts.

Scores of friends of libraries and campaign groups have formed all over the country, taking on Ed Vaizey and Jeremy Hunt’s roles as superintendents of their own local library services – standing up and saying “No!”, whilst Mr Hunt and Mr Vaizey (who both have some kind of Government responsibility for libraries) do very little.

Ed Vaizey's Unused Sheriff Badge

Ed Vaizey's Unused Sheriff Badge (c) ggstopflat/Flickr

People are fighting the cuts in so many ways…

  • As part of an organised campaign or friends group.
  • By signing the Women’s Institute libraries petition. (15,798 online signatures so far. Come on, we need more signatures than this!)
  • By signing local petitions.
  • Writing newspaper articles or blog posts to highlight what’s going on.
  • Commenting upon newspaper articles or blog posts about the cuts.
  • Responding to library consultations.
  • Local Councillors voting against decisions to cut in their areas.
  • Anyone who has spoken to friends, families or strangers to highlight what’s going on.
  • Anyone whose taken note of someone who’s spoken to them about UK public library cuts.
  • Sharing a web link or a news article about the cuts.
  • Running library events as a way to highlight the message.
  • New and existing library users who have found out that libraries are of more use to them than they realised and are making use of them in new ways.

Any of these actions make me realise that I (and other library service colleagues around the country) are valued. It’s a thought that gives me a smile, despite having to watch the battle between those who want hack away at library services and those who want to save them.

This post was triggered by a thought I had after reading the Friends of Gloucestershire Libraries open letter addressed to Ed Vaizey. This letter  highlighted concerns about his inaction over the past year regarding public library cuts and asked for people to support and sign the letter too.

I looked at that letter yesterday to see who had signed it and, as a public librarian, I was genuinely touched by the number and wide range of people who had signed it and left comments in support of public libraries and their staff.

After reading that letter I realised that as a public librarian I hadn’t said thank you for a long time for the support people are giving public libraries during this tough time. I know some people are putting so much effort in that it’s basically like having a second job!

So… thank you to everyone and anyone, wherever you are, who has said “No” to public library cuts over the past year or so. It’s the nicest Christmas present you could have given me. :-) You really don’t know how much I appreciate it.

22 11 11 whodunnit indeed

22 11 11 whodunnit indeed (c) Kikishua/Flickr

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by garygre on December 18, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on December 18, 2011

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Dapper.net: How To Make Feeds From Web Pages That Really Don’t Want You To

If I ever want to put together a mashup or just tinker with data on the web my first port of call is Yahoo pipes. However, even though I really like pipes, it frustrates me a fair amount of the time too. Sometimes it behaves erratically and I get a sulk on with it. So, I decided to have a scout around  to look for other ways of achieving what I want.

My first great find is Dapper. I imagine this is old hat to some people, as it’s been around for a few years. It’s actually owned by Yahoo too. As the site itself says…

Dapper is a tool that enables users to create update feeds for their favorite sites and website owners to optimize and distribute their content in new ways.

It doesn’t do the same thing as Yahoo pipes, but is extremely handy for pulling out data from web pages where a feed doesn’t exist, and it provides the output in the following formats (if it’s relevant to the data on the page) – XML, RSS, HTML, Google Gadget, Google Map, Image Loop, iCalendar, ATOM, CSV, JSON, XSL, YAML. I’m not going to pretend that I know what all of the feeds are, but they seem like a fairly handy group of feeds to be able to use.

I thought I’d see if I could create an RSS feed for our library catalogue. I’ve always wanted an RSS for it (so we can feed stock information through to different places easily) and I’ve also wanted a way to produce alerts for new titles (so users can be informed about any new stock they may be interested in), but our library catalogue neither. But now, using Dapper, I can do both easily.

Dapp Factory screen capture

To achieve this Dapper asks you to:

  1. Provide URL’s of web pages your data appears in. You just need to provide sample pages here. I gave it URLs of catalogue search results pages.
  2. Highlight samples of the data on these pages that you want in your feed. I highlighted fields containing Title, Author, Format (eg Hardback, DVD, etc), Book cover, Number of copies and then told Dapper what to call these fields.
  3. Group together data fields – this effectively puts related data together in a single record. If you don’t do this you end up with a list of unrelated data items in your RSS feed, rather than a list of ready formed records.
  4. Identify any portion of the url that can be changed by the user to create a brand new search using that resource. For example, in my url I changed “_TitleResults.aspx?page=1&searchTerm=cake&searchType=99&searchTerm2=&media=&br” to “_TitleResults.aspx?page=1&searchTerm={Query}&searchType=99&searchTerm2=&media=&br”, so I could easily create a new feed for a search for any other keyword without having to go through the whole process again.
  5. Choose the output format of the feed eg RSS, ATOM, HTML, iCalendar, etc (as mentioned earlier). You can also say which fields you want to appear in the output feed.

In response to this Dapper gives you a unique URL for your feed.

From this stage you can also:

  1. Change the query text, as mentioned in (4) and get its own unique URL for this new feed.
  2. Set up a service using the feed you created. Here you can make it public and allow others to create their own searches by changing the query text. This is the service I created. I also created a Google Gadget and added it to my iGoogle page.
  3. Set up an email alert for your feed. So, if a new item is added to the feed (eg a new book comes in stock matching your search query) it will send you an email notification.

I’ve only been tinkering with it for a few hours, but it looks like it’s going to come in handy for pulling out and re-using data in web pages that has in the past been difficult for me to get at. :-)

3 Comments
by garygre on December 10, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on December 10, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/12/10/dapper-net-how-to-make-feeds-from-web-pages-that-really-dont-want-you-to/

No More Access To Your Twapper Keeper Archives

Yesterday I found out via a friend on Twitter that Hootsuite had acquired Twapper keeper in September.

If you don’t know, Twapper keeper is a service that allows you to archive tweets. I use this service quite a bit and paid for the upgrade, so that I could archive more than the free account would allow me to. It’s a great service and I’m pleased that Hootsuite has realised how useful it is too – it’s just a shame that the first time I’d heard that it had been bought was yesterday – there’s been no announcement on the Twapper keeper blog about this. The site does now include a message though…

“Dec 8th, 2011: Transition update

Twapper Keeper’s archiving is now available in HootSuite! As a result, we will be shutting down Twapper Keeper. Existing archives will be kept running until Jan 6, 2012, after which you will not be able to access your archives anymore.

Thanks for using TwapperKeeper – we look forward to seeing you at HootSuite.”

“Oh good! It’s available in Hootsuite,” I thought, but I also saw the “you will not be able to access your archives anymore.” bit too.

Panic stations! What will happen to my archives? Will they be deleted? Maybe they’ll be available in Hootsuite?

In an attempt to find out, I left a comment on the Hootsuite blog yesterday.

Comment on Hootsuite blog post “HootSuite Announces 3 Million in Financing, Strategic Acquisition and Executive Team Appointments”

As a frequent user of Twapperkeeper can you tell me:
1) How will this integration happen?
2) Will it be available for the free Hootsuite accounts?
3) What will happen to the archives I have created on the Twapperkeeper site? I don’t want to lose any of them. If I do lose them it would have been a total waste of time me setting them up, especially as I paid to do so.

The response pointed me to their feedback site asking for suggestions about integrating Twapper keeper with Hootsuite, so I left these 2 suggestions – one regarding access to existing Twapper keeper archives and another suggesting ideas for development on the service, as I really feel Hootsuite could do something with Twapper keeper’s original idea.
Maintain access to existing archives that have been created on Twapperkeeper.

Twapperkeeper is often used to archive tweets for conferences and events – the tweets are used to document the event/conference and are accessed not only around that time, but also at later dates.

Due to changes in Twitter’s terms of service, users have not been able to download these archives for some time and therefore the only way these archives can can be accessed and manipulated is via the Twapperkeeper sites RSS & HTML archive links.

Can Hootsuite provide access to these existing archives in some form, so that they can be read and shared with other non Hootsuite users?

Ideas for Twapper keeper integration.

1) Allow Twapper keeper archives to be made public or private.

2) Allow the sharing of Twapper keeper archives to a broad range of external services. eg Twitter; Facebook; G+; Delicious; Tumblr…

3) Provide each archive with an RSS/XML output feed containing details of individual tweets eg status text, twitter name, status id, date stamp, etc.

4) Update archives regularly ie once an hour – or allow users to define how often the archive should be updated.

5) Allow archives to be created from any search functionality that Twitter currently provides, including lists.

6) Make Twapper keeper archive functionality available for free Hootsuite accounts as well as paid.

7) Allow filtering of tweets in archive using similar criteria as existing filters in Twapper keeper’s “Search” function.

8) Expand archiving function to other services available in Hootsuite eg Facebook, Linkedin, Tumblr, WordPress, etc.

9) Re. 8 – allow archives from different services to be combined into a single archive if desired.

10) Provide capability to mark and share favourite tweets (or posts if option 8 exists) in an archive.

11) Add tags (hashtags?) to archive upon creation and allow them to be subsequently amended.

12) Add description of archive and allow it to be subesequently amended

13) Ability to cross reference archives, for example (a) if you click on a person whose tweet has been archived, display all of the other archives they are linked to ie anywhere their tweets have been archived – this might be useful to highlight expertise or interests of individual users. (b) If any of the tweets appears in any other archive too.

14) Allow capability to bundle together archives in themes.

That made me feel better…

but I’ve just seen this tweet – sent today from the Twapper keeper account.

TwapperKeeper fans: archiving services are now migrated to HootSuite.com and available to #HootSuite Pro customers c/@hootsuite_help

So the archives are available to those who will pay $5.99 a month! What about the money I and other people have paid to Twapper keeper to set up our original archives? If we can’t access these archives any more there was no point in them being set up in the first place.
My problem isn’t so much that I can’t archive anything any more, because there are alternatives (eg The Archivist), but those services don’t give me a live RSS output (which is my main method of accessing and reusing tweets from Twapper keeper) and those services won’t provide existing Twapper keeper users with a back-catalogue of our archives in a nice clean format.
Some clever techy person with better programming skills than me will no doubt be able to pull out and save their full archives in an elegant way, but I think I’m going to have to resort to doing a bit of Gary clunky tinkering to get mine and then see if I can reformat them at a later date.
In the long-term I will find a way around this, and I do appreciate the service Twapper keeper has provided me over the past couple of years – irrespective of whether I’ll be able to access my existing archives in future, or not, it has been extremely useful – and John (who created Twapper keeper) has been extremely helpful whenever I’ve had any questions or needed help.
However, it would have been nice to have known that this was happening sooner – and I don’t mean the two tweets that happened in September. Couldn’t it have been announced on the Twapper keeper blog at the same time? Hootsuite announced it on theirs… but if you’re not a Hootsuite user how would you have known?
3 Comments
by garygre on December 8, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on December 8, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/12/08/no-more-access-to-your-twapper-keeper-archives/

My Library Mojo Has Been Flushed Down The Bog

I’ve been reading a few blog posts about how to keep your library mojo and re-energise it when it’s left you… and at the moment I feel I really need to read those sort of articles, because I’ve been hit by thoughts which seems to spiral around:

  • “What the F is going on?”
  • “What am I doing?”
  • “I’m tired and I want to go back to bed.”

I’d like to contribute to the “Keeping your library mojo intact” debate…

My words of wisdom are…

Do it before you get to the age where you are:

  • Making those funny sighing noises when you bend over.
  • Struggling to get out of the bath.
  • Snoozing on the sofa a little bit more than you used to.

I’m not saying anyone at that age is not going to have any mojo, but at the moment I don’t and I’m guilty of all 3 points above. So, in the true spirit of making the evidence fit the conclusion, this is why I believe my library mojo has been drained awaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay.

Or maybe I’m just:

  • Disheartened by a lack of support for libraries
  • Sick of the shit going on around public libraries
  • Sick of the lack of leadership in all quarters
  • Sick of toss-pots who think they know about libraries when they haven’t used one for years
  • Sick of having to fight for libraries as one of the little people, when the people who have much more power do…

“F’ ALL!”

At the moment all this frustration is making me want to take an Incredible Hulk stance

“HULK SMASH!”

Incredible Hulk

(c) Kiwanja / Flickr

And if anyone posts a comment here giving the usual crap about how:

  • You can buy books cheaply from Amazon
  • Everyone has the internet at home
  • You can just Google it
  • You can get it all on e-books
  • Why do you need librarians?
  • etc, etc, etc

They will be told to…

“PISS OFF!”

An unprofessional attitude, I know, but I can’t really see many other people higher up actually fighting for professional staff anyway! I can hear them talking about it, but that’s about it!

Yours grumpily….

NB: This is probably just a blip in my library mojo.

3 Comments
by garygre on November 24, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on November 24, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/11/24/my-library-mojo-has-been-flushed-down-the-bog/

CILIP Elections 2012 #cilip2012

I’m currently trying to decide who to vote for in the CILIP 2012 Council Elections, but to be honest I’m dithering. I’m not even sure I can vote for 4 out of the 6 standing for the trustee/councillor roles. Most of them aren’t saying what I want to hear them say most of the time. I’m not saying I can’t vote for any of them, but I’m not sure my ballot paper is going to have 4 crosses on it… which is worrying for me.
I’ve read their manifestos; read their responses to questions posted on the CILIP e-hustings; asked them a few questions via the e-hustings and the live hustings myself – although I couldn’t follow the live hustings video stream, I did follow the Twitter stream and picked up on various points via follow up blog posts.
But still I’m wavering about my decision! I get to the point where I think ”They’ll do for me,” and then I re-read something else they’ve said and I realise I disagree with them on it. I should say I can agree with most candidates on at least one of their major points, but this isn’t enough to make me want to vote for them.
I understand that once they’re elected they will have to work within the restrictions of CILIP Council and won’t be able to stage a coup and over-run CILIP with ideas that have me a bit worried, so maybe I should have faith in others on CILIP Council to stop anything unwanted from happening.
I was going to say CILIP is at a cross-roads regarding its future, but following on from the “Defining Our Professional Future” report, it seems as if it has made its decision about the direction it is going in, has indicated, and has pulled away… Now it needs a bit of gas to race from 0 to 60mph to get where it’s going as quickly as possible. So, in my mind, that’s why it’s important for me to choose very carefully who’s on the CILIP bus helping to drive it, service it and willing to push it up a few steep hills if it needs a bit of extra Oomph!
But time is running out for me to choose… so, I need to go and dither a little bit more.
All aboard CILIP's funky bus

All aboard CILIP's funky bus (c) Mattes

9 Comments
by garygre on November 21, 2011  •  Permalink
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Posted by garygre on November 21, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/cilip-elections-2012-cilip2012/

Thoughts on CILIP’s RFID in Libraries conference 2011 #RFID11

I attended the CILIP RFID in Libraries 2011 conference last week. It was the second time for me. It was interesting this year to see the increased emphasis on using RFID beyond the self-issue of library stock, including innovations around mobile devices and RFID.  Here are the points I tweeted during the conference and below that, thoughts I had about the day.

  • Mick Fortune talking about what happened in the past year around RFID
  • ISO 28560 standard finally published in 2011
  • UK data model published; BLCF published (UK); SIP3.0 due at end of 2011
  • More interest globally in library RFID
  • Suppliers – Bibliotecha/ITG/Intellident merged; New self-service suppliers; new suppliers using RFID/NFC in smart phones
  • Moving on from RFID solely for self-service circulation and into discovery tools.
  • Tags are being seen more than just labels – they hold data and new applications are being built on this idea
  • HF frequency is still dominant over UHF
  • What lies ahead? RFID transform from dumb label; Use of standards will become vital; US market will lead on RFID lib. market
  • RFID suppliers may become next LMS suppliers
  • Mark Hughes from Swansea up now.
  • Mark Hughes was one of authors of ORILS specification document
  • Mark Hughes talking about BIC NAG specification for RFID
  • Need to make sure your RFID system is future proof; be realistic; take note of the suppliers expertise
  • NAG BIC standards are supposed to evolve. The situation is constantly changing and the specification needs to move with this.
  • People need to ensure they don’t underestimate the time it takes to tag stock.
  • SIP2 is sometimes interpreted slightly differently by suppliers and you may need to iron out niggles!
  • Peter Kilborn talking about LMS/RFID communication.
  • What’s wrong with SIP2? … Not much; it’s free to use; but it’s getting quite old; there’s now more to RFID than self-service
  • RT @mickfortune: Slides from my presentation at #RFID11 now available at http://t.co/7Y87va4x
  • Communication. What does BLCF do that SIP2 doesn’t?… Built for extensibility; built to cope with web services; open; free
  • BLCF designed by RFID experts. Was commissioned by BIC. Info here http://t.co/jzlimPvC
  • BLCF is currently in draft stage.
  • Alternative standards – SIP3, but does little more than update SIP2; & NCIP
  • Viv Bradshaw (Intellident/Bibliotecha) – BLCF: Why did Intellident get involved?
  • BLCF: web services; better support for non-LMS sys; secure http; uses world wide standards eg XML; handle multi process at same time
  • BLCF: can go beyond library services – eg council wide services; one card systems
  • BLCF – backwards compatible with SIP2; use modern web based standards; RFID/LMS vendors can offer more; will be controlled by BIC
  • RT @mickfortune: Gap analysis between BLCF and SIP 3.0 reveals the circulation orientation of the latter – Viv at #RFID11
  • Should libraries be going for BLCF & ignore SIP3.0? Possibly available within 6 months, but need library service to pilot it
  • Library services need to ask their vendors to support BLCF.
  • RT @robmajor: BLCF is the new acronym on the block #RFID11
  • Paul Chartier talking about ISO conformance and interoperability.
  • There’s never been an authority for mandating certification of ISO This will change. Compliance testing will be available
  • Study undertaken by UCLA ininteroperability of RFID tags; readers; etc.
  • RT @Mark_H_Swansea: #rfid11 in effect standards compliance prevents you as purchaser from getting ‘locked in’ to proprietary technology …
  • ISO will open up the market; new vendors; will help with new technology developments
  • European Commission recently received response re. RFID privacy- all libs will be expected to undertake privacy impact assessment!
  • Don’t know if last tweet was just suggestion or fact!!!
  • John Cunningham. Extending RFID self-service
  • Talking about budget cuts creating pressures on services.
  • Talking about John Laing & Hounslow library services.
  • Shared services and integrated council services approach – RFID can assist in this.
  • Using skills of library staff to deliver extended services.
  • Intellident myCommunity self-service beyond libraries – eg council payments
  • Sandra Bruce-Gordon (John Laing) – using myCommunity at Hounslow. 
  • Hounslow say 1 aim of introducing RFID self-service was to expand/improve library staff customer service skills
  • Hounslow efficiency savings – 6 FTE staff through “natural wastage”.
  • Hounslow “will not be closing any of our libraries.” That doesn’t necessarily mean no cuts. See http://t.co/En7p2TrG
  • myCommunity service looks interesting.
  • Chris Millican: Taking stock – innovative approaches to stock management through use of RFID
  • Stock taking time can be reduced. “Revolutionising the stock management process.”
  • Wondering if anyone has successful RFID solution for assessing use of reference stock? #RFID11
  • Uni of Central Lancs. Lib. faced with budget reduction, but will still be expected to provide great service to fee paying students.
  • RFID gadgets look great. I sometimes wonder how many designers think “Hmm! I’ll design this like a photon stun-gun, just cos I can”?
  • Handy that students don’t always put books back on shelves – can be put through sorter to assess use of material that’s not issued
  • Issue laptop with RFID tags at Uni of Lancs.
  • Why can’t we use our own mobile phones to issue books?
  • Mickfortune talks ISO standard & how suppliers intend to get us to the stage where we are all RFID standardised
  • Paul Dalton – Intellident. Talking about migrating to new data model.
  • UK RFID vendors are already interoperable, but based on legacy/proprietary data models.
  • Mike Chambers – 2CQR & the RFID Alliance. Doesn’t feel proprietary data models aimed to lock-in services, but to provide a service.
  • Surprisingly few people in conference said they wanted to move to standard! :-/ Or did I dream that!!!!
  • @mickfortune points out suppliers highlight fact they are interoperable with other systems, but what if a new RFID supplier pops up?
  • @mickfortune was also surprised that very few library services are looking towards moving to standards!!!
  • University of Central Lancashire win the “RFID in Libraries Innovation Award. (also involved Capita and 3M)
  • Nicky Kaye talking about Bracknell Forest Council RFID Smartcards. One card for many services.
  • Smart Card Networking Forum is useful place to discuss issues.
  • Smart cards – enrol once and it enrols you on other services. Transaction data can be passed back from individual services
  • Provides a lot of detailed management information back to Council’s, so they can develop their services.
  • Stephen Mossop: Managing laptop loans. Laptop, lockers, key control was problem with Uni of Exeter laptop loans.
  • Laptop lockers were a long way away from were you could use them ie not in a study area or library.
  • Laptops were bought by University – thin client, so not likely to be stolen and sold in the pub! They needed to manage themselves.
  • RT @Mark_H_Swansea: #rfid11 involvement of mobido to solve the problem of how to integrate existing RFID with laptop loan lockers with n …
  • Jennifer from Mobido http://t.co/PoBwebiG sounds as if she started in the same way as @juliancheal with RFID. Tagging at home :)
RFID circuit board

RFID circuit board (adapted from cgommel)

  • Richard Stewart: Smartphones in the library.
  • I expected more people at the conference to be smart phone owners!!!
  • NFC – near field communication. Can buy smart tickets with phone.
  • Huddersfield University gets a mention re. e-payment kiosks
  • Could my phone be used for payment? As money? Saves carrying cards etc. Yes they can.
  • Handling cash costs money – libraries could save money through users using NFC and ‘wallet’ software. Maybe use phone as lib card.
  • NFC use in libraries – user authentication; secure fine payments; age restricted stock use; peer-to-peer comms; book issues
  • Access digital content from the item you’re looking at.
  • Pay for services via e-voucher. Idea: Get e-voucher downloaded automatically to phone as soon as you walk into library. Get 3 e-vouchers and get free DVD!
  • Eric Grosshans
  • By George! An American chappie just took to the stage and quoted Shakespeare at us. *Applause* Encore. :)
  • The Library phone: Focus on business, function, increased accessibility.
  • Mobile phone use inside library – checkout; notification of reserved items; events
  • Phone use outside library – capture market share (scan barcode in shop & see if it’s in library); lib info eg location/times; events
  • The Library Phone: virtual library card; online cat; paperless receipts; notifications; ; qr-code
  • Library phone: The users provide the technology – library services don’t have to provide it for them.
  • Smart connect card system only allows individual systems within the whole system to see personal info they are only entitled to see
  • Nicholas Lewis: Reducing total cost of ownership.
  • Do you continue to benchmark your services against other services? Look at workflow processes.
  • What technical functionality is missing? Listen to your users to find out what processes work.
  • Innovation comes from all the suppliers, so why would we want to be lumbered with a single suppliers system.
  • Users need to get involved in the discussion around RFID development. These are services we pay for & have a say in what happens.
  • Martin Palmer concluding the event. You can use systems in ways they weren’t intended for; Make use of mobile technology; Standards!
  • Is self-service about providing better customer service or now just a way to provide ANY service in a time of cuts? #savelibraries
Thoughts on the conference – Standards
It was good to see that various RFID standards are moving on, but it was disheartening to hear that so few customers were interested in/planning to move to ISO 28560. When asked, only a handful of delegates indicated that they were intending to go down the standards route. I suppose if you have an RFID system installed you may not want to spend money on doing whatever is necessary to meet the standard, but in the long-term how much money is this going to cost you if you want to move to a new system – if your existing supplier goes down the pan or decides they aren’t going to support that system any more, because it’s out of date? What happens if you see a fantastic new RFID feature/function provided by another supplier that will benefit users or staff and you want to integrate it into your current system. How much will it cost you to integrate it with your current system? How long will it take to integrate it? Will your suppliers be interested in integrating it if you’re the only customer who wants to use it? It also seems as if suppliers were happy to be able to work with other suppliers systems based upon proprietary/in-house standards, but how will they work with new players to the market who meet the ISO standards? Also, how does the lack of enthusiasm for standards look to those library services who are still considering installing RFID in the hope that the standards will be taken up and they won’t be forking out on a system that isn’t compliant? A system they can’t really build on easily or cost-effectively and one that won’t necessarily let them work with partner libraries or other services in the future! In a time of cuts/money-saving would it make sense to go with an RFID system that doesn’t yet emphasise the use of the standards if some way down the line more money may need to be spent on achieving those standards? However, the plans to introduce conformance testing to ensure that systems are compliant with the standards offers some hope in this area… if possible future customers can see that a suppliers RFID service isn’t compliant how likely are they to go with that supplier?
With regard to communication between systems, BLCF looks very promising, as a means to move on from SIP2.0 and ensure communication is compatible with web services and also services in customers organisations eg Council-wide services.
We also need to remember that the U.S.A.  is now showing more interest in RFID library services/systems and, though the U.K. was a leader in this area, the U.S.A. has such global influence that it may affect future RFID developments.
Visa sticks NFC into a microSD card

Visa sticks NFC into a microSD card (c) Tom Purves/Flickr

Thoughts on the conference – Beyond Self-Service
Up until recently the main topic of conversation around RFID library services has been the self-issue/return of stock. Other capabilities were available, but they had often taken second place to the circulation of library stock. The recognition that RFID tags are more than just labels – they are sources of data – may have encouraged these developments. This year the conference highlighted innovations beyond self-issue of library stock eg.
  • Loan of laptops
  • Stock management
  • Smart cards
  • Use of RFID/NFC enabled mobile phones/devices.

For me, the area that most appealed was the use of mobile devices as a means of paying for services; accessing/issuing stock; as discovery tools; as a way to handle peer-to-peer communications; offering benefits that are automatically triggered on entry to a library. The onus here is also on the users providing the technology (the phone) to access the service in the way they want to, rather than the way the library service tells them how it has to be accessed.

I’m not sure if I’ll be there next year, but it will be interesting once again to see how far things have moved on in 12 months; if any more RFID customers have gone down the standards route; if new suppliers have come into the market; and what innovations in RFID people will be talking about?

2 Comments
by garygre on November 18, 2011  •  Permalink
Posted in information, internet, libraries, programming
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Posted by garygre on November 18, 2011

http://informationtwist.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/thoughts-on-cilips-rfid-in-libraries-conference-2011-rfid11/

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