Future of Libraries: Social Software Sarah Houghton-Jan Information and Web Services Manager, San Mateo County Library Librarian in Black: http://www.librarianinblack.net

What is social software? Social software enables people to rendezvous, connect or collaborate through computer-mediated communication and to form online communities. --from Wikipedia entry, revised 04.25.06 Social software is the driving force behind Library 2.0.

Examples of social software Instant messaging Internet forums Blogs / RSS / podcasting Wikis Social network services Social guides Social bookmarking Social citations Social libraries Virtual worlds and multiplayer online games

Why should libraries care about SS? There is a great potential for new and enhanced services There are free marketing opportunities just waiting for us Our patrons are there—where are we?

What is instant messaging? Instantaneous, simultaneous text chat Add-ons like video, audio, file sharing Transcript Type here

IM client software: the holy trinity They’re all free—to you and users Other Software ICQ IRC Jabber Google Talk MySpace

IM aggregator software Trillian: http://www.ceruleanstudios.com/ Gaim: http://gaim.sourceforge.net/ Both let you monitor multiple IM accounts (AOL, MSN, Yahoo!) through one interface. Oh yeah…they’re both free!

Web-based IM with Meebo Completely web-based—no installations Sign in with multiple accounts at once Even if IM is blocked, this still works MeeboMe—web-based anonymous IMing

Why use IM for reference? Traditional web-based chat has technical and service problems Your users are here already It’s free Easy to use for both the librarian and the user You’re right there on the user’s buddy list Did I mention that everything is free? For many users, not having IM is like not having a phone.

Example of Library IM webpage

Internet forums Website bulletin boards for discussion Feedback and recommendation engines Examples: Google Groups: http://groups.google.com/ Reviews and ratings on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com Gnooks.com: http://www.gnooks.com Storycode: http://www.storycode.com

Sample Internet Forum: Storycode

Blogs Websites frequently updated with new content Examples: Lansing Library Teen News Blog: http://lansinglibraryteen.blogspot.com/ St. Joseph County Public Library Game Blog: http://www.libraryforlife.org/gameblog/ Framingham Public Library Teen Blogomatic: http://fplya.blogspot.com/ Marin County Free Library - What’s New: http://www.marincountyfreelibrary.blogspot.com/ Waterboro Public Library H20boro: http://www.waterborolibrary.org/blog.htm

Sample blog: H20boro

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) RSS is more than just blogs New books and other items News at the library New content in subscription databases Examples: EBSCO feeds for new articles (favorite searches) Hennepin County Library feeds for all types of things Edmonton Public Library feed for new teen books Seattle Public Library feeds for favorite authors and subjects FirstGov feeds for government information

Sample RSS feeds: Hennepin CL

Podcasting & Vidcasting Creating audio and video content and pushing it to users through an RSS feed Has nothing to do with iPods Examples: Thomas Ford Memorial Library audio teen book reviews: http://www.fordlibrary.org/yareviews/ Manchester Public Library video book reviews: http://feeds.feedburner.com/primesboxlive Cheshire Public Library - audio of local teen magazine: http://www.cheshirelib.org/teens/cplpodcast.htm University of Sheffield Library audio library tours: http://www.lbasg.group.shef.ac.uk/downloads/mainlibrary.html

Sample podcasts: Thomas Ford ML

Wikis Collaborative resource creation Multiple authors, ongoing creation and revision Examples: Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Wiktionary: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Main_Page St .Joseph County Library’s Subject Guides: http://www.libraryforlife.org/subjectguides/index.php/Main_Page University of Minnesota Libraries Staff Website: http://wiki.lib.umn.edu/

Sample wiki: St .Joseph CL’s Subject Guides

Social network services Places to meet people and communicate Examples: Friendster, Dogster, MySpace, Facebook Libraries with MySpace accounts Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (Teens) Denver Public Library Hennepin County Library Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library dozens of others

Library MySpace Page: Denver PL

Social bookmarking Putting your favorite websites in a web directory to share with others Examples: del.icio.us: http://del.icio.us/ furl: http://www.furl.net/ La Grange Public Library’s del.icio.us ref links Thomas Ford Memorial Library’s del.icio.us ref links San Mateo City Library’s del.icio.us ref links

Library del.icio.us: La Grange Park

Social libraries Keep track of collections Often include recommendation engines Uses tagging, user-created metadata: Folksonomies Examples Flickr.com for photographs discogs.com for music LibraryThing.com for books Stuffopolis.com for everything else

Social library: Reading PL on Flickr

I have all of these cool ideas now. But how do I convince our IT Staff that doing this is okay?

Working with IT Staff Ask Questions. Are IM, MySpace, or other sites/services banned or blocked? Why? The boogeyman of network security? “It’s a time-waster”? Ban behaviors, not technologies. Be enthusiastic. Do your research ahead of time.

Again…why should we care? Get our knowledge, helpfulness, and information expertise out there where the users are Get people to think of us as the “go to” resource for their online information needs Make us findable in an online environment

For more information about social software in libraries: Web 2.0 and Libraries: Best Practices for Social Software by Michael Stephens The Library Success Wiki: http://www.libsuccess.org/

Questions? Contact Sarah any time. E-mail: houghton-jan@smcl.org IM: LibrarianInBlack (AOL, Yahoo!, MSN)