my time at the Library Innovations Seminar

Hi everyone,
I thought I might share some of the issues we talked about at the seminar I attended yesterday at the State Library. Erik Boekesteijn an Jaap van de Geer from DOK, Delft Public Library gave an awesome presentation on their Shanachietour they have been running through the US, Jamaica and Australia. There is a website, I can't find the address right now, but when I do I'll add the details. But here is a bit of an overview of what we talked about:

Public Libraries in the 21st Century

Web 2.0

Young people of today are the long term library users of tomorrow. We need to grab their attention now, give them a positive experience now and let them know that we are up to date and can provide them with what they need and want.

There was a large emphasis on gaming through the seminar and the suggestion that we should not be snobbish toward games as content. In the same way that we are accepting graphic novels as a legitimate format of 'book', we could be thinking about (some) games as extensions of the film industry. A game is just another form of story. There are even career paths in the gaming industry and gaming in public spaces can be great social outlets.

Many public libraries are using gaming to attract young people and using events such as LAN nights and gaming days to get kids really engaged with the librarians and the library. They also use gaming events to promote the YA collection- graphic novels, books about gaming, anime etc.

Others are promoting blogging, myspace and youtube within the library and offering a place to learn about these technologies. As we know, SN sites are important networking tools, great for information exchange and even important for the career (ie LinkedIn). Librarians need to make use of these technologies to reach and capture this audience.

It was recognised at the seminar that whilst everyone in Library Land is talking about Web 2.0, no one is actually using it. Again, we can't be snobby about sources such as youtube, we really need to consider what is the best format for content. In some cases it will be a book, but in others digital media may supplement or even be more appropriate than a book. Youtube is actually a great place for instructional videos.

Using these technologies can create us a whole other 'branch' through our website. We can engage youth through things such as online partnerships with schools, blog or wiki based book clubs, a virtual reference librarian. We can invite library users to talk and blog about the books they are reading through the website, or even music and films. We all know how much people like telling us their opinion of the books they are returning, why not encourage them to tell each other?

The concluding points for us to consider in our future are:
• What can we do to understand the new world of unlimited information
• Remember there is more to text based information than books
• What are the personas of our library users and their learning styles, would they find it easier to read a book of instructions or watch a video?
• Are we answering the questions on reference desk or transferring our skills
• Why are we discriminating against new media?

Later in the day some of us gave presentations about innovations our library is running, where I gave a talk on the Living Library. Other topics were Book Clubs, Parents and kids learning info literacy together, Web 2.0 at work- which Manly has really embraced, eg, they ran a youth photography competition using Flickr; Attracting new users through targeted programming- This was Adam from Wyong library, a recent example of this is the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender collection they launched; and Partnerships and Collaborations- with other businesses and groups in the community starting with our own council!

All in all I had a great day, I met a whole lot of interesting librarians, got a few contact details for future projects and got super excited about how we at Gosford library could work toward becoming one of the leaders in 21st Century Libraries.

Enjoy,

Heather D.

Police Visit at Umina

Today our library had a visit from Constable Jamie from Gosford Police for story time. She is the youth Liason Officer. She only stayed about 30 minutes but the visit was extremely beneficial for the children. We had a very high turn out for the visit and a few carers came with their children. Contact number is 43235514 if any other libraries are interested in inviting Senior Constable Jamie to their library. She's even coming back on Thursday for the Thursday group.

At Wyoming our public access computer is still on dial- up. Our most frequent complaint is the slow response time. We have a lot of children use the net who would not be able to pay for it's use if there was a charge. Our library is the only public access facility in this immediate area, and so access to websites and word processing is in demand by local residents. Unless our response time improves via broadband, our borrowers would not be prepared to pay for the facility.

Lee

Public Access Computers

How's this for a first post!?

Public access computers

Some of the issues that are recognised regarding the public access computers in our libraries include:

· A slow down in speed toward the end of the month as our download limits are exceeded - this tends to be caused by people downloading videos and music, and kids playing games.
· We staff spend way too much time booking computers, asking people to finish their booking so that other people can have their go etc.
· Some members of the public are known to abuse our service and use the internet inappropriately.

Are there any more issues that come to mind that you would like to add?
Are there any comments or recurring questions that you receive from customers about our service, such as software that they would like to use?


We are currently working our way toward upgrading all the public access PCs to Council leased machines which will then be on a regular upgrade plan. A Service Level Agreement is also being investigated between IT and the Library for support for our public access PCs.

The cost to rent each computer is $1200, with 24 machines across the branches. Our current internet connection on the public computers costs us $9600 per year.

Unfortunately, due to our weakening dollar and to ensure that there is enough funds for book purchasing next year, the budget for free internet access is going to be reduced from $38400 to $30000 for the next financial year.

To fund such a decision we will be examining a user pays system, with a bypass for genuine information requests and queries.

The benefits of such a system include:

· With such added income, the Library will be able to lease more and better PCs for the public to use and possibly better software.
· More computers would mean that we might not need a booking system as there would generally be enough access to go around.
· A user pays system will lessen demand.
· Added income would leave the Library with more opportunity to run classes and seminars on computer use and how to use the web effectively. With added time and monetary constraints, there might be more interest generated on behalf of the public to learn these skills.
· More reference queries will be generated with people asking for our help rather than paying to do it themselves, meaning that our reference skills will be maintained.

Cons of such a system include:

· Our current users won't be impressed
· People of a lower socio demographic won't have the same leisure based access to the internet as higher socio demographic customers

I am posting this with the hopes that you all will contribute your thoughts and ideas for how we can ensure that such a transition will take place with the benefits of our customers in mind, and so that we as frontline staff might deal with it as painlessly as possible. Happy debating!

Heather