Dancing with the...Web 2.0?

My last two semesters have been full of discussion of Web 2.0, crowdsourcing, and similar ideas -- due in part to my coursework, and in part to the LibGuide I've been building on Digital Humanities (and a related column which my supervisor and I will eventually be putting out. Stay tuned). A large part of the discussion has been about the role of user-generated content -- tagging, natural-language subject headings, reviews, etc.--especially as applied to resource description. There is, of course, a pretty serious debate about this. Many people feel that libraries will survive only if they sacrifice their traditional organization for a more user-focused system. Others acknowledge that the current system is flawed but believe that abandoning traditional practice will seriously devalue the services we provide and ultimately be harmful to users (whether they realize it or not).

For me, this struggle between traditional and user-oriented is a bit like watching Dancing with the Stars.  I spent a year on my undergraduate college's competitive ballroom dance team, and while I would hardly call myself an "expert," after a while of taking lessons, as well as attending competitions and watching more-experienced dancers perform, you start to get a sense for how everything works. For those with ballroom expertise, DWTS can be difficult to watch. Non-professional competitors can try to choreograph a routine, but they don't usually get any choice or notice on the music. Many of the crowd-pleasing moves on DWTS are less-than-true to the dance and wouldn't be allowed in some levels of competition. Then there's the scoring. The judges have some say, of course--but anything resembling actual critique, especially coming from the (very traditional) Len Goodman, is usually boo-ed. And when it comes down to choosing finalists and awarding the mirror ball trophy, time and again audience votes have trumped the judges' professional assessment, although they do agree on occasion.

Here's the thing: ABC could redo DWTS, give the judges' scores more weight, and make sure the highest-quality dancing wins. Do the judges have expertise the audience doesn't?  Absolutely. But would people keep watching if they couldn't participate? Nope. First of all, if you don't dance (or if you dance but not well or often), most of what happens on that stage looks impressive, professional, and correct, even if it's not. Second of all, the audience doesn't always choose its favorites based on expertise -- sometimes their choices are more personal or 'fuzzy.' And thirdly, people like to participate. We're all used to being able to contribute our voice, and most of us aren't content to be passively entertained anymore. Interacting with the show, seeing their tweets up on the TV screen, being a part of the experience -- that's what keeps the audience engaged. That's what will bring them back for a 13th season this fall.

As librarians, we do have certain expertise that our users don't: that's why they come to us for help. But if we keep a tight hold on the library's narrative, so that it's all about how professional and expert we are, we won't keep our users interested. We can give them all kinds of reasons why we must organize resources strictly by this very particular system. But if  users  see other systems that seem to work just as well, if they don't like our system, if we shut them out -- they won't come to us. They will go to other places where their voice is welcome. We have to find a way to open up the story so that it is also about them, to continue to provide our services in a way that encourages user engagement and, well, use. How we can accomplish that, of course--well, that's a question for another day.  The first step is simply to recognize what is needed.

The "Reference Interview," Outside of RIS

Well, the holidays are over, a new semester is in full swing, and I suppose it's finally time to embark on this experiment in independent blogging--hopefully this is a project I can remain on top of throughout the semester.

Today I'd like to tackle an interesting thought that struck me this morning about the nature of the work I do here at the library. It's a bit of a different area than I've explored in my previous posts, because today I have reference services on the brain -- mostly thanks to my new course on "Information Sources & Services" (or "the reference class" as I tend to call it) starting up tomorrow.

It's not that uncommon to talk about the intersection of LIS with other careers. Many of my classmates are making mid-career changes to join the field, and they all bring with them skills and experiences drawn from those other careers. We also talk about other careers post-MSLS; it seems as if I've read and heard quite a bit, lately, about other applications for LIS-related skills, and how we newbie librarians can market ourselves to career fields that are more available than LIS.

The thought that struck me this morning is that it's actually very interesting to draw a comparison between other customer service fields, such as retail work, and LIS, in particular the reference and instructional aspects of it. I'm not necessarily recommending retail as an ideal post-MSLS career choice; after at least two degrees and presumably some accompanying financial expense, I would imagine many of us will be looking in other directions.

That said, I worked a retail position on-and-off for 6 years before starting this degree, and it's an experience I would recommend for anyone. It's amazing how drastically it changes your perception of the retail/service industry and its challenges, and how completely it can alter your behavior as a customer (I, for one, had a bad habit of leaving unwanted items, well, wherever, for staff to pick up -- no more).  A retail job is also an excellent place to pick up some useful skills -- not just skills with a cash register, but, more importantly, people skills. For someone like me, for many years too painfully shy to pick up the phone, a retail job can help develop the kind of boldness you need to approach a new customer with an offer of help, strike up a friendly chat at the register, or answer phone inquiries.  Also, in many retail situations, no matter how incredibly hostile or rude a customer is, you can't return their attitude -- politeness is your job (to a point, anyway; there are, I think, occasional exceptions to this). So you learn how to swallow your own hostility, remain polite, choose your words carefully, and calmly find a resolution to the problem, if there is one. This is a great skill to have in any kind of situation, and it is most definitely a wonderful skill to have on the reference desk.

In many ways, my retail position was very similar to the work I do on the reference desk today. I worked in a small, family-owned arts-and-crafts store with a fairly-eclectic selection of products (and an eclectic system of organization). My training consisted of taking pre-written shopping lists around the store and learning where to find the items listed; and within a short time of my working there, I was expected to have a reasonable working knowledge of what we carried and where.  Customer interactions shared many similarities with reference transactions: Known Item ("Do you sell glue sticks?"). Directional ("Where are your scrapbooks?"). Ready Reference ("What type of clay can I use that will air dry?"). And then there were some questions which were more Complex: "I need to show a river on my diorama. What ideas do you have?" At which point, in reference librarian-like manner, I had to use my knowledge of our resources (products, really, but bear with the metaphor here) to present my patron (customer) with possibilities based on the requirements for their project, the materials they had already chosen, and other needs such as their budget limitations.

Many of the services I provided, by the way, relied on "reference interviews." If a customer requested paint, I needed to determine what material they were painting on, and the level of their project (craft project vs. professional/artistic) before I could direct them to the right products.  And if a customer came in asking for "wool," further questioning was necessary to find out whether they wanted "wool yarn" or were using "wool" as a synonym for "yarn, any kind." So when I first began working in RIS this past August, even though I did not necessarily recognize the term "reference interview," the concept was immediately familiar.

It's true, there may not be a direct connect between a retail position and an LIS career. There's a reason that many aspiring librarians choose or are required to pursue further education -- there are definitely some specific skills involved. But I think it is interesting, and important, to be aware of the ways that former jobs and other experiences can enhance our abilities as librarians. I know my time in other customer services positions has made me more confident in my ability to handle a variety of situations at the reference desk.  I also like to believe that it has helped me to cultivate a more-pleasant attitude towards my patrons, and overall to provide better service to them (this is, of course, difficult for me to state objectively).

How have your previous jobs/careers have contributed to your skills as a librarian/information professional? 

Digital Libraries

Thanksgiving break, the ‘calm before the storm,’ so to speak, before a final onslaught of papers, projects, and assignments begins--and it’s time for my final blog entry of the semester. As I said in my first entry, the semester’s end does not mean the end – I intend to keep this blog running to the best of my ability even after I’ve safely checked LSC 555 off my list of required courses – but the blog will obviously be taking a slightly-different structure and tone from this point out.

But there is still one official, LSC 555 entry to go, so: back to business. We’ve touched upon many different technological concerns in LIS this semester – usability, Web 2.0, records management, and others – but it is perhaps appropriate that our final batch of readings looks ahead, to the future of libraries.

What is the future of libraries? This may seem a ridiculous question here in the 21^st century; without a doubt, the future of libraries is digital, or at least necessarily involves digital tools in some way.   Digital libraries have been coming along for quite a while (for example, I recently completed a paper for LSC 555 overviewing the Perseus Digital Library, which has been in development since the late 1980s).  But whereas the Perseus Digital Library was initially a finite set of documents contained on a set of disks, digital libraries in the 21^st century have a seemingly-infinite variety of possibilities and applications.


 Brian Gambles (Gambles, 2010) describes a few of these possibilities in his overview of the Library of Birmingham.  Gambles puts forward a variety of ways in which the Library of Birmingham, or LoB as he frequently abbreviates it, will move into the digital age, many of which are reminiscent of our earlier discussions of Library 2.0.  LoB, like many digital libraries, is designed upon an awareness of the expectations of users in the digital age: that information be available anytime, anywhere, with both physical and distance access.  It will approach this goal with a special emphasis on opportunities offered by mobile devices: for instance, LoB will have a navigation system accessible from mobile phones which will direct users not only to the library, but through various areas to find the particular information or resource they need.  LoB will also build upon principles of Web 2.0 by aiming to increase user participation and collaboration in its services—i.e., by allowing users to share reviews and recommendations. Finally, and perhaps most-uniquely, LoB will include information beyond the typical, digital library resources in its collection. Gambles describes how LoB may use a framework similar to iTunes U to capture the special information of subject librarians for general use.  All of these efforts are, of course, in addition to our usual vision of digital libraries, including, among other features, full-text searching and access to some primary materials which are otherwise restricted.

 Still, digital libraries are not as cut-and-dried as we may tend to think they are –here we can carry over some principles from our discussion of electronic records management. In fact, many of the same issues are present with digital libraries: stability/preservation of electronic data, hardware and software obsolescence, and – particularly with digital libraries – issues of data integrity, privacy, etc.  When we talk about the problems facing digital libraries, copyright seems to come directly to the front of the discussion. Even in the early days this was a problem.   When the Perseus Digital Library was first developed, the project had significant difficulty acquiring the rights for its materials; no one really knew how to adjust the existing policies to accommodate its new format, much-larger scale, and much-greater (intended) lifespan (Mylonas, 1993, Rights and Publication).  Nowadays, of course, the complications have increased exponentially.
                Siva Vaidhyanathan presents a few of these complications in his article on the Google Libraries Project and the legal issues it has recently faced (Vaidhyanathan 2005). Many of us, I would imagine, have heard something or other about these legal battles, but Vaidhyanathan has a take that I, for one, had not considered: he argues that the Google Libraries Project is actually reckless. While there are undoubtedly benefits to an electronic gathering or resources, in his view, these benefits are not enough to uphold Google’s actions in a court of law. That is, if Google tries to justify its various breaches of copyright over the course of this project by arguing for the “greater good” or “market failure” (i.e., that Google is providing a service the market fails to provide, therefore its service falls under the “fair use” of copyright law), it will lose its case. Vaidhyanathan is not sure that Google is the only, or best, institution to provide the digital resources involved, and that means that exceptions to copyright probably should not, and probably would not, be made in its case. Additionally, Google’s method of paying back university libraries for their parts in the project –handing off the digital copies it produces, free of charge – are a little questionable. So, the courts will side against Google, there will be some large fines involved, a slap on the wrist, and Google will continue to operate, innovate, and push the envelope in other ways, right? According to Vaidhyanathan, wrong.  He argues that the visible things, like the Libraries project, are not the only ways in which Google violates copyright; the very way that its search engine works, by caching people’s (copyrighted) webpages, is borderline in-violation. If Google pushes the copyright issue in court, it could end up losing a lot more than a digital library; its very ability to function as a search engine, and by extension, the ability of other companies to run their search engines, could be jeopardized.  Whether or not you agree with these drastic predictions, we can take away from Vaidhyanathan’s discussion a sense of the seriousness of the issues involved in creating digital libraries. Digital libraries do not only pose technological difficulties; they challenge and drastically-alter the ways in which we have previously thought about, structured, and taken possession of information.  As librarians, guardians and disseminators of information (among other duties), it will at many points fall to us to explore, determine, and uphold the boundaries which are appropriate for our developing, digital culture.

There is, of course, another side to this issue: users are not the only ones getting free information which they perhaps should not be. Martin Zimmerman, in an article published just last year (Zimmerman 2010), takes a vigorous look at the information about users which digital culture is making (questionably) available. Going back to Google (and other search engines) and their cached information, for example. Our internet browsers keep a cache, too – and that cache frequently includes information about us, whether it is the websites we have visited (and how often, and when), the locations and computers from which we access them, or the personal information we leave behind (like that credit card information that we love to have conveniently saved). How many of us are diligent about making sure this information is cleared, even when it is cached on public computers and not our own laptops? How many of us remember that even our own computers are not 100% safe from intrusion-- or that we have no idea what other computers, and in what state of security, are collecting that information on the other side of our internet transactions?  Despite our previous discussions about the fragility of electronic records, they are not dependably fragile, and can sometimes slip between secure cracks.  

This can pose more issues for librarians than the cached information on our public computers.  There is an aspect of our profession that relies heavily on service with confidentiality, and open access to information—an aspect which our efficient information systems can actually undermine. Zimmerman suggests several ways in which this is so. For one, we have come to rely heavily on electronic databases – there is plenty of discussion today about the financial and intellectual difficulties which these databases and their accompanying contracts may cause.  But these contracts also, in many cases, allow vendors to access certain information which may very well fall under our profession’s sense of confidentiality. More significantly in recent years have been the privacy issues presented by our own, in-house systems. Circulation modules allow us to track, well, the circulation of materials, to align missing or overdue materials with the relevant patrons, and in general to keep our services running efficiently. But if these systems retain our patrons’ information, they can also prevent our services from running confidentially. Electronic records without a thoughtful retention/deletion policy (emphasis on deletion in this instance) create a liability, a record of patrons’ activity every bit as intrusive—and every bit as retroactively-retrievable—as those caches on our computers. So while we, as librarians, must be aware of the information necessary to run our transactions properly, we also need to be mindful of what we potentially expose patrons to each time we collect that information.

To sum it all up, the role of librarians is changing vastly, and most-likely doing so on a daily basis.  Today we are rookies, learning this in theory; but tomorrow, as librarians, we will be on the front lines.  This means: knowing how to use developing technologies, and how to learn the ones that we cannot even imagine developing at this moment.  It means revising the way in which we think about users, information and the sharing thereof, and the role of libraries in general. It means “going with the flow,” gradually developing a sense of the ways in which Web 2.0 can best contribute to our mission, without destroying or totally altering it. But most importantly, it means understanding both the benefits and limitations which technology can bring to our profession.  We have seen, in the first article on LoB and in other readings throughout the semester, the miracles that technology can work in our libraries. But we have also seen, in the case of the articles on Google and on user privacy, that it can present some pretty serious challenges. Like any powerful entity, technology can be just as dangerous as it is helpful. The judgment call that we will have to someday make, perhaps on a daily basis, is: Where is the line drawn? Where will technology hurt libraries more than it helps? Where is mindless implementation of technology/Web 2.0 just too much? 

 I suppose as a general discussion question we might pose, Is technology worth it? –but I believe that ship has long since sailed. So I would propose instead that we ask ourselves, Where do I actually see my role—our role-- in the future of libraries?  Are we gatekeepers of copyrighted knowledge, or champions of free information at the loss of copyright? Am I a facilitator of user interaction and input? To what extent should my knowledge of information science impose on user input methods such as tagging? Do I see myself running a merging physical and digital library, or one or the other? Am I here to organize information? Collocate it? Simply find it where others have laid it?  Or do I, too, share a responsibility for creating such information resources as I can?

…And with those thoughts, I leave you-- to continue using my electronic library resources to push a last bit of coursework through.  All my wishes for a restful Thanksgiving, a survivable end-of-semester for those of you/us in academia, and (depending on how long it takes for me to get back to this) Happy Holidays.  See you soon!

Gambles, B. (2010). "Rewriting the Book: On the Move in the Library of Birmingham.” Ariadne, 64. Retrieved November 22, 2011 from http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/

Mylonas, E. (1993). The Perseus project. In A. Okerson (Ed.), Scholarly publishing on the electronic networks. Proceedings of the Second Symposium, December 5-8, 1992. Washington, DC: ARL. Retrieved Nov 3, 2011 from http://www.arl.org/

Vaidhyanathan, S. (2005). The Googlization of Everything and the Future of Copyright . UC Davis Law Review, 40(3), 1207-1231. Retrieved November 22, 2011, from http://lawreview.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/

Zimerman, M. (2010). Technology and privacy erosion in United States Libraries: A personal viewpoint. New Library World. 111(1/2): 7-15. Retrieved November 22, 2011 from Emerald Library.

All About the User

               How do we define usability?  This is an important point of consideration for this week’s readings – and it’s not just about finding a dictionary definition.  Actually, it somewhat recalls our readings for the week of September 12^th, where I asked, how do we define an “effective” information system? Once again, it all comes down to the user.
                The problem with evaluating information systems or, as this week’s readings touch upon, websites, is that we can’t always see it from all sides. The technical folks responsible for the physical construction of the website may take a different view from the librarians responsible for its content, or from the users.  Take these three groups, and you might end up with three completely different sets of criteria for what makes a usable website. For that matter, try throwing in a fourth group – “usability experts,” operating outside of the technical structure, outside of the library administration, outside of the users. It is important, therefore, that when we construct systems like our library websites, we try to incorporate all perspectives, and that is largely the point of this week’s readings.

                As usual, there are three articles on the table, so I’ll take them in chronological order. The first article, by Beth Thomsett-Scott, is called “Yeah, I Found it! Performing Web Site Usability Testing to Ensure That Off-Campus Students Can Find the Information They Need” (2004). Thomsett-Scott basically  attacks the issue of off-campus students and their ability to navigate library websites effectively, before touching upon some of the ways of measuring a site’s usability in this context. As a mostly-off-campus student, I can definitely relate – even though I actually work in the library, work time is not research time, and it’s been really important for me to be able to search the CUA databases and catalog from my kitchen table at all hours.
                So what makes a site usable? Thomsett-Scott runs through a variety of definitions offered up by a wide variety of individuals who presumably bear some authority in the subject area; while they differ in some respects, these definitions are common in that they are all user-centric. After all, it makes sense; if the user can’t use a site, then how “usable” is it? (Try saying that 10 times fast!)  Thomsett-Scott excellently paraphrases an article by Collins and Aguinaga from 2001, saying that they “describe their amazement at how differently the study participants used the site than the staff or the designers of the site expected it to be used” (Thomsett-Scott 2004, p. 472). And that, I propose, is the major issue I mentioned earlier: users don’t always think like we do, and that different method of thought is not wrong. There is no room for wrong; what purpose do our materials have if they can’t be accessed? The users’ thought patterns must be accommodated. The way to do this, Thomsett-Scott lays out, is to determine usability, which can be done through formal, scientific studies (with users as subjects); through focus groups (seeking user input); or through cognitive walkthroughs (performed by experts).  The author actually appears to recommend at least a partial compromise here; while acknowledging the benefits of cognitive walkthroughs (experts will notice a lot of the errors straight away), she is loath to encourage a usability study that does not, in some way, include the user (Thomsett-Scott 2004, p. 482).

                Tolliver et al. touch upon the same ground in 2005, with a paper titled, “Website redesign and testing with a usability consultant: lessons learned.”  Tolliver’s group, it emerges, obtained their results solely through the expertise of usability experts – not Thomsett-Scott’s most recommended method, because really, (everyone say it together), “It’s all about the user.” The authors, however, single out some further benefits to the expertise part of the deal: “time saved in self-education, the input of an expert’s experience, and an unbiased viewpoint “(Tolliver et. al 2005, p. 158). At that statement, though, I kind of want to screech to a halt and say, “What do you mean by unbiased?” Fairly-innocuous term, that, and yet in this context it is eyebrow-raising. In a situation where user needs are on the line, I would hesitate to go for unbiased; what we really need is biased, towards the user.  A system may be functional in a beautiful, idealistic vacuum, but if it cannot meet user expectations (no matter how biased, uneducated, needy, etc.) then what good is it, anyway? Fortunately for the library’s users, in this particular instance the usability experts did consult with a modest amount of users in a few areas of interest. Key statement here on page 163: “Interestingly, this is a case where the library staff’s knowledge of the AAE Library users was important in choosing the best terminology, despite the concerns of the usability consultant who felt that the term might prove too ambiguous” (Tolliver et al. 2005, p. 163). Bingo.  Why? Because the usability consultant was, here, operating in a theoretical vacuum of what principles are generally best for usability, when users neither exist, nor use the library, in a principled vacuum.

                The final reading for this week was a 2008 article was Shu Liu, “Engaging Users: The Future of Academic Library Web Sites.” Right away I like this title because it ties in with what we have been saying about the importance of users. This article also, I think, offers an important perspective because in talking about, well, user usability, it goes beyond the typical statements of confusing vocabulary or users’ ability to navigate a site. Yes, Liu actually delves into the realm of expectations: “Librarians are facing a new generation of online users who are technologically savvy and integrate information access and use in all spheres of their lives to an unprecedented degree. They approach the traditional library with certain expectations which may conflict…”(Liu 2008, p.6)  We will put aside my many, many qualms with over-generalized statements about the technological savvy of the Millenials, which are clichéd and in many cases (many of whom I have met, personally) absolutely incorrect. No, instead, let’s focus on the expectations model. Library websites can fail users if they are too complex to use; but sometimes that complexity comes from a lack of similarity to other technologies. In the world of Web 2.0, many of the most-frequently used websites share similar functionality and similar interfaces. A library with a completely different, non-intuitive interface could be just as complex, or more so, to a tech savvy user as your basic Google search might be for my grandmother. This is very important to consider as we move into the age of Library 2.0, and as we concern ourselves with usability generally. Liu encourages librarians to improve their usability by incorporating Web 2.0 and making the library website an interface which is comfortable, familiar and personalized to each user (Liu 2008, p 14). Again,  the studies show that usability is not about how well a librarian likes their site, or how strong they think the functionality is: the only thing that matters is whether the USER finds the site functional, comfortable, and usable.

  

  

Sources Cited: 

Liu, S. (2008). Engaging users: The future of academic library websites.College & Research Libraries, 69(1), 6-27. Retrieved October 29, 2011, from the Wilson Web database.

Thomsett-Scott, B. (2005). Yeah, I Found It! Performing Web Site Usability Testing to Ensure That Off-Campus Students Can Find the Information They Need. Journal of Library Administration, 41 (3 & 4). 471 – 483. Retrieved October 29, 2011 from the EBSCOHost Education Research Complete database.

Tolliver et al. (2005). Website redesign and testing with a usability consultant: lessons learned. OCLC Systems & Services. 21(3). pp. 156-166. Retrieved October 29, 2011, from the Emerald Library database.

The Web Generation, 2.0

This week in LSC 555, it’s all about the Internet (and let me tell you, as someone who just moved into a new apartment and has barely been connected this past week, these articles elicited both a new appreciation for the wonders of the web, and some serious consternation over the lack of Internet connection).

Here is a completely fun and frivolous discussion question for you (more-academic question(s) to follow later): Do you remember the first time you experienced the Internet? Personally, I’m a little fuzzy on the date (I think I was in 3rd grade), but I remember it happening. One day my parents came home with a Windows 1995, HP Pavilion PC, which was just a whole new world from the DOS-based IBM Tandy we had owned previously. They set it up and then a few hours later my dad was in a chat-room with some guys from Malaysia. That’s right, Malaysia. I don’t think I’d even heard of Malaysia before that. Anyway, he let me say hi, and type a smiley face to them, and it was just...amazing stuff for an 8-year-old, really. I remember going to bed thinking , “Wow! My dad has friends in Malaysia now!” (not really, but hey, I was a kid). And just like that, I was introduced to the wonders of the World Wide Web (all of this, of course, was over an old-fashioned dial-up connection. You should have been there when I discovered DSL).

It’s been well over a decade since I sent a handful of characters to a group of Malaysian strangers, and the Internet has become a completely different entity since then -- as the rise of Web 2.0 should make clear.  But the basic principles are the same (and still just as fascinating and impressive, I might add), which is why I was glad to find that the first of this week’s articles was a basic introduction to Internet connectivity: “How Internet Infrastructure Works,” written by Jeff Tyson for the HowStuffWorks website.  I would have preferred to see a date on this article (I couldn’t find one anywhere, not even in the metadata), just because anything related to web connections and speeds is necessarily very date-sensitive.  Still, it made for an informative read.  

Tyson steps through all of the basics an Internet user could need or want to know:  How is the Internet structured? What exactly are we connecting to, and how, when we get online? What is this IP address thing we are always hearing about, and what does it do? How do URLs work? How do servers work with the Internet?

Personally, I found the section on IP addresses and DNS look-ups particularly striking, in part, I’ll admit, because I vividly recall the online game I played in middle school, using a program called TelNet, that put me through the hassle of manually entering an IP address every time -- and now I finally understand what that was all about.  But I also found it striking because I had never really considered the “magic” (I suppose technology would be a more appropriate word, although less descriptive of my level of ignorance) behind URLs before. In all my time online, never have I questioned the fact that typing in “http://www.google.com” would lead me to Google. Nor, for that matter, did I really understand what the “http://” part was all about, or why some URLs lack the “www” but none of them lack the “http://” (because “www” simply refers to the World Wide Web host machine within a domain name, whereas “http://” refers to the protocol, or communication language, to which every website conforms). Cool stuff, and, I would venture, stuff that’s good to know. Most of us will never need to understand the inner workings of the Internet, because its interface is designed so that we can use it anyway; still, I think there is something to be said for having some grasp of the power behind the Internet, if only because we might be able to use it more effectively.  Besides, it certainly doesn’t hurt to maintain a healthy level of respect for the power of any tool, like the Internet, that is integral to our daily lives.

One article in, and this blog entry is already becoming a novel; go figure. I’ll try to be a little more succinct talking about our other two readings....
    ...Which is actually a little simpler because both of these articles take the Internet subject in a new direction, highlighting the wonders of Web/Library 2.0. What is Web 2.0? The simplest, common definition of Web 2.0 is that it comes out to the “next generation” of my chat with Malaysian strangers: the ultimate in communication and social networking. Or, perhaps this is a better example: in the late nineties, my dad built a website, http://dailydash.com (believe it or not, this page is still in existence, albeit not very functional), as a dissemination point for a daily e-newsletter that he was writing at the time. He typically sent this around through e-mail, but he wanted to have a central, stable place to share the information.  At that time, it was kind of a big deal, especially since this newsletter was really an amateur endeavor; today, my Dad can -- and does--post a note or link on Facebook, send out Tweets, or even post to a blog like this one.  And that, my friends, is the beauty of Web 2.0. Or one of them, anyway.

For a more detailed, information science-oriented perspective to Web 2.0, a good place to start is our second reading for this week, Paul Anderson’s 2007 article, “All That Glisters Is Not Gold.” Anderson’s title is meant to be a reminder that not every “gold” functionality of Web 2.0 is transferable to Library 2.0;  rather it is our task, as librarians, to devote critical thought to which features will work in a library context (Anderson, 2007, p. 195).  One of the great points of this article is Anderson’s description of  “Six Big Ideas” posited by Tim O’Reilly of O’Reilly Media, which Anderson presents as the core of the Web 2.0 framework--alongside “mature social applications” and currently-developing W3C technologies/standards, such as XML (Anderson, 2007, p.196).  What are these Six Big Ideas? :

1. Individual production and user-generated content  - For a real-life example, see this blog.

2. Harness the power of the crowd -  Despite what you’ve heard about the “mob mentality,” O’Reilly (as cited in Anderson, 2007, p. 197) posits that there is actually some value in “collective intelligence.”

3. Data on an epic scale - Whatever we do online, whether we intend to or not, we are creating HUGE amounts of data. Smart companies know how to collect that data and use it (take Facebook, for example, or even Gmail --using profile data/message contents to create targeted ads. We may not like it, but we have to concede it’s financially-savvy).

4. Architecture of participation -  Anderson cites Google Search as an example: not only do well-designed websites and tools encourage participation, but participation can actually help these architectures to become better-designed.

5. Network effects This means taking seriously questions and discussions about the logistics of the World Wide Web and the impact each user has.

6. Openness Open source code, open standards, open information access -- you name it.

(Anderson, 2007, p.197).  Of course, it is not sufficient for us, as aspiring librarians, to grasp the concepts of Web 2.0; we also have to be able to envision the role they will play in Library 2.0.  We have to be constantly aware of the swift evolution of technology.  We have to have always in mind the ethical implications of Library 2.0 with regards to copyright and intellectual freedom.

But we also have to discuss Library 2.0 among ourselves. Part of the problem Anderson sees is that there hasn’t been enough professional discussion about Library 2.0, or even a formal definition (Anderson, 2007, p. 196). So here’s some (pre-professional) discussion: what  can we, as aspiring librarians, do to get this discussion rolling? And, what thoughts do we have about the possibilities and implications of Library 2.0?  Anderson  says, that the ethical implications of Web 2.0 “actually [put] librarians in a strong position in terms of potentially being able to influence how new types of technology develop and are used within libraries, and maybe even more widely"(Anderson, 2007, p.197). Do you believe that this is true?

Finally this week, we have a report from some of our colleagues in Greece (Athens and Corfu to be exact), Dimitris Gavrilis, Constantia Kakali1, and Christos Papatheodorou.  They describe a prototype improvement on the OPAC system called OPACIAL, developed by Panteion University to take advantage of Web 2.0 technologies.  The report makes mention of a few other OPAC notables we may want to keep an eye on , including the Ann Arbor District Library and Hennepin County Library systems, open source programs such as Scriblio, and proprietary programs such as Aquabrowser (for an example of Aquabrowser, check out CUA’s own Discovery Catalog. Not my favorite, but definitely an interesting approach to catalog-searching) (Gavrilis, Kakalil and Papatheodorou, 2008, section 2).

But the real focus of the report, of course, is OPACIAL. The authors step through the system development process -- a little lengthy and complex to summarize here, but definitely a  fantastic example of the system development life cycle in action -- including a discussion of the components of their system.  OPACIAL has some really fantastic Web 2.0 features -- a user-created tag cloud (made searchable after user testing), faceted searching, and a list of potentially-related items.  My favorite part of OPACIAL, though, has to be the breadth of information in the catalog records: they contain not only bibliographic data, but also a space for users to tag and annotate, reviews, and (my personal favorite) an image of the library’s floorplan showing exactly where the book can be found (Gavrilis et al., 2008, section 3). Pretty amazing stuff, albeit maybe not as well-suited to a massive, complexly-organized library like CUA’s Mullen Library (I have no sense of the size of Panteion, I freely admit).  The authors conclude the article by describing the process of user-evaluation, including statistics, user suggestions, and some final comments on where OPACIAL stands now -- definitely in a good place, but definitely requiring revision (Gavrilis et al., 2008, sections 4-5).

    Some discussion points: OPACIAL looks fantastic, at least in my (still-beginner) opinion. As with any user interface, it is obviously going to be a point of personal preference. But beyond the limitations of personal preference, I tend to be idealistic. I’ll admit, I have grand visions of OPACIAL swimming around in my head right now, but going back to Anderson, is that realistic? Yes, OPACIAL implements some of the truly innovative possibilities that have come with Web 2.0, and yes it embraces the social, user-created mindset that Web 2.0 embodies.  But as Anderson pointed out in the second article, it’s our job to think critically about what is actually feasible for Library 2.0. Do you think OPACIAL is feasible? What might be the challenges for implementing Web 2.0 features in the catalog -- tag clouds, for example, or reviews--, and can we overcome those challenges? Should we even be trying to? 

Articles Cited:

Anderson, P. (2007). “All That Glisters Is Not Gold' — Web 2.0 And The Librarian”. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science,, 39(4), 195-198. Retrieved October 10, 2011, from the Sage Premier 2009 database.

Gavrilis, D., Kakali, C., and Papatheodorou, C. (2008). Enhancing Library Services with Web 2.0 Functionalities. In Proceedings of the 12th European Conference on Research and Advanced Technology For Digital Libraries (Aarhus, Denmark, September 14 - 19, 2008). B. Christensen-Dalsgaard, D. Castelli, B. Ammitzbøll Jurik, and J. Lippincott, Eds. Lecture Notes In Computer Science, vol. 5173. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, 148-159. Retrieved October 10, 2011 from http://www.wcl.ece.upatras.gr

Tyson, Jeff (n.d.). HowStuffWorks: How Internet Infrastructure Works. In HowStuffWorks: Tech. Retrieved October 10, 2011 from http://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet-infrastructure.htm

How permanent are electronic records, really?

            If there is one thing that has jumped out at me from this week’s readings, it would have to be this: electronic documents are not nearly as stable or permanent as we tend to think they are.  Maybe it’s just me, but I tend to put things on the computer when I want to preserve them. Photographs from my semester in Rome? They’re all in a file on my desktop. Why? Because if I print out all of my photographs and put them in a photo album, they might fade…or I might spill a coffee on them, and bye-bye Rome memories. I tend to think I am permanently preserving and safeguarding the information on my computer. But here’s the thing I never think about: what if that hard drive crashes? Or, what if I get a new computer system that for some reason is unable to read JPEG files?

            This week’s readings challenge us to think differently about electronic formats. As Philip C. Bantin says in his report, “Records Management in a Digital World,” electronic documents are actually fairly fragile. After all, at their core they are composed of digital bits which have meaning only when interpreted by software programs – and, often, saving a new version of a document means the prior version is lost forever (Bantin 2002, pg. 5).  I’ve lost a paper or two that way, and been reminded that I really ought to make use of backups. But as Bantin says later, it’s important to develop better preservation strategies for important information, because “the back-up solution does not deal with the root causes of the deterioration and obsolescence of digital records: hardware obsolescence; storage medium deterioration; and the biggest problem of all, software dependence…” (Bantin 2002, pg. 7). A recent example: last week, in the reference office where I work, we ran out of a particular type of book slip. No problem, I thought to myself, I’ll just go on the shared drive, pull up the file, and print some more. Actually, one problem: the file, being several years old, was made in ClarisWorks, and nobody knows how to access it with our new computers and software. No big deal; I can recreate the slips in Microsoft Word in 20 minutes. But suppose that this ClarisWorks file actually contained important information about employee records, or the books in our collection?  That could be a more serious problem.

            Back to the information science here: what Bantin attempts to advocate in his report is the development of better recordkeeping systems. “Recordkeeping systems” being, in the most basic sense, ways of storing records. Records have three important characteristics: they provide evidence of transactions or activity; they must be authentic and uncorrupted; and they must be reliable, complete and with trustworthy content. “The ultimate goal of records management,” he says, “is to ensure that at no point in its life cycle will the fate of the record be left to chance…” (Bantin 2002, pg 3).  Unfortunately, the three main types of recordkeeping systems he describes (OLTPs, DSSs, and EDMSs) do not accomplish this goal. They are not designed to store data in a stable fashion for the long-term; they do not preserve records in their original unaltered state; their records often lack sufficient metadata; and they generally do not consider the value of a record when determining when or if it should be destroyed (Bantin 2002, pg 7).  Unless an organization’s record management includes comprehensive policies and requirements for handling records, it is likely that valuable information will be lost. Merely keeping data in electronic format is not sufficient for its preservation

                 In the second reading, Gary Johnston and David Bowen consider the benefits, rather than the shortcomings, of this type of record management system. These systems can be either an ERMS (Electronic Records Management System), and EDMS (Electronic Documents Management System), or an EDRMS (Electronic Document and Records Management System); the authors focus primarily on EDRMS systems because they have found that “users benefit most from a continuum model covering both documents and records” (Johnston and Bowe 2005, pg. 131).  But this poses some questions, especially for those of us less-familiar with ERMS vs. EDMS vs. EDRMS:  One can gather, from this article, that documents are files of a more temporal nature while records contain information that needs to be retained. Johnston and Bowen mention that files must then be definitively declared as either “documents” or “records” (Johnston and Bowen 2005, pg. 132). But doesn’t this pose a problem for users? It is clearly very important to make this distinction, as “documents” will not receive the same attention towards preservation as “records.” Doesn’t this open the system up to problems with dishonest or irresponsible employees who do not designate files properly? Suppose I create a file with important data and I forget to designate it as a “record”?  Alternately, suppose I have an email correspondence that implicates me in criminal activity, and so I choose to designate that correspondence as a “document” that will not be retained?  Records management systems will need mechanisms in place to prevent these kinds of errors if they are to be truly effective. As the authors point out, “…a recordkeeping system is about more than just the software; it is about a complete system that involves people carrying out their jobs.” (Johnston and Bowen 2005, pg. 133). Again, we see the fragility of electronic data: without a human component performing specific tasks, the system will not function as intended.  

Johnston and Bowen describe many benefits for users, their organization and society in general that may come from an EDRMS, but again it is unsafe to rely on computer activity alone. For example, an EDRMS may have an audit log which allows it to be trusted – but it must first be configured to be secure.  Also, while test-studies show that these systems are mostly robust and will function in disaster recovery scenarios, there are no published reports of instances where this has actually occurred (Johnston and Bowen 2005, 134). This, therefore, leaves a certain degree of uncertainty as to the preservation of the system’s information.  Finally, RETENTION PERIODS are really an issue for the records manger/implementation because some risk-adverse companies may have extended retention policies beyond what is needed (Johnston and Bowen 2005, 139). This may limit the effectiveness of retention/destruction policies that are meant to be such a strong benefit of this type of system.  Ultimately, we reach the same conclusion, which is that benefits are not assured because they depend on “well planned and executed implementation projects” (Johnston and Bowen 2005, 139).

            The final reading, a case study by Sherry Owen, is an interesting complement to the previous two (although a discussion along entirely different lines) because it covers the implementation of an EDMS in her own company (Arkansas Electric Cooperatives).  This brings to light some important considerations about these systems: what happens when one of these is implemented? How hard is it to do? What functions can it assist with? Owen describes functions that the EDMS was able to perform for AEC:  procedures for systematic destruction, protection of records that provide a “permanent” record, and safeguarding records that would be required in order to continue business operations in the event of a disaster, or that were required to be retained by law (Owen 2006, pg 22). And the results were good: AEC saw great cost savings, improved access as well as legal compliance, and a comfortable coverage in the event of disaster recovery (Owen 2006, pg. 24). But as Owen points out, “the challenge for records managers is to keep abreast of both the technology and the recordkeeping rules and regulations.” (Owen 2006, pg 25) Again, the electronic systems themselves are not self-sufficient, but require a certain level of human involvement and expertise in order to function at their best.

Again, we find that electronic systems and documents are not as perfect, permanent and reliable as the digital revolution has promised they would be. Despite all of the benefits of technology, it remains to be seen whether it will ever be 100% reliable and remove 100% of the burden from human activity. This, I think, raises an interesting counterpoint to the assertion that librarians and information professionals are or soon will be outdated.  Until we find a way to allow technology to do more than simply process the information we give it, but to “think” or “reason” about that information, we will always need people who are familiar with these systems and the way they process information. Otherwise, the systems will not function effectively (and then we will still be relying on human labor). Especially for those of us who are part of Gen Y/Millenials/Internet Generation/whatever title they are giving us now, who grew up with ever increasing technology and in some cases are almost becoming complacent about it – I think this is an important lesson, and a reminder to continue to be cautious of technology’s shortcomings while embracing its benefits.

Full Citations:

Bantin, P.C. (2002). Records Management In A Digital World. EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research Research Bulletin, 2002 (16). Retrieved Sept 21, 2011 from http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERBO216.pdf.

Johnston, G. P. & Bowen, D.V. (2005). The Benefits Of Electronic Records Management Systems: A General Review of Published and Some Unpublished Cases. Records Management Journal, 15 (3), 131-140. Retrieved Sept 21, 2011 from ABI/INFORM Complete.

Owen, S. (2006). Electronic Document Management Systems: A Case Study. Arkansas Libraries, 63(1), 22-5. Retrieved Sept 21, 2011 from Library Lit & Inf Full Text database

What makes an effective information system?

Question of the week:  So, how exactly do we define an “effective” information retrieval system?  I realize it’s a little unorthodox to begin with a question when I haven’t even delved into this week’s readings yet, but bear with me.  I think it is useful to consider all three of this week’s articles with this question in mind.

I’d like to start with a reading retrieved from ProQuest, originally the content of Calvin N. Mooer’s 1959 remarks to the American Documentation Institute, because I found myself reacting to it fairly strongly. The selection was brief (about two pages), and it deals with a concept called, appropriately, “Mooers’ Law.” This was Mooers’ response to the tendency of patrons (or “customers” as he calls them) to repeatedly turn to less-than-effective information sources.  In today’s terms, this would probably be the equivalent of, “Why are all of the university students using Google for scholarly research, instead of scholarly databases?” Mooers’ notes are not in today’s terms, however, and it is important to remember this, because Mooers was making these statements in 1959 and well before the age of Google.   Mooers’ Law is defined as follows: “An information retrieval system will tend not to be used whenever it is more painful and troublesome for a customer to have information than for him not to have it” (Mooers’ 1960, para. 5). In short, he argues that (1) users do not actually want information because it is a pain to deal with once they have it, and (2) users are rarely penalized for duplicating work or being slow to find information; they are more often penalized for thoroughly researching and/or citing their work (Mooers, 1960, para. 6-8).

 Keeping sight of the fact that I am in no position to comment on the state of affairs in 1959, my feeling is that, if Mooers’ Law were ever true, it is no longer true.  (1) If users did not really want information, they would not persistently turn to search engines that leave them swimming in information, but would instead use systems (like some of our library catalogs) that would return a blank at the first spelling mistake or synonym. (2) In today’s culture, it is simply untrue that there are no consequences for failing to do sufficient research, or that citation is discouraged (quite the opposite, in fact).  I would, in fact, propose that the problem Mooers’ seeks can be found in his own words: “We have all seen reports describing retrieval systems which can perform more efficiently, search more rapidly, operate on larger collections, and so on” (Mooers 1960, para. 3). But according to whom? By whose standards are these retrieval systems more efficient, more rapid, more capable?  This is the question that needs to be considered before we turn on the users as simply being lazy and unmotivated (for that is how Mooers’ comments tend to come across).

The next reading in our list actually comes from Google itself, which is appropriate given Google’s widespread use as an information resource. In this selection, Matt Cutts, a Google software engineer, explains the algorithm behind Google searches.  The algorithm can be broken down into four broad steps:  (1) Googlebot, a “spider” program, requests a document from a server, scans it for links, then follows those links to new documents where it scans for further links, etc. This is how a list of documents is compiled; (2) Googlebot creates an inverse index – that is, an index created solely based upon the contents of the documents it has compiled; (3) Googlebot pulls out those documents which contain the user’s search terms;  (4) Googlebot ranks these retrieved documents based on several factors including: how many pages link to a document, the quality of pages linking to a document, relevancy based on frequency of search terms, whether search terms appear as a phrase, position of search terms on page, etc. (Cutts 2005, Crawling and Indexing section).

This algorithm is important to understanding why Google is so popular: as Martha M. Yee suggests (in a different article which I’ve recently had cause to read), Google ranks sites. It makes it easy for users to pull out the information that they need (or at least, that they imagine they need). Library information systems do not always do this; their results are sometimes by subject, sometimes alphabetical, sometimes chronological or by location, but less frequently can we view results based on relevance. Is this necessarily better? No, of course not. As Yee points out, Google’s ranking algorithm relies heavily on popularity, which does not always mean quality (Yee 2007, Section III, Evaluation section)--and this is even more the case in the age of tactics like “Google-bombing.” But users are led to believe that the best results have been nicely packaged for them and placed on top of the list – and, for obvious reasons, that is very appealing.

                The final article in this week’s readings comes from Tito Sierra, Joseph Ryan and Markus Wust at NC State, concerning a software platform which that institution constructed based upon their library catalog. The ins-and-outs of this system, called CatalogWS, are a little complicated to explain in a single blog entry, but here’s the gist of it:  The team responsible for CatalogWS posits that it is not possible to have a catalog which is optimal for all users and all types of searches. Therefore, they developed a platform based on their library catalog, and added to it an Application Program Interface (API) as a way of using the catalog data. The API does not take entire MARC records but instead consolidates important information for each record into search indices, allowing it to handle the most pertinent bits of catalog information efficiently. With the API, the team was able to develop search tools for both known-item searches (by title, author, etc.) and exploratory searches (subject, etc), a mobile catalog application, a visual exploratory search tool called FacetBrowser (which also allows users to adjust searches by facet, i.e., language, format, etc), and a graphics feature called “bookwalls” which allows librarians to generate digital displays of book covers from recent books, faculty books, etc. for display in the library commons (Sierra, Ryan and Wust, 2007). Obviously the team at NC State was able to use their catalog data in a lot of interesting ways through CatalogWS. But, even they admit that it is not perfect. For example, the API “exposes data in an easy-to-use format,” which is convenient; but its method of indexing means that the data included is less-comprehensive than it would be in a normal catalog, which could be a disadvantage. Additionally, though I am admittedly still familiarizing myself with CUA’s own catalog, ALADIN, it seems to me that many features which the NC State team said could not be optimized into one catalog are, in fact, in ALADIN: ALADIN allows for both known-item and exploratory searches (to an extent), permits facet searches, and even lends itself to RSS feeds, which are not far off from NC State’s “bookwalls” (CUA, however, uses these feeds primarily in LibGuides in a separate part of the libraries website, not inside the catalog; this may make a difference).

                So again, the question I am left asking, and the question I pose to you, is: how do we define an “effective” information retrieval system? And for that matter, on whose standards do we base this assessment? We as librarians spend a great deal of time interacting with knowledge, and because of that I think there is a Mooers-ish tendency in us to focus on what we view as groundbreaking and effective ways of presenting information. But then again, what we as librarians need to keep in mind, especially as we review readings such as these, is that library science is user-service based. If we as librarians have full information access, but our patrons do not, we have failed in our mission, no matter how efficient our retrieval services are.  But while serving our patrons, we have to keep a balance between what we think our patrons need and what they think they need or want. In what ways can we keep this balance while maintaining integrity and quality in the information we provide? In what ways do libraries already manage to do this?

Full Citations:

Cutts, M. (2005). Google Librarian Central - Article 12/2005 - 1. Google. Retrieved September 9, 2011, from http://www.google.com/librariancenter/articles/0512_01.html

Mooers, C. N., & Mooers, C. (1996). Mooers' law or why some retrieval systems are used and others are not . Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 23(1), 22. Retrieved September 9, 2011, from the ProQuest database.

Sierra, T., Ryan, J., & Wust, M. (2007). Beyond OPAC 2.0: Library Catalog as Versatile Discovery Platform. Code4Lib(1). Retrieved September 9, 2011, from http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/10/comment-page-1

Yee, M. M. (2007). Cataloging Compared to Descriptive Bibliography, Abstracting and Indexing Services, and Metadata. Cataloging and Classification Quarterly, 44(3-4), 307-327. Retrieved September 9, 2011, from http://dx.doi.org/10/1300/J104v44n03_10