I read a lot of library-related blogs (I know, exciting!) and my favorite is Stephen’s Lighthouse. Yesterday, I had the opportunity to hear Stephen Abram speak for the first time and it was challenging, frightening, thought-provoking and inspiring. What I like about his writing and overall approach is that he’s not afraid to paint a picture that might not necessarily be what librarians want to see or think about it. He speaks honestly, he’s pro-libraries, and he thinks in terms of the big picture.
His slides from the presentation are available here, but here are some ideas/thoughts I wrote down while listening to him. A lot of this is me interpreting what he said, and plus he speaks fast, so I apologize in advance if I get any of this wrong:
- communities start to decline when they lose their libraries
- librarians need to get better about telling people what they do
- libraries are the last non-partisan space anywhere; you don’t have to be anything to use the library
- big question: how do we connect to people online since so many of our users are there already and are using us that way
- people with communication skills are taking over
- im ref is a conversation, email is not
- text messaging ref – aligning the technology with the tech our users are comfortable with instead of the tech that are boomer librarians are comfortable with
- libraries do “how” and “why” questions, while Google does “who, what and when”
- libraries need to reposition ourselves to answer the important questions of the community
- Google is fooling ALA and librarians into thinking that they actually care about us
- with the current economic situation, public funding will decrease
- dvd is dead in Europe and will soon be in North America; Denver PL has been experimenting with downloadable video to see how they’re going to handle the death of DVD
- will Reading Matter? Books do not need to be protected because they’re not at risk!
- people read more than ever now
- the average gamer is a 31 year old woman
- what is our 5-year plan? are we communicating our expertise? are we making ourselves known to our communities? some people in libraries don’t even want to wear name tags in fear of being stalked! how are we going to make ourselves known?
- we should be targeting the facebook user
- what action verbs are taking place in your library?
- staff your virtual branch properly!
- the social web is a way for libraries to connect to people; it’s an opportunity
- there are different kinds of learners and we need to respect that and build our services around that
- an inherently mobile focus
- improve the quality of the user experience
- have fun at the workplace; allow creativity and play
- eliminate the worry tank and the excuses and move forward!
- libraries are social institutions
- context is king, not content
- top 10 influences for the 2008 election (YouTube #1); how many are we using to influence our audience?
- clarification, not information (that’s what ref needs to be)
- things are constantly changing, so get in there and play, experiment, don’t worry so much about getting it perfect