Transcript Web 2.0

Blogs, Wikis and more:
Web 2.0 demystified for
information professionals
Eastern RSC event
Monday 23rd February from 11:00 - 12:00.
Marieke Guy
Research Officer
www.ukoln.ac.uk
UKOLN is supported by:
This work is licensed under a AttributionNonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence
(but note caveat)
A centre of expertise in digital information management
www.bath.ac.uk
Introduction to UKOLN
• UKOLN is a National centre of expertise in digital
information management
• Library and cataloguing background
• Located at the University of Bath
• Funded by JISC and MLA to advise UK HE and FE
communities and the cultural heritage sector
• Many areas of work including:
– Digital preservation: DCC
– Metadata, registry work
– Repositories: eBank, Intute, SWORD, DRIVER
– Dissemination: Ariadne, International Journal of Digital
Curation
– eScience: eCrystals….etc.
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Introduction to Me
•
•
•
•
Been at UKOLN 9 years
Now a remote worker
Member of the Community & Outreach Team
Currently working on:
– Good APIs project
– Chair of the Institutional Web Management Workshop
– Cultural heritage work
• Previous roles/projects include:
– JISC-PoWR, JISC Standards Catalogue, QA Focus, SPP
Project Manager, ePrints UK project manager, Public
Library Focus work, NOF-digitise, Web Magazines
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Workshop Programme
•
•
•
•
•
Presentation on Blogs, Wikis and more
– 20 minutes
Do It Yourself - A chance for you to try out some of the tools
– 20 minutes
Discussion - A chance for you to think about the challenges
– 5/10 minutes
Presentation/Discussion on Challenges of Web 2.0 for the
Information Professional
– 10 minutes
Final Feedback -Any final questions, comments etc.
– 5 minutes
Will use this logo when it’s time for questions
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Workshop Resources
• All resources (and more) linked with Delicious tag:
http://delicious.com/mariekeguy/rsc-eastern-200802
• Wiki for you to work on
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
So…What is Web 2.0?
• Marketing term (derived from observing 'patterns') rather
than technical standards - “an attitude not a technology”
Characteristics Of Web 2.0
• Network as platform
• Always beta
• Clean URIs
• Remix and mash-ups
• Syndication (RSS)
• Architecture of participation
• Blogs & Wikis
• Social networking
• Social tagging
www.ukoln.ac.uk
(folksonomies)
Web2MemeMap,
Tim
O’Reilly,
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• Trust and openness
2005
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Blogs
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cecio/259559422/
Blogs
• A blog is a Web log, online diary
• Professionals are increasingly using blogs to describe what
they are doing
• A social phenomenon of the 21st Century
• Key characteristics are openess, collaboration and
syndication
• There is a need for information professionals to:
– Understand blogging and related technologies (e.g. RSS,
Technorati)
– Be able to find resources in the 'Bloggosphere'
– Explore how to use blogs to support business functions
(support users, staff & organisation)
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Why Blog?
•
•
•
•
Community of library professionals
Long tradition of sharing experiences and knowledge
New issues – need to find new communities
Blogs can be a timely way to
– Offer advice and commentary
– Make new connections
– Record discussion over time
– Also provide a different view to email discussion threads
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Reading Blogs
• There are lots of
dedicated blog
readers
• You can sign up
for RSS feeds to
be alerted to
changes
• Try not to be
distracted by
adverts etc
http://www.bloglines.com/myblogs
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Bloglines – a Web-based Blog reader. You are informed of
you in
last
viewed
the page.
Achanges
centre ofsince
expertise
digital
information
management
Library Blogs
• Lots of Individuals creating blogs: Phil Bradley’s, Peter
Scott, Technobiblio, Library Techtronics, Shifted Librarian,
Free Range Librarian, DIY Librarian
• Lots of themed blogs: Going Green at your library,
Librarians for Human Rights, The ‘M’ Word - Marketing
Libraries
• Lots of branch specific blogs: i Know Gateshead Libraries,
Oxford University Library, Manchester Lit List
• Some subject specialist and medical blogs, moving more
towards library teams
• British Librarian Bloggers list (lis-bloggers)
• Hot Stuff 2.0 – great list of library blogs (over 800) collated
by Dave Pattern
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Spineless? http://hwlibrary.wordpress.com/
Paige Turner http://swansealibraries.blogspot.com/
The Unquiet Librarian - http://theunquietlibrarian.wordpress.com/
Using Blogs
• Blogs are very interconnected with each other (bloggers
discuss other blog postings, blogrolls etc.).
• This can help to provide feedback; measure impact; engage
in discussions; etc.
• Web Monkey extension can give blog comments on your
pages
• Technorati can help find Blog articles, etc.
• A search for “Oxford University Library Services” returns 87
hits, was mainly student blogs, now many others
• The comments field can allow you to engage in discussions
• Time for you to establish a blog?
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Ideas for Blogs
• A News Blog
– New branches, stock areas, user services, service
changes, opening hours, fines, event information
• From the Librarian’s Desk
– Blogging about your daily work, provides transparency
and openness
• Library Resources Blog
– Special collections
• Special Projects Blog/ Task Groups Blog
• Reflective Blog
– Use as a ‘try it out’ experience
• Professional Development Blog
– Chronicle your daily activities, identify progression,
achievements, use it for annual appraisal
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
A Few Issues…
• Institutional Issues – e.g. Can you have a corporate voice,
do you want one?
• Technical Issues – e.g. What software will you use?
• Barriers to making the decision to blog e.g. Do you want all
your thoughts to be accessible to all? What about an
internal blog?
• Barriers to getting started
• Gaining momentum e.g. A huge number of blogs are not
read and become deserted by their writers
• Keeping your momentum! e.g. Will you be able to come up
with content?
• Stopping?
• Right person for the job!
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Gaining Momentum
• Participate: embed yourself in the community, social
networks e.g. Ning, Facebook (need to be aware of privacy
issues, ownership of data, dangers of data lock-in)
• Identify and follow other blogs
• Get a great feed reader like Google Reader
• Link, a lot, especially to other blogs
• Comment, and use your URL when you do
• Be fairly shameless in self-promoting:
“I like what you’re saying but over on our library blog
we’ve taken a different approach..”
• Spread the URL around
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Keeping Momentum
• Use Technorati, Google Blog search, etc
• Start to embed these in people’s lives by reporting
• Make sure you post regularly, and with high quality:
– Don’t post because you haven’t done one in a while...
– Do post because you’ve got something to say
• If you’re losing momentum, maybe there’s a reason?
• Do some evaluation of your blog: ask readers
• Look for co-authors. Guest posts. You may be surprised!
• if it’s getting stale, try some alternative approaches:
– Interviews, podcasts, surveys or polls
– Video or other media embedding, live blogging
• ...be creative, and copy other people
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Wikis
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cogdog/1627257/
Wikis
• Wikis are collaborative Web-based authoring tools –read
state and write state
• They can be used for:
– team work and collaborative papers (avoiding emailed
MS Word file around)
– Note-taking and social discussions at events
– As an easy way to set up a group Web site
– A great e-learning tool
• Uses a simple markup language (wikitext or wikisyntax)
• Ability to compare previous versions of a page, revert back
and track who edited the page
• Many allow users to discuss issues prior to making changes
• Increasing popularity in the public sector
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Wikipedia
• Easy to create
• Provides high-profile
information (Googlefriendly)
• Allows the
community to
enhance and
develop content
• Is time your library
had an entry?
• Who will edit it?
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Wiki Issues
• Vandalism, spam
• Wiki etiquette
• Searching (more tagging needed), archiving (ephemeral),
organisation of pages – no heirarchy
• Mark up – no standardisation…yet – training implications
• Stopping your wiki from becoming an unmaintained
storehouse of out-of-date information!
• Organisational Culture - Freedom to move away from usual
design, protocols, habits
• Resources - Staff training, time, costs
• How will librarians add wikis and blogs to their collections?
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Potential for Libraries
“At their best, they can become true community resources
that can position the library as a an online hub of their local
community”
Meredith Farkas
• Book reviews, FAQs
• Comments section, suggestion box
• Commonly asked questions (reference or general library)
• Local history, personal stories
• Course collaboration, e-portfolios
• Library project work, input for research work
• Workshops
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Social Web
Social Networks
• Sharing and community are what Web 2.0 is all about
• Some of the most famous networks are MySpace, Facebook,
del.icio.us, Frappr and Flickr
• Library is a social network in itself so the implications for it
are huge
• Tagging – allows users to add keywords to items
– Created by groups/communities who are the resource users
– Natural language – common understanding
– No hierarchy, feedback
• RSS Feeds
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Sharing - Flickr
• Web 2.0 includes
community-building
• You can help support
your communitybuilding by making it
easy to share photos at
events (e.g. this
seminar)
• Simply suggest a tag
and encourage
delegates to upload
their photos with this
tag
• Flickr Commons
http://www.flickr.com/photos/westmontlibrary/176505152/
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Sharing – Delicious
http://del.icio.us/mariekeguy/rsc-eastern-200802/
• Another aspect of
sharing is sharing
bookmarks
• This can be used to:
– Manage your
bookmarks
– Allow others to
contribute resources
– Allow lists of
bookmarks to be
repurposed
– Carry out impact
analysis
Who
else has bookmarked this resources? What are their interests?
www.ukoln.ac.uk
(I
may have
similar
interests)
Howmanagement
many have bookmarked my resourc
A centre
of expertise
in digital
information
Sharing - Slideshare
http://www.slideshare.net/MariekeGuy
• Many other resources
can be shared e.g.:
• Slides
• Photos
• Maps
• Video
• Travel info
• Events info
• Music
• Etc.
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Google Maps/Mashups
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/web-focus/events/
workshops/webmaster-2007/maps/
http://www.talis.com/tdn/competition
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• Web 2.0 provides
valuable opportunity
to provide mapping &
location services:
– Embedding Google
maps on your Web
sites
– Developing rich
services using this
– Providing location
metadata /
microformats
which can be
processed by
simple browser
tools
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Creative Commons
Openess is a key aspect of Web 2.0: open
source; open standards and open content can
all help to bring benefits through maximising
usage
of services
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• Creative Commons
offers copyright
holders licences to
assign to their work
• The licences aim to
clarify the conditions
of use and avoid
many of the problems
current copyright
laws pose when
attempting to share
information.
• CC maximises impact
of work
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Facebook
• The Facebook platform
provides access to (a) Skype
(b) Twitter micro-blogging
service (c) mini-questions
• Facebook:
– A social networking
Web site
– Had the largest number
of registered users
among college-focused
sites with over 30
million members
worldwide
– Ranked between top
10–20 Web sites
– Seventh most visited
site in the US
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0
Podcasts
• Podcasts are syndicated
MP3 files
• New items in a podcast
http://www.podanza.com/podcast/...can appear
automatically in your
Podcast client (e.g. iPod)
or RSS reader
• Resources can be
accessed via iTunes
The University of Bath won a European award for its podcasts from guest
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lecturers,
etc. We can regard this as maximising impacts of the ideas and
promoting
the University,
little
cost management
A centre
of expertise inat
digital
information
Web 2.0
Communication
http://www.gabbly.com/
• Realtime discussion is
a key part of the Web
2.0 and the .net
generation (IM, SMS…)
• Can be used by
patrons, chat
reference services with
transcript
• How much effort does
it take to provide an
instant messaging
service for your
library?
• Try Gabbly.com
• What about Skype?
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Micro Blogs
Twitter
• Twitter:
– Best known of the microblogging applications
– Web application, with
desktop & mobile clients
• Uses:
– Community-building
– Support from your peers
– Answers to questions
– Ideas
– Marketing
– …
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Do It Yourself (20 Minutes)
• Time try out some of the applications that have been
mentioned
• Try to keep in mind how this could be applied in your
working environment
• Any problems just communicate in the chat area
http://rsc-eastern-200802.wetpaint.com/page/Tasks
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Discussion (10 Minutes)
So what are the challenges of Web 2.0 for information
professionals?
1.
The top 5 challenges for the information Professionals community?
http://rsc-eastern200802.wetpaint.com/page/Challenges
2.
Possible ways that you can meet these challenges
http://rsc-eastern200802.wetpaint.com/page/Meeting_Challenges
Best to write thoughts in notepad, refresh wiki page, paste
onto wiki then save
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Librarian/IP Stereotypes
• They think they know better than the user e.g. they don't
like people using Google Scholar; they should use Web of
Knowledge
• They think that users should be forced to learn boolean
searching and other formal search techniques because this
is good for them
• They don't want the users to search for themselves (
folksonomies) because they won't get it right.
• They want to classify the entire Web - despite the fact
that users don't use their lists of Web links
• They want services to be perfect before they release them
to users. They are uneasy with the concept of 'forever
beta' (they don't believe that users have the ability to
figure things out themselves and work around the bugs).
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Web 2.0 Backlash
• When significant new things appear:
– Enthusiasts / early adopters predict a transformation of
society
– Sceptics outline the limitations & deficiencies
• There’s a need to:
– Promote the benefits to the wider community (esp.
those willing to try if convinced of benefits)
– Be realistic and recognise limitations
– Address inappropriate criticisms, avoid the chasm in the
Gartner curve
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Library 2.0
• Paul Miller stated that he saw Web 2.0 as being about:
– freeing of data, remixing and the opening up of the long
tail
– the building of virtual applications,
– participation, sharing, communication and facilitating
community
– applications that work for the user, are modular and are
smart
• Web 2.0 + Library = Library 2.0
• With Web 2.0 libraries have an opportunity to work their
wealthwill
of bypass
data harder
and serve
their existing
audiences
Warning: Users
processes
and institutions
that
they perceive to
better
be slow, unresponsive,
unappealing and irrelevant in favour of a more
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direct approach
to services offered by others that just might be 'good
centre
of expertise
in digital
information management
enough' Afor
what
they need
to do.
Safe Experimentation
• Are you interested in using Web 2.0 in your organisation?
• Worried about corporate inertia, power struggles, etc?
• What you need is a deployment strategy:
– Addressing business needs
– Low-hanging fruits
– Encouraging the enthusiasts
– Gain experience of the browser tools – and see what
you’re missing!
– Staff training and development
– Address areas you feel comfortable with
– Risk management strategy
– …
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Deployment Challenges
Staff Development
http://podcasts.alablog.org/blog/
_archives/2006/4/12/1881517.html
• There's a need for your staff
to:
– Understand what Web
2.0 is about
– Learn how to make use
of Web 2.0
• This is all subject to
constraints of lack of time;
resources; etc.
• The Library 2.0 Podcasts
Web sites provides a useful
resources for learning about
new tools, techniques, etc.
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Some Low Hanging Fruit…
http://www.librarything.com/
• Librarything provides a good
example of a Web 2.0
service:
– Catalogue your books
– AJAX interface
– Exploit data provided by
the community
– Export capabilities
– Other books you may like
– Implications for reader
recommendations
– …
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Other Ideas
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
RSS feeds, create them and use them
Wikipedia
Secondlife, Cybrary city
Slideshare
Bookmarks - del.icio.us, citeulike, connotea
Librarylookup – Library mashups
Folksonomies – different ways of organising information
YouTube – video, streaming of video
OPACs - Think of your library system as “an interlocking set
of functional components rather than a monolithic black
box” – Plinkit (Public Library Interface Kit)
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A centre of expertise in digital information management
Risk Managment
• Take a risk management approach to your evaluation of
Web 2.0 technologies (as we do with IWMW)
– Establish Agreements
– Use well-established services: Google & Delicious are
well-established and have financial security.
– Notification: warnings that services could be lost.
– Engagement: with the user community: users actively
engage in the evaluation of the services.
– Provision of alternative services
– Use in non-mission critical areas: not for bookings!
– Long term experiences of services: usage stats
– Availability of alternative sources of data: e.g. standard
Web server log files.
– Data export and aggregation: RSS feeds, aggregated in
Suprglu, OPML viewers, etc.
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Conclusions
• Web 2.0 can provide real benefits for our users, however
organisations tend to be conservative
• We therefore need:
– Advocacy
– To listen to users' concerns
– To address users' concerns e.g. risk management
– A change of culture
• We can all benefit by adopting Web 2.0 principles of
openness and sharing. So let us
– Share our advocacy resources, risk management
techniques, etc.
– Develop your own social network based on openness,
trust, collaboration, ..
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management
Questions?
www.ukoln.ac.uk
A centre of expertise in digital information management