Socialites

I have to say, I find wikis very useful for content and such a pain to create. It just always feels awkward and I'm not sure why. Part of it is that you have to consider navigation as you create, I think - pages need to link to other pages as well as be linked from others, so there's a lot of editing involved, trying to figure out how it all slots together and what people will be looking for next. The benefits of a wiki is that with so many connections, you can pretty much follow a stream of consciousness to learn more information. (Best observed when you realize you've lost an hour going from wikipedia page to wikipedia page.)

Heather has talked about wanting to do a website with storytime song and rhyme videos, and I really like how this library uses their wiki to do that: Tell Me a Story. You can find songs easily through categories or alphabetic lists, and each song page has recommended similar songs as well as links to back to categories it belongs in.

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I adore twitter. So easy to keep up (provided you don't go overboard on followers), so easy to update. It's not for everyone, I understand, and it's easy to get lost in a sea of obnoxious updates. I have a mix of librarianship and friendship people listed and use it accordingly. This probably violates some twitter social rules, but I am too lazy to manage more than one account and no one has complained yet.

I love the creativity that the medium forces - it's hard to be witty and/or smart and/or interesting in 140 characters or less, especially consistently, but some people manage well. I only linked Betty, but all the Mad Men characters have accounts - during the season, they will chat back and forth, or hold parties, which is great. I also just learned that Clara Barton is "live" tweeting the Civil War, via the National Park Service. The first bullet was just fired on Fort Sumter 12 hours ago. Nifty.

It is also a very easy way to push information to people - I like hearing about events, sales, brand new books, etc straight from the brands without having to go hunting. I like being able to surprise people with book recommendations or answers to questions thrown out into the twittersphere. I can also choose to get text messages when certain accounts update, which can be very handy.

I think we have a nice balance on the OPPL account - there's three of us posting (me, Sharon and Monica, with Anne rejoining soon) - and we are able to push events, answer questions and just chat with our patrons, all of which is appreciated. Ten Ways Twitter Will Benefit Your Library sums it up pretty well. Also see: The four stages of understanding twitter.

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I think the article overstates the importance of having a Facebook, but since we do have one, I wish we used it better. It's missing the social aspect that our twitter has, and I agree with Rory that we need to engage the patrons who are there more. I think we could ask questions, share reviews, share links, solicit opinions, etc. Why didn't we post asking for snapshot quotes there? We're half-hearting it there, and it shows.

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One great thing about Library Thing is that it offers you recommendations based on the books you add and the tags you give it. There's also a quick link to Project Gutenberg, and it tells you if there's a copy available there without any clicking required. I like that a lot. I like the idea behind it quite a bit, but the thought of actually cataloguing my own collection is overwhelming. I'll stick with GR, which serves my purposes pretty well.

I do like the idea of using LT for book reviews/recommendations for patrons, though. In addition to the automatically generated recs, we could add our own read-alikes. I think it might work as a replacement for the staff recs page, which I generally forget exists. An LT widget on the home page would be neat.

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My best friend loves to go on Yahoo Answers and answer math questions (she's an accountant, and a geek). I hadn't tried it before, but I liked the idea as suggested at ILA. There is a books and authors section, and a homework help, which could be a good place to start. Like Rory, I haven't responded to any under the authority of a librarian, but maybe some day. I think it's a great way to remind people that librarians are there to help with any kind of question.