DrWeb's Domain

Librarian blogger keeps tabs on tech revolution | KALW

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Lost Countdown Season Six

Blogs [OCLC - Talk]

Blogs [OCLC - Talk].

Blogs

Want to know what’s on the minds of some of OCLC’s most inquisitive team members? Then make it a habit to visit OCLC’s official blogs—you can even join the conversation by posting your own comments. OCLC’s bloggers continually scan the library landscape and beyond from a variety of viewpoints, looking for news, ideas and other information of potential interest to the library community. See the latest from OCLC’s bloggers:

Metalogue
Metalogue is a forum for sharing thoughts on all things related to knowledge organization by and for libraries, hosted by Karen Calhoun, Vice President, WorldCat and Metadata Services for OCLC.

Hectic Pace
Andrew K. Pace, Executive Director for Networked Library Services, covers library systems and the state of library automation.

WorldCat Blog
A fun spot to read about what's happening on WorldCat.org and to share cool ways that people are using the site and their libraries.

It’s all good
Four OCLC staff who share personal, unvetted reflections on issues and news that impact libraries and their users—informed by their proximity to the center of the WorldCat universe.

Lorcan Dempsey’s Weblog
A look at libraries, services and networks from OCLC’s Chief Strategist and Vice President, Research.

Hanging Together
A place where some of the staff at RLG Programs, part of the OCLC Programs and Research division, a partnership of libraries, archives, and museums, can talk about the intersections we see happening between these three different types of institutions. We travel to our partners a lot and go to conferences and take note of the interesting things we see along the way. Stop in, stay awhile, and hang out. Outgoing
Thom Hickey, Chief Scientist for OCLC Research, covering library metadata techniques and trends.

Weibel Lines
Stuart Weibel, Senior Research Scientist for OCLC research, featuring ruminations on libraries and Internet standards.

025.431: The Dewey blog
News and views on classification issues, interesting and unusual DDC resources, and a means to provide ongoing feedback to help shape the DDC’s future.

BlogJunction
WebJunction’s niche in the blogosphere.

The Bloggers Among Us - 12/15/2007 - Library Journal

The Bloggers Among Us - 12/15/2007 - Library Journal.

The Bloggers Among Us
A survey of the library blogosphere shows the mainstreaming of the medium
By Meredith Farkas -- Library Journal, 12/15/2007

Say “librarian blogger,” and most people would probably imagine a tech-savvy person in his/her late 20s or early 30s, working in a technology-oriented area of the field. They might assume that bloggers are low on the career ladder and relatively new to the profession. They even might think that people who blog don't publish in the professional literature.

While this may describe some bloggers, a survey I conducted of 839 blogging librarians (see box below) depicts a much more diverse and rapidly growing population. True, most respondents are under the age of 40, but more than one-third (37%) are over 40—a significant and growing segment.

The largest groups of bloggers work not in tech but in public service areas such as reference (15%), general public services (7%), and youth services (5%). While only 6% of all library bloggers are administrators, almost 40% directly supervise other staff members, and 34% have been in the profession for more than a decade. Bloggers are also well represented in more traditional media. More than 55% of bloggers have been published in print or online journals, and 20% have been published in a peer-reviewed publication.

Good stuff, way to go for Meredith.. I'm part of that over 40 :) bloggers in libraries.. this is a useful survey and should be updated annually...

Top 25 Librarian Bloggers (By the Numbers) | OEDb

Top 25 Librarian Bloggers (By the Numbers) | OEDb.

Top 25 Librarian Bloggers (By the Numbers)
Published on Tuesday 4th of September, 2007

At OEDb, we understand the importance of libraries to education and research. In fact, we recently launched our own Library 2.0-themed blog, iLibrarian. Recently, our interest in the amount of blogs authored by librarians begged the question: which librarian bloggers have the biggest reach? With nowhere to turn to answer this question definitively, we thought it would be an interesting exercise to rank all of the biggest blogs by librarians.

In ranking the top librarian blogs, our goal was to show — using objective data from reliable sources — which blogs are the most popular, according to visitor traffic and site backlinks.

Ratz, DrWeb's Domain didn't make the lists, but then, I don't try to be "big" or "important".. my blog is an old-style "link" blog mostly, with some occasional think pieces and longer essays thrown in.. congrats to the top bloggers, they are one cool group, and yep, I read them all...

Walt at Random | Blog Archive | Public Library Blogs: 252 Examples–coming soon!

Walt at Random | Blog Archive | Public Library Blogs: 252 Examples–coming soon!.

Public Library Blogs: 252 Examples–coming soon!

The second Cites & Insights Book will appear Real Soon Now: A survey of current English-language public library blogs, mostly consisting of profiles of the blogs themselves. ...

Which blogs? Those that were listed in one of the two primary wiki lists of public library blogs as of May 2007 and that met a few basic criteria:
    * In English
    * Started before 2007 (since “young” blogs have a pretty high failure rate, and I’m interested in showing plausible successes)    
* Have at least one blog in two of the three “study months,” March, April and May 2007    
* Appear to be a blog in most key respects, or to be a blog portion of a library home page (in some cases, the blog is the homepage)

That resulted in 209 blogs from 196 libraries. I went back to each library and added other blogs (43 in all, and never more than five blogs from one library) that met the criteria but weren’t listed in the wikis.

Cool idea, and looking forward to seeing this published.. will be a good resource for those looking to start a library-based blog, or wanting to see how others are doing it...

Online Social Networks, Virtual Communities, Enterprises, and Information Professionals - Part 1. Past and Present

Online Social Networks, Virtual Communities, Enterprises, and Information Professionals - Part 1. Past and Present.

FEATURE
Online Social Networks, Virtual Communities, Enterprises, and Information Professionals — Part 1. Past and Present
by Mike Reid, Vice President, Sales and Business Development, Cognition Technologies, Inc. and Christian Gray, Senior Account Executive, Safari Books Online, LLC

Most organizations ... ours included ... are just beginning to experiment with meaningful social networking. What will it take for most of us to make the transition from business-as-usual … to business in a wired-in world of online social networking where our personal, professional, and corporate online reputations are critical to success? First and foremost ... I believe it will take the unique knowledge ... experience ... and vision of information professionals like you.
--Janice LaChance Chief Executive Officer Special Libraries Association

Building on its 10,000,000th new member, the business-centered, online social network LinkedIn adds more than 10 new members every minute [1] ; MySpace adds more than 150 new members every minute. [2] “This is a revolutionary new approach to knowledge exchange. With these tools, we have the benefit of access to everyone’s brain working on a problem,” says Charles Chaney, president and CEO of Biomedical Engineering Central [http://www.bmecentral.com]. Online social networking software allows users to discover, extend, manage, and leverage their personal networks online. As defined by Microsoft’s Social Computing Group, a virtual community is “a gathering of people in an online space where individuals come together to connect, interact, and get to know each other better over time.” We will use these definitions here. We will focus on the use of these tools for professionals working in organizations and institutions. We will not focus on consumer-oriented social networking services such as YouTube and MySpace, though the impact and interaction between consumer use of these new tools does affect enterprise use.

We Are Rantasaurus Rex, Hear Us Roar

We Are Rantasaurus Rex, Hear Us Roar.

Memorial Day Madness!
May 26th, 2007 by tyrantasaurus 

Hello, Rantasauruses! This week we had a couple firsts and it was awesome. We had our biggest day of traffic, our first time on the Top Blogs list and our first comment fight but not really because both people are extra nice and let’s keep it that way.

I’ll be back updating on Monday morning. I’m not going anywhere, I’m just turning this machine off and stepping outside or something else fancy. I’m starting to look a little translucent and the cats and I have too great of an understanding.

In the meantime, keep those submissions coming and remember, you can rant about anything anytime, you don’t have to stick to the theme. Since we’re getting such a great response, I’m officially deciding to make the Rantsplosion a bi-monthly thing instead of every week.

Funny site, rants, reminds me of Dennis Miller's stuff.. some rants not for minors.. enjoy!

Friends: Social Networking Sites for Engaged Library Services

Friends: Social Networking Sites for Engaged Library Services.

Saturday, April 28, 2007
Launch of Friends: Social Networking Sites for Engaged Library Services

Friends: Social Networking Sites for Engaged Library Services, a blog devoted to application and use of online social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace for any and all types of library-related programs or services, was officially launched on April 28, 2007. Friends will include announcements, general news, as well as citations and links to significant articles, books, and other publications about online social networking in general and their use by libraries and librarians.

Posted by Gerry at 3:47:00 PM 0 comments     Links to this post Labels: Launch

Congrats to Gerry on the launch of his new blog.. I hope it will be a useful resource site about libraries and social networking...

BioMed Central blog

BioMed Central blog.

BioMed Central blog
Tuesday Jan 30, 2007

Welcome to the BioMed Central blog

Things are moving fast at BioMed Central. The pace of change in scientific publishing is hotting up - Open Access to the scientific literature is not just a nice idea, it is becoming a practical reality. To keep you up to speed with the latest developments at BioMed Central, and to give you our take on relevant news from elsewhere, we're pleased to launch the BioMed Central blog, along with a Chemistry Central blog and a PhysMath Central blog. We'd love to hear from you, so please take advantage of the blog's comment system to have your say.

Matt Cockerill, Publisher, BioMed Central
Posted by Matthew Cockerill at 13:06    Comments (0)

TypePad Featured Blogs: Skimp

TypePad Featured Blogs: Skimp.

February 17, 2007
Skimp

Hide the credit cards, Skimp is a new blog guaranteed to turn practical, research-minded electronic lovers into the biggest impulse shoppers this side of the Pacific. Loaded with coupons, deals, and discounts on tech toys of all sorts -- from webcams to monitors, scanners to cell phones. The posts are simple and straight to the point, offering only the facts, prices, and links you need to know. There are often more than a dozen posts a day leaving readers swooning with desire. The products come from BestBuy, Circuit City, NewEgg, Tiger Direct, and even more old-school department stores like JC Penney. If you're shopping online, look here first.
Technorati Tags: bargains, electronics, shopping
Email this • Add to del.icio.us • Subscribe to this feed

Always after a good bargain, coupon, or discount, this blog featured by Typepad looks like a winner.. you can search the entries via Technorati...

So, Who Says That a Blog Has to Blare? - New York Times

So, Who Says That a Blog Has to Blare? - New York Times.

Novelties
So, Who Says That a Blog Has to Blare?
By ANNE EISENBERG, Published: February 18, 2007

MOST bloggers are not known for their reticence. One purpose of blogging, after all, is to cast personal views far and wide.

But some people who long to blog are more circumspect and may be hesitating to begin, lest details of their private lives end up indexed on Google for all to see.

Now several easy-to-use tools for setting up Web pages, with privacy filters included, are on the market. They are ideal for those who want to get their blogging feet wet quietly.

A new service, Vox (www.vox.com), offers free personal blogging sites where you can decide who will see each posted item. If you post pictures of your children, for example, you can mark them for family-member-only viewing. But if you write a book review, you may mark it for friends as well as family, or even for public viewing.

Nice article on Vox and privacy in simple blogging.. I have a free account, but so far I haven't done a lot with it.. maybe I'll experiment some over the holiday Monday...

YouTube - Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us

YouTube - Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us.

"Some of you may have already come across this video on Web 2.0 from Michael Wesch, an anthropology professor at Kansas State, but if not, it is definitely worth watching. The link showed up on Seth Godin's blog last week and has been getting enough views on YouTube. As others point out, it touches on many library 2.0 issues."
--post on Web4Lib, 2/9/07, by Emory Craig, The College of New Rochelle

Cool video, and makes you think.. this one would be great to kick off a discussion of Web 2.0 or Library 2.0 in a library technology meeting...

Google Librarian Central: Welcome to the Librarian Central blog!

Google Librarian Central: Welcome to the Librarian Central blog.

Welcome to the Librarian Central blog
Wednesday, January 17, 2007 10:09 AM
Posted By Pamela Saenger, Librarian Outreach Team

Happy New Year! It's hard to believe that 12 months have passed since we all posed with our newly-purchased cowboy hats on the Riverwalk at ALA Midwinter in San Antonio (see photo below). Since then, we've put out a number of newsletters, videos, and handouts, as well as appeared at conferences such as ALA, CLA, CSLA, NYLA, AZLA, the Charleston Conference, and others. One of our biggest undertakings in 2006 was the librarian survey, which we sent to you in October and have subsequently studied, analyzed, and dissected. Thanks again to the thousands of you who completed the survey -- your input was immeasurably helpful as we evaluated what worked and what didn't in 2006 and planned our activities for 2007.

Kudos for Google's Librarian Central.. one fine place to find out all you need to know (from the horse's mouth, so to speak..) about Google and its tools and applications for research, information-questing, and helping others use them, too.. sign-up for the Google Librarian Newsletter, free via e-mail...

ABC News: Hands on with MS, Google's New Blogging Tools

ABC News: Hands on with MS, Google's New Blogging Tools.

ABC News: Hands on with MS, Google's New Blogging Tools
Blogosphere 2.0? We dig into Google and Microsoft's blogging software updates to see what's new and what's improved.
by Davis D. Janowski - PC Magazine Aug. 16

Those who've had their own blog know all too well that formatting and uploading stuff to a blog can be a bit of a pain. Developers at both Google and Microsoft have in the past few days each announced availability of new tools to make blogging easier—albeit on a rather limited basis in terms of browser support. Google's new Blogger features are optimized for Firefox and IE6 (Safari on its way) and Microsoft's new app works only in IE (versions 6 and 7). Even so, both offerings are a big improvement on what's available now for free and show a lot of promise.

I'm trying out the Windows Live Writer (though not with this post from Firefox).. I'll have to take a look at the new Blogger beta, sounds promising...