From Thursday's Globe & Mail:

News for paranoiacs

"“In Utah, the National Security Agency is building a $2-billion [U.S.] storage facility that will house and analyze all forms of electronic communication … a potential yottabyte of everyone's (formerly) personal data,” Gizmodo.com reports. “So how big is a yottabyte? CrunchGear puts it well: ‘There are a thousand gigabytes in a terabyte, a thousand terabytes in a petabyte, a thousand petabytes in an exabyte, a thousand exabytes in a zettabyte, and a thousand zettabytes in a yottabyte.' … To be fair, the yottabyte figure is just one estimate generated by a Pentagon think tank. The facility could hold a mere hundreds of petabytes. But either way, the prospect is as unsustainable as it is frightening. This one facility will burn through as much electricity as the entirety of Salt Lake City. All this data comes from the book The Secret Sentry: The Untold History of the National Security Agency by Matthew M. Aid.”"

Hmmmm. With our head office in Utah maybe we can get this into the OPAC!

Just kiddin'

Stephen

mashers
Originally uploaded by Alice SnearyHere in Seattle at the WorldCat Mashathon Seattle. Great ideas and questions coming out. This morning we're building some lightweight apps with Yahoo Pipes and most of us are finding success!

Here's a great idea:

Lbrary Research Service has provided this:

Peer-Based Return on Investment Calculator

(for public libraries)

Try it out!

And don't forget the November 17th open and free SirsiDynix Institute on ROI with Ulla de Stricker:

We can count 'em...but do they count? Challenges in assessing ROI from information services

Register Today.

Stephen

Campus Technology website has an interesting summary of their webinar and some research:

Most College Students To Take Classes Online by 2014

1. "Nearly 12 million post-secondary students in the United States take some or all of their classes online right now."
2. "This number will skyrocket to more than 22 million in the next five years, according to data released recently by research firm Ambient Insight."
3. "Some 1.25 million students in higher education programs take all of their classes online, while another 10.65 take some of their classes online. The two groups are still outnumbered by students who take all of their courses in physical classrooms, which Ambient Insight reckoned at 15.14 million as of 2009."
4. "This situation will change drastically by 2014, at which time, Adkins forecast, only 5.14 million students will take all of their courses in a physical classroom, while 3.55 million will take all of their classes online, and 18.65 million will take some of their classes online."

Despite the recession, online learning is still growing. This research implies that the context for libraries in academic and college settings will transform very rapidly in the next five years, which isn't a very big window.

Stephen

I don’t want to interact with my hard drive; I want to interact with my friends. [litl :: philosophy] The Litl webbook can be used in two configurations: like a traditional laptop, with full keyboard, used to surf the Web; or flipped upright, like an easel or picture frame, for broadcast of photo and video. The [...]

On Monday night I had a unique and exciting dinner. It was with two of my grade school librarians, Ms Baird and Ms Carter. I had been anticipating dinner with them for weeks. I was very excited. I hadn't seen them in about 37 years.

You see, libraries saved my life. I was the nerdy, small (tiny actually - always the smallest boy in the class) kid who read. I didn't play sports at all. My social skills were a little off (and probably still are). That meant that playground bullying and beatings were the norm. That's part of the reason why I ended up in the school library. I was able to volunteer from grade 5 on with Mrs. Channen and that meant every day before and after school and at lunch. I never had a tan! I also learned to love and feel comfortable in libraries from an early age. I knew that the library was the place to go since I had been using the local public library at our old house regularly and felt safe there too. When my family moved I discovered that the library was the only anchor I trusted as a consistently safe place to read and learn. My bike ride to the far off public library branch was a godsend.

In high school I joined the Library Club and finally grew a lot in grade 9/10 (almost a foot in height over 10 months). I was lucky because my high school library was building a new library wing on stilts over the front door which was to open in grade 10 and it would be staffed by 4 school librarians and two secretaries supporting a school with three tracks (tech, general, academic) and almost 3,500 students. You can imagine that this was a very busy library where automation didn't exist beyond the Selectric. I'll never forget the day we moved all the books using a single chain of students who passed the books from one wing to another and up the stairs and still maintained the order perfectly. A huge library was moved lickety-split. My community also built a huge regional branch of the public library across the street and I spent many evenings there too.

How did we meet again? Well, recently I was at a party given by a friend (and great librarian) to celebrate his first ten years in Canada. It was a lot of fun and I met someone there with whom I had a conversation. He was 80 years old and had gotten his library degree in the same year of graduation as me, 1980. What a coincidence, I said, we're both coming up on our 30th anniversaries. I asked him what did you do before that? He had been a professional choreographer. I asked him if I might have seen any of his productions. He mentioned a few and then mentioned that he had done some high school choreography work too. I finally recognized him as Cliff, the choreographer who had done all of our amazing high school extravaganzas (Finian's Rainbow, King & I, Music Man...). What a small world! I knew that he had been good friends with my favourite school librarians so I asked after them, since I had been unsuccessful at ever finding them. He was still good friends with them and I gave him my card. I heard from Ms Baird, now Campbell, by e-mail the next day. We reconnected and decided to meet for dinner. (My brain was going OMG, OMG OMG. I am a little excitable - little ADHD Stephen still comes out to play occasionally.)

So, on Monday Ms (Baird) Campbell drove down to my neighbourhood and I learned that it was where she grew up. Ms Carter came in from out of town and came with Ms Campbell. My wife was there too (we met in the same high school and she performed in the school band for the musicals. If you watch closely in Saturday Night Live re-runs you can see our school bandleader's name on the wall at SNL.)

I recognized them right away. They looked the same! They quickly became Nora and Judy.
The time flew. We shared stories. I learned about their lives. We gossiped about other personalities in the school. Nora headed another Toronto high school library for 28 years and her two boys are very well educated. She still works part time in a school library. Judy has retired to her home town. I can't believe that they were both only in their early twenties when they made such a difference in my life as an awkward teen. They were always there to talk and advise - on homework, life, whatever.

So, if there are any school or public librarians out there working with kids and teens. Just remember that people remember you and what you do - even when they're 55 and old like me. This was a really big reconnection for me and I've been absorbing it all week. Somehow it was easier to find Little Stephen in myself this time and recognize that he made it through. Sometimes Big Stephen needs to remember that the bullying made him stronger and that he chose librarianship because he saw the difference librarians and libraries make in people's lives - especially his own. There will always be bullies in life and I learned to avoid them at a young age and, when they show up, not to let them deflect you from your path. Some people build up and develop and some people tear people down. I've been involved in almost every sector of librarianship in some way and the best librarians are those who build, lift people up, and encourage the heart. There is a huge gulf between critical thinking and criticism. I love what we do and how librarians can practice everywhere and what a huge difference we make to society when we choose to.

My school librarians did that for me and started me on the path.

Thank you:

Nora (Baird) Campbell
Judy Carter
Marilyn Moore
Margaret Tucker
Mrs. Channen
and hundreds of public and academic librarians too.

It takes a village to raise Stephen.

Stephen

Haven't we all seen all of these rules broken?

From CIO.com

Smartphone Etiquette: Five Unspoken Rules for the Holidays

Rule 1: If you must text, head to the bathroom
Rule 2: Thou must not use the iPhone during religious events
Rule 3: Three's a crowd on a date
Rule 4: Holiday parties are a time for socializing, not social networking
Rule 5: Turn off your iPhone before it becomes a turn-off

The article has some tongue in cheeky comments.

Stephen

Recommended Article:

Building Searcher Personas For Greater Customer Engagement and Acquisition by Vanessa Fox

It's from O'Reilly Radar and has a business flavour, but anyone can make the leap to the public sector.

Stephen

Lee Rainie sent me the latest Pew Internet and American Life press release which outlines research that blows holes in the proposition that people in social networks are socially isolated and geeky:

Social Isolation and New Technology
Nov 4, 2009

(Washington) People who use modern information and communication technologies have larger and more diverse social networks, according to new national survey findings that for the first time explore how people use the internet and mobile phones to interact with key family and friends.

These new finding challenge fears that use of new technologies has contributed to a long-term increase in social isolation in the United States.

The new findings from the Pew Internet & American Life Project show that, on average, the size of people’s discussion networks – those with whom people discuss important matters– is 12% larger amongst mobile phone users, 9% larger for those who share photos online, and 9% bigger for those who use instant messaging. The diversity of people’s core networks – their closest and most significant confidants – tends to be 25% larger for mobile phone users, 15% larger for basic internet users, and even larger for frequent internet users, those who use instant messaging, and those who share digital photos online.

The survey was conducted by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication, led by Keith N. Hampton, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Communication and the Pew Internet Project.

The survey also probed larger issues related to the extent of social isolation in America: At one level, the results challenge previous work. The Pew Internet survey found that Americans are not as isolated as has been previously reported and social isolation has hardly changed since 1985. Only 6% of the adult population has no one with whom they can discuss important matters or who they consider to be “especially significant” in their life.

At another level, the findings confirm that Americans’ discussion networks have shrunk by about a third since 1985 and have become less diverse because they contain fewer non-family members. However, contrary to the widespread speculation that the new technology is tied to shrinking social networks and declining network diversity, the Pew Internet study finds that ownership of a mobile phone and participation in a variety of internet activities are associated with larger and more diverse core discussion networks.

“There is a tendency by critics to blame technology first when social change occurs,” argued Prof. Keith Hampton, the lead author of the Pew Internet report, Social Isolation and New Technology. “This is the first research that actually explores the connection between technology use and social isolation and we find the opposite. It turns out that those who use the internet and mobile phones have notable social advantages. People use the technology to stay in touch and share information in ways that keep them socially active and connected to their communities.”

Here are some of the other key findings in the Pew Internet report:

•Some have worried that internet use limits people’s participation in their local communities, but the Pew Internet report finds that most internet activities have little or a positive relationship to local activity. For instance, internet users are as likely as anyone else to visit with their neighbors in person. Cell phone users, those who use the internet frequently at work, and bloggers are more likely to belong to a local voluntary association, such as a youth group or a charitable organization. However, we find some evidence that use of social networking services (e.g., Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn) substitutes for some neighborhood involvement.

•Challenging the assumption that internet use encourages social contact across vast distances, this study shows that many internet technologies are used as much for local contact as they are for distant communication.

•Internet use does not pull people away from public places. Rather, use is associated with frequent visits to places such as parks, cafes, and restaurants, the kinds of locales where research shows that people are likely to encounter a wider array of people and diverse points of view. Indeed, internet access has become a common component of people’s experiences within many public spaces. For instance, of those Americans who have been in a library within the past month, 38% logged on to the internet while they were there, 18% have done so in a café or coffee shop.

•People’s mobile phone use outpaces their use of landline phones as a primary method of staying in touch with their closest family and friends, but face-to-face contact still trumps all other methods. On average in a typical year, people have in-person contact with their core network ties on about 210 days; they have mobile-phone contact on 195 days of the year; landline phone contact on 125 days; text-messaging contact on the mobile phone 125 days; email contact 72 days; instant messaging contact 55 days; contact via social networking websites 39 days; and contact via letters or cards on 8 days.

•Social media activities are associated with several beneficial social activities, including having discussion networks that are more likely to contain people from different backgrounds. For instance, frequent internet users, and those who maintain a blog are much more likely to confide in someone who is of another race. Those who share photos online are more likely to report that they discuss important matters with someone who is a member of another political party.

•While participation in traditional social settings, like neighborhoods, voluntary organizations, and public spaces, remain the strongest predictors for the overall diversity of people’s social networks, internet use, and specifically use of social networking services like Facebook, are also associated with knowing more people from a wider variety of backgrounds.

“All the evidence points in one direction,” said Prof. Hampton. “People’s social worlds are enhanced by new communication technologies. It is a mistake to believe that internet use and mobile phones plunge people into a spiral of isolation.”

Read the full report here [84 page PDF].

This matches some research on the hypothesis that gamers aren't social either. People keep finding new ways to pigeonhole and be prejudiced. It's great when people try to see if its true.

Stephen

LIS Students from the University of Toronto are drumming up support for their participation in the A Dare to Remember AIDS awareness campaign by walking around Toronto and photographing people with a giant I ♥ librarians sign. I ♥ this project! Check out the I ♥ librarians photostream on flickr because there are some great [...]

Duct Tape University is beta testing a new social media training course for enterprises to use social media in their strategies.

Social Media Pro Coaching.

The course outline is interesting and I'd love to find the time to take it.

You can read more here too.

Stephen

Are you looking to host or try an unconference?

I had a great time at the half day unconference at Internet Librarian and host at Monterey Public Library.

Anyway, this slideshare from Allen County Library is excellent and shares the detail of how to organize one:

Library Camp: How to run an unconference at your library

Stephen

Great video! The patron comments speak VOLUMES about the services of this library. What would your users say?