SPLAT - Special Projects Library Action Team

Last weekend I returned to the US with an entirely different perspective on my access to information.  I had just spent the week at the PNLA Conference in Victoria, BC where connectivity was a major challenge for me.

When I've traveled in the US, Ive always been confident that hotels and convention centers will offer me free, reliable wifi.  I admit now that I was incredibly naive as I crossed the border between 2010 and the 1980s.   

I, unfortunately, was so caught up in getting ready for, and getting to, the conference that I forgot to plan ahead--I forgot to arrange for international calling and data transfer for my iphone.  It was quite the shocker to be able to turn on my phone once landing in Canada to be told by my trusted, omnipresent phone, that I have no coverage.  I was then advised that data transfer would by $15+ per certain amount of data transferred if I accessed the web.  Airplane mode went right back on at that point!

I stayed at the historic Empress Hotel--which was lovely but did not offer wifi access.  Nor did it readily offer internet access--it was a land line and cost $15.64 Canadian per 24 hours.  I grumbled and bemoaned my fate and ponied up the credit card number.  i needed to access all that information I had so cleverly stored in the "cloud" for portability!  I whined to my fellow board members--who told me that the conference planners had been unable to negotiate internet access for conference attendees at the hotel or at the conference center for anyone except 1 presenter per room.  (I must have missed that vital piece of info during a board meeting.)  On a good note, I could join the hotel's VIP club and then get free internet access.  Well, for some reason I couldn't do it from inside the bubble of what I had paid for so I waited until the conference started and signed up at the internet cafe.  (Thank the heavens for internet cafes at conferences!!!!)  I found out that wifi was offered in limited ways to conference attendees for the pre-conferences and that because of a horrible technological glitch that day, attendees in a particular session were refunded their preconference fees by the conference center.  Then, sometime during the conference the conference center began offering wifi.  I found out about this on the last day of the conference at the end of the conference sessions when i was thanking the internet cafe vendor for their services.  i told him my story and he said he'd been using wifi all day! 

So, what is the moral of my story?  What great truths were revealed to me?  Well, I learned that I really should plan better for international travel.  I learned that I am way too dependent upon my phone and computers for what I need (and yes, I am chagrined to admit that).  I was lucky enough to recall the 1980s when technology was only just becoming available to the masses.  The internet was not available to the public yet.  I was forced to "look up" and be more involved in my sessions rather than tweeting and blogging about them while they happened.  In some ways I was more engaged and in others i was thinking to myself--"wow that was great! I wish I could share that with folks RIGHT NOW!"   I'm glad I was reminded of how far we've come, but ever-so-thankful to be connected again!

Did you miss the PNLA/WLA conference in Victoria, B.C.?  Many of the conference presentations and handouts are available at http://nwcentral.org,a local library continuing education clearinghouse.  The easiest way to see all the PNLA/WLA materials is to enter pnla/wla into the search
box. 

I'm grateful to Hofstra's "Ernster the Library Cat" blog for this link to a New York Times article about a new hybrid blogging/networking site called tumblr.  It seems to have attracted some major media participants.  May be worth a look.

Here's the link:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9407EEDA143CF931A3575BC0A...

I'm grateful to Hofstra's "Ernster the Library Cat" blog for this link to a New York Times article about a new hybrid blogging/networking site called tumblr.  It seems to have attracted some major media participants.  May be worth a look.

Here's the link:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9407EEDA143CF931A3575BC0A...

Want to let people text reference questions to your library? Now is a great time!

Wow, there are now so many services you can use for text message reference, and so many reasons to do it, I wonder why people are not doing it! First of all, almost everybody texts. Secondly almost all younger people text. Thirdly, some texting options are free or super close to free.Oh, but you also need to know that SMS stands for "short message service" and it also means texting. Texting=SMS. Yup.

Why do it?

• Librarians can provide more value added answers than ChaCha
• Librarians provide more value added answers, and cost less, than KGB
• Google's texting an answer service only really provides crappy answers
• 88% of all teens are texters (Pew Internet)
• 65% of all adults send or receive text messages (US Census/LA Times)
• Go where your users are!

Check out some of the libraries offering a text message service: http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Libraries_Offering_SMS_Reference_Services

Things to think about:

• Who is your audience? Teens? Public? Students?
• How can you market it to them?
• Can you market this service on a regular basis (it helps)?
• How much money can you spend? some are free, some have minimal costs with perks!
• decide on a service: use InfoQuest - a consortium or Google Voice or Springshare's product or  something else
• Determine staffing: will reference desk people staff it? Staff in their offices?
• Determine the hours available: one cool thing about the Springshare product is that it offers after hours auto replies to say that the library will get to the question in the morning!
• Will this service replace an existing service? Keep in mind that some research shows that offering many virtual reference services can cause competition among them, and not compliment one another.

Phew. Got all that? What do you think? Let's talk! Post a comment below!