SPLAT - Special Projects Library Action Team

I don't use a lot of social media (I won't bore you with all the reasons here),
but one of the sites I actually do love is Goodreads. Goodreads is a great site
for readers, helping participants keep track of what they read and to find
suggestions through other readers.

There are other book lover's cataloguing sites out there - Library Thing and Shelfari
being two of the most popular - but I have been using (and enjoying) Goodreads
for awhile. And, instead of writing a long page of pros and cons, I'm going to
be lazy and make a bulleted list for the highlights.*

Things to like as a Reader:

• It's completely free.

• You can be as active as you like. If you just want to keep a list of books, without
  rating or reviewing them, you can. At the other end of the spectrum, you can rate,
  review, send specific recommendations to friends, comment on friends' reviews,
  participate in live chats with authors, and even arrange for book swaps.

• They have an app, keeping you connected on virtually any device.

• The reviews actually mean something. You can get reviews from Amazon or
  B&N, but half the time, those reviews are more about the retailer (or the
  other reviewers). For the most part, reviews on Goodreads are useful when I'm
  trying to decide what to read.

• The recommendations engine is pretty decent. They take a look at your ratings
  in standard genres and will give you somewhat personalized suggestions. (And
  this part might get even better if they continue to work with the booklamp.org
  guys, who literally scan books for their DNA.)

• You can see what your friends are reading. And, sometimes snarkily (I'm sure
  that's a word) comment on their choices.

• They offer book giveaways, and authors have their own pages/blogs so that you
  can get first-hand information on what's new. There are also groups you can
  join who want to talk about books on specific topics.

• You don't feel as if you have to log in everyday! Or get sucked into the time-suck-warp (I'm looking at you, Pinterest).
  

• They have some interactive features like the never-ending book quiz, reading
  challenges, and the year-end best books voting activity. And you can ignore
  these features or go hog-wild.

• You can tie Goodreads into your Facebook or Twitter account.

Things to like as a Librarian:

• You can keep track of what I've read. You know the feeling - a patron approaches
  and asks you for a good book in a certain genre and you go completely blank.
  This way, you can quickly scan through your shelves for a good suggestion.

• Patrons can keep track of what they read. Anytime I see a patron with a
  notebook full of scraps of paper with book titles, I sweetly mention Goodreads.
  

• You can create a page for your Library. Last year, we used our Goodreads Group
  page for Summer Reading, where people could post their reviews instead of
  filling out a physical form. In the future, I want to experiment with doing a
  Book Club online. You can also post videos or create polls on your Group page.

• If you have NoveList or NoveList Plus, results are linked into Goodreads. And
  if you have NoveList Select, those Goodreads reviews can be linked to your
  catalog.

• Because authors are using Goodreads for promotion, you have even greater access
  to them - in fact, some will even chat via your Group page.

One caveat:

Like every other social media, there are people on Goodreads who probably
should follow the old adage of keeping quiet if they can't say something nice. Generally,
I think most people post appropriate, relevant, and/or constructive things, but
there are a few bullies out there. (And this goes for reviewers and authors!)

If you haven't joined, at least check it out. I can't promise you won't get drawn in, but at least you'll be doing
something you enjoy and might actually use at work. Find my info at
goodreads.com/jhills.

* I do realize that I probably will have written just as much in a bulleted list as I
would have in actual paragraphs, but this is one of those fibs I tell myself
when I need to get something done.

I saw this article a while ago,and was at first tempted to dismiss it as another one of those studies that just show things are changing (I mean, things do change - that's not exactly new). But then I kept thinking about it as I used my e-reader, and I realized that
maybe there is something to this.

I recently used my Nook Color to read one of my Library's Book Club* books, and since I was the one leading the discussion, I needed to take notes and highlight. I found that using my Nook to do this really frustrated me. It's not that it was too difficult, but if I didn't highlight correctly, it took a minute or so to undo and then fix it. Adding notes wasn't that hard either, but locating those notes afterwards is not exactly instant.

As the article mentions, some people (like me, apparently) remember things in a physical book in a spatial way. I will remember a note or a highlight based on where I was - say, a half an inch from the end. Or, I'll draw a frowny face near a quote that emphasizes an evil character. It's not easy** to do that with an e-reader. So, as much as I love using my Nook for reading and other things, I doubt I'll use it again for notes for Book Club.

Which brings me back to why I thought this article would be interesting for SPLAT. Do you think that students today who use electronic texts are adapting better than some of the digital immigrants? How does this play into our e-book collection development? Or, am I just too Old School with my yellow highlighter pen and post-its?

* First rule of Book Club is to talk about Book Club. Sorry - I couldn't resist...

** Well, at least not easily removed, anyway, especially if you're fond of Sharpies.

SPLAT presented at ILA Region IV (that's the Magic Valley region, y'all) last Thursday, and we had a good time sharing some really cool web tools. Jezmynne shared her experiences with Last Pass and a few other password managers; you can find her previous SPLAT post here. And Heidi gave us a quick and dirty introduction to Pinterest, which definitely piqed my interest. I talked about Diigo.

What is Diigo, you ask? Well, it's a fun little tool designed to be a step beyond a simple bookmarking site. I have loved Delicious, but often want to label things (or simply remind myself why I saved a site in the first place). With Diigo, you can highlight items on a site, even capture photos or other graphics, write sticky notes, and then share them with a group. This works really well when you want to work collaboratively but hate to have to email someone every time you want to share a site.*

Another neat thing about Diigo is that it's saved in "the cloud" (I totally want an echoing microphone every time I say that phrase). You can access your notes and saved sites from most mobile devices - and you can save things to read later. You can even upload stuff from your phone - like notes or photos - to research when you get home or wherever your laptop is living.

Since you can create folders and groups, Diigo can help you streamline a project, or in my case, help you remember what was so cool about the site you saved at 3 AM. I use this at home when I come across an idea that I think would be great for the library, but don't have the time to delve into it (usually at the aforementioned time of 3 AM). But I can also see how teacher librarians could use this to help gather resources for a subject or class. Can you guys think of any other great ways?

*First, I love footnotes - just warning you. Second, if you click onto Diigo's website, they have a short, albeit dorky-looking, video that explains some of this. The information you glean is interesting, but the execution leaves something to be desired...