Knowledge database
Submitted by katharinapenner on Sun, 2007-02-25 21:15.
During one of our first chat sessions someone mentioned that blogs can be viewed as a kind of a knowledge database. I am beginning to realise the truth of it. Blogs on this site extensively reflect on various aspects of the materials we view, read and discuss throughout the week and this way collect the best ideas on social software by some 40 really smart and engaged people. For me, these blogs are a way to verbalise my thinking, unfinished as it may be, on what social software may mean for our imperfect library. (Maybe in the end I will just have to search the blog and the final project will simply emerge from the collected contents?!)
I really like the webcasts and how practical and down-to-earth they are designed. As a small institution offering degrees in only one study area, in theology (though with different specializations), we will certainly never produce as many blogs with RSS feeds as large universities, presented in some examples. But there are other very realistic and helpful uses of RSS. For example, to have a blog (or better, four blogs, one for each of the degree specialisations) on recently added materials together with an RSS feed would definitely benefit our students and faculty (U of Alberta example). Last Thursday we have downloaded and configured Moodle, a course management software. While the professors are in the process of designing their courses, I will start planning the library section in Moodle. What a perfect chance to integrate right from the beginning as much social software as possible! I am thinking, for example, of adding RSS feeds to subject guides, of getting users hooked on Del.icio.us and this way „tame the web“ (name of a blog to whose RSS I have subscribed) a bit in the area of quality theological materials on the Internet for shared use as well as for pushing to each other materials in the area of one’s research (doctoral students). Instead of a Table-of-Contents service that never really took off in our library, is seems so much easier to use already existing services. I am planning to collect a list of journals that have RSS feeds, mark journals to which we subscribe and include especially open access journals in religion and theology (what a great idea of the U of Saskatchewan).
I feel a bit overwhelmed because there are so many ideas but so little time and so little expertise to actually do it right away. And each week more suggestions and examples are waiting to be explored...
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Katharina, no need to feel
Katharina, no need to feel overwhelmed. This is the time to take all of it in and see what sounds like the best fit at your library. Even if you do your proposal on one tool, it's not like you absolutely have to implement it. Maybe later on you'll realize a wiki would be a better tool than RSS and that's just fine. This is the time for processing what you're thinking about these tools, and it sounds like RSS would have some really great applications at your institution.
It's never a good idea to jump into implementing social software in your library anyways. It's important to think about how it will be managed, if you need policies, if you need training, how to sustain the project, etc. Take your time and process these ideas. Come back to them again after the course is over. I've seen too many blogs abandoned after six months and empty pages that would have had del.icio.us links from the library on them if the librarians had continued to bookmark things.
No one is going to be able to make all of these things happen at their library. I can't recreate what the University of Alberta did with catalog RSS feeds at my library either. Perhaps in the future that will become easier to do. One way to make that happen without using your catalog is to catalog your new books in LibraryThing and then use the RSS feed from that to populate a new books page. That's what the Washington State Library did. Here's their blog (see the new books list in the sidebar) and here's their LibraryThing page. For those of us who don't know programming languages and aren't allowed to muck around in our catalogs, this is a great alternative option.
Cincinnati Hills Christian
Cincinnati Hills Christian Academy is a non-denominational Christian high school of 420 students. The Christian Studies Dept is comprised largely of Ph.D. graduates and candidates studying at Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati, OH. Each faculty member teaches a required and graded course: freshman-Old Testament Covenant, sophomore-History of Christianity, junior-Christian Thought, and Senior: choice of-origins, nature of scripture, ethics, world religions.
Like you, I am thinking about incorporating social software tools into the library program. I would like to share links from del.icio.us for research e.g. virtual religion index, include RSS Feeds to keep the Web site current and interesting such www.christianitytoday.com/help/features/rss.html on Books & Culture and www.sojo.net on Faith, Politics, and Culture. It is interesting that institutions like Harvard (on NPR) have recently recognized that religion needs to be included its curriculum because of the part religion plays in today's world. See The Mighty and the Almighty by Madeleine Albright. Blogs might prove useful to evaluate what works and what doesn't in the research process, a research log so to speak Just a few ideas to consider as we go forward.