Updated May 2010
A blog? What's that? If you've spent time with the more tech-savvy individuals in your organization, you've probably heard the term blog or blogging mentioned at some point. Blog is a shortened form of the word weblog and refers to a specific variety of website where the content is provided in an ongoing series of dated entries. These entries, or posts, are typically displayed in reverse chronological order, bringing the latest content to the top of the webpage and making new material easy to identify. In addition to requiring little or no knowledge of HTML coding to produce, weblogs are designed to facilitate easy usage and frequent updating by the author(s). The original blogs took the form of link journals that chronicled the online experience of the site owner. Many of the first blogs were written by tech geeks who wanted to share and remember interesting things they found on the web, thus the term 'web log'. Soon after, people came to recognize that blogs were a user-friendly form of web publishing and many varieties came into being. Some were simply personal journals where people could share their thoughts and keep their friends up-to-date on life events. Other budding authors took the opportunity to provide commentary, news and/or advice on a seemingly infinite variety of topics from politics to parenting to sports and on and on. These days, the popularity of blogging is unquestionable and the topical coverage both broad and deep. You may be surprised to learn that there are many librarians who publish their own blogs, dedicated to a wide array of LIS topics and a plethora of other interests. The most renowned of these is The Shifted Librarian, published by Jenny Levine of the Suburban Library System in Illinois. Two great resources for finding other blogging librarians and library-related blogs are Peter Scott's Library Weblogs page and the dmoz.org (also known as the Open Directory Project) category for LIS Weblogs. Although blogging began as a form of personal publishing, this is no longer exclusively the case. Collaborative blogging allows a community of people with similar interests to contribute to a collectively beneficial resource. LISNews, run by Blake Carver, exemplifies this cooperative spirit. The site features up-to-the-minute news of interest to information professionals, pulled from a wide variety of sources and contributed by a ever-growing group of individuals. Entries are read, commented on, and discussed by an even larger community, often fostering active debate. This may sound similar to a listserv and, in some ways, it is. However, unlike a listserv, blogs are typically accessible to the public at large, thereby encouraging more diverse readership and disseminating information further and with greater speed. The hypertextual, link-centric nature of weblog entries further facilitates this rapid exchange and distribution of information. So why should information professionals care about blogging? The question is best approached in two parts - first, the relevance of blogging to librarians and then to libraries. First, let's consider why you should be reading blogs. Quite simply, weblogs are an excellent way to stay current. News travels down the blogging pipelines long before it appears in print and, in many cases, online magazines and journals (keeping in mind that authority is still important and reading with a critical, objective mind essential). By visiting the blogs of other librarians, you gain the perspective of others working in your field, confronting similar issues and exploring solutions. You also experience the wonderful diversity of opinions, perspectives and personalities that make up our field. Librarians are great filters of information and relying on a select group to provide your daily information can be a great time-saver. That said, remember that blogs are only one tool in the well-informed librarian's tool chest. (For ongoing coverage of issues related to librarian currency, I refer you to Steven M. Cohen's Library Stuff, "the library weblog dedicated to resources for keeping current and professional development.") Perhaps not as obvious is why you should consider writing your own blog or contributing to a collaborative effort. Here's some reasons to consider: The good news is that many already do. Libraries are using blogs for a variety of purposes: Blogs are perfect for this kind of information dissemination as the system of dated entries makes it easy for viewers to identify new content. The Suburban Library System has gone so far as to make a blog the central content of their home page. A number of the system's libraries have caught the fever as well. Librarians at St. Joseph County Public Library in South Bend, Indiana are being encouraged to use their respective knowledge domains to contribute to the SJCPL Lifeline. Notice that blogs can represent both the collective voice of the organization and the diversity of the individuals that comprise it. Because of the ease of updating, weblogs make a ideal (and affordable) solution not only for public announcements, but for in-house transmissions as well. Remember that whether you publicize your webpages or not, they are never truly private, so discretion is a must. Since blogging is fast becoming a cornerstone tool in the online dissemination and comsumption of information, it makes sense to briefly explain a concept that extends that concept even further. It's called syndication and the premise is simple enough. Some people, myself included, read a lot of regularly updated web materials in the course of a day: blogs, news sites, etc. Visiting each site individually is time-consuming and, since updates are unpredictable, not always fruitful. To streamline the process, savvy content producers provide a XML document (in a format called RSS) containing the most recent updates to their site. You might hear this referred to as providing a news feed. The reader uses an application called a news aggregator to download (automatically if the reader has "subscribed" to the feed) this document, as well as any other subscribed feeds. He/she can then browse all of the downloaded entries from all of the desired feeds in one place. To see aggregation in action, pay a visit to LISFeeds, a web-based display of some of the most noteworthy LIS news feeds. It will give you some sense of how aggregators bring scattered web content together through the simplicity and power of XML. Aggregators are a great time-saver for the librarian that wants to keep up with the latest news, but has little time to spend surfing between web pages. (A substantially richer look at RSS and news aggregators can be found in an article entitled "RSS for Non-Techie Librarians," written by Steven M. Cohen.) Similarly, libraries that implement blogs will want to seriously consider providing a news feed to reach potential readers who rely on aggregators and have little time to visit the website regularly. Many blogging tools are equipped to do this automatically. Blogs are a simple and efficient way for librarians to stay informed and for libraries to disseminate information in a timely manner. The format's central benefits are ease of use and clear presentation of updated content. Many blogging tools are designed to make publishing easy, regardless of the user's technological skill level. Part of the magic of weblogs is the way they can be used to accomplish so many different things and cover so many diverse areas of life. The potential for using blogs in libraries is only just beginning to be fully explored. As more libraries experiment with providing regularly updated content, they discover new types of content to provide. The future is as limitless as the imagination and innovation of the librarians who use them.
Why should libraries care about blogging?
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