Those Wicked Wikis.....

Greetings.
I must confess that when I read of some of the problems people had with RSS feeds I put Week 4 in the 'too hard' basket and moved on to Week 5 and wikis. I hope to come back to Week 4 later ...
I found the most amazing thing about wikis to be that the German equivalent of wikipedia is regarded as superior to the 'proper' encyclopedia in terms of the quality of its content. I would have worried about the content of wikis being open to vandalism or at best inaccurate input, particularly when one reflects on the level of vandalism in the real world, unless access with editing rights is very closely controlled. I can see that wikis are a very democratic form of information sharing and in line with current social attitudes of equality of rights, freedom of expression, etc, etc. And I must confess that despite my reservations as to the quality of the information I do use Wikipedia as an information source to answer client enquiries. I am reassured by hearing that Wikipedia employs a small army of people to vet entries .....
With reference to any three of the cited wikis ....
A. The Book Lovers Wiki. This is essentially a collection of submitted reviews indexed by genre. I see it was operated in 2006 but not 2007 - it would be interesting to know what prompted the library to change tack. Maybe it was recognised that having the review attached to the item record is more useful to patrons than in a separate wiki. So the wiki is now more a piece of local literary history or as the front page puts it, "'a snap shot in time' of what our club members read during the summer [of 2006]". Reading between the lines, the desire to experiment with a new technology seemed to be at least partly the motivation to etablish the wiki.
Such a wiki is useful as a gimmick and as a way of getting together a number of tagged reviews without a lot of labour on the part of library staff. However if the defining quality of a wiki is interaction and ease of editing existing material, one wonders how a wiki is better than an ordinary website that allows postings as there isn't - or shouldn't be - the need to edit reviews, i,e, opinions, posted by others.
Wikis shine where the knowledge to be communicated keeps changing, is refined through mutiple inputs and is cumulative - the value of the sum of the content is more than of the individual components, not I would have thought the case with collected independent reviews.
B. Mint Museums Wiki. The initiators define a wiki as 'a type of website that allows you, the user, to add or edit the content of the website' - a collaborative information resource. So the wiki both provides information from the Museum about particular collections and exhibitions and enables others - "curators, educators, docents and other users" - to add their expertise and knowledge to those bones. Thus those contributing to the wiki would be a community of interest and people with genuine knowledge to share and likely to 'spark off' one another. So the sum of the content is more than the individual components as it includes reactions to earlier posts. The wiki is password-protected and such a subject area is likely to attract only genuine contributors anyway. I noted there were 503 revisions of one page so the wiki is obviously valued (used by a large number of people!) and active .....
C. The Full Library Success. This is described as "a one-stop shop for great ideas and information for all types of librarians" and as such should be a great professional resource for librarians. Editing now requires submission of an email address because of vandalism but that is not an onerous control on content - though pointing to one of the issues with wikis. Having a parallel discussion page where people can post opinions and reactions about a topic seems like a good idea, and likely to reduce unnecessary editing without stifling input. Warnings that "personal attacks" and copyright infringements will be deleted may be pre-emptive strikes or may point to problems that have occurred. The warning against using the wiki for advertising points to another potential issue that I haven't seen raised elsewhere. A quick look at a sample revisions page showed that a considerable number of edits were reversed by the wiki manager suggesting either that freedom of expression can be abused or a conflict between the democratic ideals of a wiki and the vision of the wiki manager ......
I looked at the WikiNorthia site and while this is obviously at an embryonic stage has great potential. However it might need a full-time manager and hence lie outside the library sphere .. unless a Local History Librarian was able to assume responsibility. I thought about how it compared with a blog like Southern Tablelands History Matters and felt the wiki would have more uneven content in terms of quality but cover a much wider cross-section of information inviting as it does content under the broadest of headings as opposed to comment/reaction to posted material. So the wiki has greater potential to attract and store information.
Also the sample intranet procedures manual would be great for a really big library or one operating from multiple sites like some university libraries - templates or standards for input would be easy to manage, input would be accurate because by the on-the-ground practitioners, and the manual would always be up-to-date.

I always was stronger on theory than practice .... the required input to the NSW learning 2.0 wiki has been made. Not without problems - like the window warning me that if I left the site no-one would be able to use it for a time (I envisaged crashing the whole thing) and putting my name instead of "Guest" - I didn't expect that bit to appear onscreen. But once I realised that you just typed on despite what was already there being in html language it was quite easy. I commend the two video tutorials too - particularly the Wikis in Plain English may be very basic but that is just what an IT Nitwit needs!

From a Flickr to a Flame ...out

I provide this as evidence that I spent about an hour trying to upload an image from Flickr ... Hence the reference to 'flameout ....'!!
It was of a child reading to an adult with a dog listening in - useful example of the value of a pet/therapy animal as a target audience for a non-confident reader. And another argument in favour of a library 'pet' .. I once knew a library dog which rejoiced in the name of Gumbles and was probably the most petted dog in town!
Actually the first challenge in this exercise was to find a Flickr photo with the magic 'blog this' button - this was not my first choice by a long way!
Good luck to anyone else who is finding this exercise 'sticky' - the local CTC manager had never uploaded from Flickr so there wasn't much help available!

Some more thoughts on those sample blogs .....

On reflection perhaps I was meant to say a little more about the sample blogs so ....
A. Southern Tableslands History Matters: A very attractively presented and informative blog, although it challenged my concept of what a blog is - I would have described this as an active and growing information website rather than a blog which to me is a more personal document (but one aim of this course is probably to sweep away misconceptions ....). If interactivity is characteristic of blogs the authors may be disappointed by the small number of comments posted. The entries show a lot of care and research in contrast with the informal (verging on slapdash ) presentation of some blogs. It is certainly a quality information source, and the clear authorship allows for verification of any issues.
B. Sutherland Shire Library News: an online library newsletter with a huge number of links. As there is a near total lack of reactions posted it would be interesting to know the number of hits, particularly in view of the amount of time maintaining the blog must take. But it is a very good way of keeping members up-to-date with library events and presenting a professional and vibrant face to the community. I noted the use of FlickR to host additional photos.
C. Alternative Teen Services: a professsional discussion forum, with a huge amount of resource material for professionals - the 'main despatch' sums it up. That comments are being posted indicates the service is being used. A very useful way of enabling professionals to interact - I suspect blogs achieve most interaction in the horizontal plain if you see what I mean - between equals rather than informer/informees.
D. ACT Public Library Blog: like the second example, an online library newsletter with more frequent postings (daily?) but less ambitious in content - shorter entries and minimal pictures. Contains local library news and a few quirky items from the wider library world, with the option to email the posting to a friend but not to post comments. The many labels make locating related articles very easy. I presume the hope is that members might check the blog daily as they would open their daily newspaper or look at their favourite news site. This is probably less labour-intensive than Sutherland Shire's blog but still represents a big commitment in time and labour. But like any web-located information service it is ,much more immediate than any print offering can ever be!

I don't know whether this much content was necessary but at least it has given me the chance to practice adding to a log. I have done the preliminary reading/viewing on FlickR - the next challenge is to find and upload that photo/s! (and to successfully publish this .....)

The first 'toe in the water' .....

Good morning, all ...
I feel that this is an historic moment - the very first blog posting of an IT nitwit. I'm not sure whether to thank the State Library's Web.2 training programme or not .... No, seriously, thank you (or should that be thanx?) for clear instructions that even I could follow.
Progress to date. I listened to Stephen Fry and thought his presentaton gave a whole new dimension to the term NOW generation. I watched the set short video on Web 2.0 - in fact I had to watch it three times because of the speed with which the key ideas were delivered, very much in keeping with an audience accustomed to the 30 second grab. To me the content was a case of style over substance, relying on technology to communicate but superficial, consisting of a set of bold statements wthout analysis or assessment.
However looking at the sample blogs this week was a pleasant surprise. Without ever having actually seen a blog before I had a preconceived attitude based on the personal blog concept which to me is narcissism gone mad. But now I recognize that a blog as an online forum or discussion zone like the Alternative Teen Services example or regular information service like the Southern Tablelands History Matters site has considerable professional potential. My immediate reaction to the Alternative Teen Services blog was how useful something similar would be in the Regional or Co-operative Library setup where it would be akin to an ongoing staff meeting allowing the immedate exchange of information, insights and concerns without the constraints of travel (both time and expense), time and the old 'brightest-idea-on-the-way-home' phenomena. However involvement in multile blogs would be impractical due to the time factor, risking the substitution of professional development, even personal enjoyment, for provision of service.
Some thoughts on Learning 2.0 .... At last I have an understanding of 2.0 as a context - a second stage in the IT information revolution. At my age and stage (approaching retirement) and in my work context (a small rural library) I may never use it but at least I'll have a basic understanding of key aspects of it and familiarity with the terminology, some appreciation of its applications, and can be happy to know I 'dipped my toe in the information revolution water' to the extent of posting a blog! But I suspect first and foremost doing (attempting?) the course involves for me satisfying personal curisoty and confronting a challenge - after all I'm someone who doesn't own a mobile phone and has never played a CD!!!
Lifelong learning meets personal needs but has most practical value where the work context, both in terms of expectations, task parameters and available technologies/tools is changing. And this is very true of librarianship!
Good luck to anyone else doing the course who may read this .....