Electronic Activity at ALA 2009

Hi friends-

This summary from Jenny Levine came through the ALA listserv, and gives credence to the importance of the ALA initiative to open up access to electronic participation channels...

Some numbers:

· 4,011 Flickr pictures (http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=ala2009&w=all)

· A Google Blogsearch says there are about 14,000 posts using the tag ala2009, but that’s not really right (http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=ala2009&btnG=Search+Blogs) because it includes the Flickr pictures, comments on blogs, etc. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to get an exact count. If I had to guess, I’d say that most of the posts are recaps of someone’s conference experience, followed closely by summaries of sessions, and links to presentation materials (in that order). Some samples:

o ALA 2009: A Perspective - http://yolaleah.wordpress.com/2009/07/20/ala-2009-a-perspective/

o ALA 2009 Wrap-Up (Warning: It’s LONG) - http://bedtimebooktalks.blogspot.com/2009/07/ala-2009-wrap-up-warning-its-long.html

o Displaced at ALA Annual - http://wpmuhosting.com/displaced-at-ala-annual

o ALA lesson #2: The Power of Teh Intarwebs - http://notemilybookblog.tumblr.com/post/146623422/ala-lesson-2-the-power-of-teh-intarwebs

· 10,362 tweets using the #ala2009 tag by 1,321 authors (including the ALA Annual account and other ALA units)

o Specific statistics for Twitter:

§ tweets before: 765

§ tweets thu: 680

§ tweets fri: 1380

§ tweets sat: 2390

§ tweets sun: 2250

§ tweets mon: 1725

§ tweets tue: 589

§ tweets after: 583 (7/15-24, although tweets continue to appear so this number will still increase a little)

§ by tag:

· #ala2009 – 8517 (this was the main hashtag that we asked people to use)

· #ala09 - 415

· #alacouncil - 82

· #membership - 39

· #totebag – 265 (an unofficial snark channel)

· #unala2009 – 450 (the unconference)

· #acrl101 - 22

· #ala09_is – 8 (ACRL Instruction Section)

· #ala2prom – 26 (Library 2.0 session)

· #lib2.0 – 118 (Library 2.0 session)

· #ttt2009 – 35 (LITA’s Top Tech Trends)

· #toptech – 43 (LITA’s Top Tech Trends)

· #bigwig2009 – 13

· #clene09 - 10

· #clenets09 - 6

· #godort09 - 3

· #mobile_lib – 50 (WO panel)

· #rusaht – 6 (RUSA Hot Topics session)

o The reason I can give you such specific stats about the tweets is that ALA member Heather Devine offered to create an online Flickr/Twitter tracker for the conference a couple of weeks before the event. She finished it just a couple of days before Annual started, having done most of the work while she was on vacation. You can see it still running at http://www.flexyourinfo.com/projects/ALA2009/, and she’s going to give us the code and database so that we can 1) archive it, and 2) implement this for other conferences in the future. I can’t begin to describe how lucky we are that Heather did this, because there’s no good way to archive tweets right now, and we don’t have the resources to create this ourselves. The site got a lot of notice and a lot of hits during Annual, with Roy Tennant in particular noting it at http://www.libraryjournal.com/blog/1090000309/post/1110046911.html. I’d like to request that ALA to send Heather a letter of thanks if possible for this herculean and incredibly valuable effort.

o LJ very smartly did a daily recap of what they considered to be the “best” tweets of the day. Reading through them gives an excellent overview of the conference.

§ Saturday - http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6670399.html

§ Sunday - http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6670525.html

§ Monday - http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6670879.html

§ Eric Hellman did an analysis of the ala2009 hashtag - http://go-to-hellman.blogspot.com/2009/07/twittering-librarians-confront.html

§ Then there was the interesting, but relatively harmless, appearance of the anonymous alasecrets (http://twitter.com/alasecrets) and alasecrets2009 (http://twitter.com/alasecrets2009) accounts on Twitter. While they were discussed, retweeted, and linked to online, those tweets didn’t spill over very much into the mainstream hashtag, and in fact, it allowed the really nasty stuff to stay out of the ala2009 space, which was good for us. One media blog picked up on it and noted it at http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/sexist/2009/07/13/library-conference-secret-twitter-feed-proves-librarians-sexy-stern/, but that was about it. Someone shut down the original alasecrets account when it devolved into sex talk, but others had saved the tweets and posted them at http://www.scribd.com/doc/17344326/Library, and the alasecrets2009 account took over where the other one left off. LJ did an interview with the anonymous originator of both accounts at http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6671858.html.

· According to Boopsie, more than 1500 people downloaded their ALA2009 application (http://boopsieinc.blogspot.com/2009/07/thank-you-ala-2009.html). I’m unclear if this figure includes people like me who accessed it on the web (Deidre, maybe you can get some clarification on that?) It garnered a lot of praise online, with a couple of people tweeting that it helped them find a session when they didn’t know where it was.

· There are also a ton of great videos on YouTube from the conference, including several of the book cart drill teams and a wonderful fake fight between Neil Gaiman and James Kennedy for the Newbery Award (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAvkmkFIf24).

Some overall impressions:

- Vendors were a lot more visible online this year, and they interacted directly with attendees and online watchers.

- Online communication was an essential part of the conference experience for a larger (and growing) number of attendees. Several people again tweeted appreciation for Councilors who posted updates from the floor, and a lot of folks tweeted that they wished they could have attended. I’d say online posts and tweets about the conference were overwhelmingly positive, with only about 10-15% of them being negative, complaining, or reporting problems. The biggest gripes were 1) the lack of wireless at the hotels (although everyone did understand why), and 2) how slow the shuttles ran, making the trip between hotels and the convention center excruciatingly long (although again, folks were appreciative that Gale provided this service). When folks were snarky, in general they didn’t name names, which was a relief, and when I’d respond with an explanation, they were generally appreciative.

- Twitter acted as an announcement service, troubleshooting venue, and interactive platform for us. I think I probably read about 6,000 of the 10,362 tweets in real-time. In the future, though, we’ll need to discuss how to manage that flow and respond, as it will no longer be feasible for one person, especially someone participating in the conference, to manage that. I might be able to do this again for Midwinter since it’s smaller, but Annual is likely to be an even bigger problem. I helped resolve three separate housing issues alone because of Twitter, so we really need to consider how we’ll integrate customer service or conference services in the future.

- Overall, conversation has moved from blogs to Twitter and a lot of it takes place in real-time, which means we need to adjust how we monitor these things. For example, I knew about the alasecrets account on Friday when it started, but PIO didn’t find out about it until Sunday when one of their staff members got a notice about the blog post via a Google email alert.

- Neil Gaiman was *huge* for us. I would guess that a discernible number of people came just to see him, his signing lines were long, and his sessions created an enormous amount of buzz online. If there’s any way to have him again next year, especially as a keynote speaker, I think it would continue to be a boost for us. His tweets about librarians were also great, and he interacted with a lot of attendees that way during the conference, which further raised the visibility of his appearances at Annual.

John Chrastka should have stats from the Text-a-Librarian service, and Greg Landgraf should have numbers of views to date for AL Focus videos about Annual. Unfortunately, there’s really no way to know how much activity took place on Facebook, although I know there were lots of status updates and group posts.

Let me know if you have questions about any of this.

Jenny

Toot Your Own Horn - Improving Your Image

Donna Cardillo spoke about how to improve the image of the library in the community. This was not one of those presentations about how you dress, although that subject was touched upon. She referenced the book entitled Six Steps to Free Publicity 2nd ed. by Yudkin. She urged that we

• Monitor the media
• Write letters to the editor
• Develop media relations (reporters, TV and radio stations, etc.)
• Get media training
• Become a resource to the media

On networking, her suggestions were to

• Get out of the library and into the community (Chamber of Commerce, Rotary, etc.)
• Stay in touch
• Use business cards
• Start shaking hands to establish a personal contact and develop relationships
• Learn to make conversation

I loved this last bullet because it is not one of my strengths. She commented that you don't want to approach people with a barrage of questions starting with "What is your name?" It can put people off. Instead, she suggested that you start off with comments like "What session did you go to?" "Have you been to Chicago before?" or "Where are you from?" She also suggested wearing a small pin that reflects your profession or interests. People will often notice and ask about it in a casual conversation.

Donna also spent a lot of time talking about handshaking. A handshake is a very important social convention in the US, and is a sign of respect and suggests that you are on an equal footing. She mentioned that a handshake has three components, a complete hand grasp (none of those wimpy fingers).

In terms of staying visible, she urged us to write columns and offer to speak at local events. The power is in the doing...we spend so much time and energy worrying about the outcome that we forget that it is the trying something new that creates positive energy. Write about what you know and love, and develop relationships with someone who will read your writing critically and make suggestions.

Donna also urged us to develop speaking skills. Practice, preferably in front of a video recorder. Master appropriate audio visual skills. Speak on a regular basis to keep your comfort level as high as possible. In practical terms, she suggests that you think of your core message in the least number of words, say it, and stop talking. If you babble on, you lose attention from your audience. Be sure to include pauses and slow down. The pauses may be uncomfortable for you as the speaker, but they allow the audience to absorb your message.

This was a wonderful presentation on raising the visibility of the library through your own efforts and willingness to be the face of the organization.

Creating Zones with Heart

Dr. Michael Stevens, author of the Tame the Web blog, presented a program on ways to create spaces with heart in our libraries. His blog contains a whole statement of the presentation as well as the slides he showed. See http://www.alatechsource.org/blog/2009/06/creating-zones-with-heart.html for a fascinating discussion of this topic.

Future of Libraries

In this panel presentation, Alan Inouye, Director of the OITP, suggested that there were three main areas of change that would affect the future of libraries: demographic and societal trends, institutional evolution, and technologically based advances. For example, the increase of single parent households and the increased percentage of women in the workforce has brought emphasis to the perception of the library as a safe place for children.

Also noted were trends such as the increased number of households with broadband access, the sophistication of baby boomer seniors, the desireability of new revenue sources and partnerships, and the need for more creative spaces. More wireless and more reliance on mobile devices, new technologies such as cloud computing and virtual reality, and complex privacy issues were also discussed.

Jennifer Hendrix, consultant to the OITP, has completed a literature review of what librarians are saying about the future of libraries. Not surprisingly, librarians are writing and blogging extensively about the future of the institution and the profession. There is general agreement that it is up to us to determine our future. Technology is revolutionizing our media -- digital media changes the way users find, access and use information, and new information processes are changing libraries and the way they operate. It is important to plan flexible physical spaces and focus on collaboration to future proof our libraries.

The next speaker was Roger Levien, who is an OITP Fellow. He is not a librarian but a consultant to various businesses on future planning. He brought a number of very interesting observations to the conversation, but most interesting was the process by which he analyzes future trends. In brief, he first separated out "pure tone" elements for theoretical analysis, while acknowlegeing that in reality the themes combine into melodies. An example was to imagine that technological, social and economic transformations overwhelm the structures underlying our libraries, and that the response was to create a nationwide network of libraries of which each local library is a branch. Users order materials from the catalog, and receive the media from the nearest branch, which may or may not be a physical presence. Future thinking indeed!

The last speaker was a familiar face, Stacey Aldrich, now Acting State Librarian for California. She started with a quote by William Gibson, "The future is already here, it is just unevenly distributed." She urged us to challenge our assumptions...will we really be able to retain our mantle as guides to information? Do we really need more of the same? Will it be enough to have "stuff?" Will people actually retire? She observed that change is happening so fast that multiple generations are having the same problems.

Stacey reported on a retail analysis generated by the Metropolitan Library System about use of the library. 70% of visitors came to use the library for leisure. Less than 10% came to support school projects, etc. Only 30% know what they want when they come in. 93% stay less than a half hour, and 80% come alone.

She closed with another quote I loved, which was "People don't change because they see the light, they change because they feel the heat."

Small Green

Well, all I can say is it was a good thing we bought my husband a Garmin GPS unit for Father's Day. Getting to Chicago was the easy part. I-80 all the way. But once we hit the city, it was a little like playing one of those PlayStation games where the cars chase around and you die all the time...

The first session on Saturday, entitled Small Scale Green, set the tone for my experience of the conference. The idea was how to integrate green practices into your planning right now, where you are, and then went on to describe standards that might require a new building. Emphasis was placed on incorporating planned changes into your strategic plan, including measurable goals to help justify more ambitious undertakings later. The speaker also advised attendees to try to include people on your Board or planning committee who support green energy. To help your Board support these initiatives, do not just report the building cost, but also emphasize the reduction in operating costs over time.

Among the practical suggestion for “greening” libraries are things we already do, like keeping track of supplies and recycling book sale leftovers instead of taking them to the landfill. Another suggestion was to develop a collection on green energy practices and highlight it in a display, or to move away from desktop computers to laptops. These suggestions support the notion that we can enhance our role in the community by being the advocate for sustainable practices.

Although somewhat frustrating to me, the speaker postulated that the greenest thing you can do is to preserve an existing building. A part of me sighed deeply, remembering the poor accessibility and ancient infrastructure of my own library, but his point was one we can take to heart: you have to stay on top of maintenance. If you tend to details such as cleaning out the gutters, you avoid more expensive rehabilitation later on. Involve all members of staff in planning, including the maintenance man who may be best able to make suggestions.

The speaker also validated my conviction that HVAC and lighting are at the heart of the green energy problem. He recommended making sure that you are correctly sizing mechanical systems by having a complete energy audit performed, and by action such as installing double-paned windows, making sure there are sweeps under the doors, and routinely changing air filters. Both speakers mentioned several times that one “green” option is to allow for a little wider temperature variation, and you can open windows if the indoor humidity is less than 50%.

One statistic I thought was worth noting is that lighting accounts for 1/3 of the typical electric bill. The recommendation was to think about upgrading fluorescent lighting if it is more than 10 years old because of recent advances in that area. Along those lines, he also mentioned that there is new interest in reporting on energy savings, and noted as an example the website at the University of Vermont has a “dashboard” to communicate their energy savings to the public.

The speakers went on to describe even more ambitious green initiatives such as geothermal ground source heat pumps, under floor ventilation, even earth ducting, as well as solar and small wind power generation projects. They also addressed storm water retention and treatment, using native vegetation in landscaping to reduce water use, and shading reflective pavings to reduce the “heat island” effect. If you are going to go ahead with a new building, you get LEED points for salvage and reuse as well as recycling construction and demolition materials. There are 50 LEED certified libraries in the country right now, and 270 more registered that are in progress.

This was a presentation that gave me a lot of practical ideas for short-term projects that fall into line with the new environmental consciousness of the country as well as plenty to think about in terms of longer-term planning for a possible new library.