February 3rd, 2011 Brian Herzog
Just a few quick blurbs on some upcoming events that caught my eye - the first two for Boston-area people, and the third for all of New England:
MobileCampBoston
I seem to be all about mobile technology lately - and MobileCampBoston is a day-long event devoted to it. The day looks organized into three tracks - Programming, Design, and Business/Marketing, so attendees can focus on their area of interest. Should be a great day of learning, and best of all, it's free.
Boston Radical Reference: Volunteer at the Community Change Library
Members of Boston Radical Reference will be volunteering at the Community Change library, which houses some of the best sources of information on racism in the United States. The plan is to conduct a comprehensive inventory of the collection, going book by book, to catch errors in the catalog, determine subject areas in which to expand, and identify books that need repair.
NELA-ITS Spring Workshop
I'm part of the IT Section of the New England Library Association, and we're designing this year's Spring Workshop to address the intersection of mobile technology and libraries. We're still working out the details, but the overall plan is to devote the morning to a sort of "state of things/orientation" as far as libraries and mobile tech goes, then lunch, and then an afternoon panel of librarians demo'ing ways they're using mobile tech in their own libraries. If you've never been to an NELA-ITS workshop before, they're a good time, and very focused on practical information.
I'll be at all three of these events - if you see me, please say hi.
Tags: boston radical reference, Conferences, event, events, libraries, Library, mobile, mobilecampboston, nela, nela-its, public, Technology, volunteer
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February 1st, 2011 Brian Herzog
I don't know how I missed this before, but only recently Boopsie for libraries reached my radar screen - it's a company that will create a mobile version of a library's website and catalog.
There are other options* out there, but Boopsie seems like a great and easy alternative to creating your own mobile website. And even better, they also mobile-ize the catalog, which I couldn't do (although apparently non-catalog services are more popular with mobile patrons).
Pricing seemed reasonable (for what you get) - a library near me is in the process of signing up, and reported the cost is in the few-thousand dollar range (or, it would be roughly $10,000 for our whole 36-library consortium to sign up). Lots of libraries are already using them - Sarah has a good write-up on San Jose's experience, and WorldCat and ALA also use their app.
I'm not trying to pitch Boopise, so much as I'm pitching the importance of libraries having a way to serve mobile patrons - using vendors like this* are an option for libraries who can't do it themselves.
*Library Anywhere from LibraryThing is another mobile website+catalog solution, and seems to be cheaper than Boopsie
Tags: app, apps, boopsie, catalog, devices, libraries, Library, mobile, phones, public, smartphone, Technology, website, Websites
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January 29th, 2011 Brian Herzog
This week's question is yet another one in which I wasn't involved: my library is a funny place all around.
The Children's librarian told me about a young boy she helped in the Childrens Room. He came up to her, all excited, and asked for help looking for information on sperm whales.
No problem, she thought. Animals and endangered species are big topics will school kids in Chelmsford, so we do have a lot of resources for questions like this. And before too long, she was able to find some sperm whale books for him.
The boy was happy, but not satisfied - next, he asked her for books about the "giant colossal squid." That request gave her pause, but every year we all get asked for information on an endangered species that we've never heard of before, so she started looking.
She checked the catalog and subscription databases, and had no luck. Next she went to the animal books and started searching through the indexes of anything that looked remotely promising, but again just could not find anything.
This is the way it continued, with my coworker expanding and expanding her search, trying to locate even a mention of the "giant colossal squid." But no matter what she tried, she couldn't find a thing.
Just then, the boy's mother walked up. After my coworker related to her what she was looking for and how it was going (not well), the mother replied,
Oh, don't worry - he only learned about it in a movie he watched last night. The "giant colossal squid" isn't actually a real animal.
This is why I love librarians - who else would work this hard just because a child was curious about something? Actually, now I'm kind of curious which movie it was this patron watched. Hmm.
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January 27th, 2011 Brian Herzog
Lots of great comments on my previous post about emptying the book box on long weekends - thanks everyone. I plan to bring some of those ideas up with my coworkers, but one comment* reminded me of something else entirely. Laura said:
I know this wouldn’t solve all the long weekend/book drop problems, but what about adjusting due dates so that books don’t come due for one or two days either side of a long weekend. [...]
Laura's comment reminded me of an idea I had long ago (and may have mentioned here before) for a community "stay-at-home" circulation model.
The basic idea is that, when someone checks out a book, they just keep it at their house until the next person needs it. They would get their guaranteed loan period (three weeks or whatever), but then when another person put a request on that item, the first patron would be notified to return it to the library - be it in four weeks or two years.
When the item got checked back in by staff, then the second patron would be notified it was ready for pickup at the library, and then that patron would hang on to the item until someone else requested it.
Crazy, right? I could see this working in the case of a library building project (as a way to keep books accessible and in circulation when the actual library itself is closed to the public), or if a small library wanted to maintain a collection far larger than what the physical building itself can hold.
Of course there is always the risk of library materials getting damaged or lost because they're sitting in peoples' homes longer, rather than on library shelves. But really, we take that risk every time we check something out, and I think part of the program would be to educate patrons to know that they are absolutely responsible for the condition and safekeeping of that item, no matter how long they end up keeping it.
It couldn't be mandatory, of course - if someone didn't want library books in their house for seven months, they could bring them back somewhere. But for those that did keep them, the recall notification process would ideally be automated calls/emails, and I don't know if our ILS could even handle such a thing.
Okay, admittedly, this idea has flaws (i.e., you lose your browsing collection, immediate gratification, and the ability to help all those kids that come in the night before their homework is due). I just think it would be such a great way to really involve the community in the library - the library itself would actually exists within the community members' homes.
*I like Laura's idea as a way to deal with long weekends, although I'm not sure it would work for us - we don't charge overdue fines, so the people returning books probably are just done with them, and aren't necessarily pushing to get them in under the due date.
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January 25th, 2011 Brian Herzog
There's a situation at my library that doesn't seem to have a good solution, and a recent conversation with a friend prompted me to just ask other librarians how you handle it: who empties your book drop box on long weekends?
I work in a busy library, and on regular days, we empty the book return box (the one in our parking lot) about twice three times a day. We aren't open on Sundays* but the book box we have is generally big enough to accommodate any materials that get dropped off. Monday morning there's a lot of stuff to check in, but the box isn't overflowing.
However, on long weekends when we're closed on Monday, someone needs to come in to empty the book box - otherwise, it would overflow and patrons would just have to leave items sitting in the parking lot.
And by someone, I mean me. I inherited this duty when a former Assistant Director left the library, because:
- Historically, it's always been a guy that wheeled the box in. It's always full and heavy, and although we got a new book box that is much easier to roll, it still can be a lot of work. I know this sounds sexist, and I know some of my female coworkers do occasionally bring it in during their shifts, and I absolutely welcome them to do it
- Of all the guys on our staff, I'm the only one that isn't one of the maintenance guys - which means I'm the only guy who can also check in all of the items in the box. If the items aren't checked in, then the Tuesday morning desk staff has a two-day mound of items to check in, plus the crush of patrons who haven't been able to get into the library for two days - plus, or course, all their normal work
- As a department head, I have keys to the building to let myself in on the weekends
- I live relatively close to the library, so it's not that big a deal for me to come in - except that I can never go anywhere on three-day weekends
I don't mean to sound like a martyr, and certainly don't want to be one - which is why I'm posting this. What do other libraries do on long weekends? Do you not make any special arrangements? Do you just let everything build up and deal with it on Tuesday?
This seems like a common problem for libraries, so I'm hoping the wisdom of the crowd can help free up my weekends. Thanks for any suggestions - please put them in the comments below.
*Not being open on Sundays is a whole separate issue for me, so don't even get me started.
Tags: book, box, drop, empty, emptying, holiday, libraries, Library, long, parking lot, public, return, three-day, weekend
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January 22nd, 2011 Brian Herzog
As I was coming back to the desk after lunch one day, I saw one of our regular patrons walking away carrying an alarm clock. I asked my coworker what was going on, and she said:
[The patron] called and said he was always late for work because his alarm clock was going off at the wrong time, and wanted to know if we could help. I thought it might have been set for six o'clock PM instead of AM, but he didn't know how to check. Since it was battery operated, he just brought it in. It was set to PM, so I changed it to AM for him.
And there you go - talk about providing the services our patrons need.
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