Staying Ahead & Keeping Current with Blogs and RSS

Thinking Ahead

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+ “To stay ahead, you must have your next idea waiting in the wings.” - Rosabeth Moss Cantor

+ “Keeping a little ahead of conditions is one of the secrets of business.” - Charles Schwab

+ “It’s better to be ahead of the curve than to be behind it.”- Me

Advice

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How car mechanics and librarians differ

Quick Overview

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+ Website, listed reverse chronological order, with written content and links.
+ Most use software for easy publication.
+ Calendars, Permalinks, Archives, RSS, blogroll, comments.
+ Easy Easy Easy Easy Easy…

Examples of Librarian Weblogs

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+ Library Stuff - (http://www.librarystuff.net)
+ LISNews - (http://www.lisnews.com)
+ Resourceshelf - (http://www.resourceshelf.com)
+ The Shifted Librarian - (http://www.theshiftedlibrarian.com)
+ Librarian.net - (http://www.librarian.net)
+ It's All Good - (http://scanblog.blogspot.com)
+ The Kept-up Librarian - http://keptup.typepad.com/)

Blogging Tools

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+ Blogger (http://www.blogger.com)
+ Movabletype (http://www.movabletype.org)
+ Radio Userland (http://radio.userland.com)
+ WordPress (http://www.wordpress.org)
+ Live Journal (http://www.livejournal.com)
+ TypePad ( http://www.typepad.com)

Why?

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+ Easy to distribute content
+ Communication within the building (reference desk)
+ Great for Library Web pages.
+ Library News
+ Reference Desk Discussion (FARQs, patrons, etc)
+ New Acquisitions.
+ Consortia
+ Book Clubs
+ Backend CMS only

(Guidelines and Ethics)

Disadvantages

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+ Information Overload?!
+ Have to continuously update them
+ Takes time on behalf of the writer
+ Crossposting
+ Subjective
+ Reliability of content
+ No Rules

Advantages

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+ Easy, Easy, Easy, Easy, Easy to publish
+ No need to download software
+ Open source, open access feeling
+ Interactive
+ No Rules

Examples of Library Weblogs

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+ Construction Diary (http://urbanafreelibrary.org/bldgblog.html)
+ University of Minnesota Libraries (http://blog.lib.umn.edu)
+ Wisconsin Library Association (http://wlaweb.blogspot.com/)
+ Metropolitan Library System (http://www.mls.lib.il.us/)
+ Simple Machine Blog – (http://www.resco.ca/machineblog/)
+ Waterboro Public Library (http://www.waterborolibrary.org/blog.htm)
+ Georgia State University Libraries (http://www.library.gsu.edu/news)
+ Rosedale Public Library Blogger Book Club (http://www.roselle.lib.il.us/YouthServices/BookClub/Bloggerbookclub.htm)
+ Bryant Library (http://www.nassaulibrary.org/bryant/blteens/blog.html)
+ Hospital Advocacy Weblog - (http://hosplib.blogspot.com/)
+ National Library of Medicine - SCR Region - (http://nnlm.gov/scr/blog/)

A Bit on Marketing

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+ Stand out in the crowd.
+ Ease of use
+ Best way to publish without trade publications (on your own terms)
+ Finding your niche (http://marylaine.com/exlibris/xlib185.html)
+ Write everyday
+ Marketing the Librarian – (http://www.liscareer.com/cohen_marketing.htm)

"Historically, librarians haven’t had the pleasure of getting the respect we deserve. When school districts cut budgets, the library is often looked at for cuts. I follow news in the library profession closely and have read hundreds of articles over the years about library jobs being cut, and it turns my stomach. While librarians have tried (sometimes successfully) to prevent these cuts by raising awareness of what the library can do for the clients, the library administration rarely seems to show off the talents of their librarians on staff...If the talents of the librarians working on the front lines (at reference desks, for example) can be seen by the community (be it academic, public, or corporate) via marketing deployments of articles written, conference presentations made, or even “thank you” notes written by patrons, we may be seen in a better light. Companies like to show off their employees (well, good companies should). Libraries should do the same."
- From Marketing the Librarian

Getting Associations Excited About Blogs

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+ PLA Blog - (http://www.plablog.org)
+ SLA Conference Blog - (http://slablogger.typepad.com/sla_conference_blog/)
+ ALA Techsource Blog - (http://www.techsource.ala.org/blog/)
+ InfoShare - (http://haverfordlibrary.typepad.com/infoshare/)
+ ACRL - (http://www.acrlblog.org/)

LIS Specific Blog LIsts

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+ Peter Scott’s List (http://www.libdex.com/weblogs.html) - Not Updated anymore.
+ ODP Library Weblogs – (http://tinyurl.com/ew7o)
+ Blog Without a Library - (http://www.blogwithoutalibrary.net/links.html)
+ LISFeeds - (http://www.lisfeeds.com)

RSS 101 - Let's Talk

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+ Can’t be read in a browser on its own.
+ Look for the orange button!!!
+ Steven’s Personalized Page (DEMO)

Library-Related RSS Feeds

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+ ALA - (http://tinyurl.com/bza6y)
+ Library Journal - (http://www.libraryjournal.com/index.asp?layout=Learn_RSS)
+ Information Today - (http://www.infotoday.com/newsbreaks/rss/)
+ E-Lis - (http://eprints.rclis.org/last.xml)
+ Proquest - (http://www.proquest.com/proquest/rss/rss.shtml)
+ EContent Magazine - (http://www.econtentmag.com/rss/rss_feeds.aspx)

....much more.

A Few Examples (of thousands)

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+ Chronicle of Higher Education - (http://chronicle.com/help/rss.htm)
+ Reuters - (http://www.reuters.com/newsrss.jhtml)
+ New York Times - (http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/index.html)
+ Christian Science Monitor - (http://search.csmonitor.com/rss/index.html)

A Few Good Aggregators

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+ Bloglines (Demo) - (http://www.bloglines.com)
+ Net News Wire - (http://www.netnewswire.com)
+ Newzcrawler - (http://www.newzcrawler.com)
+ Newsgator (Outlook) - (http://www.newsgator.com)

Customize!

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+ Ebay – (http://www.rssauction.com/)
+ HubMed - (http://www.hubmed.org)
+ UPS/Fedex/USPS – (http://track.toolbot.com/)
+ Moreover (http://p.moreover.com/cgi-local/page?k=librarian&o=rss)
+ ODP Directory Project – (http://www.xmlhub.com/odp_feed.php)
+ Find Articles – (http://www.findarticles.com/)
+ Amazon – (http://www.onfocus.com/bookwatch/AmazonRSS.asp)
+ Amazon Wishlists – (http://www.edazzle.net/amazon/)
+ Topix (http://www.topix.net)
+ Ingenta Connect – (http://www.ingentaconnect.com)
+ Yahoo News Search - (http://search.yahoo.com)
+ Google News Search - (http://news.google.com)
+ PubSub – (http://www.pubsub.com)

RSS @ Your LIbrary

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+ Oklahoma University Library – (http://libraries.ou.edu/rss/)
+ RIT Libraries – (http://wally.rit.edu/feeds/)
+ Kelvin Smith Library – (http://library.case.edu/ksl/rss/)
+ New Books – (http://apu.kenton.lib.ky.us/newbooks/newadult.php)
+ Library Elf – (http://www.libraryelf.com/)
+ University of Alberta (NEOS) – (http://www.library.ualberta.ca/newbooks/index.cfm#callnumber)
+ Hennepin County Public Library – (http://www.hclib.org/)
+ Edmonton Public Library - (http://www.epl.ca/EPLMaster.cfm?id=INFODESK)
+ More from Hennepin County - (http://www.hclib.org/pub/events/)

+ Happy Customers - (A Case Study)

Thanks

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Contact Information

AOL IM - nylibrarian
skype - stevenmcohen
phone - 631-645-4516
e-mail - stevenmcohen [at] gmail [dot] com