November 30, 2006

Dreams, Schemes, and Themes


Leave it to Bob Dylan to show us how radio shows should be done--it's not enough that he tours most of the year, just released his 44th album, and is working on the second volume of his memoirs. Yes, I'm talking about Theme Time Radio Hour. He's contracted for 50 episodes of the radio show and he's currently at number 31 (the most recent theme was Tennessee). If you're interested in downloading some of the shows, you can get them here. If you're interested in getting your feet wet, I would recommend the following themes--Jail, Divorce, Bible, Time, and Halloween. That said, they're all great (with a few exceptions, such as Flowers, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it).


CRM @ the library - students respond

I had to give a presentation for my Reference course yesterday, which the focus was on improving customer service at the reference desk. Before going in, I was wondering if I should go into my idea of CRM @ the library and decided to include it at the end of my presentation. It was my idea that it could generate some feedback, so I could know better what the pros and cons were. My fellow students didn't disappoint me--there were enough people responding to my idea that the professor cut off the discussion, due to time restraints (and she even had some input on it as well).

The response I knew I would get was that some people didn't like the thought of the library knowing about their habits--the privacy issue. After the initial shuddering, someone made a great point--younger people are having trouble understanding privacy issues. Take, for example, the middle and high school students in Massachusetts who have recently been in trouble with the law, because they post pictures and discussions on MySpace about the latest party--where underage drinking was taking place, or a fight broke out. This can be contributed to either one of these cases: that they are ignorant of privacy issues, where information volunteered in a public space can be used against them; or they don't care, thinking it won't be found--an idea known as "security through obscurity." Regardless to say, the point that was made opened up a whole can of worms.

The professor made the point that she didn't like my term "opt-out" but preferred "opt-in"--this was my way of thinking about the program, but I was not using the correct terminology for it. Of course, it would be run as a pilot program that people could opt-in to.

Because of the lack of time available for the responses, I received more criticism than reinforcement--but that was what I expected. You have to get the knee-jerk out of the way before the brain can begin to function--politics speak to that. But the reinforcement I received was very positive, telling me that people are not only open to the idea but enthusiastic about it. So, I will go further into the idea in future posts, such as the technology that can be used to make this idea a reality. (Should I begin to copyright my thoughts?)

November 29, 2006

CRM @ the library?

This will be more of a reminder to me to blog about this idea later, but I'll give you a taste of things to come. Customer Relationship Management has been in the business world for years--it's becoming so entrenched that people are forgetting what CRM stands for. I've heard it referred to as the "customer really matters" by the VP of area operations when I was working in the hotel industry and, while that definition retains some of the flavor of CRM, it doesn't touch on how customer-intensive CRM can be. One of the ideas I've been kicking around is how CRM could be brought to libraries--government institutions are notorious for not adopting helpful business practices, and libraries are right there with them. There's an argument that's been going on for some time on whether to refer to library users as "customers," as opposed to "patrons" and it's very telling of how libraries view their support base.

One of the reasons I see further reluctance to adopt CRM is because one of the cornerstones of CRM is collecting information on your customers, so you can create personal levels of conversation with them. This is anthema to libraries, who have been railing against the Patriot Act and have maintained that privacy is one of their ultimate concerns. It can go as far as creating guidelines, to not mention a book that a patron might like, because you've noticed them checking out similar ones before. But are people really that concerned anymore about keeping what they've read private from an institution? Is privacy from governmental intrusion the same as institutional privacy? The millions of users of Amazon is an example of this idea chipping away at privacy, in order to obtain personalized service. If libraries were to institute a similar program, one where people could opt-out if they wanted to maintain total privacy, would they see an increase in use? I certainly think so, but a lot of my colleagues and fellow students cringe at the idea.

Are you my caucasian?

I've been wondering if another season of Curb Your Enthusiasm was on its way and--gods be praised!--there will be another in 2007. If you haven't seen it or don't know what it is, well, it's the best damn show on television. There's no tres chic metropolitain women discussing orgasms over cosmos, no medical doctors dissing the system, no homicide dramas, no lawyers putting away the disgustingly bad guys (what I like to call "Special Perverts Unit")--just good ol' fashioned bumbling foolishness by Larry David. My favorite episode? Probably the one the title of this post comes from, where Larry meets Wanda Syke's new fiance, Krazee Eyez Killa (a cockeyed rapper). Not only is it great to hear Larry dissecting Krazee's lyrics but it leads into a two part episode of Larry getting something caught in the back of his throat--won't say what it is because that'll ruin it.

For drama, I've been watching The Sopranos, which I'm only into the first season of. Great stuff, though--just saw episode 5 last night, and it was probably the tightest script ever, really well written. It could almost stand on its own, which says a lot for a series.

Beyond that, I can't wait for TBS to play another 24 hours of A Christmas Story!


November 27, 2006

So sleepy . . .

I've just spent the majority of my day finding and reading new resources for my paper on folksonomy for my cataloging course. Folksonomy is a really interesting new way people are creating social circles while increasing findability of items on the inter- or intranet. A quick breakdown of what folksonomy is--do you use the Favorites list on Internet Explorer? How about the bookmarks tool on Firefox? When you do that, you're effectively tagging something--that is, applying terms to it to increase future findability. Tagging is the process of keeping found things found.

In its now-popular form, tagging is where you apply a word or a series of words to a piece of data, say a web site, so you can find it again--or other people can find it by searching those terms. There are services on the web that have communities based around tagging data--users at del.icio.us tag web sites, YouTube contributors tag videos, Flickr tags pictures. As I mentioned, not only is this being used on the internet, but also on the intranet--that is, a network closed to outsiders, used by businesses or government agencies.

Now there are two "languages" that can be used to tag--formal and folk. Formal tagging language is known as ontology or taxonomy. It is a hierarchical system of divisions and subdivisions used to categorize and, ultimately, catalog. An example of this is the term mammal. A human is a mammal, but mammal is not a type of human--that is because of a hierarchical system of knowledge. It has its origins in ancient philosophy and, needless to say, very entrenched. Folksonomy, which is a term created by Thomas Vander Wal, is a mashup of the words folk and taxonomy. It is a term that describes a language of cataloging that arises from the individual or a group of individuals. Folksonomy does not have a hierarchical system--I won't get into this, because it's a whole other discussion (but you can find a really cool and interesting discussion of it here). What terms come to mind if you are going to catalog this web site? You put them in and, voila, you have employed folksonomy. Now you or other people can find this site by searching the same terms. And don't even get me started about the social groups that have grown up around this thing . . . you thought World of Warcraft was bad? Let's get together a group of people who tag web sites about designer shoes and see which you think is more interesting . . . .

I hope that helps you guys understand what I've been working on. It has so many implications--imagine how excited businesses were when they realized they could look in on how people view the internet. And it's just begun, so there's so many more things it can do. Oh yeah, and it's really tearing some librarians up. How do you think you'd feel if there were people out there saying the ordinary man on the street is now able to do your professional job?

If anyone's interested, I think I might post a link to the paper I'm writing on the subject. Yes, your excitement about it is almost palpable!

Sunday @ The Museum of Science

Last time Sam and I went to the Museum of Science, we saw the Star Wars exhibit (really cool!). This time we decided to get an anatomy lesson and went to see their Body Worlds 2 exhibit. I really enjoyed reading the bits of philosophy they had on banners throughout--philosophy, of course, relating to the impermanence of the body and death. Regardless of how fascinating it was--the process of plastination, the anatomy lessons, the flayed and butterflied bodies--I couldn't stop wondering how many people passed out while taking it all in. One of the compounding elements to this problem, I thought, would be the fact that it's been cold in Boston recently (no shit?) and it's really warm in the exhibit hall. So, you have all these people, wearing heavy winter coats, packed like sardines in a room of dissected, plastinated bodies. Seems ripe for a fit of fainting, wouldn't you think? Well, I didn't get the pleasure of seeing anyone pass out and fall into a case full of preserved gonads, but I did ask one of the staff from the exhibit how many people passed out while viewing all this. Guess how many? Only 4 or 5 a week, she said. That's 5 people out of, say, 8000 people who view it (a rough estimate). So what does that imply? Well, I've got a couple of preliminary thoughts about it. First, I don't think my mom would have let me see something like this until I was old enough to understand it. But there were so many children there that they accounted for at least a fourth of the people, possibly a third, as a lot of school groups go to it during the week. Also, this is in Boston, so there's a lot of people who work in hospitals or are training to work in one--so they're used to it, or should be. But to go further, is it perhaps that our media overload has something to do with it? I mean, fifty years ago this guy would have been considered to have an abberant personality. Now it's difficult to imagine something we don't have access to hearing or seeing. But I just wanted to touch on that . . . .


After taking a trip through the exhibit, Sam and I went to see something a little more relaxing--the butterfly garden in the Museum. Sam took some pictures, most of which didn't turn out, but I thought I'd post these as well. It was a really small room but it was filled with butterflies.

It's that time of the year!


Well, it's that time of the year again, when Black Friday is in the news, riots break out in stores, and we're constantly reminded of how many shopping days we have left. Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy, right? Well, Sam and I are here to tell you that there's more to the season than shopping--like parties at our house! For those of you who aren't able to make it, due to geographic constraints (I'm talking about you, Hoosiers!), I wanted to show you the picture for our 2nd Annual Hannumas Party invitation cards.

Beginnings

Welcome to my blog! I've been dabbling in all sorts of internet coolness since beginning GSLIS this past September and this is just one manifestation of that interest. Other things I've been doing is creating a personalized Google homepage, tagging at del.icio.us, and cataloging my library online at LibraryThing. When I get some free time, I'll write more about why I'm involving myself in these new internet technologies (which are examples of Web 2.0). Also, I'll be posting stuff about my life, to keep my friends and family up-to-date--because it seems like I don't get enough time to tell them everything that I've been busying myself with. I hope you enjoy it!