The end of assvice?

I have been working a lot in the area of shifting publishing and more and more I find my identities crossing over. Mother. Woman. Librarian. "Blogger". Twit. I am happy about that since I actually started the Mother-Woman blog back in 2005 to weather the fracturing of identity I faced when I returned to work that autumn a mother surely but unsure how to be a hyphenated mother.

To this day, though I do it so infrequently now... I do still like the blogging. I was so excited to hear my friend and mommy-to-meta-blogger Kerry is presenting at Northern Voice a Vancouver blogger event I am going to for both personal and professional reasons. 1.) let me rankle.. the NV folks better not be billing my best mommyblogger peeps just to attract the inevitable, Mommy Bloggers you suck press coverage from the top flight proprietary news outlets. And 2.) aren't social media threads for parenting information just the best thing ever invented???

As I spend more time, as a librarian, thinking about what is happening to the quality (qualities?) of information a bit of an aha moment. I keep looking for the points of disconnection between the information sources we've had and the new options. Do you agree with me when I say it's not just about convenience it's about credibility? I mean if you share my low-ish opinion of the parenting books from main stream publishers blogging makes inordinate sense. If we asked the question what's so great about parent blogging? Well yeah it's because it is better and more credible than those books. Parenting that's about a social as it gets, innit?

And, if you ask bon... well what about the genres. We need to reshuffle the deck on voice. As I wade through they myriad of choice for information sources in schools day by day I never make up my mind. Organize by format? By access.. by discipline. Well like one of my best friends said to me when I had my first baby "Repeat after me. Your guess is as good as mine"!

And, that's peer review for ya nowadays, innit?

Thinking space for civilization

I am telling every librarian I can to read this : http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6716277.html


Q: What do you think is coming for publishing generally speaking and the idea of words on a page? How can information managers in a library environment either help influence public opinion or help content creators?

A: If I were a librarian now, I would attempt to conceive of the library from an experiential point of view. I would say, “What is the experience that is missing from the agora, from the world out there, from the private home? What is the experience that’s missing that we need in order to be human, in order to think, in order to consider?”

My own take on it would be that information availability in some sort of raw form is not a problem anymore, because of the Internet. It is for some people, as you well know; not everyone has Internet access or equal Internet access. Acknowledging all of that and just speaking in a very crude way that ignores [the digital divide] for a moment…if somebody has broadband at home, if they’re affluent, it doesn’t mean they have all they need. They still, in many cases, lack the time and space really to think in their lives. And, gradually, libraries will take on the role in civilization of providing that space. I don’t think the home will provide it anymore.

The thinking space where people can get to know themselves and get their ideas cogently arranged or what have you…

Q: So the cliché of the librarian going, “Shhhhhhhhh….” Oh, are we tired of that!

A: I’m sure you are, but, in a way, that is going to become something that is so desperately desired that I have a feeling there will be a new life for the library in which it provides the thinking space for civilization.

A thinking space for civilization.. that’s a good core service list for a libraries sharing/community + ideas/knowledge + beauty = civilization.

If I have been asking for months.. what are our principles? What can we offer that students don’t get elsewhere… there it is.

Bibliodiversity

I am predicting that physical collections at our schools will shrink by 15% over the next couple years. A combination of the rise of good information online, budget cutbacks over 17 years that have made buying good books harder and harder, increasing virtualization, format creep** and a culture of hoarding = frugality have caused us to reach this point.

I am excited. I keep harping on the shortness of distance between the libraries and production as these changes come. A dream that change will come and we will find our way to keep what we value and need. It's probably all Pollyanna but in my heart I hope I am at the cusp of a metamorphosis in resources for learning and living .. and not the death of library system.

But who knows?



** Format creep is what I bill as "It's the 70's all over again!" Listening centres are back, video streamed clips are the new film strip, models are huge and we are all media makers. How can this not be awesome?

JDG image above first seen on this post. Now part of a show at the David Weinberg Gallery, Detroit.

Let's get small

I have tried twitter. It's tiring. But as fall approaches I wonder how many bloggers will be coming back to blogger. Twitter is certainly buzzing but I'm glad for blogs. Even if I haven't had the energy to write a real post for over a month.

Those things happen.

The most valuable thing I have taken from twittering is the 'nano' of everything now. It is reassuring that things are gonna 'get small'. You know I'm a Steve Martin fan so that's good. As a librarian I spent so much time recently trying to help people survive an overnight in a chilly sea of information without a survival suit. Didn't we all get bit by 22 apps last year at work? I look forward to a new outlook where all I have to do is get them to grocery store or the bank or where they are actually going. Obsessing about how we could go anywhere now that was tiring.

Watch TV!

One of the joys of my job is helping children read sure.. but also watch tv! I prefer good tv. Say something like this:



Now free for home use anywhere and licensed for classroom use across BC. Next time they try and make them watch something airheaded at school remind them there is good kids video to choose... still. http://nfb.ca/playlist/kids-cartoons/

Watch for my playlist details.