I love this! No, really, we should use it. One thing Google has that
many libraries/library catalogs don't is a sense of humor. I think that
sense of humor translates into the feel that the resource has some kind
of personality, that there's someone on the other end the user is
interacting with. Some may dismiss it as branding, but I think that
kind of personality cuts way down on the intimidation factor. In my
experience, one of the major hurdles for getting (especially) undergrads
to use the library is that they perceive it as intimidating.
Intimidation=fear=not being able to or wanting to learn how to use the
tools. Gosh, if it were fun, lots of people would want to use them!
Kathy Mitchell
Cataloger, Jeffcat
Jeffco Public Schools
1829 Denver West Dr.
Golden, CO 80401
303/982-5934
kaamitch_at_jeffco.k12.co.us
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Next generation catalogs for libraries
> [mailto:NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu] On Behalf Of Ranti Junus
> Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2007 6:10 PM
> To: NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu
> Subject: Re: [NGC4LIB] Elitism in libraries.
>
> I suddenly got the impression that there would be three kind
> of user interfaces available:
>
> "I'm feeling lucky"
> "I've used this stuff"
> "I totally pwnd this stuff"
>
>
> ranti.
>
>
> On 8/2/07, Michael Fitzgerald <mike_at_jazzdiscography.com> wrote:
> > At 11:34 AM 8/2/2007, Jonathan Rochkind wrote:
> > >Instead, it's having systems that meet the users where
> they are at,
> > >that work for the high school students AND the faculty AND provide
> > >the 'ladder' to move from one to the other.
> >
> > And the 'ladder' is bibliographic instruction. It might (partly) be
> > computerized, adaptive, and transparent or it might be (gasp!) an
> > actual human librarian who has teaching skills in addition to a
> > thorough knowledge of the relevant tools. You don't get from 'high
> > school students' to 'faculty' without education. Just
> adding pizza and
> > waiting six years time doesn't do it. Pretending that
> people will get
> > smarter by using the lite version of the tools doesn't make
> sense to
> > me. And trying to make the lite version give you everything
> that the
> > real deal does simply avoids the issue. Academic libraries,
> at least,
> > ought to be creating power users who can use the real deal
> effectively
> > to squeeze the maximum out of the catalog. College seniors who are
> > still always using the single search box (for
> > research) have not learned what they ought to have.
> >
> > Mike
> >
> >
> > mike at jazzdiscography.com
> > www.jazzdiscography.com
> >
>
>
> --
> Bulk mail. Postage paid.
>
Received on Fri Aug 03 2007 - 08:03:15 EDT