Leader's Digest December 2006
From PLN
Leader's Digest December 2006
by Leslie Dillon
December 5, 2006
Disruptive innovation for social change
Why do aggressive, expensive efforts to solve social problems often fail? The primary reason is misdirected investment--groups that could be served by simple solutions aren't reached. The way to reach them, according to the authors of this article in December's Harvard Business Review, is through "catalytic innovation." Based on Clayton Christensen's disruptive-innovation model, catalytic innovations focus on creating social change and offer "simpler, good-enough solutions aimed at underserved groups." Catalytic innovators:
- Create social change through scaling and replication.
- Meet a need that is either overserved (i.e., the existing solution is more complex than necessary) or not served at all.
- Offer products and services that are simpler and cheaper than alternatives, but good enough.
- Introduce resources that may seem initially unattractive.
- Are often ignored or put down by those who don't see these as viable solutions.
Examples of successful catalytic innovations include online classes in public high schools, the community college model in higher ed and the fast, affordable, walk-in Minute Clinics at CVS drugstores. (Have you been to one? They're great! And they sort of remind me of a what a library kiosk might be like in a shopping mall.) This is one article you might want to read in its entirety--it's worth your time! (Clayton Christensen et al., "Disruptive innovation for social change", Harvard Business Review, December 2006, Vol. 84, No.12. From EBSCOhost Business Source Premier.)
Google Answers bows out but reference services are thriving
Spurred by the demise of Google Answers, John Blossom of Shore Communications takes a look at the current state of online reference services. The success of Yahoo! Answers is a good contrast to Google's now-defunct service. Despite the uneven quality of Yahoo's user-generated answers, Mr. Blossom believes that "Yahoo! is doing a good job of turning the product into an entertaining community portal" and he notes that Yahoo's alliance with Answers.com may help move Yahoo! Answers "into a more serious reference service." But the real question is: "what's the right model for a reference service that can incorporate user-generated content?"
Wikipedia is fast becoming the "reference service of choice" because "moderation and people with reasonable levels of expertise are key to successful user-generated reference materials." (Note from Leslie: Is Wikipedia an example of a catalytic innovator that offers simple, good enough solutions?) Library reference desks are becoming increasingly popular for people who want "one-on-one answers from research professionals" and services like Guideline have positioned themselves as executive research services. These various models give Google some food for thought "as it decides how best to be a source of answers." (John Blossom, "Google Answers bows out but reference services are thriving", ContentBlogger, Nov. 30, 2006.)
What you need to know about video gaming
By the Numbers
- 80 % of kids 6-17 have a video game console.
- 69% of U.S. adult heads of household play computer or video games.
- 50 minutes per day are spent by 8-18 year-olds playing video games.
- 33 is the average age of gamers, but 25% of gamers are over 50! And women represent a greater proportion of gamers than boys 17 and under!
- $7 billion was spent on computer and video games in 2005.
Most Popular Games in 2005
- Video games: Madden NFL 06
- Computer games: World of Warcraft.
What Public Libraries are Doing
- The Bronx Central Library offers a Madden tournament where teenagers play Madden NFL and compete for prizes.
- A teenager in Ann Arbor claims he'd hardly have used the library if it weren't for the gaming offered there. Now he says the library is "pretty cool."
- To persuade skeptical libraries to offer games, young librarians cite academic researchers who claim that playing video games is "practically a requirement of literacy in our digital age."
("Are video games good for you?", Raleigh News & Observer, CQ Researcher Video Games, v 16-40 ($15.00), Entertainment Software Association, Essential Facts About the Computer and Video Game Industry: 2006 Sales, Demographic and Usage Data. Free 16-page PDF; lists top 20 titles for video and computer games, and gives lots more detail on gamers' habits and interests.)
Online world as important to internet users as real world
The Center for the Digital Future at the USC Annenberg School reports in “Surveying the Digital Future” that 43 percent of Internet users who are members of online communities say they “feel as strongly” about their virtual community as they do about their real-world communities. The report looks at online communities and social networking in detail. Readers can compare the social networking data and correlate it to six years of attitudes and behaviors online. The 8-page summary (press release) is here. The full 127-page report provides detailed comparisons, trends and analysis of current developments. Individuals and corporations are charged for the full report but libraries are instructed to contact the Center at digitalcenter@digitalcenter.org to obtain a copy. (ResourceShelf, Dec. 1, 2006.)
Quick takes
Study finds Wikipedia accurate
A study by librarian Thomas Chesney found that information at Wikipedia is generally accurate.] More interesting is this unexpected conclusion: Those who are not subject experts are less likely to believe what they read there than those who are subject experts. ("An empirical examination of Wikipedia's credibility", First Monday, via The Virtual Chase, Nov. 27, 2006.)
Review of Google Book Search
Greg Notess' review of Google Book Search points out the tool's deficiencies as well as its strengths. (The Virtual Chase, Nov. 21, 2006.)
Wiley announces massive digitization project for 2007
Wiley is digitizing more than 750 volumes from at least 21 book series in their entirety over the next year. With most of the series going back to Volume 1, users can access valuable content that is no longer published in print. (ResourceShelf, Dec. 1, 2006.)
UNESCO and Library of Congress meet on World Digital Library project
On December 2, UNESCO and the Library of Congress hosted a meeting to pave the way for the launch of a World Digital Library, an internet-based repository of knowledge from all cultures and in all languages. (ResourceShelf, Dec. 2, 2006.)
December 12, 2006
Libraries thinking differently--what a year!
2006 has seen some mighty exciting new library developments! First it was North Carolina State's Endeca catalog (McMaster University in Canada has also adopted Endeca), then OCLC's WorldCat.org. And just last week, Casey Bisson of Plymouth State University won $50,000 from the Mellon Foundation for WPopac, an interactive OPAC built on WordPress, the hugely popular blogging tool. WPopac turns the library's bibliographic records (they're an Innovative customer, by the way) into a blog page where users can post content. WPopac doesn't try to eliminate the OPAC; instead it "complements and extends it." Here's a sample WPopac record; take a look and then try a search of your own. It's gorgeous!!
Plymouth State will use the $50,000 to purchase catalog records from the Library of Congress and redistribute them free under a Creative Commons Share-Alike license or GNU. WPopac will be offered as a free download, "likely in the form of sample records plus WordPress with WP-OPAC included."
Jessamyn West is right when she says: "Think how having that sort of data available to you (or your library, or your open source OPAC) could really, seriously change things."
Other initiatives bear watching as well:
- MIT's beta on WordPress, the Virtual Browsery, includes a few titles from the Humanities Library.
- Hennepin County Library's OPAC permits patron reviews, loads Amazon reviews with bib records and offers RSS feeds.
- Ann Arbor District Library is experimenting with a virtual library catalog to which patrons can add marginal notes.
- PennTags at the University of Pennsylvania lets students bookmark records.
But while these are all interesting projects, the real seeds of revolution lie in Casey Bisson's WPopac with its freely available records!
And you might want to make a note of this: Casey Bisson will be authoring the May/June 2007 issue of Library Technology Reports, "Open-Source Software for Libraries."
(ALA TechSource, Dec. 5, 2006; The Shifted Librarian, Dec. 4, 2006; MaissonBisson, Dec. 4, 2006; Open Libraries, Bookism.org, Dec. 4, 2006; librarian.net, Dec. 8, 2006; Atomic Lemur, Dec. 6, 2006; WalkingPaper.org, Nov. 18, 2006; ALA TechSource, Jan. 30, 2006;)
A lesson in economics
Brian LaVoie, a consulting Research Scientist at OCLC, has a fascinating post about economics on the hangingtogether blog. He points out that libraries' interest in economics "focuses narrowly on business models and cost projections" when in fact, economics isn't the study of money. Instead, it's the "study of behavior, and in particular, how people make decisions." An introductory economics textbook identifies ten principles of economics. The first four are:
- People face trade-offs.
- The cost of something is what you give up to get it.
- Rational people think at the margin.
- People respond to incentives.
Brian explains these principles this way:
- The first principle is about scarcity of resources--when we want to expand effort in one area, we usually need to scale down or eliminate effort in other areas.
- The second principle is about opportunity cost--the cost of choosing to undertake one activity includes not just the cost of carrying it out, but also the benefits foregone by not choosing something else.
- The third principle is about scale--the question is usually not whether an activity will be undertaken, but how much of the activity will be undertaken.
- The fourth principle is about incentives--people or organizations engage in economic activities because they perceive a self-interest or motivation to do so.
Scarcity, opportunity cost, scale, and incentives: Brian notes that "when we think about the economics of libraries, archives, and museums, it is these principles that should shape our questions and guide our thinking." (hangingtogether, Dec. 7, 2006.)
Forbes Special Report on Books
This series of articles on books and the future of publishing from Forbes.com is "brim-full of reasons to be optimistic. People are reading more, not less. The Internet is fueling literacy. Giving books away online increases off-line readership. New forms of expression--wikis, networked books--are blossoming in a digital hothouse." Cory Doctorow gives his books away online, and it's made him "a bunch of money"! Ben Vershbow believes that complaints about e-book readers are missing the point--that "the ways we read and write are changing. And it’s not the screens that are driving the change, it’s the network that those screens are hooked up to." In "Custom-built libraries" we learn how Michael Lamb from Powell's Books is designing a private library for a Saudi sheik. And the article "How the internet saved literacy" argues that despite fears to the contrary, literacy has actually increased recently as has the sale of books, which jumped 9.9% to $25 billion in 2005. These articles are definitely worth a quick look, and they're free! (via ContentBlogger, Dec. 7, 2006.)
Training that sticks
Dan Heath, co-author of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, writes that messages with sticking power have some key traits in common:
- People remember the unexpected: Common sense doesn't make an impression because it's already known; show people what's new.
- "Training six things is training nothing." Be sure what you tell people is simple enough that they can easily remember it. "[S]cale down until you're focused."
- Use concrete examples. " Illustrate your points with stories that paint a picture of your words."
("Business intelligence: Training that sticks," ManageSmarter, Sales & Marketing Management, Nov. 28, 2006.)
Managing creative types
A survey finds that managers of creative staff see their biggest challenge as knowing how to motivate different personality types. While creative people are naturally enthusiastic and don't seem "to require frequent coaching...even the most self-motivated professionals need to be encouraged and rewarded from time to time... The best managers...tailor their motivational strategies to the individual." ("Managing creative types", ManageSmarter, Sales & Marketing Management, Dec. 9, 2006. From the Sales and Marketing Management Performance Newsletter.)
Quick takes
Microsoft Live Search Books
Microsoft Live Search Books (beta) is available at http://books.live.com. The initial load includes books from the University of California, the University of Toronto and The British Library. Cornell's books are being scanned and will show up soon. All the books available are out-of-copyright titles. The New York Public Library and the American Museum of Veterinary Medicine will be future contributors. (There's lots more information in Greg Notess' full article: "Microsoft launches Live Search Books", Information Today Newsbreaks, Dec. 11, 2006.)
State health facts
StateHealthFacts.org from the Kaiser Family foundation has a wealth of demographic and statistical information. Recent updates include number of dentists, nursing home residents, AIDS cases, etc. (via Resource Shelf, Dec. 8, 2006.)
What's next for MySpace?
Fox Interactive Media will soon announce "a significant new mobile partner for MySpace." Some say it's Cingular, but Cingular isn't talking. A deal with Cingular (or another major mobile carrier), could help make wireless social networking mainstream. (Steve Rosenbusch, "What's next for MySpace?", BusinessWeek.com, Dec. 4, 2006.)
Moving beyond YouTube
Online editing applications let people go beyond just watching and sharing video. Several startups, including Jumpcut, Grouper, and Motionbox, provide free software that lets anyone mix video clips online and even make movies whether or not they have content of their own. Jumpcut, now a Yahoo! company, lets people do real-time video editing through their Web browsers using advanced Flash applications. (Kate Greene, "Moving Beyond YouTube", Technology Review, Dec. 4, 2006.)
December 19, 2006
Analysis: CSA acquisition of ProQuest
Shore Communications' John Blossom says the acquisition of ProQuest by CSA parent Cambridge Information Group will likely benefit CSA and ProQuest, but not necessarily Thomson Learning.
CSA has a "powerful search interface" with scholarly content in arts & humanities, natural sciences, social sciences and technology. ProQuest gives CSA "deep roots in library services" and more scientific, technical and medical content, plus vast electronic newspaper archives. This will give "CSA a much different potential profile." Illumina clients will certainly benefit from this broader content, and CSA will be able to offer more corporate information services. Thomson Learning won't necessarily benefit from this deal though, "which Thomson hopes will generate cash for bolstering its position in its financial, legal and pharma markets."
Blossom believes "the demand for high quality research products is not going to disappear." (And Andrew Pace comments that content is still king.) Organizations like Google and the Open Content Alliance "will pick more of the low-lying fruit of this sector as time goes on, and they may in time decide to go for the premium offerings to round out their online research offerings, but that's a way down the road at this point. For now consider CSA as having made a good move..." (John Blossom, ContentBlogger, Dec 15, 2006. Information Today will have a full NewsBreak report on Dec. 26. I'll keep my eyes peeled for it!)
What is a Leader?
Harvard Business School Publishing's ad for its CD program on leadership gives key tactics for great leaders:
- Step back to analyze a situation--getting on the balcony and using existing patterns and relationships.
- Identify What Needs to Change--listening to people's concerns; looking for conflicts; looking at oneself and one's team; regulating stress.
- Empower Employees--aligning people with a vision.
- Selectively Show Flaws--the best flaws to reveal are those that can be perceived as strengths, e.g., working too hard.
- Be Empathetic--good leaders give people what they need, not necessarily what they want.
(eLearning Alert, Harvard Business Online, Dec. 2006.)
Getting good advice and using it wisely
According to Dan Ciampa's book, Taking Advice: How Leaders Get Good Advice and Use It Wisely, too many leaders overlook the "demand side" of advice, and, while "advice has become more ubiquitous, leaders have grown less satisfied with it." Leaders "often overlook help from colleagues, board members, subordinates, friends, and spouses. Good advice bridges the gap between a leader's vision and realization of that vision. When leaders fail to solicit advice or obtain it from the wrong sources, the leader and his vision suffer." Ciampa gives a topology of advice (strategic, operational, political, personal) and defines four types of advisers (expert, experienced, sounding board, partner). He also identifies the defining characteristics of effective advice takers." (from Harvard Business Online; the book costs $18.60 new from Amazon.)
Toxic communication
We all know how toxic communication can infect a workplace. A Canadian consultancy has identified the four most common types of toxic communication and suggests techniques to help your managers and staff communicate more effectively. Some of these behaviors would probably be hard to learn and harder to practice daily, but it's still a useful list because we've all probably seen at least one of these, and the damage from toxic communication can be permanent.
- Toxic: Indirect communication, non-verbal messages that show disapproving attitudes and critical humor.
- How to avoid: Use "XYZ" communication, where a staff member says: "When you do X, it makes me feel Y. Could I ask you to do Z instead?"
- Toxic: Character assassination that dishonors someone who is not there to defend themselves.
- How to avoid: While talking about a fellow staff member in his or her absence, tell staff to picture their colleague, and say only what they would say in their presence.
- Toxic: Public redressing to avoid talking face-to-face.
- How to avoid: Managers should try their best not to discipline workers in front of their peers.
- Toxic: E-stabbing where a "scathing e-mail" message is sent copying the recipient's manager.
- How to avoid: Talk to staff face-to-face about the implications of using e-mails as a "fault-broadcaster".
("Toxic Communications", Inside Training Newsletter, Dec. 13, 2006.)
Google Apps for Education
Google Apps for Education has some great features for academic librarians, some of which, according to Michelle Boule of the ALA TechSource blog, could potentially revolutionize the way librarians interact with faculty. "Librarians would have access to a campus-wide IM service, GTalk, which would enable them to reach faculty with greater immediacy." Google Apps for Education's calendar feature "would give librarians the ability to create meetings with faculty members to discuss collection issues, information literacy, or their research needs for the next semester". And there are additional tools that would enhance collaboration with faculty. But there are issues that need to be kept in mind relative to Google Apps: there's less local control with a hosted service; Google doesn't archive digital material, so other arrangements would have to be made for record retention; and it would affect campus IT staffing. (Michelle Boule, ALA TechSource, Dec. 15, 2006.)
Cool new tools from ALA
Have you seen the Librarian’s E-Library from ALA? It uses Google Co-Op to create a customized search engine that searches more than 225 web resources on libraries and librarianship. And it has a growing list of volunteers. It's also fun to search! The ALA Professional Tips wiki is a pathfinder for using ALA’s web site with three main areas: a categorized set of articles on librarianship, an ALA history timeline and a Q & A area. (The ShiftedLibrarian, Dec. 8, 2006.)
Library in a box
Some "important work to bridge the digital divide" is being done by eIFL, Electronic Information for Libraries, an initiative of the Soros Open Society Institute. The Open Source Software for Libraries Program was officially launched in October and is working to define a roadmap toward the design of the "library in a box." The plan involves distributing a "cutting-edge open-source ILS" on CD. The ILS is a priority because it's typically libraries' "biggest technology expense." (Catalogablog, Dec. 13, 2006, and eIFL.net press release, Nov. 7, 2006.)
21st century students
Time Magazine's December 18 cover story is really relevant to libraries. "This is a story about the big public conversation the nation is not having about education...whether...an entire generation of kids will fail...because they can't think their way through abstract problems, work in teams, distinguish good information from bad [emphasis added] or speak a foreign language." In the 21st Century students must become "smarter about new sources of information." "[K]ids need to rapidly...distinguish between what's reliable and what isn't" and to know how to manage information, "interpret it, validate it, and how to act on it." Classes that teach information literacy in public schools are rare, but increasingly colleges and employers believe they are essential. There's a huge role for libraries here---not only teaching the students, but also teaching the teachers how to teach information literacy! (Claudia Wallis & Sonja Steptoe, "How to Bring Our Schools Out of the 20th Century", Time Magazine, Dec. 18, 2006.)
Great source for reliable statistics
NationMaster.com, which the New York Times called "astounding and easy to use," is a massive compilation of data from sources like the CIA World Factbook, UN and OECD that lets you easily generate maps and graphs on all kinds of country statistics. Its sister site, StateMaster.com, compares US states in over 3,000 ways, using various primary sources such as the US Census Bureau, the FBI and the National Center for Educational Statistics.
NationMaster and StateMaster both provide visualization technology like pie charts, maps, graphs and scatterplots. Mary Ellen Bates calls NationMaster.com a "great resource for gaining new insights from the available information." Their stated purpose is "to be the web's one-stop resource for country statistics." Curious about how they make their money (which I assume is from ads), I checked their FAQ, which says they are independently owned and run. (from Mary Ellen Bates, "Geeking Out on Statistics", SearchEngineWatch, Dec. 12, 2006.)
What comes after Web 2.0?
A more intelligent Internet is still a long way off, reports my favorite technology writer, Wade Roush. MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Amazon, and Google are all working for "a smarter Web" and some of their prototypes are available on the Web, but none are ready for prime time. Want to know more? The full article is definitely worth your time! (Wade Roush, "What Comes after Web 2.0?", Technology Review, Dec. 1, 2006.)
Newspapers with Mojos
Newspaper giant Gannett has a fleet of mobile journalists, "mojos", who look for stories on the road and file several a day, mostly for the newspaper’s Web site, but sometimes for the print edition, too. They create a stream of local, current Web content with "high-tech tools--ThinkPads, digital audio recorders, digital still and video cameras--but no land line and no office... Gannett’s papers focus on the Web first, newspaper second. They are slashing national and foreign coverage and beefing up 'hyper-local', street-by-street news. It is trying everything it can think of to create Web sites that will attract more readers." (StayGoLinks, Dec. 5, 2006.)
