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Blog central for Australian Libraries

Public access to WorldCat launched.

OCLC’s public version of WorldCat went live on 6 August 2006.

worldcat.jpg

August 8th, 2006 Posted by Kathryn Greenhill | All sectors, Useful resources | one comment

ALIA Victoria - Special members only event!

Members only event – Explore the State Library of Victoria - behind the scenes!

ALIA Victoria invites members for a special tour of the State Library of Victoria.

In what promises to be a fabulous evening, you will get an introduction to the Library’s history, an outline of the slv21 initiatives and hear more about the new Ballarat Offsite storage.

Then on for a fantastic tour of areas such as the closed stacks, La Trobe Library, Redmond Barry Reading Room, Genealogy Resources, Arts Library etc.

Afterwards, you are then more than welcome to join others for dinner afterwards at a restaurant to be decided.

Where: State Library of Victoria, Cnr La Trobe Street and Swanston Street, Melbourne

When: Tuesday, August 15th 2006. Meet in the foyer of the Library at 5.30pm for a 5.45pm sharp start. The tour should conclude by 7pm.

Cost: Free

RSVP with your ALIA membership number by Friday 11th August to Jill Baker, is essential.
Email - [email protected]

Please let Jill know if you would like to come out for dinner afterwards as well.

This event is sure to be booked out as numbers are strictly limited, so get in quick!

We hope to see you there!

August 6th, 2006 Posted by Jenelle | All sectors, Events, Victoria | no comments

Communicating with patrons

Keeing up with the options - very difficult for me, with my busy life and lack of tech skills.  So I appreciate, so much, posts like this one. Stephen Cohen has pointed out a great example of a library using flickr to communicate with its patrons.

August 6th, 2006 Posted by Bronwyn | All sectors, Australia, New technologies, Queensland, Useful resources | no comments

Great Australian online resources - old becomes new!

Re-Member, is a biographical database containing summary biographical information about all Members of the Parliament of Victoria since 1851. It is based on information drawn from “A Biographical Register of the Victorian Legislature 1851-1900″ and “Biographical Register of the Victorian Parliament 1900-84″. Records for members elected since 1984 have been created from the information contained in Parliamentary Handbooks.

Australian Dictionary of Biography Online Edition is the Internet version of the ADB’s traditional print volumes. It is operated by the Australian Dictionary of Biography (ADB), Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University. The website is a joint production of the ADB and the Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre, University of Melbourne (Austehc). The biographical articles published in the first online edition are those found in the printed ADB: Volumes 1 to 16 in the continuing series and the Supplementary Volume. The articles are concise, authoritative accounts of the lives of significant and representative persons in Australian history.

August 4th, 2006 Posted by tango | All sectors, Australia, Useful resources, Victoria | no comments

Interview with a (not so) retiring librarian

My colleague Sue Grey-Smith will be retiring next year, and I thought it might be a good time to interview her and ask her to share a few insights on our profession. Sue’s worked in a number of different roles within the Library and Information Service at Curtin University of Technology in Perth, including web co-ordinator, and Senior Librarian, Humanities.

The interview was conducted via email.

How long have you been working in libraries?

Fifteen years in all (two as a library officer when I was untrained).

Why did you decide to become a librarian?

I had worked part-time as a library officer in a small country public library, then a few years later decided to go back to do some more study. I had the option of choosing to upgrade my skills in graphic design or in librarianship, but I decided to get a postgraduate qualification in librarianship as I thought I’d have a better chance of getting work in libraries than in graphic design which is very much a young person’s environment I think. Besides, I really enjoy interacting with people, and libraries are a good place for that!

Talk about the work of information workers - such as librarians – being outsourced, has been around for a while now, and recent books like The world is flat and A whole new mind, are suggesting that information technology, by enabling rapid and easy communication, is “flattening” the world, and enabling many jobs to be done by workers in countries like India. So in India we have accountants preparing tax returns on behalf of American companies, radiologists reading CAT scans for American hospitals, lawyers conducting legal research for American law firms, and of course we have all those call centres. Professionals will need to change and adapt, and will need to be able to “do what workers abroad cannot do equally well for much less money”.

The next few years are going to be (already are!) an interesting and challenging time to be a librarian. You’ve always inspired me (yes, really!) by always having great ideas, and always being able to see the bigger picture and coming up with creative and interesting solutions to problems– have you any suggestions for how to stay fresh, engaged and interested?

Well, I think that if we keep our eyes on all the new technologies that are happening every day, and think of how they could be used by our clients, (or explained to our clients) then life as a librarian is sure to be interesting. The key is to remember that most people are not as technically literate as us, so it needs to be promoted in a way that makes it accessible - that’s where libraries can be so helpful! (And CW, you are already doing this - you help me all the time by explaining things to me!!) The other way to make life interesting is to think of ideas that can be done easily and quickly so it can happen without any fuss from management, and to share ideas with others outside the organisation (again, you already do this!)

CW: Well, Sue, I think the lesson here is for library professionals to keep talking to each other and sharing ideas and enthusiasms… And while I’m on this subject, I don’t think I have ever thanked you for your positive attitude and for encouraging me to keep looking… at blogs (and RSS and wikis…). I have learned a lot from you, the most important lesson being the importance of being positive and open to new things. Always looking for ways to achieve things. Your example has made a big difference to my professional practice. Thank you Sue!

Have you enjoyed being a librarian?

Yes.

What have you enjoyed most? What project has been most memorable?

I’ve enjoyed getting small interesting projects up and running - the SMS a Query service is one, although I was not actually part of the implementing team, I had the initial idea and feel very pleased it has been successful. Another project I really enjoyed being part of is our podcasts project - helping work out what we wanted to do and how to do it.

CW: Again we have you to thank for seeing the possibilities and keeping us positive and interested and focussed on what we wanted to do!

Do you have any advice for aspiring librarians, those of us still in library school?

Don’t be afraid to question everything! Keep your eyes on the wider world! Don’t get too stuck in the minute details of library life because then you lose sight of what’s happening outside. Always think about everything from the client’s point of view - so don’t use library jargon or complicate things for the ordinary person. If you enjoy your work as a librarian and do the best you can, you’ll find the rewards are great - people really appreciate the help they get from librarians - and that’s a pretty rare sort of job to have.

Anything else you’d like to add?

Thanks for the opportunity to think about all this!

August 4th, 2006 Posted by CW | Academic libraries, All sectors, Australia, LINTerviews, Western Australia | one comment

statistics and such

A recent post to the NewGrads’ elist highlights a career overview of librarians, on Australian Jobsearch. Interesting to note is that average salary is around $1,000/week (which seems high based on most of the librarians I know). While job prospects are average, unemployment remains low. It’s a female dominated industry at 78% of the workforce; 67% of employees are fulltime. NSW has the biggest share of librarians, followed by, in order: VIC, QLD, WA, SA, ACT, TAS, NT. Information in the Jobsearch overview is based on data from ABS.

August 3rd, 2006 Posted by snail | All sectors | 3 comments

Trying to describe Library 2.0?

If you are feeling a bit fuzzy about what Library 2.0 means, or have a colleague who doesn’t seem to get it, this short paper provides a very clear over view of Web2.0/Library 2.0 and outlines some of the changes and technologies we’ll need to face:

Maness, J. (2006). “Library 2.0 Theory: Web 2.0 and Its Implications for Libraries”. Webology, 3 (2), Article 25. Available at: http://www.webology.ir/2006/v3n2/a25.html

ABSTRACT: This article posits a definition and theory for “Library 2.0″. It suggests that recent thinking describing the changing Web as “Web 2.0″ will have substantial implications for libraries, and recognizes that while these implications keep very close to the history and mission of libraries, they still necessitate a new paradigm for librarianship. The paper applies the theory and definition to the practice of librarianship, specifically addressing how Web 2.0 technologies such as synchronous messaging and streaming media, blogs, wikis, social networks, tagging, RSS feeds, and mashups might intimate changes in how libraries provide access to their collections and user support for that access.

via Library Link of the Day

August 1st, 2006 Posted by Kathryn Greenhill | All sectors, International, New technologies, Useful resources | no comments

Blogs and wikis in Australian libraries

Ever wonder how many libraries around Australia are using blogs? What about wikis? Recently I learnt about a great project Chelsea Harper and Kate Watson are working on, which aims to investigate how blogs and wikis are being used in Australian libraries. This project is supported by the Ray Choate Scholarship, an award which “enable[s] the recipient[s] to investigate a particular aspect of reference or information services that will lead to improved practice in the area.”

Chelsea and Kate have set up a wiki to collate the information they are gathering. There is a small, slowly growing list of library blogs listed, as well as a few library wikis. Take a look, and if your library is not listed you might want to assist Chelsea and Kate by adding your library’s details.

From the Research Project Update page, I see that the plan is to present a paper on their findings at the 2007 Information Online Conference in Sydney. I’m looking forward to learning about your findings!

August 1st, 2006 Posted by CW | All sectors, Blogs, Special projects, Wikis | 2 comments

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