Author Archive

social media and libraries

Use of social media by the library current practices and future opportunities (White Paper)

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/access/white-paper-social-media.pdf

#tfsocialmedia

Social media objectives:

  •  promotion
  •  collection management tool
  • Outreach
  •  teaching and learning

Opportunities and challenges

  • opportunity to build a sense of community between the library and its users
  • the variability of skills across library staff for using social media effectively, striking the right tone between professional and personal, coordinating activities across the institution to avoid duplication
  • maintaining visibility for the library brand and copyright issues relating to hosting library resources on social media sites

Policies and management:

  • Librarians are divided on the benefits of introducing formalized social media policies and plans. About a third of libraries responding to the Taylor & Francis survey had a policy in place, but over 40% had no plans to introduce one
  • Some believe that representing the library as a professional function with a
    consistent tone is the priority, while others believe that a more human approach is important, with individual staff free to bring their own ideas and personalities to social media activities.

Effectiveness and assessment:

  • difficult to prove return on effort and that the time required to do this was a major barrier to more comprehensive analysis of impact
  • framework for evaluation, so it is likely that assessment against commonly agreed metrics will become an increasingly important part of social media activity within the library in the near future

Current Social Media Practices:

  • In a study from the mid 2000s (Cantrell and Havens1 ), most library directors in the US when questioned about social media said they did not think that libraries had a role in social networking
  • A more recent study from 2012 (Kai-Wah Chu and Du4) shows how use of social media by the library has now become mainstream. In this survey of libraries in Asia, North America and Europe, 71% were found to be using social media tools with a further 13% saying they planned to use them

Advantages of using social media

n Financially the costs of using social media are perceived to be low;
n It requires little training;
n It promotes library services and disseminates news quickly, delivering this information more directly to library users;
n It increases engagement and interactions with library users;
n It helps gather feedback to enhance user services;
n The promotion of library holdings via social media can help increase usage of content;
n It enhances communication both within the library and with other departments;
n It can be used for outreach activities through onward sharing, well beyond the institution itself, helping build connections and reputation more broadly

Social Media Objectives: graph on page 8 of the PDF document:

A To promote events
B To promote library services
C To promote resources/collections at the library
D To update on library refurbishments
E To promote new acquisitions
F To promote library guides, exhibition guides
G To connect with new students joining the university
H To engage with the academic community
I To connect with the wider community beyond the university e.g. the town in which the institution is based
J To connect with distance learners
K As a customer services tool- complaints, suggestions, enquiries, feedback

L To highlight subject specific information
M To connect with potential students
N As a teaching tool to promote information literacy, technology and writing tips (not library based)
O To promote courses
P As a research tool to locate official documents and studies

From UK-based focus group: “The library is a programme, not just a building.

Channel preferences: Graph on page 10 of the PDF document

SOCIAL MEDIA USES Table on p 13 of the PDF document
Twitter n Distribute library news and information
n Provide customer service
n Build connections with researchers
n Build connections with other librarians and institutions
Facebook n Distribute library news and information
n More social and less formal than Twitter – share photographs and run competitions
n Arrange events including tracking RSVPs and sending event updates
n Engagement with students
Pinterest n Promote general library collections, digital and archive special collections and information literacy
n Set up of online repositories for students to pin researched references as part of
collaborative group work
n Display book titles to save time browsing and promote new titles
n Provide an arena for students and course leaders to pin reviewed and recommended reading
for a particular topic
n Develop communities with other online libraries
YouTube n Streaming film collections
n Instructional ‘how to’ videos teaching information literacy skills and how to use library
services and resources
There are also a number of other social media products that are being used by librarians that reflect regional
preferences and the need for the specific functions offered by niche applications.

Collection usage and discovery: Graph on p. 15

Teaching and learning

From US-based librarian interview: “The trend in education now is to create environments that foster collaborative learning. Faculty have ditched textbooks and course management systems in exchange for a Facebook page for their class, or a wiki, or a blog. These online environments are fun; students already know how to use them and are more motivated to comment, discuss and share in these environments than a dry CMS.”

Social media policies and management, p. 18

73% of respondents stating that they believed more roles dedicated to social media would appear in the library in the future.

Effectiveness of social media

From UK focus group: “We keep track of something particularly successful, then we redo the campaign 6 months later.”

From US focus group: “We have very few interactions with anyone on our Twitter feed.”
“Twitter is definitely the best platform, because we hashtag all of our posts with the keyword
of the publication, and so for the academic audience, once they click it’s going to pull up all
of the similar publications under that topic.

Promoting library social media channels

From UK focus group:
“We retweet each other to encourage new followers.” My note: Suggested by me regarding SCSU_Library for Twitter and Pinterest and SCSUTechinstruct but “considered” (in local lingo, slow death of the idea)

Teenagers, The Internet, And Privacy

The Truth About Teenagers, The Internet, And Privacy

http://www.fastcompany.com/3037962/then-and-now/the-truth-about-teenagers-the-internet-and-privacy

danah boyd, a professor at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for the Internet and Society, argues that teenagers closely scrutinize what they share online because it is a way for them to negotiate their changing identities. In her book, It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens, she describes how teenagers carefully curate their feeds based on the audience they are trying to reach.

Adolescents have been migrating away from Facebook and Twitter over the last few years, showing preference for sites like Snapchat, Whisper, Kik, and Secret that provide more anonymity and privacy. Part of this transition can be explained by the fact that the older social media sites stopped being cool when parents joined them, but perhaps another reason could be that teenagers growing up in the post-Snowden era implicitly understand the value of anonymity. For teens, it’s not a matter of which platform to use, but rather which works best in a particular context.

Dropbox and Microsoft

Dropbox and Microsoft form surprise partnership for Office integration

http://www.theverge.com/2014/11/4/7153975/dropbox-microsoft-partnership-microsoft-office

For Dropbox it’s a lot easier to partner with companies and build a platform rather than try and create a rival to Microsoft Office. Dropbox’s updated apps will be available across mobile platforms in the coming weeks alongside Microsoft’s own Office apps. Additionally, Dropbox has also committed to building a Windows Phone version of its app which will be available in the coming months.

social media listening strategy

Seven tips to creating a social media listening strategy

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/article/20141104142730-79555391-seven-tips-to-creating-a-social-media-listening-strategy

  • Conduct a content audit. 
  • Analyze how and where you are sharing your content. Decide where you need to adjust. 
  • Determine your target audience and make sure you listen to them and pay attention to what they’re doing, too. 
  • Monitor for conversations around your brand and industry with online tools and TweetDeck. 
    • Complaints:
    • Praise:
    • Inquiries:
    • Recommendations/referrals:
  • Pay attention to breaking news and leverage your own content appropriately.
  • Join and monitor forums where people are talking about your brand. Respond when appropriate.
  • Don’t be a robot. Listen to your target audience and those who are similar to your brand. Engage with them.

Engaging Students on Social Media

Engaging Students on Social Media

http://robertbochnak.wordpress.com/2014/10/19/1859/

Mark Feltham

Principal Lecturer in Animal Ecology at Liverpool John Moores University

Nice. We use Facebook to teach bioscience undergraduates about statistics 🙂 See e.g.

http://www.slideshare.net/markfeltham6/melsig-june-3rd-2014-10-reasons-why-you-should-use-social-media-in-your-teaching

Also Twitter #doingstatisticsdifferently #statsexpo etc

My own view is that Social Media is an underused tool in HE that provides an excellent medium for providing students with choice in how they learn. It’s enable us to embed and manage flexible pedagogies within our programmes and offer students interesting new ways to learn…particularly in relation to #makered (Maker Education)

See e.g. http://www.slideshare.net/markfeltham6/research-cafe-october-8th-maker-education

Mobile Video Advertising

Mobile Video Advertising Still The Hot Ticket

http://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/236980/mobile-video-advertising-still-the-hot-ticket.html

Traffic Share (Mobile Phone Operating System)
Operating System Share of Traffic Share of Revenue
Android

57.64%

41.77%

iOS

30.2

51.20

Other

6.37

5.91

Symbian

4.37

0.47

BlackBerry

1.20

0.49

Windows

0.22

0.12

Source: Opera Mediaworks, October 2014

Social Networking is still the most popular category in mobile advertising, accounting for about 1 in 5 ad impressions. At the same time, Music, Video and Media sites and apps drive the most revenue, with 23%

electronic portfolio: resources

ePortfolio for the Assessment of Learning 

http://www.futured.com/documents/FuturEdePortfolioforAssessmentWhitePaper.pdf

http://www.myefolio.com/
http://chalkandwire.com/index.php/product

A Survey of the Electronic Portfolio Market Sector: Analysis and Surprising Trends

http://campustechnology.com/articles/2011/10/12/a-survey-of-the-electronic-portfolio-market-sector.aspx

FolioTek, Columbia, Missouri, ePortfolio launch in 2001. Sells in U.S. with interest in expanding globally.

Livetext, LaGrange, IL, founded in 1998. New product: Field Experience Module. Smart phone app: iPad, iPhone, Android. Mostly U.S., but expanding in South America and the Middle East. Easy tie-in to accreditation agencies and their standards. Individual accounts. New release start of 2012. Started in K-12, moved focus to higher education, now exploring K-12 once again, starting with teacher education.

RCampus, produced by Reazon Systems, Santa Ana, CA. Software development started in 1999,

Desire2Learn, Kitchener, Ontario also Baltimore, MD, with offices around the world, founded in 1999. Sells worldwide, latest release for the electronic portfolio (ver. 3.5) was in August 2011. Electronic portfolio and the D2L LMS are bundled; each leverages functionalities from the other. ePortfolio moving to hosting service and individual accounts soon.

Digication, Providence, RI and Palo Alto, CA, founded 2002. Is in partnership with Google Apps. Individual accounts; institution keeps assessment data; individual keeps ePortfolio functionality. Through Google Apps: free digital accounts with Digication (no assessment management functions with these accounts). “Three or four clicks and Digication is enabled.” Almost daily updates. Smart phone app: IOS and Android. Contact jyan@digication.com.

Learning Objects, producers of Campus Pack, in Washington, DC, with employees around the world, founded in 2003.

TaskStream, New York City, organized 1998, founded 2000, markets internationally, versions available in a variety of languages. Offers separate platforms, AMS (Accountability Management System) and LAT (Learning Achievement Tools); each is multi-component.

Longsight, based in Ohio with offices in NY, IN, OH, WI, and CA, founded in 1978, a service provider for open source solutions. Supports both the Open Source Portfolio (OSP) and Sakai, within which OSP is embedded.

Chalk & Wire, Ridgeway, Ontario, Canada;

NobleHour, produced by TreeTop Software, in Lakeland, FL, founded in 2011

Sherston, Tag Developments, the assessment division of Sherston Software, Ltd., providers of Red Pen Tool: http://www.maps-ict.com/redpentool.mov, of LiveAssess: http://www.maps-ict.com/liveassess.mov, and of MAPS 3: http://www.maps-ict.com/maps3.mov.

PebblePad from PebbleLearning, in Telford, UK, with office in Australia, founded in 2003. Most popular ePortfolio in the U.K. and Australia,

Symplicity, in Arlington, VA, offers an electronic portfolio (http://www.symplicity.com/reflection) but it is only one among dozens of products that Symplicity offers–all of them are management tools for higher education (see http://www.symplicity.com/products). Good example of separating products to support a single function.

Blackboard

eFolioWorld, technology from Avenet, the Minnesota Colleges and Universities portfolio system,

iWebFolio, from Nuventive. Also known for TracDat, marketed since the 1990s, Nuventive founded 2000.

Epsilen,

Mahara,

eLumen,

A survey of e-pdp and e-portfolio practice in UK Higher Education

http://www.islamicstudiesnetwork.ac.uk/assets/documents/pdp/survey_of_epdp_and_eportfolio_practice_in_uk_higher_education.pdf

p. 10 and p. 18 offer questionnaires for assessment

Exploring Faculty Perceptions of ePortfolio Use and Its Relationship to Faculty Teaching Beliefs

http://ncepr.org/finalreports/WSUfinalreport.pdf

p. 3 questionnaire  p. 5

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