It appears that people still like to talk to and get/give info directly from other people, face-to-face. From the Article: A survey conducted by BIGresearch for the Retail Advertising & Marketing Association (RAMA) found that in-person communication was social media users? top impetus to start an online search for a specific item. Social media users were even more influenced by face-to-face word-of-mouth than average adults. [Snip] Online communities such as MySpace and Facebook influenced less than one-quarter of social media users to search for a product or service. Men were marginally more likely than women to report such an influence; age had a larger effect. Among the 18-to-34 group, nearly three in 10 searched because of social networks, compared with less than 20% of 35- to 54-year-olds and 15.3% of those 55 and older. [Snip] RAMA found that, just as when they are getting information, social media users prefer giving information face-to-face. More than 71% communicated about a service, product or brand in person after an online search, compared with only 21.6% who spread the word via sites such as MySpace or Facebook. Not all digital communication was shunned, however; about one-half used e-mail to tell others what they had found. Access the Complete Article Source: eMarketer (Source: ResourceShelf)

Check out this post and see how recent some of these innovations are. 18 Interesting Firsts on the Internet 1. The First Email 2. The First Ever Domain Name 3. The First SPAM Email Ever 4. The First Ever Mobile Phone with Internet Access Facility 5. The First Ever Website 6. The First Ever E-Commerce Website and Transaction 7. The First Ever Online Bank 8. The First Ever Search Engine 9. The First Ever Blog 10. The First Ever Podcast 11. The First Item Ever Sold on eBay 12. The First Book Ever Sold on Amazon 13. The first edit on Wikipedia 14. The First Ever Video on YouTube 15. The First Ever Message on Twitter 16. The First Ever Voice Chat Service 17. The First Ever Website Hacked 18. The First Ever Social Network Site I was surprised by some. Stephen (Source: Stephen)

Editor’s Note: Last month we shared news about our new ACRLog-ALA Emerging Leaders Group. Each month one of our Emerging Leaders will contribute a guest post, and each will focus on some aspect of gearing up for the ALA Annual Conference in Washington, DC. To get the series started this month’s post is from Wendy Girven, Public Services Librarian at University of Alaska Southeast. Spring is in the air, which means before you know it, ALA Annual will be upon us. This year?s conference is in the nation?s capital, Washington DC, which coincidentally, is where my first Annual conference was while I was still a LIS student in 2007. My conference goals involved attending a session during every time slot, finding a job, and coming home with a few new books and ideas. Then I walked in the door of the convention center and was lost in a sea of people. I must admit, I was overwhelmed by the size! Luckily, a few friends showed me the ropes of finding out where to get my badge, figuring out the conference buses, and getting to the new member orientation programs. One of these programs that you can attend is the ACRL 101 session (with breakfast!) during the conference, where you can meet others who are new to ACRL, and make connections with librarians who are interested in/work in academic libraries. If you are in library school and have yet to decide the path you might want to choose for your career, ACRL 101 session offers a chance to explore. In addition to that meeting, there are mini-sessions held on the exhibit floor. All of these ACRL 101 sessions have an informal feeling and provide opportunity to learn names and faces. (I?ll be at each of the mini-sessions this year, come say hi!). The main lesson I learned from my first ALA was not to worry about hitting the most possible events, but to prepare yourself to be ready for all of the opportunities that can arise spontaneously. ...

Social Networking and Constituent Communications: Member Use of Twitter During a Two-Month Period in the 111th Congress, February 03, 2010... (Source: beSpacific)

Found via Jennie Law--who is back from New Zealand.  Oh so jealous...According to a Web Behavior Survey: I'm an ostrich  Fast-moving - We can tell from your results that you are a speedy surfer - one of the characteristics of the Web Ostrich, whose real-world counterpart has an impressive top speed of 45mph. Sociable - The web is a social place. You take full advantage of this when you search for information by using social networks and other sites whose content is created by its users. Real-world ostriches are also highly social, even keeping eggs in each other?s nests to share the burden. Specialised - The real-world ostrich is a true specialist, highly adapted to survive in hot, dusty African grasslands. You might not be at risk from lions when browsing the web, but you are still very focused. From your test we can tell you do best when you concentrate on one task at time, rather than several things at once. (Source: Hedgehog Librarian: Prickly, Nocturnal, InfoDiva)

Join the ipl2 (Internet Public Library) in Celebration of 15 Years of Innovation, Service, and Research In 1995, it took 35 students 70 days to develop what would become the world?s largest and most recognized free, online collection and reference service in the world: the Internet Public Library. This month, 91,982 reference questions and 40,000 vetted, searchable electronic resource items later, the Internet Public Library celebrates its 15th anniversary. In conjunction with this event, The iSchool at Drexel will be hosting the Institute on the Future of Reference and its Impact on Library and Information Science Education March 15 -16, 2010. The institute is part of the IMLS grant Transforming the IPL into a Virtual Learning Laboratory. Faculty, students and staff from Drexel University , Florida State University, The University of Washington, The University of Illinois, The University of North Carolina, Syracuse University, and the Free Library of Philadelphia are among those participating in the institute. Additionally, two special open presentations have been planned in honor of this moment in the ipl2?s history. You can join the celebration as we reflect on the future of reference and its impact on the future of library and information science education. These presentations will be streamed live on video, with information also reported live on the ipl2 blog, Second Life, and Twitter. [Instructions below the agenda for accessing the conversation on our social networks.] ipl2 – Celebrating 15 years! Monday, March 15, 2010 4:30 p.m. ? 5:45 p.m. EST Speakers: Mick Khoo: ipl2 Merger Surprises Joyce Valenza: Web 2.0 Reference on the Ground K-12 Special Guest Speaker and IPL Founder Joe Janes: IPL to ipl2: The Past, Present and Future Tuesday, March 16, 2010 12:30 p.m. ? 2 p.m. ...

AP – “Blending behind-the-scenes nuggets with a defense of President Barack Obama’s record, White House and administration officials increasingly are communicating through Twitter. The popular social network is operating as a Web-based clearinghouse for public statements on weighty subjects (the federal budget) and the mundane (personal grocery lists). It’s similar to a bulletin board where anyone can post short notes and users cull the pieces they see by choosing to “follow” individuals’ account.” (Source: Library Stuff)

Adult Photography Record-Keeping and Inspection Law Threatens Free Speech, Privacy Source: Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a friend-of-the-court brief today urging a federal court judge to block two criminal statutes that unconstitutionally limit the free expression of millions of adults who use the Internet and other electronic forms of communication, bringing the threat of criminal sanctions for private, lawful speech. At issue are provisions of federal law that require anyone who produces a visual depiction of sexually explicit expression to maintain extensive records — including copies of drivers’ licenses, the dates and times images were taken, and all URLs where images were posted — and often force public disclosure of a creator’s home address. Even more troubling, the regulations allow law enforcement warrantless entry into homes or offices in order to inspect the records that are supposed to be kept. While these statutes regulate the commercial pornography industry, they also likely apply to a staggering number of Americans who create and share images of themselves over social networks, online dating services, personal erotic websites, and text messaging. + Amicus Brief (PDF; 212 KB) + More on Free Speech Coalition v. Holder (Source: Docuticker)

Cynthia Cleto, Springer Science + Business Media; Joshua Talent, eBook Architects, moderator; Pablo Defendini, Tor.com; Jeffrey Yamaguchi, Knopf Doubleday Cleto: in STM market things are different. First move was into electronic journals, so STMs tend to have their own platform for sales to scientists. Large proportion of business is sales to institutions and libraries. STM does everything in house cause already have platform and content is highly technical so it must be absolutely correct. Have 35,000 ebooks on their platform and is easier for the work flow to have everything in house. PDF and HTML formats. Library distribution: sign a contract with libraries and then open up access to whole university for simultaneous user access to both journals and electronic books. Paying for a license but get open access, but has to be for the entire collection. Launched ebook collection in 2006 and have massive adoption even before devices came along. For trade stuff have specific marketers and partner with retailers like Amazon. Also market trade stuff to libraries and actually have people who help librarians to market trade books. Want to keep usage high so that libraries renew the contracts. Have created some social networking through society portals, but since are working in a collection individual authors less important. In their market are DRM free. Defendini: Tor has own print bookstore on line. Use Ingram for delivery. Haven’t found a consumer friendly solution to buying ebooks on the site, so that’s why print sales only. Macmillan-wide outsource ebook production to companies that have ebook production services. Very little QA goes on and allows a lot of crappy ebooks to hit the market. Personally believes that this QA process should come in-house. Tor deals with libraries through third parties, such as Baker & Taylor. ...

Library site a hot new social media hangout for teens "Our goal is to draw students in so that they're comfortable hanging out in the library, and then get them to engage with the workshops and technology in the space," Neal said. "We're seeing more and more students who were hanging out, participating in workshops and on the social network. It's been great to see their interests develop." Students enrolled in workshops may check out digital still cameras or Flip high-definition video cameras for a week at a time to work on special projects. (Source: LISNews.org)

Research Information: February/March 2010  Web 3.0 promises change for librariesAlmost as soon as the term ?Web 2.0? was coined, the web community split into two factions. There were those who embraced the term and started debating future iterations and the meanings of ?Web 3.0?, ?Web 4.0?, and even ?Web 5.0?. Meanwhile, the other group labelled the 2.0 moniker as hype.One of the problems with the term Web 2.0 has been the lack of an explicit definition. In his seminal paper on the topic, Tim O?Reilly instead provided a list of features and technologies, such as using the web as a platform, and harnessing the wisdom of the crowd. The wide variety of features has led to arguments that Web 2.0 is vague enough to include everything on the web and as such means nothing. However, away from the details, the term ?Web 2.0? reflects a major shift in the way that users view the web: from a read-only web, to a read-write web.The term ?Web 3.0? reflects an equally momentous change in the way we view the web. Some of the possible avenues for the future include the 3D web, the semantic web, and the real world web. All have gained a lot of interest among library and information professionals. Virtual 3D worlds such as Second Life provide new places and ways to offer information and services. An increasingly semantic web offers the opportunity for access to increasing amounts of information from disparate sources. Meanwhile the real world web offers to integrate the web with the world around us. We are yet to see which of these will capture the imagination of library stakeholders to such an extent that it will reflect a new perspective in the way they see the web.The 3D webThe potential of a 3D web and a far richer web experience have been enabled by increases in computer processing power and higher bandwidth capabilities. ...

In preparing some recent presentations I have been talking about three primary ways of experiencing the web which emerged successively and continue to work together. Here I will call them the site-web, the search-web, and the context-web (alternatives might be site-centric, network-centric, and user-centric). Site-web. Our early experience of the web tended to focus on individual websites. Enumeration of websites was common, in lists, directories and guides. Search-web. Attention soon shifted to the network of websites as a while and search quickly emerged as central to our web experience. Google rose to prominence based on the insight - expressed in its pagerank algorithm - that not all websites are equal. Search is now our primary way of finding resources and navigating the web. This was underlined, I think, by the introduction of the single box in the Chrome browser for both url entry and search. A while ago, I was looking for something with my son. He was amused that I was typing in a longish URL - search is how he goes to everything, even where he knows the URL. Context-web. It seems to me that we are now moving to what I call for my purposes here the context-web. Search remains important but is no longer enough. We expect services not only to know about resources on the web, but also to know about us. We are seeing servces contextualised by their knowledge of people using those services and their relationships. Think about how Google is incorporating location- and social-based results in their searches. If I search for cameras, I will be shown mapped results from near Dublin Ohio and I will be shown what people in my 'social circle' are saying about cameras (my 'social circle' is what Google knows about people in my social networks - Twitter and so on). As the recent controversy about Buzz showed, Google knows quite a bit about me through my use of is services (I regularly use Search, Reader and Gmail, and dip into other services). ...

Information Services Librarian (Fond du Lac Public Library, Wisconsin) 2006 Wisconsin Library Association Library of the Year Fond du Lac Public Library seeks an outgoing, creative, Information Services Librarian to be part of an innovative library team. The successful candidate must demonstrate an ability to create lasting connections between the library and the public within a dynamic environment. Patience and a sense of humor are critical. ...

Microbe Magazine has an interesting article and an audio interview about two ways people are using mobile devices and social networking to help monitor hand washing compliance and track infectious diseases.    The first method they describe is an iPhone app called iScrub (free and available on iTunes App Store) which was developed to “automate the monitoring of hand-hygiene practices in health care settings.”  Originally developed for hospital settings, the article states the app could be as a “stealth app” to be used in other non-hospital environments where hand hygiene is important such as food handling.  The second method they describe is using Twitter to track infectious diseases.  The article states Alessio Signoroni and Philip Polgreen used the 2009 H1N1 outbreak to test Twitter as method for tracking disease outbreaks.  They started in April 2009 and by June they had collected 950,000 tweets containing terms such as H1N1, swine, flu, or influenza.  And you thought iPhone apps and Twitter were just for fun and had no real world value?  While I know there are practical applications for these tools, I have to admit I would have never thought about creating a hand washing app or tracking tweets.  It will be interesting to see how these and other things like them pan out. (Source: The Krafty Librarian)

In an effort to connect to more members MLA is experimenting with meeting based social network site called CrowdVine.  Connie Schardt wrote a nice little piece about it on Medlib-l. MLA has created a customized CrowdVine site for the 2010 meeting to help participants interact “before, during and and after the meeting.”  The CrowdVine site links has links to the official meeting page, official blog, and allows members to set up RSS feeds into the site (blog posts, photo streams, social bookmarking, etc.)  As Connie mentions, “the real power of the service is its ability to identify participants that share common interests that they can seek out and meet, in person, at the conference.” Hop on CrowdVine look around and if you are interested sign up and start adding some of your information or join in a discussion.  If you are more of the lurking type, sign up and just watch what happens, who knows maybe you might go from lurker to occasional contributer. (Source: The Krafty Librarian)

Citation for the article:Sobel, Karen, "Promoting Library Reference Services to First-Year Undergraduate Students: What Works?" Reference and User Services Quarterly 48.4 (2009): 362-371.Read via Academic Search Complete (EBSCO).I continue my look at some articles on reference assessment that I started over here and continues here. This one seemed relevant to me given the work I do as an outreach librarian where a good part of my job is promoting the library. When it comes to promotion for undergraduates, it is something I try to do in collaboration with our instruction librarian when it is feasible. Sobel's article explores three things. First, it looks at how aware are undergraduate students when it comes to reference services. Second, it asks what percentage of those students seek help from reference librarians. Third, the author asks about what online media the students find comfortable to use in communicating with the reference librarians. I think that last question could have been explored a bit further. It certainly can be explored further now given the ubiquity of services like Facebook and Twitter. That would be something I would be interested in especially since we do have a Facebook page for the library, and we use Meebo chat widgets in our subject guides. I know the study took place in 2007, according to the article, when things like Facebook (it opened to everyone in 2006) and Twitter (also founded in 2006) were still gaining ground, but I guess the fact I can ask the question just shows how quickly things have changed. By the way, Meebo was launched in 2005, and the widgets we use in 2006. I guess I am just saying if I was expanding this type of assessment, I would want more on how social networking is used by the library to reach students.The article opens with a brief summary of promotional techniques that libraries commonly use such as flyers and online links to chat services, things that I will note we do her as well. ...

From the Announcement: comScore today released a study on social networking access via mobile browser. The study found that 30.8 percent of smartphone users accessed social networking sites via their mobile browser in January 2010, up 8.3 points from 22.5 percent one year ago. Access to Facebook via mobile browser grew 112 percent in the past year, while Twitter experienced a 347-percent jump. [Snip] In January 2010, 25.1 million mobile users accessed Facebook via their mobile browser, up 112 percent from the previous year. MySpace attracted 11.4 million users, approximately half that of Facebook, in January. Interestingly, Facebook?s mobile browser audience surpassed MySpace in February 2009, three months earlier than the Facebook audience exceeded that of MySpace on the PC-based Internet in May 2009. Twitter, which has experienced tremendous growth in both mobile and PC-based visitation, attracted 4.7 million mobile users in January, up 347 percent versus year ago. These figures do not include access of the social networking services by the nearly 6 million mobile phone owners who do so exclusively through mobile applications. Access the Complete Announcement (Including Two Charts) Source: comScore (Source: ResourceShelf)

When growing up I?m sure I never envisioned the day where I?d need to back up my phone. However, with all of the data we store on our phone beyond the every growing contact list, that day has come. Here?s a brief list of options for backing up your smart-phone data for each of the four major platforms. (There may be others but I like focusing on the free options.) WaveSecure (Android, Windows Mobile, Symbian & Blackberry) Lock & Wipe Backup & Restore Location & SIM Tracking iDrive Lite (iPhone, Blackberry & Android) Backup Multiple restore options Restore contacts Restore selected contacts Clean Slate Restore Restore from other device(s) Restore contacts from another account Restore from earlier version Microsoft My Phone (Windows Mobile) Back up your phone automatically Share photos on your favorite social networking sites Access your contacts, text messages and more online for free Locate your lost phone  mobileme (iPhone) MobileMe keeps your mail, contacts, and calendar information in the ?cloud? and uses push technology to keep everything in sync across your iPhone, Mac, PC, and the web automatically. So no matter where you go or what device you use, all your information is up to date ? no docking required. With MobileMe iDisk, it?s easy to store, access, and share files online. You have plenty of storage space ? even large files are no problem. Just add the files you need to your iDisk, and whatever you upload will be there for you to download using a web browser on any computer or using the iDisk app for iPhone or iPod touch. (Source: Travelin' Librarian)

The NLM page went live the other day. You can access the NLM page here. From the Announcement: Click on the “Become a Fan” icon, at the top right of the screen. You’ll then be treated to updates in real time, as they’re issued. [Snip] The new Facebook page will post information about all aspects of the Library. Fans will be among the first to know about the latest NLM developments, receive notifications on conferences, guest speakers and other events, and be guided to the vast and various research resources NLM has to offer. They can also read the latest issues of NLM’s popular consumer magazine, NIH MedlinePlus, and its Spanish/English language counterpart, NIH MedlinePlus Salud. Viewers can browse through historical images and contribute to discussions on future projects, all via their favorite social networking site. The page will also lead users to content from NLM’s growing roster of social media sites. Source: NLM (Source: ResourceShelf)

Every so often there are those times when you bump into a couple of articles published by people, who you know and respect dearly for the tremendous amount of great work they have done in the space of Social Computing, that give you such an adrenaline rush, while reading through them, that you just can’t stop thinking about anything else for a little while. And if those blog posts have got to do with two of my favourite topics from all along (People and Trust) in that context of the Social Enterprise, you know I will surely be sharing my two cents of the conversation. So here I am; more than happy to point you to two essential, and worth while going through, blog entries that will surely make you think quite a bit on how important trust is for Enterprise 2.0 to succeed within the corporate firewall (And beyond, for that matter!); yes, I do realise that trust is one of those recurring terms / themes that perhaps may have been abused quite a bit, specially in the workplace context (Just as much as terms like Collaboration, Communities, or, even, Knowledge Management), but then again, when you see the word trust you know pretty well what you are referring to and could very well explain it in a sentence or two. Well, my good friend Oscar Berg has just done that over at one of his recent blog posts titled "Control is waste & trust drives value creation", where he shares a couple of golden nuggets worth while remembering, when describing how crucial trust is for any personal business transaction amongst peers, customers or business partners: "Trust is the fuel for any enterprise. Trust in your purpose, trust in your peers, trust in yourself. Trust drives value creation. Control is a sign of trust failure. Control does not add value. Control is waste. Control restricts value-creation. ...

Way back in December 2008, I wrote about an article by David Carnoy, called “Self-Publishing a Book: 25 Things You Need to Know.” An editor at CNET, he was sharing useful lessons he’d learned while self-publishing his novel, Knife Music. I checked in with him the following month, asking about his experience purchasing a book review from Kirkus Discoveries, and meant, throughout 2009, to check in again to see how his experiment was going. At some point last fall, I noticed that his book had been taken down from Amazon–which, I assumed, meant that he had sold it to a traditional publisher. I was proven right when, last week, I saw a galley for Knife Music, to be published in July by Overlook Press, in the offices of Booklist. There’s still some experimenting going on–Carnoy and Overlook are allowing readers to vote on the new cover. (If you’d like to weigh in, you can do so on Facebook.) Thinking that Carnoy might have useful insight into the relationship between self-publishing and traditional publishing, I fired off the following questions via e-mail, and the obliging Carnoy fired his answers right back. How long did it take before a traditional publisher offered to publish your self-published novel? Were there other offers besides the one from Overlook?   About four months. NY1 (a local TV station in NY that also syndicates its content nationally) did a piece on the book (”Self-Publishing Is Not a Last Resort for Authors“) and it sparked some interest from publishers (there?s nothing like the power of TV to validate success). I was in the somewhat unique position of already having a major agency, Trident Media, behind the book. My agent was in discussions with other publishers, but Overlook was the first to make an offer. It was a two-book deal, which was appealing. ...

Although It has been in beta for a while but today is the official launch of the NCAA Vault [College Basketball] and it’s home to A LOT of content and already an essential site for college basketball fans. It’s free. A company named Thought Equity Motion has edited every play of tournament game (Sweet 16-Championship Game from 2000-2009) and placed all of the data and video into a searchable database. Now, simply search by team or player, wait for your results, and start viewing the video (either game highlights and in many cases the complete game. There Are Also Pre-Built Categories Including: + Dunks + Great Blocks + Great Shots + Great Finishes + Most Outstanding Players + Current Starts At the bottom of the video box there are links to post a specific game moment to Facebook, Twitter, and/or get a URL for a web page or blog. A Bit More from the NY Times: ?Fans want basketball content, and we wanted to find a way to get people to connect to it,? said Kevin Schaff, chief executive of Thought Equity Motion, which digitizes and stores video archives. Schaff?s company announced an exclusive deal last month to license footage from The New York Times?s video library. [Snip] Gregg Winik, the chief executive of CineSport, an online highlights provider for local media Web sites, and a former executive at NBA Entertainment, said that the mixture of video and social network had created a ?big and bold step? in the evolution of sports video archives. Access the NCAA Vault Have a friend(s) who like college hoops? Make sure to let them know about this new service. Source: Thought Equity Motion, NY Times (Source: ResourceShelf)

Yes, indeed, it is that time of the year where very soon I will be on the road again for my second and third business trips of the year and already working towards finalising the last few details, before I embark on the not-to-be-missed and always interesting Lotusphere Comes To You events. That’s right! Next week Tuesday and Thursday, 9th and 11th of March, I will be in both Madrid and Barcelona, respectively, presenting a couple of times per event on the topic of the Social Enterprise (What else, right? hehe). If you would want to find more details about the various Lotusphere Comes To You events around the world you can go and have a look into them over here, or at this particular link, where you will find the scheduling; in this case for Europe, but you could also access other geographies from there. The main Web site though for the Spanish Lotusphere Comes To You events can be accessed over at this link. From there onwards, you can have a look into how you may be able to register for the event (If you happen to be around…), as well as check the agenda that has been put together for both events. Lots of interesting and rather relevant topics related to the main Lotusphere 2010 event that took place in January, as you may be able to see; I have now taken the liberty of sharing this screen shot of the agenda below so you can get a glimpse of what to expect: You will see how in the agenda there is a key concept permeating throughout the entire event for both locations and that is the one on Collaboration. But not just collaboration for the shake of collaboration alone; more along the lines of Social Collaboration (i.e. The Social Enterprise) and Smart Work / Collaboration. ...

Not too long from now, a panel discussion at MIT explores Death of the News?. “Death of the News? Journalism is in a crisis; newspapers are going out of business; editors and reporters are losing their jobs. In a vanishing era of traditional media, will the news vanish with it? A panel discussion about the rise of online media and its impact on global society with the following experts: Maria Balinska (BBC), Susan Glasser (Foreign Policy), & Jason Pontin (Technology Review) Tuesday, March 2 | 5:30p – 7:00p Wong Auditorium (E51)” On my way to the forum, I did a double-take at a fellow walking down the sidewalk who resembles Bob Stepno, whom I could imagine would appreciate this talk. I should look into what he thinks about the changes in journalism professions. Jason Pontin began by saying he imagines many of us have statements because responses to the topic are often highly opinionated. His summary provides a grim look at the present news industry and included statements about how many organizations have lost significant money and shut down. “So something happened and we’re going to explore what.” And, of course, any discussion about media must mention Jay Rosen. The panelists must answer who they are and from where they are coming. Susan Glasser is unhappy with the panel title because it is pessimistic. “As long as there are people interested in accountability, people will be interested in journalism.” Maria Balinska says she’s in audio journalism instead of being in radio journalism these days because of how the Internet has changed things. “None of us can predict what’s happening because of how things are changing. … I’m convinced there is a hunger for understanding the world around us …” The days of strong national papers might be behind us. ...

Dr Michael Stephens delivered the Dr Laurel Anne Clyde Memorial Keynote Address at the ASLA XXI Biennial Conference, held in Perth, Western Australia, from 29 September to 2 October 2009. Reprinted with permission from the Australian School Library Association Inc. (ASLA) Access 2010 24(1): 5. The evolving Web is an open and social place. The Web has changed everything. Its impact on every facet of our lives ? home, work and school ? would be difficult to measure but the ?always on, always available? Internet is certainly a game changer. Can you recall the first time you realised that the Internet would change your job? Your school? Your students? Dr Laurel Anne Clyde recognised the power and potential for emerging technologies in schools and spent time exploring the implications. As technology evolved, so did her research. Her work examining weblogs was one of the first scholarly endeavours with emerging Web 2.0 tools. Now many of us study and move in a world of hyperconnected spaces: Facebook, WordPress Multi- User Blog communities (WordPress MU), Flickr and any number of socially enabled sites. What a world Dr. Clyde would see today! Sadly, this world includes the fact that many libraries are suffering financial setbacks. The recent news that Australian school libraries are in dire need of support all too well illustrates that changes are needed. The press release from the Australian School Library Association (ASLA 2009) detailed the findings of a 2007 study by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), including: That means ensuring there are enough qualified teacher librarians as well as maintaining and improving infrastructure. Having a new or refurbished school library is important, but the full potential of these resources cannot be realised without a qualified teacher librarian in place as well. This fact cannot be ignored. Schools need qualified librarians. ...