Week 12 - Social Networking

Discover
Firstly, the video Social Networking in Plain English sums it up quite nicely - I'd heard of MySpace and Facebook and perhaps Bebo; however, I hadn't heard of some of the ones on the LeMonde map (eg Hi5, Skyblog) but I did find it interesting that Australia is a big user of MySpace (no surprise but I thought that I'd heard "young people use MySpace and old people use Facebook" - where I think "young" means attending a 'school') whereas New Zealand is a big user of Bebo. Perhaps I'm naive in that I would've thought Australia and New Zealand would've been similar in the popularity of social networking services...

Explore
I thought the article Seb Chan highlighted the importance and relevance of museums (and perhaps libraries as some libraries are 'amalgamated with museum services') in utilising social networking. Our library recently conducted a customer satisfaction survey and this survey was also available online on the Council's website. The online survey was available to all and this was one way that the library could reach its online customers - great! However, how many more customers could have been reached if the library utilised social networking options - although I believe customers would need to be aware of your 'space' on the social network to become part of the 'community' - that is where your marketing and promotion enters the equation.

In more traditional ways, in varying degrees, libraries are already embracing the Research, Marketing, Support, Development aspects through their website; however, an opportunity exists for libraries to make the leap to the next chapter - social networking.

I enjoyed exploring the different examples of social networking and the first one I clicked was the NZ library (as NZ libraries always seem to do fantastic things!) and it certainly had the wow factor - interesting to note in their slideshow of the faces of the customers (couldn't do that in Australia).

In summary, I can see the benefits and the opportunities for social networking in libraries - and as with all new technologies, somebody has to be responsible for it - I wonder if that is where it will fall down - the staffing resources?

Second Life
I'd heard about Second Life when I first joined our Emerging Technologies team at my library - and not long after, I'd heard the news story about a person caught stealing in Second Life but was arrested in 'this life' and I recall the breakfast radio announcer asking the question "were they arrested with virtual handcuffs or real handcuffs?"
Also, people can study university degrees - including library science - in Second Life.

At this point in time, I couldn't imagine our library joining Second Life; however, as Librarians are 'slamming the boards' to answer enquiries - I'm certain some libraries and librarians will be in the Second Life.