Cutting Edge: The Latest Info on Web 2.0

Jen Maney from the Pima County Public Library. Web 2.0 allows libraries to interact with customers and meet today's need today. Web 2.0 is the second generation of the web and focused on the social. The virtual library has a motto "Designing for uncertainty." Accepting that the future is uncertain. There is no right and no wrong there is only change.

(She had a great PowerPoint with simple slides for which she spoke a great deal about each one, and the slides were dynamic and interesting. One of the best PowerPoint presentations ever!)

Have slide shows on the web site with Fickr wrapped in the web design. Teens are doing videos. It is reaching them because they are voting and commenting on the videos on You Tube. Not everything is successful 2.0 is about my life, your life, our life! When it fails, take it down!

Use people on the web site, in the program. The Technology Team plays....need self-proclaimed Luddites for new technologies, because that makes techies really explain what they are doing and why. You can't do it all, you need to have a team and start to focus. Can't do everything that is new. Starting to use 2.0 technology with staff, including heavy use of a wiki.

Have learned that web based participation is higher when it is connected with an regular library program.

Michael Stephens started by taking a photo of the group. Here he is, I guess that in his, you will see me taking this photo.

One library uses Page Flakes as its start up page for all its public computers. He had some great examples including that the Library of Congress is using Flickr. Libraries need to be transparent, and need to talk in a human voice.

He talked about a lot of libraries including that Salt Lake Public will require that its new library director blog, Darien Public library has its circulation staff blogging.

Say yes to play! Hennepin County has done some great things as well. All of his slides will be up on his web site. Gwinnett County Public Library Flickr page is sort of a mini-web page. We need to throw out the culture of perfect.

Bring your heart to your job. We need to put a human face on library staff (which staff may not feel comfortable about -- editorial comment!) We need a carefully planned response to a changing world. Do it because you are meeting the mission and vision of the Library. How do we evaluate these new tools. In Australia there was a conference call on evidence-based librarianship. Have we reached an evaluation bypass? Singapore has a glass cubicle for cell phone users. Think about the library you are building for the future.

Michael closed with three thoughts:

• Learn to learn
• Adapt to change
• Scan the horizon

John Blyberg, formerly at Ann Arbor and now at Darien (CT) Library, was next. His talk was called "Keen on 2.0: The Amateurs are Coming." Andrew Keen writes that every few centuries there is another great seduction. The last was communism. The new one is digital utopians. He had some great paraphrases of Keen's comments. He had the actual quote and a snarky translation, like "You sexy commies!" "Karl Marx -- a playa" "You might be boring" "You barbarian horde!" (I hope it puts the slide show up on the web! He gave a link, but they are not here yet.)

We tend to arc into the web and then find our way with conscious choices about where to go next in following links. Andrfew Keen's book is The Cult of the Amateur. We are moderates, Andrew Keen is an extremist. We need to encourage play and encourage the heart. Questions followed.