Tips for Blogging in Libraryland

As this month marks my blog’s four year anniversary, I thought about the lessons that I’ve learned since I started writing here. For those thinking about adding their voice to the online librarian community, there are certainly no shortage of ways in which to participate. Over the weekend, I jotted down some of those musings that I think will help those starting out or thinking starting a blog. So, without further ado, here we go.

Pick a Name

And for the love of God, pick a better one than mine. While I have grown to truly love the name over time, it really started out as a clever play on words but still doesn’t quite roll off the tongue. A compliment from a friend encouraged me to keep it but, really, take some time in choosing a name. Bonnie Powers was recently writing about her blog name love/hate (her blog’s name is Bring Your Noise) so it got me re-thinking about my own title.

In a quick non-scientific survey of librarian blog titles, a good number of them fall into the "[noun] librarian”, “[adjective] librarian”, or “[adverb] librarian” category. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that (although there are some doozies out there) and there are other library related names (think “biblio”, “libris”, and anything book related), but just take some time to pick out a name. Also, perform some due diligence by doing a quick Google search for any names you want to try out to see if anyone else has used it.

Whatever you decide on, just make sure it is an accurate reflection of you. You will be telling a lot of people the blog title name so you do keep that in mind as well. You may be stuck with it for a very long time.

Pick a Blogging Platform

Do your homework and consider your blogging platform options. Sites like Tumblr, WordPress, Blogger, Livejournal (do people still even use that anymore?), and Typepad offer an array of options both paid and free. You want to find a blogging platform that meets your needs.

For myself, I use a free WordPress site (obviously) and write my blog posts in Windows Live Writer (a good solid blogging program and less buggy than the WordPress browser interface). It has served me well for these four years and I will continue to use it for the foreseeable future.

If you decide to host your blog on your own website, that does change some of your options here but doing your homework will find you the right fit.

Write What You Know

It’s a devilishly simple sounding sentiment, but it can be deceptive. This isn’t saying that you should be limited in the breadth and depth of the topics you want to talk about, but an acknowledgement that some subjects will take more time and research to arrive at a coherent blog post. For example, I could write a library eBook post nearly off the top of my head based on what I know as well as remembering recent blog posts and articles addressing the article. If I was to attempt to write about AACR2 and RDA, I’d need to do background work so that I had the faintest of clues as to what I was talking about it. Even then, I’d probably have to focus on the most general of topics around it (such as whether to use it or not) rather than the nitty gritty cataloging details that make me reach for the whiskey bottle.

With that in mind, the quotation “you are entitled to your own opinion but you are not entitled to your own facts” springs to mind. Anyone can write an opinion piece on anything in libraryland but presenting a logical and factual persuasive argument is a whole other ballgame. It’s the difference between “AACR2 sucks, RDA rules” and “RDA is the future of cataloging for these reasons…” I may not be a cataloger, but it doesn’t mean I can’t learn as much as I can before weighing in on the debate in a meaningful manner. Honestly, you’re a librarian. The research aspect should be second nature.

Even then, no matter what topic you are writing about, do make allowances for corrections or edits. I’ve made mea culpas in the past and I certainly will make them in the future. There is nothing wrong with admitting you were wrong so long as you fix the error. Learn from these mistakes or missteps and move on.

Find Your Voice

As anyone who writes will tell you, it is an ongoing process that takes months, years, or even a lifetime to achieve. For the sake of simplicity, I’d say it is finding the writing style that most suits you. This is about tone, word choice, sentence construction, and cadence. Anyone could dissect my blog and find the words and phrases that I use over and over again as well as how I structure my sentences. Those aspects are a reflection of me as a writer and a thinker.

As I see it, it’s a translation of my personality to the computer screen. When I write like I would talk, think, or feel, the words come freely and naturally. When I try to make the text a bit fancier or with more flourish, I sputter and get bogged down. It reminds me of the studies about the brains of people when they are lying; they have to work harder since they are inventing the story as they go. When you aren’t true to your style, diction, or temperament, it’s going to be a struggle. Write as the person that you are for people can connect to that in terms of authenticity.

Links, Links, Links

This could also be called “show your work” or “cite your sources”. If you make a reference to another website, provide a link to it. If you got an idea or thought from somewhere else, provide a link to it. If you are talking about a particular issue or topic and there is a good explanation for it, provide a link to it.

I will admit that providing a link is a pet peeve of mine. I hate reading blogs that make a reference to an article, website, or another blog post and there isn’t a link provided. If you are going to take the time to write about something, don’t suddenly take some sort of magical internet “higher ground” and refuse to link to the offending/provoking article because you don’t want to encourage people to visit the website. That’s just completely asinine since it sends the mixed message, “I think this is important enough for me to comment on, but I don’t want you to read it and make your own decisions.”

As much as it irks me, I will admit that there are times when I don’t want to provide a link to something that I consider distasteful, unworthy of direct citation, or simply link bait. It puts me in a very bad mood as I balance out my own pet peeve against the loathing I feel for the article in question. Ninety nine percent of the time, I’ll swallow my disgust and link to the offender. For those rare one percent, I try to at least provide a breadcrumb trail for people to follow to get to the article. I might not link to it directly, but I’m not going to completely deny them the chance to read it themselves and make their own decision. Link as much as you can to cite your sources and references, but make provisions for when you can’t bring yourself to do it.

Edit When Possible

Before I hit Publish for the majority of my posts, I go through and do an edit. This isn’t a long drawn out process, but one to find the regular errors in spelling (usually words that are spelled correct but not in that context), my sometimes creative grammar problems, and my often “Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra” sentence construction issues. It also helps with organization of the post, allowing me to re-organize points, alter the cadence, or even eliminate unnecessary sentences and paragraphs. It’s not the finest polish I can offer, but it’s enough to take the easy mistakes out of the posts. The time you invest in your posts will show in the final product that you publish.

Be Brave

“Blog fearlessly” is a short mantra I say to myself before I hit the Publish button on a post that I think will generate some discussion or controversy. It’s a tough moment when you can feel the doubts creeping back and the “don’t rock the boat” urge pushing against the back of your mind. Some of the topics will elicit an emotional response or provoke a critical reaction. Be prepared for pushback, disagreements, and (in very rare cases but it happens) character assassination. My best advice is to roll with it: stand firm on the points you can prove or the opinions that you hold, concede the points you can’t, correct the mistakes you make, and try to foster the best dialogue you can. I’d also say pick your battles, but that’s never been a strong suit for me. If anything, it may help you finely tune your own positions as well as be a learning experience to the variety of viewpoints out there.

Promote, Promote, Promote

So, your blog post is up. Now what? Given the cacophony of the online librarian world, if you want to get your post notice you’ll have to do some publicity for it. Most of my traffic comes from Twitter, search engines, and other blogs that link to various posts. Google Reader tells me that I have over 1,700 subscribers and it shows in the number of syndicated views I get for my posts. In addition, I have a Facebook Author Page that helps me share my posts.

When I post something new, I set up some automatic tweets for the next day at different times (for different time zones) and share it on Google Plus (for whatever that’s worth); my Facebook page will automatically post the new entry. From there, I thank people for Retweeting, answer any comments on the Facebook or Google plus posts, and answer blog comments when I have something to say. When I was just starting out, I also posted to my blog on LISNews in order to increase the number of people who saw my writing.

Some people might balk at self promotion, but I believe it’s the best way to get as many eyes as you can on your blog post. If you’re not going to toot your own horn, who else is going to?

What else?

That’s not so much a topic heading as a question left for you, the reader. What else is there to know or consider when blogging in libraryland? Add a comment if you have a question or share from your experiences.

State of the Blog: Year Four

This month will mean that four years have slipped by since I put fingers to the keyboard to start a blog. I am hitting this anniversary at an odd point in my writing life since, well, the blog is not exactly a priority at the moment. While I’ve had cycles of writing and not writing before over the course of the last four years, this one has pushed the blog to near back burner status.

Over the years, I’ve had a couple different approaches to writing here. I’ve had frequent updates, longer essay posts, open threads, and probably some posts that don’t fit any of those categories. Overall, I’ve mainly kept it focused on library issues with the occasional personal post. That’s probably why I haven’t written much in the last month since the kinds of things that hold my interest for writing these days are far, far away from libraryland. I’m engaged to get married in the fall, my interests in country and ballroom dancing have grown as I’ve gotten better at them, and video games feel more rewarding (whether it is achievements in World of Warcraft or the thrill of battle in Team Fortress 2) as a leisure activity. When presented as a choice, spending time blogging tended to lose out in the recent past.

In trying to root out my writing ennui, I feel a distinct lack of inspiration that I used to get from the libraryland blogosphere. If I was to guess at a point of origin, it’s about when Will Manley disappeared off the scene. His daily posts and lively discussions were a good pulse on current topics and I miss them to pieces. Moving forward in time from that point, I still have people on my ‘must read’ list but they seem to be writing less these days as well. Even then, there are still excellent bloggers out there (some of whom I’ve grown to adore), but nothing they are saying wants me to set aside time and type up my thoughts on their post. I just nod, maybe share somewhere in my social media web, and then move on. There are times when Google Reader just becomes an exercise where I choose between skimming and clicking on Mark All Read. 

As I write this, I am realizing that this is perhaps the first time in a long time that I haven’t been in the midst of a bunch of projects, presentations, conference, and whatnot that had kept me tethered closely to the library world. I look at the notecards on my project board (divided into two sections, “NOW” and “FUTURE”) and it hasn’t changed in the last couple of months. I have a talk for a library science class in May and a note to remind me to check in with John about EveryLibrary… and that’s it. In the last three years, I would have had three or four ideas or projects in the each section. Perhaps I pushed myself too much in the past (I can remember some of the looks I got when I told people how much I was doing at any given time) and this is the inevitable burnout that was destined to happen. It’s something I’ll need to figure out over time.

(Funny enough, after writing the above paragraph, I actually wrote down a few I had forgotten and added them to the board. The big moment will be trying to figure out what to do with them. Since I’ve put up the board, I’ve kept every notecard I’ve posted on it, whether it panned out or not. I’m toying with the idea of making all of those notecards available to anyone who would want to pick through it and use one of them. If I’m not going to use them, they might as well go to a good home. -A)

I can’t say that I’m done blogging forever (so some people reading this can put their party hats down now), but I feel that this blog will be entering another era of change in terms of tone and content. I hope you’re willing to come along for the ride, no matter where it takes us.

Happy 4th of the Blog.

Why I Just Won’t Shut Up (or, Why I Blog)

I’ve been turning over Bonnie Power’s post “Why do bloggers blog?” in my head for the last two weeks. Every time my fingers have come close to touching the keyboard and writing something about it, my attention span would magically divert itself to something else like video games or social media stuff. In the past, I’ve taken that as a sign that I’m really not up for writing on a particular topic and just moved on. But, alas, her post planted a thought that simply wouldn’t die: why do I blog? In just letting it run its course, here is what I found.

Initially, it felt pretty self evident; I write because I have something to say and I want to be heard. The internet, the great digital soapbox of our time, has the capability of providing that platform for the second part of that sentiment. But “something to say” is just too neat, too tidy; I wanted to say something that would make people think. I wanted to offer something different, something new, something to push people into using their critical thinking skills. It is my desire to fill the role of a public intellectual for libraries, a position that I have not seen much in my travels around the web. It’s only been recently that I’ve found something that captured that sentiment:

An intellectual is not an expert, and a public intellectual is not an expert who condescends to speak to a wider audience about her area of expertise. An intellectual is a generalist, an autodidact, a thinker who wanders and speculates. As Jack Miles puts it in a stellar essay on the question, “It takes years of disciplined preparation to become an academic. It takes years of undisciplined preparation to become an intellectual.”

Setting aside the problems of such a label (and there are some) as well as whether my efforts are taking me there (perhaps, perhaps not), the underlying motivations have not exactly been what I expected. They seem to be rooted in a dissatisfaction with the status quo, the not-always-constructive need to argue, and a nearly unexplainable driving desire to offer differing and sometimes contrarian point of views. This is a writing arc that only seems to have me finish as a human form of Grumpy Cat, forever unhappy with anything. It’s a struggle not to end up in the gutter ball lane of internet humor, the short snarky retort written in Impact font over the picture of an animal. It’s the mantra of “try[ing] to add something worthwhile to the conversation” that keeps me on track most of the time. That ideal has killed more blogs posts than I care to imagine.

I would say that the keyword that has appeared within my own thoughts around why I blog is “challenge”. I want to challenge people to defend their beliefs so as to help make their arguments tighter or see an error in their thinking. I want to challenge people to step up to the plate, to have the courage of conviction to take on the pressing issues of the day, and to step outside their comfort zone to (as they say in the ALA Think Tank) make it happen. I want the challenge of saying something bold, something crazy, and perhaps something unexpected. I want the challenge of people telling me I’m right or wrong and assimilating what they say into either defending or evolving my own positions. I want the ultimate challenge that comes with failing; and failing grandly with an online world that never forgets, so as to take the lessons from it and move on.

I don’t want to squander my youth or my status as a still-new-to-the-field librarian in writing ‘safe’ blog posts, bland ramblings on mundane subjects that fade into the background of the online libraryland noise. I feel a duty to be reckless, impetuous, and antagonistic so as to reap the rewards of wisdom and experience that will shape my writing into my later years. This will ruffle a few tail feathers, but I consider that to be a statistical inevitability.

In the end, I’d like to imagine that I’d be writing this blog even if no one read it. But knowing that I have a following, that my blog posts are shared widely around the world, and that people are impassioned enough to take the time to offer a comment, that makes it so much more compelling to continue to write. I’d like to thank everyone who is reading these words, those who share them, and those who think they are worthy enough for discussion. I am humbled and honored by your attention in this world of distraction.

Salem Press Blog Awards 2011

This year, I will be a judge for the Salem Press Blog Awards. I won First Prize for Best Public Library blog last year and I was thrilled when Peter and Mirela asked me to judge the contest this year. I look forward seeing the nominees (as well as adding them to my ever increasing Google Reader feeds).

If you want to see the winners from last year (as well as the other blogs nominated), Salem Press has left them up on their site. You can also see who else was nominated in the various categories.

Not to co-opt this post with another contest, but TED is having auditions for TED talks. You need to create a one minute video to start (due April 25th) and they are looking for crazy fun uses of technology. So, take your chances with either/both!

State of the Blog: 2 Years and Going

I wanted to make a quick note of my second anniversary blogging.

I finally got to meet Blake Carver last week at the Computers in Libraries conference. It’s been a long time coming but I credit him with giving me my first big break by bumping one of my blog posts to the front page of LISNews. That encouragement has set me down the writing path that I have taken in these last two years. I really can’t thank him enough for that. (I will plug his business, LISHost, for those considering starting their own websites.)

I’m looking forward to what the next year will bring.

I’d like to thank everyone who subscribes for their support, those who take the time to comment for making this blog better, and everyone who finds their way here. I love writing in this blog and I’m happy that there are people who enjoy reading it.

(Man, I should do this for a living or something, right?)

Once again, thanks for your time and support.

End of the Year

After a few days of starting and stopping, I’ve decided to declare a holiday from blogging till after the New Year. There are some offline things that have been really grabbing for my attention and I want to give them some time in the sun (so to speak). My blogging pace has increased a lot over the past couple months, so I should recognize that some rest is in order. I’ll just put anything I want to comment on until after the new year.

You can still follow me on Twitter and/or my Facebook Author page. People can contact me there if there are problems with the Secret Santa. Also, the View From Your Desk Tumblr blog is still accepting your library work space pictures. And be sure to get yourself a Endangered Species t-shirt if you didn’t happen to win one!

State of the Blog: Google Reader

I thought a little “behind the scenes” look would be a fun change.

For those who may have a curiosity as to where I get some of my content, that’s my running thirty day total in Google Reader. To be fair, not all of the Reader items are library related. I have a couple of Google alerts for specific terms and subscriptions to some pop culture and technology feeds. This also does it represent combing through a half dozen other news sites that I look through for tidbits that might spark an idea for a blog entry. I also comb through Twitter and Facebook for additional ideas.

When it comes to library and librarian blogs, I like a wide range of voices to choose from. I’ve started incorporating blogs from other library types (academic and school, mainly) and specific library aspects (reader’s advisory, cataloging) so as to broaden my world view. I won’t say that I’m able to understand everything I read, but I’m working on it slowly.

In sharing some of my own continuing education, my question to my readers is this: what online (or offline) sources do you use to get news in the library world? What works for you?

September Blog Banner

I made a new one tonight since I’m somewhat overdue for one. I know it is Library Card sign up month and Banned Book Week is at the end of it, but when I read this entry from the.effing.librarian, that quote stuck out for me. I plucked it out of a larger passage, so some context may help. However, I think I managed to save the meaning of it in the illustration.

As someone with a biology background, the notion that evolution doesn’t mean trial and error, risk, or loss is absurd. When it comes to the librarian profession, it is without a doubt something that is going to occur. But from the flaws and failures of others, I believe a hardier librarian will emerge.

What that really means I can’t say for sure. But I’m excited to find out.

The Riddle of Twitter

It’s a blog! No, it’s a microblog! No, wait, it’s a cocktail party! No, it’s something for you to be witty or interesting on so you gain followers! Wait, no, it’s the light infantry! But not for conferences! And not for mundane crap!

What I find baffling is that people seem to be hell bent on defining what Twitter is (or, for that mater, is not). Unlike most other social media (Facebook, Myspace, Friendster, Livejournal, Blogger, etc), Twitter comes with the shortest instruction manual and it is phrased in the form of a question: “What are you doing?” The deviously simple interface is a portal into an ongoing real time conversation of your own choosing as you opt in to follow people based on your own taste and criteria. (And, likewise, opt out or unfollow someone when they fall outside of your interest.)

For me, the conversation about Twitter closely resembles the tale of the blind men and the elephant. People are so determined to pin down what Twitter is and is not that they are missing the overall point: that Twitter is everything that people describe it to be. Want to share what you had for breakfast? Go for it. Want to keep tabs on a couple of friends? You got it. Professional networking? It’s there, just do it. Build up an online presence cult of personality? Tweet away, oh future internet trend despot. It is the Web 2.0 Mirror of Erised, a magical looking glass upon which a person can gaze at what they wish to see and input their say in their Twitter feed. How can it possibly be any simpler? While it might not be for everyone, with the proper external tools and some internet elbow grease, it can satisfy the most picky user’s expectations.

For myself, I find that Twitter is the right balance of personal and professional. I can share my joys, woes, observations, and thoughts to a select (reasonably interested) crowd. More importantly for me, it has become a valuable source of professional articles that offer tips and insights that I am certain I would not have found otherwise. My network of library professionals has expanded beyond my library system and granted me access to (what I can only think to call) a people database. These carefully cultivated contacts now exist on the local, national, and international level and put a spectrum of knowledge and expertise a mere tweet away. For me, that kind of raw information potential is captivating and powerful; and it makes me extraordinarily grateful to be in such a supportive profession. That is how Twitter has met and exceeded my expectations and why I continue to happily tweet today.

Personally, I have a very unscientific and suitably unsupported theory about the low retention rates. I base this solely on my unwritten observations of Twitter, people in general, and related postings. I would be willing to bet dollars to donuts that the so called “retention problems” lay with the end user because they come to the service with unreasonable expectations. Whether it is the idea that a Twitter account will somehow magically grant them access to celebrities or consistently give them a specific type of information they are looking for or be the social happening place that it is at any given moment (your mileage with followers may vary), they are let down when the reality doesn’t match the hype. Sure, it looked good on Oprah, but beyond Oprah’s sparse tweets (51 in total, none towards any non-celebrity of her 1.6 million followers), what is there for these new members to do? They have been dropped off at the proverbial Promised Land without a guide or an incentive to stay. Even if they did not ride the mighty coattails of Oprah to the service, they could find the “noise” of uninteresting updates from those they follow to be a deal breaker for the service. Whether it is for personal contacts or professional information, the sheer volume of information that passes through their page feels insurmountable. They flail, they flounder, and then they flee. And it is when Twitter fails to meet a person’s presumed expectations of the service that they toss it aside like a stuffed animal that has fallen out of favor with an angry child.

[Darker consideration: My much (worse) theory is that people approach it like television; specifically, I mean that they look to the service to conform to their whims without any effort on their part. They fall into the trap of being too lazy and treat the service as something that should acquiesce to their preferences right out of the proverbial box. Rather than engage the service, they curse it for not being what they want from the moment they log in. The passiveness of other social media (like the gentle cascade of a Facebook feed page) is a complete juxtaposition to the active nature of Twitter.]

There has been much press about Twitter’s retention numbers and active accounts. I find the numbers being waved around to be rather uncompelling because they simply do not go far enough in their analysis. It does not account for lurkers (people who sign up for accounts simply to be able to read a list of who they follow), those who use it for marketing & research (read: data mining) purposes, and the spammers who constantly on the move within the service creating accounts (nevermind what counts as an ‘active’ account or the fact that you can be active on an account without followers). Find me in a year or two and then I’ll take a look at the charts again. Perhaps it is our ever increasingly small technology cycles, but I don’t believe that all businesses on the internet need to follow the explosive growth of Google, Amazon, or Facebook to prove long term success. More people are coming online, more people are embracing social media to maintain their relationships for different aspects of their lives, and the world is becoming more socially connected. Even if it’s only 10% of the people generating 90% of the content, that’s still a fair number of people generating a massive amounts of information. On Twitter, that is roughly 450,000 people based on the estimated 4.5 million accounts; it would be equivalent to the population of Luxembourg. (Or, for a much larger number to think about, 10% of active Facebook users would be approximately 20 million people worldwide. For comparison, that is just a little shy of the population of Australia).

And it’s only going to get bigger. You can bet the cocktail party on that.

This post can also been seen on LISNews.org.

Blog Snapshot: Wordle

Look at all the pretty words!