Thing #15, not just for Librarians

Designed for Librarians, this Thing provides some thoughtful messages about working with emerging technologies. One of the writers, Michael Stephens, notes that the Librarian 2.0 is a trendspotter; he made me think of and be thankful for our own Patricia and the enthusiasm with which she embraces and promotes new technologies and strategies for all LL teachers and students using the library. I think we're lucky to have her, and Anne, around!

As to Libraries, Rick Anderson notes some dangerous "Icebergs" floating around: a "just in case" collection, or the idea of collections at all; reliance on "user education"...there aren't enough librarians to educate all the potential users; and the "come to us" model of library service now that we're in the "post-print" era.

The aforementioned Michael Stephens also notes that Librarians 2.0 plans for their users, always asking what new technologies and materials are really needed, but warning against a thoughtless "technolust."

Chip Nilges and John Riemer advocate ways for making information accessible using Web 2.0 strategies such as tagging and relevance ranking (such as through keyword prevalence).

What this Thing most made me wonder is how much organized thought is really going on in teacherland. Maybe a lot, I just don't know. However I think we are learning quite a bit by the leadership of these Librarians and particularly this project.