Social Networking and Libraries

Still playing catch-up. (Who am I kidding? You don't catch up when things have slid this far)

So, I had seen what the assignment was about, social networks, and felt a great deal of reluctance. I've got a profile on Facebook (hounded into it by my sister who was having such a good time reading the stuff friends of her kids were posting on their pages and looking at the pictures they added) Especially the profile of her nephew (her husband's sister's oldest son), who's a Lieutenant serving in Iraq.

Well, the whole thing struck me as pretty creepy. More voyeuristic, I guess, as I didn't want to be poking members of a younger generation or gifting them, or telling them how cute they looked in that picture from the school play. My oldest nephew had some pictures from college plays posted by friends and he had other photos he and his new wife had taken on their honeymoon (in Ireland) which were kind of neat. But the nephew in Iraq wasn't someone I felt comfortable "friending" or whatever just because we're not that close and, given the situation he's living in, I don't want to add to his distractions. I did ask my nephew for Christmas present ideas, but we wound up corresponding by email instead. I did flip through my niece's list of books once (she reads a lot! I know because that's how I found out Facebook doesn't have the 200 item limit that LibraryThing puts on free accounts!) just to see if I could get some ideas for Christmas presents for her. But she's all over the map so I did like I usually do and guessed.

So I haven't really been back. I did get a couple of automated email contacts from Facebook, asking me if I'd finished reading a book I mentioned I was reading on my account. I had. Today I revisited my account to see what may have happened. I still have my original three "friends" and a lot of them have friends in common who are candidates to be friends with me, but it isn't gonna happen. But I did let readers of my page know I'd finished reading that book from back then.

Kind of like catching up with my Project Play assignments.

So that brings me to our assignment. (What, I had to dig in the archive to find it? How long have I been blowing this off?) The assignment is to look at how some libraries are using social networking sites using three from a list of sites with a presence on MySpace, how they're "surfacing," reflect on the place of libraries in social networking, and post my thoughts on why or why not I would want to create a MySpace page for my library.

So I looked at pages for LaCrosse, Oshkosh, Winnefox, and Denver. They've got pictures and everything. Including profiles! Well, let me tell you, the Midwest does not look to be making a committed effort at keeping their pages updated. There are some blog updates and some lists of friends/adds, and the occasional list of open hours and Heroes who are "Readers" but so what. And the profiles are just lame. 100 years old, female and doesn't drink or smoke? How endearing! They're getting cursory attention, if that. It stopped being fun for whoever did it and became one more task that got dumped on a back burner. Or abandoned.

Denver (or should I say teen-Denver), by comparison, seems to be kept up. Although I saw they did have their links to teen interests in movies, music, etc. disabled. They should probably take those links off their pages then, don't you think? Their last blog entry is dated February 19, 2008, which isn't as bad as a couple of our Midwest examples, but I don't think they're putting a whole lot of effort into it. They do have a link to their online catalog that's working and some other library type resources. So they do put their library presence online. (Yeah, Winnefox has a link to their catalog too. And a link to AskAway. But theirs is still a lame page)

I'm not sure what "surfacing" means but I think it might be creating a (superficial) presence on a social networking site. I think the Midwest libraries I looked at are doing a poor job. But that's just me. Any effort they made has been more-or-less abandoned.

As for my view on the role of libraries in social networking, I think it's a wasted effort. There needs to be a steady presence and frequent updates, (like a blog!) or you don't attract visitors. And you really can't do the marketing of your services on MySpace that you could do with your own web presence. Getting your "friends" to add a link to your catalog or web page on their "MySpace" pages would be the best you could hope for. Then they could easily place holds while viewing their web pages and the comments (and recommendations) they get from friends. A MeeboMe link from the library, or an AskAway link that they could add to/embed in their personal pages seems like it would be the best you could ask for-- to get your tools where people would be able to most easily access them. But, given the context of where they'd be located (a social site catering to younger users who are probably not doing homework (let alone research) and the types of questions you'd wind up getting would probably be just as effectively answered with a Magic 8-Ball.

Which I guess kind of sums up how I feel about whether or not I think we should set up a MySpace page for my library. We already have a pretty good web presence and get occasional comments from some of our users. But it is labor intensive. Which means there has to be staff investment, and not just money for staff, but staff who are also committed to giving the extra effort this kind of marketing needs. That's not easy to get. Or maintain. How easy would it be to duplicate some of this effort on a social networking site? Judging by the timely updates that some of the sites I looked at don't provide, I don't think we'd be getting enough positive feedback from an online networking site to justify the effort. I think one of the most satisfying feelings a library with a MySpace page could probably get would be the feeling of accomplishment they'd get when they finally took their page down.

But that's just my opinion. Your comments, as always, are welcome.