Outside McMaster University Library in Second Life

Having visited ALA Island and Virtual Alliance Library in Second Life, and being a little disappointed to find no one there, I decided to visit a university library in Second Life and see if perhaps things were a little more lively.

I must be there at all the wrong times, because McMaster University Library was deserted when I arrived. The library space is a little smaller than the other libraries I visited, but this was welcome; finding things was a lot easier. When you first enter the library, the first thing you see is a notecard prominently placed on a table, detailing who staffs the reference desk and when.

The foyer and reference desk at McMaster University Library

The reference desk is placed right inside the entrance, with a chair in front of the desk to sit at. An interesting feature was a round “Reference Buzzer” on the desk, which you can touch to send an IM. I’ve found my SL experience so far to be confusing, in that I’m never quite sure what to do, so I was glad to find that when I touched it, without having to take any further action, it said to me: “DeForest Mint, please say your message on one line and it will be recorded and/or sent.” When the desk is manned, I can inititate a reference encounter by touching the buzzer. A “Help and Information” console is also found on the desk. Touching it gives me four options (all to open a webpage): 1)McMaster University Library, 2)Library Catalogue, 3)Need help? and 4)How to find.

The rest of the library contains seating space, more consoles for different information needs, similarly set up to direct users to the appropriate websites. One table, for example, has four consoles: Find Books, Find Articles, Research Collections and Archives, Maps, Data, Gov Pubs. This way of visually arranging resources, one per physical console, is a welcome (at least, if you’re already wandering around in Second Life) change from hunting around on a cluttered library web site. I can see the appeal of this approach, though I must say that it is helped immensely by the clean layout and small size of this one-room library. I didn’t feel the same sense of being lost and wondering where I am when I was trying to walk around and find something inside the multi-level library at InfoIsland.

Interactive tips presentation on the wall - just touch it to view a new tip

Decorating the walls are posters for current library events, and one feature I found especially charming. Whereas most wall decor I’ve seen in SL links to websites, there is a wall presentation that gives tips on finding books and articles. Touching the presentation causes the presentation to go the next tip. It was nice to not have to leave SL to go to an external website to get substantial content – this is the kind of integration and immersion that I’ve always imagined SL would be used for.

McMaster’s simple, uncluttered, functional library shows that less is more in Second Life.

Visit for yourself:
Get Second Life
McMaster University Library in Second Life: (Coordinates 38, 186,23), via SLURL

The blog page itself is integrated into the ICPL website (not hosted externally) so it’s always easy to navigate back and forth between the blog and other sections on the website. The blog has several authors, but there’s no About page or introductory post that identifies them or their relationship to the library; I would have liked to see this in order to get a better sense of ownership of the blog and be able to put a person to the opinions in the review. It would also give an element of authority – people arriving at the blog from the home page would know that it was “staff picks”, but on the blog page itself, this is never mentioned anywhere.

Even without knowing anything about the post authors, I enjoyed the personal, conversational style of the book reviews. Music and other materials in the library system are also reviewed. Each entry is a tantalizing description, a bit of context for the item being reviewed in terms of current or historical popularity, or how it ties into some part of the writer’s life. Cover shots are included to further pique interest. Reviews point out parts and aspects of interest for particular readers (for murder mystery fans or Jane Austen fans for example) and what the author personally liked best about the piece.

The posts are categorized by subject, genre, or media (Arts & Crafts, Audiobooks, Historical Fiction, Magazines, Poetry, Reference, to list a few), giving a reader the opportunity to browse like items. A link to the item’s catalogue record is listed after entry, a great convenience for the library user to immediately check whether the item is available. There’s also a link to send the review to a friend, or add a comment.

Visit for yourself:
Iowa City Public Library
ICPL Collection Blog

A visit to the Library of Congress‘s blog this afternoon left me feeling a tiny bit overwhelmed by all that’s going on at the Library of Congress. But overwhelmed in a good way – sometimes this mother of all libraries seems so big that it’s faceless, so different from the libraries I know and have visited, and I struggle to get a grasp of what the LOC does, other than being the world’s biggest library and being responsible for all those subject headings (LIBR 502, I miss you already).

The LOC blog is used to announce new features, new podcasts and additions to existing series, address press media’s coverage of the LOC,  upcoming events and exhibitions, and mini articles and discussion about the LOC such as How ‘Big’ is the LOC?.

Currently authored by the LOC’s Director of Communications Matt Raymond, the link for the blog can be found at the bottom of the navigation links on the LOC home page, in a little navigation section alongside the link for RSS feeds, email updates, and podcasts. The home page is full of content but uncluttered, and the blog link is not difficult to find.

The blog page itself is organized a little differently than most blogs. You’ll find a search box, blogroll, other links, RSS subscription button, but no listing of posts by date. Instead, finding and navigated posts is achieved through a prominent listing of the categories, or by reading all the posts in reverse chronological order using the “previous page” link at the bottom of the blog page.

Through just the most recent blog entries, I learned that the LOC has it’s own Flickr collection, Twitter account, podcast series, and most recently a YouTube channel to showcase items held only by the LOC. I’m looking forward to checking out each of these lately – something very appealing about them is that they seem to direct their focus towards a general-interest audience, that is, the public at large, by focusing on the content of what they are providing rather than focusing on its provision as a library service. The variety of content makes the blog feel less like a library blog and more like an established cultural-historical interest blog. (The LOC blog is just shy of two years old since its first post in April 2007.)

Even though current going-ons are shown the LOC homepage, the blog is a great place to keep on top of the LOC’s projects. I might even say it could become an integral part, since so many the LOC projects and programming are for the dissemination of its holdings, and have little value unless people are made aware of their existence. There is a news page at The Library Today that lists more individual events, but the conversational nature of the blog fits very well in bringing together the variety of LOC activities, sharing the cultural value of LOC with a wide audience and making each of the projects and events more accessible.

See for yourself:
The Library of Congress home page
The Library of Congress blog

Wearing ALA's "Read Banned Books" t-shirt in Second Life

In my techie days just after the dot-com bubble burst, I had my first taste of the kinds of web developments that would come to be called web 2.0. They were new ways of doing things that were fresh and exciting in the … hmm, what did we call it before the blogosphere, when waves rippled through websites? I was excited when Flickr promised to change the way we share and find photos, excited when Twitter was predicted to become a veritable archive of the minutiae of  everyday human life, and especially excited when Second Life launched.

A whole new world, where I could be anything and go anywhere. Even own land and build a house. Wow. Of course, back then, Second Life over a 56k dial-up connection and a computer that could choke itself playing Tetris would probably be a frustrating experience even if Second Life was heaven. But even with the novelty, I was a little distrustful of these new things – what made anyone think it wouldn’t just be another bubble to be burst? It took years to even switch over to using blogging software from daily uploads of a hand-coded page.  Most of these budding web developments, interesting as they were, failed to find a useful place in my online hangouts and life moved on.

Years later, when I found myself at SLAIS, I learned that all that much of the stuff that I’d forgotten about had grown into a buzz in the library world. I was especially surprised to learn that many schools and libraries had established themselves in Second Life; it was a little hard to understand why these institutions would expand here when there were so many web resources they could develop without the (what I saw as) hassle of having to go through this virtual re-creation. It seemed as if it going through Second Life would be more of a barrier to access than an advantage. But still, the concept of virtual libraries and ALA Island (by the American Library Association) in particular intrigued me, and I didn’t make it to the end of my first term at SLAIS before I gave in to my curiosity and got myself a Second Life as DeForest Mint, the man with flawless hair I always dreamed I could be.

Second Life sucked me in at first. Well, actually, at first, it made me an ugly man with a lopsided bald spot and dropped me into a beach where I fell off a ramp and got stuck trying to walk around a wall. I had a lot of fun setting up Leonard with the a trim body and getting rid of that bald spot, then went about trying to find my way around.

The brief tutorial that appears the first time you log in is helpful, but not quite helpful enough.I felt quite lost in this new world, and quickly realized that anyone seeking library services, or any services really, in Second Life would have to be people already very comfortable in this setting. Libraries don’t set up shop in Second Life to attract non-Second Lifers, though the idea might be appealing enough for people who have a pre-existing interest in SL to actually sign up for an account and try it out.

I walked around in the demo area for quite a bit before realizing that the real-world concept of walking distance doesn’t apply in Second Life, and I had no idea where I was going. I used the omnipresent search box to find ALA Island and was able to teleport there. My first disappointment upon arrival was that there was no one there. My second Aha! moment came when I realized I didn’t really know why I was there. Well, I was there because I wanted to see what it was like, but I didn’t know what I was going to do there, and it wasn’t clear what I could do there. There were some places that I could touch that would take me to ALA websites, but I didn’t find anything that I could do only in Second Life (though, had there been other people there, could have been a totally different experience).That’s as far as I got that first time I tried Second Life a few weeks ago, and I wanted to visit again so I could talk about ALA here.

But aye, here’s a problem: today I tried visiting ALA Island again, but all I got when I searched for it was a “Sorry, this item’s privacy settings prevent us from showing you this page”. It turns out to be a SL grid glitch they’ve been having the last couple days. Unfortunately, as I’m not fluent enough to figure out how to find ALA Island again without the search tool, I won’t be able to write more about ALA Island. A cursory online search about how to get to a place turned up nothing, which leads me to believe that this is not the place for neophytes.

I’ll check again shortly, because my first impression of how ALA can fit into my life wasn’t all that great. But I’d like to hear from you seasoned Second Lifers – how have you found the library services there? Would you seek them out in Second Life rather than directly to ALA’s web services?

(Annnnd we’re back! I figured out how to get to ALA Island again.)

Part 2: Revisiting ALA Island

Upon arriving at ALA Island, you’re handed an ALA Welcome Notecard, which outlines the ALA briefly and lists landmarks on ALA Island. In addition to ALA Main, there is a stage, meeting areas, “Party Central”, “Freebies”, and open areas. Some of the areas were ambiguous, like “Divisions Red Side”, and I had to visit it to see what was there.

During my visit to ALA Island, exploring the above areas, I found an ALA Store, places to sit (presumably if there were other visitors it would be a nice place to chat), a news stand, links to items on the ALA website, guestbooks to sign, and a landmark of a ball on a stand for Virtual Reference. The landmark gave me a card from which I could teleport to the Reference Desk at InfoIsland (Alliance Virtual Library). It noted that 24/7 reference wasn’t in place yet but that they were aiming to do so.

I visited InfoIsland to see what was there, wearing a free t-shirt I scored in the ALA Store I found a very cosy den, with a fireplace and places to sit and bookshelves along the wall and a grand piano. In real life, I’d love to have a place like this, but in SL, with no one to chat with and not able to read the books and play the piano, it was little more than a decorator’s fantasy. Oops, spoke too soon. I accidentally discovered just now that if you touch the piano it can play songs for you. You may also lay on it in a sexy pose. You can also dance in the middle of the den, or sip a coffee at the bar, and there is a lovely outdoor garden.

The Den at InfoIsland, Alliance Virtual Library

Next to the den, (and at this point, I realized I’d already left ALA Island and gone to Alliance Virtual Library), there was a library complex. This was quite interesting , with rooms and sections by subject. I visited the Romance Section, whose walls were plastered with posters of book covers. You can click on terminals that take you to websites for blogs, reviews of Romance books, and sites to learn more about Romance novels. There are pleasant seating areas for people to congregate and chat. As someone who doesn’t read romance novels and would have no idea where or how I’d start reading romance novels (other than randomly picking a book off the shelf), I found this little area approachable. There are only a few actual books out on display, but they have catchy enough covers that it’s intriguing (I’ve never found them this intriguing in a real library…) the display feels a bit like an art gallery.

The romance section in the Alliance Virtual Library

Visiting the Government Documents section was a similar experience; nice decor, terminals to visit online resources, and a few identified actual sources. Navigating in the library suffers from the same awkwardness as walking in the rest of Second Life, getting stuck on obstacles, occasionally being trapped in a wall, and for users like me, getting nauseous from the 3D experience of spinning and walking at the same time.

I enjoyed the visual richness of the environment, and how it can do things (like displaying book covers as posters) that would be a great novelty in real life. However, even though I enjoyed exploring and browsing, I personally would not use in-SL services if I was serious about locating information and needed to do so in an efficient manner. All of the web resources that can be found can be readily accessed online, though the groupings in this particular SL give a nice place to start. In a sense, the library sense is limited as well, as this place isn’t linked to a real place I can take out these books. I’m looking forward to visiting other real/SL libraries to see whether this is possible anywhere else.

Oh oh! Someone just came and asked me for directions to a class!! That was nice – I could see myself spending more time here if there was more interaction. That is, if I can get over the vertigo. I can see how places like this library would be a great place to hang out in Second Life – it looks beautiful, feels like walking through a gallery, and (hopefully) meet like-minded people to chat with.

However, right now, I’m dizzy, the world takes a long time to load over a basic broadband connection, and there’s no one in the library – for now, I think I’ll head down the street to the bricks and mortar branch to peruse the shelves.

Visit for yourself:
Get Second Life
ALA in Second Life: (Coordinates 130, 103, 101), link via SLURL
Alliance Virtual Library in Second Life: (Coordinates 89, 122, 33), link via SLURL

Screenshot of IM options at Ask A Librarian at UWaterloo

If you visit the Library website at the University of Waterloo in search of online reference services, you’ll find a page called “Ask a Librarian” that provides several ways of getting in touch with a live librarian. While not visually distinctive, the link for Ask a Librarian is listed along with other navigation links and is easy to find. Placement right above the “Help & Instruction” link might attract users who may not be aware of the existence of the Ask a Librarian set of features.

What distinguishes “Ask a Librarian” from a traditional list of contacts is the variety of ways in which a librarian can be reached from this page. A telephone number and named contact person is given for each library, as well as contact information for liason librarians in different subject areas. Of particular interest  to me is that many of the librarians have MSN contacts listed, which brings us back to the main Ask a Librarian page, where we find no less than six different instant messaging (IM) choices to get in touch with a UWaterloo librarian.

The library has accounts for MSN Messenger (now called Windows Live Messenger, though it remains commonly referred to as MSN ), Gmail’s chat, Yahoo! Messenger, AOL Messenger, Skype‘sIM Chat (users can also initiate a Skype Voice Chat), and Meebo (which can use accounts from other clients). Having accounts for so many popular IM clients maximizes the odds that users who already use IM can simply add the library to their existing accounts. This is great for encouraging use of these services by reducing the amount of setting up and managing accounts that users might otherwise have to do.

To make access even more convenient, the Meebo IM is presented in an embedded window called “IM a Librarian” right on the Ask a Librarian page. A guest nickname is automatically generated for you when the page is loaded so no account is needed. The online hours (Mon-Fri, 12 noon – 4 pm) are listed on the page, but messages can be left during offline hours. A user can begin asking a question right away; the question field is initially filled with a “Type your question here and hit enter to get started”. For users that already use IM, this feature adds convenience of access, but for users that have never used IM, this ability to skip the process of setting up an IM client and account makes it as easy as possible to access the service.

Because the different IM accounts are identified only with the library’s account beside the accounts’ logos, this page presumes the user’s familiarity with instant messaging services; indeed, because only “IM” is labelled anywhere, at least a basic awareness of the use of instant messaging is presumed. No instructions for using any of the IM/Skype services are listed on the page. While this might be overly presumptuous in a public library, this may be perfectly appropriate for the university’s population. During my university years, instant messaging was a mainstay of my dormitory life (and almost everyone I met there – we used to message each other down the hall rather than walk there!), and many of us came to prefer IM over picking up the phone; the ability to hold a conversation while doing work made it so much easier to schedule more into our tight schedules. Personally, I would have loved to have library IM service so immediately available at my fingertips as an undergrad student.

Visit for yourself:
University of Waterloo Library
Ask a Librarian at the University of Waterloo Library

Why beta? In the software world, a beta is a product that is released but not necessary finalized. I think the dynamic nature of web technologies very much lends itself to a state of constant beta, as does a library. Being in beta gives us the ongoing possibility to change and adapt as we need to, always in an iterative process of trying and evaluating and improving.

Always unfinished, always under development, never stagnant, this too is the kind of librarian I seek to be – right now, I’m librarian 2.0 beta !