Springer launched a free analytics tool providing visualizations for usage of Springer’s online products, called Springer Realtime. It shows keywords for recently downloaded articles, mapping of downloads, charts and article-level information.

What if there was something like this for your library’s downloads?

[Thanks, Martha!]

The January issue of ITAL (Information Technology and Libraries) had an interesting article on academic librarians learning to keep up with the changing pace of technology.

Here’s a Drexel proxied link to the article, and an ITALica blog post with the abstract.

Even though “emerging technologies” in libraries are somewhat different from the rest of the world, it’s important to be able to keep up with what the students are actually doing, and to understand the tools they use to complete their coursework.

Co-edited by yours truly.  From our press release:

We are pleased to announce the release of a new book, Scholarly Practice, Participatory Design and the eXtensible Catalog, based on user research for eXtensible Catalog, available now from ACRL or Amazon.

As part of the development of eXtensible Catalog (XC), a project to develop open source software sponsored by the University of Rochester’s River Campus Libraries, and funded by the Mellon Foundation and project partners, four institutions conducted eighty interviews and numerous workshops to understand how researchers learn about, acquire, and use scholarly resources. Research findings informed the design and development of XC, a set of open-source applications that provides access to resources across a range of databases, metadata schemas, and standards. In this volume, members of the project team report on key findings of the user research that was done at Cornell University, Ohio State University, the University of Rochester, and Yale University, and discuss the value of including library users and technology specialists from many disciplines in the software design and development process. Editors: Nancy Fried Foster, Katie Clark, Kornelia Tancheva and Rebekah Kilzer. Authors: Jennifer Bowen, Kaila Bussert, Katherine Chiang, Katie Clark, Maureen Donovan, Nancy Fried Foster, Gabriela Castro Gessner, David Lindahl, Melissa S. Mead, Kornelia Tancheva and Wendy Wilcox.

EDUCAUSE is running an interesting experiment — they’re holding a 5-day online event called the Mobile Computing 5-day Sprint.  It’s a collection of five days worth of webinars, including polls, interactive discussions and other features.  The live sessions are booked, but they promise to post recordings each day.

I’m especially interested in tomorrow’s theme: Teaching and Learning.

The full list of themes for each day, and details on the sprint format, are available.

Former Google Video user?  If so, you should think back to see if you have any files there you want to keep.

Google has decided to shut down Google Video, which actually stopped allowing uploads in 2009.  If you’re (were) a Google Video user, here’s some info that can help you save your files.  You have until May 13.

[Thanks, Kate!]

Please join us for our next Spark! Presentation featuring John Cannan and his Constitution Project.

Tuesday, April 5 : Hagerty L33 : 10 am

John is a Legal Reference Librarian at the Legal Research Center, and has been working on a Drupal-based web site to organize the Constitutional Convention’s debates in a topical form.  The project is funded by the American Association of Law Libraries.

You can preview some of his work on the Preamble, here.

Please bring a morning beverage – snacks will be provided.

Last fall, Google released a new collaboration product, Shared Spaces.  This allows you to create customized collaboration work spaces with anyone.  You can create a place to play games, plan a trip, make lists or search Amazon, with people you know.

After observing the technology knowledge gap between undergraduates and librarians at Brigham Young University’s Harold B. Lee Library created a self-directed training program for staff, offering incentives and methods for improving technology skills in a flexible manner.

From the article:
The Technology Challenge was implemented from June 2007 to January 2008. HBLL staff included 175 full-time employees, 96 of whom participated in the challenge. (The student employees were not involved.) Participants were asked to spend fifteen minutes each day learning a new technology skill. HBLL leaders used rewards to make the program enjoyable and to motivate participation: For each minute spent learning technology, participants earned one point, and when one thousand points were earned, the participant would receive a gift certificate to the campus bookstore. Staff and faculty participated and tracked their progress through an online board game called “Techopoly.”

Participation was voluntary, and staff and faculty were free to choose which tasks and challenges they would complete. Tasks fell into one of four categories: software, hardware, library technology, and the internet. Participants were required to complete one hundred points in each category, but beyond that, were able to decide how to spend their time. Examples of tasks included attending workshops, exploring online tutorials, and reading books or articles about a relevant topic. For each hundred points earned, participants could complete a mini-challenge, which included reading blogs or e-books, listening to podcasts, or creating a photo CD. Participants who completed fifteen out of twenty possible challenges were entered into a drawing for another gift certificate.

The full article is available through our databases:
Bridging the Gap: Self-Directed Staff Technology Training Quinney, Kayla L; Smith, Sara D; Galbraith, Quinn. Information Technology and Libraries29.4 (Dec 2010): 205-213.

One of the common complaints about electronic book formats is the loss of marginalia — the little notes that readers add as they read through a print book.  Researchers use these notes to gain insight into a famous reader’s thought processes, or to keep track of their own thoughts as they read through a volume.

This O’Reilly Radar article talks about the options for marginalia in the digital world — even as a revenue source.

Join us for our next Spark! event on Tuesday, March 1, 2011 at Hagerty Library, room L33.

Because staff suggested that a longer time slot with fewer presenters could be beneficial for the audience, the 5×5 event has been renamed Short Talks and will feature 3-5 speakers leaving 20 minutes at the end of the session for discussion.

This month’s event features the following speakers:

• Emily Missner: Clinical Faculty Workshop Series
• Diane Kinney: Tips for Getting Organized using Microsoft Outlook
• Rob Sieckiewicz: Online Internships
• Jenny James: Preparing the Annual Report

The event will be webcast and archived.  Please see your meeting invitation for the webcast information.   We’ll provide some morning snacks, so bring a drink, and enjoy!