A Wandering Eyre

(I said Friday for big news, but I suppose I am unable to read calendars. This is the big announcement. Enjoy.)

People fear and worry about the unknown.

The PTB, Powers That Be, in most organizations perpetuate fear by having closed meetings, by distributing meeting minutes that have no substance, hiding or disguising the way decisions are made, and not explaining any of the above to the people whom these decisions invariably effect the most. These practices create worry, fear, and gossip mongering because the lower levels of the organizations are kept, unintentionally or deliberately, in the dark. Who does this system protect? Certainly not the people on the bottom.

I believe that information is power and it is time we give it back to the people.

In an effort of experimentation, truth, and transparency, the leadership of BIGWIG will henceforth be practicing Radical Transparency. We want to model how radical transparency can change the work of an ALA group. We want to show that transparency breeds loyalty and productivity. It does not produce chaos. We discussed this at ALA Midwinter with the group and everyone was in favor of moving forward.

How will this work?

BIGWIG has registered its own domain called Your BIGWIG. There you will find different areas for discussion, work, and projects. We will strive to publicly discuss all projects, from the bottom up. The first item up for discussion and work is the Social Software Showcase planned for Annual. Well, it is not so much planned yet. We want the people to plan their own program.

We are not creating a democracy. We are creating a transparentocracy. The chairs of BIGWIG will still have final decision powers and will be true leaders of the group, but everyone will know what is going on, what is coming down the pipes, and how every decision is made. People will know because decisions will be made on the web for all the world to see or they can search the archives later).

Transparency is the future. It may be the medicine that ALA needs to regain and restore faith to their members. BIGWIG, the tiny IG unlike any other, wants to show ALA that it can be done. If you want to play, come on over, and sign-up for the fun.

–Jane, always happy to be the bearer of good things

I am very pleased that Jason Griffey, my conference husband and friend extraordinaire, is joining the TechSource Team. He is a super smart guy and is always amazing me with the things he knows and finds. I know he will have some very good things to tell us.

Welcome, Jason.

–Jane, loves to see her friends do amazing things

The not so good bits being two things I did not see but heard a lot about about one thing for which I was present and accounted for.

Most of my complaints about ALA Midwinter are about things having to do with the division in which I spend most of my time: LITA. As we say down South, Bless your heart. Bless your heart, LITA, I know you try, but let us consider the ways in which the brain was left behind in the planning of some of the aspects of ALA Midwinter 2008 and how your members have lost touch with reality and the word leadership.

In the past, LITA sponsored a Blogger’s room, which has become more popular as more people found out about it’s existence. At Annual 07, there were always people hanging out in the room, chatting, blogging, and surfing the internet whenever I chanced by. The room had multiple tables, chairs, wifi, and many power strips. BIGWIG usually has its meetings in this room because it is available, convenient, and has all the equipment we needed (wifi and power strips). At Midwinter 07, the room was bumped back to only be a couple tables in the back of the ALA office, but it still included power strips and wifi. Members of LITA have been thinking of ways we could use this service of a plug and wifi as a way to market LITA as a technology provider guru to ALA at large. I think this is a wonderful idea and an even better service.

(As a disclaimer, I did not see said table, but I did hear about it from multiple people. I wanted a picture, but ran out of time on Monday. If anyone snapped a picture, please share it in the comments.) This year the idea of the room or properly equipped tables seems to have gone awry somehow. This year, we again had a Blogger’s Table at Midwinter in the ALA office. But it was one table with two chairs, no power strips, and no wifi. Welcome bloggers, you would be better off sitting on the floor by a plug in the hallway instead of using this service we have not put much thought into providing. I am not sure who thought this would be a good idea, but clearly it is not useful and a waste of space besides.

The Blogger’s Area should be something, by now, that LITA leadership and admin have realized is a “good thing” for their image, but BIGWIG has to ask and advocate for it before every conference. It should be something that LITA wants to provide, not something they must be cajoled and prodded into doing.

At Annual, LITA, I will not be there to enjoy it, but please provide a real room, with numerous tables, chairs, power strips, and wifi . We know it costs money, but think of it as much needed advertising to all the techies hiding in other ALA groups that see you not as a technology leader or innovator, but as an innovator and leader that has forgotten what it means to do so.

I again must write a disclaimer as I was not present at the following meeting, but I did hear about it after the fact from multiple people. At Midwinter, the Top Tech Trends Panel holds an open discussion meeting in which they throw out ideas about new trends and the audience is able to comment on the panel’s assumptions. Other then the President’s Program, the TTT Panel at both Midwinter and Annual are the most popular LITA events. The thing that makes the Midwinter program stand out is that, instead of the panel talking to the audience, as they do at Annual, the panel talks with the audience about tech trends in libraries.

You would expect that such a largely attended and well received program would not have the problems getting the right room and equipment they need from LITA to hold their events. Indeed, they should not have the kind of problems a little IG would have, say getting a blogging area, but the TTT Committee had similar connectivity and set-up issues. It is possible that these issues were a problem with the conference staff and not LITA. If I am wrong in my assumption, I want to be corrected. Someone, please correct me!

Instead of a large room, set up for a lively discussion and debate, the room TTT was given was small and set up for a traditional committee meeting with a table in the center and chairs around the table. The chair of the committee, Maurice York, had to run around, fetching as many extra chairs as he could cram into the room. During the discussion, the room overflowed into the hall. LITA - we do not have room for you.

The connectivity in the room was not wonderful. One of the committee members, trying to participate virtually on Skype, had issues connecting to the group because of the wifi. Wifi can be problematic, so I am hesitant to really lay that on LITA’s door. I applaud the committee for trying Skype. Who says ALA does not have virtual participation?

Lastly, the LITA Town Meeting ended in a debate over which we should be: Innovative Leaders of Technology (in which we often blaze the trail as the first) or Leaders in Technology (in which we do not care about innovation but instead create best practices and know the best tools in hopes that others will seek out our expertise). The conversation made me want to cry, scream, and rip my hair out. It is the conversation I hear repeated in MPOW and in libraries all over the nation. It is the reason a lot of libraries talk about doing something but never actually get around to doing anything at all and thus never lead anyone anywhere.

Why try to be first, when you can be last? I have a news flash for the people in LITA who think we should give up trying to be first and be the ones who make great policies and practices. All those groups who blazed the trail we are sauntering down, already created all the policies and best practices they need because shortly after being first, they realized they needed some guidelines. When you wait for others to do all the dirty work and then step in later to save the day, you only look like an attention grabber and no one believes you have anything to contribute that is worthwhile. If you did have something meaningful to say, you would have said it at the beginning, when the innovative group was hacking through the jungle, not later when the road is built.

I am not bringing this up to say that age is the factor, but someone asked all of us under 30 to raise out hands and there were less than 5 of us in a room easily holding about 60 or 70 people. I know LITA used to be the leader back when they had the Internet room for people to use and you were all young. I know because you tell us about it all the time. I am proud you blazed that trail and it is part of our history. You know what though, you are the only ones who remember that and that remembrance is not enough for the rest of ALA to keep believing you are a leader of anything. One good idea will not ensure your status as an innovator. It just means you had one good idea.

People no longer see LITA as a leader in technology because we are not. Not in innovation, policies, or best practices. If we really want to reclaim our position as a leader in technology we have to actually lead the way to be taken seriously. I want LITA to be great. I want us to blaze a technology trail others can walk down. I want us to partner with other divisions who are also using technology in innovative ways so we can be leaders again. We do not always have to be the first ones down the trail, but we should try to be in the lead group, leading.

–Jane, not ready to sit back and let others have all the innovative fun

This is the round-up post minus the soapbox elements. In this post, I write about the things I liked about my trip and the things that made me feel good about ALA. There were, of course, some not fabulous things about Midwinter, but I am putting those in their very own post. Just for you, readers, because I know how you sometimes like a good bitch.

ALA Midwinter was fun, if very quick, for me this year. I flew in on Saturday and left Monday. Philadelphia was a nice city to visit, even if I left one rainy cold city for the same weather at home.

The best meeting I attended by far was the Jim Rettig Presidential Advisory Board Meeting. It was a good meeting for two reasons:

First, it was very well run and efficient. Second, at no time during the meeting was any idea turned down with a no or dismissed. We instead discussed how to make each idea feasible, even if it meant giving the idea to a group who could handle it better. I left feeling positive about the possibilities for the group’s initiatives and it was the best meeting I attended all conference, including the one that I helped run. It affirmed my belief that there are plenty of people in ALA who want to try new things.

The ALA Publishing Reception was at the Mutter Museum at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. I liked the babies in jars and fetal skeletons displays the best followed closely by the syphilitic skulls. I have not seen so many cool skulls since Physical Anthropology in college. Fabulous. The Terminal Street Market was wonderfully full of delicious food, spices, fruits, vegetables, and handmade items. It was a feast for the eyes and the belly. I had some veggie samosas from Nandi’s Kitchen that were fantabulous.

This is likely be my last ALA until Annual 09 because I plan on staying home from traveling for a year after Baby Rochester arrives. I still have virtual commitments to several committees and that will continue. It made all my meetings with friends bittersweet, knowing I would only see people online for a large amount of time until I start the conference circuit again. It was nice to see old friends and meet some new people, as always.

The Blog Salon was fun, as usual, and was in a wonderfully large room this year. Sadly, there were no shower caps, but I did see a group in Second Life off to one side. I also met the creator of the “March of the Librarians” video, Nick Baker, who is a lovely person.

As I was uploading pictures to Flickr, it dawned on me that I take less pictures when I am not drinking. My set for Midwinter is very small as a consequence of my being in Philadelphia for a shorter period than normal and for the distinct lack of alcohol consumed. I still have a handful to get online.

The wifi, though occasionally spotty (as wifi sometimes is), was usable in most areas of the conference center. Thank you, ALA. It is much appreciated and was noted by this blogger. I hope this is a precedence that only improves.

–Jane, it’s raining in Houston today

For various reasons, I will only be in the city of Brotherly Love for a short time. I have, as a consequence, completely packed my schedule. Some things are overlapping and this may be the first time I have ever missed a Blog Salon. I am hoping there are still some drunk librarians, I mean, some people, still there after 8. I will drop by after my meeting.

Saturday
2:19 Arrive
4-6 Seeing a Man About a Dog
5:30-7:30 Darien Public Library Get Together
5:30-8:30 ALA Publishing Reception
After Meeting some friends if I have any steam left

Sunday
9 Breakfast with the 2 other TechSource Peeps
10:30-12 BIGWIG Meeting
12:30 Lunch w/Rachel V.
4 Coffee with Pete B.
6-8 Jim Rettig Board
After Blog Salon if it is still going on, if not, something else

Monday
8 LITA Town Meeting
Lunch Cheesesteak
3 Leave for Home

Safe travels to all going earlier than me, which I think is almost everyone.

–Jane, will be sad, this is her last in person ALA for awhile

A mundane update about me, because really, it is all about me, you know.

I had a fun weekend filled with tree trimming and house light hanging. Mr. Rochester could really care less about either, but I adore them so that he perches on the ladder while I hand him gutter clips and the next string of lights. He even helped with the tree this year. Lovely. In other Rochester news, we are having a healthy baby boy. Mr. R is glad to have escaped a house of giggling and princesses this round and I am glad to have escaped the threat of having my daughter want to be a cheerleader.

Now, if you were unfortunate enough to have spent your formative years cheerleading, please do not be offended, but what would two nerdy geeks do with a cheerleader? Just consider that and move on without getting all huffy. I was a band nerd for the love of Friday.

I then packed off to Sacramento, CA to teach the first of many workshops for InfoPeople. The workshop is on using Web 2.0 tools and ideas for staff training. It went off well with a very participatory group with a myriad of good ideas of their own. I am going to make some tweaks for next time. If you live in California, I will be back every week in January teaching the same class.

If you have received your copy of American Libraries for December, my little face appears twice! I wrote the “On My Mind” column this month on freedom and literacy in libraries. There is also a picture of me a few pages later, p. 48, at the Gaming, Learning, and Libraries Symposium from this summer. In that picture, you can see me laughing as I lose horribly at Mario Kart. It was fun, even though I failed to be victorious, twice.

Now, I am back in Houston, enjoying our “cold” weather (it is 50 today) and contemplating what to tackle on my to do list first.

–Jane, had some last minute emails from students who did not prepare well for their research papers

I wanted to write this as a comment on the blog Marcus’ World, but it requires an account to TypeKey, which I did not want to set up for one comment. I also wanted to email Marcus to let him know I responded to his post. Alas, he has no email or other contact information that I could find on his site. I could have spent time Googling him, but I decided a response here would have to do.

Marcus took from my post about virtual meetings and ALA that I hate all F2F meetings and think physical conferences are not worthwhile. That is completely not the case. I do not like F2F meetings that are a waste of time. I do owe a huge amount of my success to friends I have made at physical conferences. The other 70% * of my success comes from my virtual network of peers and blogging, but that is a different post altogether.

I think that most F2F meetings are a waste of time because we spend time reporting and discussing things that are best left to email or chat. We travel hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles**, to talk about something in a formal meeting that would have been fine translated to email. Sometimes we hear reporting on things that have already been sent out in email, double jeopardy. Instead of doing the majority of our organization’s work virtually and using ALA Midwinter and Annual to make major decisions (after all the angles have already been discussed online) or to have wider membership discussions, we meet to talk about committee reports, committee updates, and plan the upcoming year’s projects. All these things could happen more efficiently over email or IM.

The major benefit to F2F conferences, regardless of the organization or venue, is the people***, not the meetings. Marcus is right when he says that the interactions and networking are what make an in person conference worth attending. I did notice that Marcus was not touting the great experiences he has in meetings. It is the after meeting discussions in bars and over lunch that make a difference. Those things can never be replaced completely with virtual means.

What I am really arguing for is the ability for people to participate in a meaningful and principle way virtually in our organization. It is an argument for efficient use of my time in between meetings. It is an argument for ALA to formally allow their members to participate without going to two costly meetings a year.

It is a plea for ALA to stop living in the pre-Internet days and start living in this century. A fervent wish for our organizations, ALA and libraries alike, to realize that we already live online and we expect for you to as well. That means we expect to be able to participate virtually with all the benefits (voting rights) of members fortunate enough to be able to travel.

–Jane, has thus far been blessed to be able to travel often

*Numbers should be believed even if they are totally fictional.
**In the past year I have traveled 5,027 miles to 3 ALA conferences. Based on actual calculations and travel distance.
***Picture of actual people at Annual not in a meeting and having fun.

On the heels of Meredith and Jason, I have to throw my hat in the ring.

Jason describes a conversation we had at Internet Librarian in which we hatched the most brilliant of all schemes ever. Well, we think so anyway.

Jason describes very well the meat of our plan: ALA should offer a virtual conference at the cost of the profit they would normally net from physical attendance.

One added benefit Jason did not mention would be far fewer physical rooms and hotels needed for conferences. It is possible ALA could actually have the conference someplace nice, during a nice time of year. Milwaukee in Summer or anywhere north of the Mason Dixon line for that matter when the rest of us are boiling. We might even be able to do away with Midwinter. Oh, be still my heart!

I would only add to his description this: ALA not allowing true virtual membership and using revenue as an excuse is not longer a reason. You can not hide behind money anymore. Stop trying to do it. We all know that this is simply an excuse not to look for alternative revenue streams. In less then 24 hours, you have now had three independent members offer you alternative revenue. Think out of the box and stop torturing us with F2F meetings that are unnecessary, not to mention personally, blindingly expensive.

I also would like to take the idea a step further by wedding it to Meredith’s post. She talks about online ads and sponsorships. Not only could ALA charge the amount they would normally net from physical attendance for online participation from members, they could also pimp the vendors with everything from banner ads to sponsoring talks and themes. As Meredith said, this does not mean letting the vendors talk, it means letting them be sponsors, much like NPR does on the radio with a short little commercial blurb that does not interfere with content.

Online ads are big money and so are online sponsorships. MySpace will make over a billion dollars in ads this year. Why can’t an organization of smart professionals figure out how to do what the twenty somethings have already figured out?

The great thing about a conference with virtual content is that many, many more people will have access to it and would be willing to pay for it. I know so very many librarians who can simply not afford to go to an ALA conference, but they could afford $50 of their own money to attend a virtual conference.

Bless your heart ALA, we love you, but you really need to consider these things. Seriously. And you should do that now. Not with a million committees that will mull over it for years only producing a useless report. We are asking for some action. I believe our future is riding on the decisions that get made about this issue. Please make them soon.

–Jane, please keep in mind Jane is not very patient

I am on an ALA LITA Committee that is trying to design a better technology conference. We want to know what you liked, did not like, or would like to see at a technology conference in the future.

If you have ever attended a technology preconference, session, conference, or you simply have an opinion, please take this survey. Feel free to spread the survey far and wide. We would like to have feedback from as many people as possible so that we can create something that will serve you better.

–Jane, thanks!

updated: the link should now be working!

James Paul Gee
Libraries, Gaming, and the New Equity Crisis

[This guy really blew me away. He really makes me want to change the way we are teaching our kids and made me think about things I want to do with my own kids. I felt like he was really calling us to rethink the way we do learning in libraries. I want to try to find ways to use gaming strategies in my Information Literacy sessions. You can find a list of his books on Amazon.]

The Gaps
Literacy gap – no longer a sufficient condition, it is a must.
Applications gap – kids being unable to apply the knowledge they have
Knowledge gap
Tech savvy gap – you are not afraid of technical stuff, including equations, and you can use technology productively to solve stuff. If you are not tech savvy on any level you will be unable to be successful in a developed country
Innovation gap – every job that is beyond the basic is outsourced so only innovative people will survive in our society

What predicts success for 1st grade?
Early literacy at home

What about 4th grade?
Kindergarten Vocabulary
The language of schooling is not the same as regular English.
[that is interesting]

Kids still learn complicated languages in games. The examples are Yu Gi-O cards, but these kids still struggle with academic language in school. Capitalist learned that complicated language is hard only in school. Companies have been forced to discover learning principles and then applying them to games. We have, in our games, better learning principles then we have in schools.

Learning Principles from Games:
Ask yourself these questions while I tell you the principles:
a) do you think it is good?
b) should we put it in school?

1 – Lower the consequences of failure
The cost is not so large that you fail right away. You can always start over and learn something new by doing it a different way.
IDEO – Fail early, Fail often.

2 - Performance before competence
You have to play a game [and be bad at it] to learn how to be competent at the game. In school, you would get a textbook to read. You learn by performance. Most things in life are this way.

3- Players high on the agency tree.
Your choices and decisions in a game really matter. Choices can make the game play different from everyone around you. When your choices matter, your commitment to the game is higher.

4 - Problems are well ordered.
Immerse people in rich environments, but they have to be given directions. Order the problems so that the problems they solve at the beginning will teach them things they will need to solve more complex problems later.

5 - Cycles of challenge, consolidations, and new challenge. (expertise)
This cycle has to be present for people to be experts in anything. They have to be given a problem that they can master and eventually have automatic mastery. Then, you give them a problem where that knowledge no longer works and they have to solve a new problem. In a game, this is called the Boss.

6- Stay within, but at the outer edge, of the player’s “regime of competence.”
Pleasantly frustrating. Games keep cycling you into the circle of flow where you are always challenged, but that you can still achieve success.

7 - Encourage players to think about systems and relationships, not just isolated facts.
Games force you to keep in mind a huge set of variables, like Civ, where everything you do affects everyone else in the world. We can not make decisions in isolation. We do not teach our leaders to do this well.

8 - Empathy for a complex system.
A game is a simulation where you are in it. This gives you empathy for the system.

9 - Give verbal information “just in time”- when players need and can use it – or “demand” when the players ask for it.
[You never read the manual unless you need something right then.]

10 - Situate (“show”) the meanings of words and symbols and show how they carry across different actions, images, and dialogues.
Don’t just offer words for words. Education does not do this, it is just words in a textbook. A good theory of literacy - you shouldn’t read manuals. The only thing hard about academic language is that there are no pictures, motions, and actions to which kids can relate the information being thrown at them.

11- Modding attitude
Games come with the software that allows kids to modify and change their games to create something new.

12- Assessment
We have to change the way we do assessment. Games give assessment all the time. Charts in Civ that track your progress against your opponents. It makes McGraw Hill look sick. The graphs in Civ are clearly for them.