What to blog about?

I'm not sure who, if anyone, reads this blog. Or who, if anyone, might ever read it. It's a litle odd having a conversation that has the potential to go on in real time, or to generate a response weeks, months or years later. I've been assuming students and staff of the University are my most likely audience, or possibly fellow blogging librarians of the world. (I know you're out there.) I'd really appreciate some feedback so, if you are reading this, let me know - what should I blog about? Otherwise I'll just ramble on the way I have been so far and hope someone, sometime, might find it useful!

Key business resources - WARC pocket books

There are a series of statistical pocket books produced by WARC that are a really useful source of data, presented in a very user friendly way. Drawn from a range of statistical sources they cover drink, retail, media, lifestyle, finance, and marketing in various parts of the world including Europe, Asia, America, and Canada.

They can be found in the business reference section: turn right as you come through the doors onto floor 1 of the library.

Time

According to a BBC report on how students spend their time, going to the pub is "only one percentage point more popular than exercising and playing sport" but it's "five points more popular than reading."

If you need help managing your time maybe a few minutes spent with a book could help? Get Organized by Ron Fry shows you how to create your ideal study environment by using simple time-management tips.

Feeling stressed?

The holidays are over, deadlines are looming. If you're feeling stressed about study you might find some useful information and advice here.

Revision and exam stress
Imperial College's Health Centre web-site has excellent information on self-help strategies for stress management, revision and exam techniques. It also describes three stereotypical phases and approaches to exams and revision. Which one do you fall into, and what can you do about it?

How to cope with the stress of student life
Advice and information from Mind, the mental health charity. Viewable only.

Stress
This website deals with stress in relation to exams in particular but the advice is useful for anyone experiencing stress whilst studying. There is an outline of the symptoms of stress as well as suggested strategies for managing it.

Study skills help : stress management
This site provides a range of links to other resources offering guidance on managing stress. They cover a range of topics such as attitude, relaxation and sleep.

For more information and links see our study skills and practical study skills subject guides.

Merry Christmas!

Business librarians will be around until 12 noon on Christmas Eve and back again on Wednesday 4th Jan. If you have any enquiries over the holiday please email us and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

Don't cite Wikipedia!

Who says you shouldn't cite Wikipedia? The founder of Wikipedia, no less. In fact he suggests it's not a good idea to cite encyclopedias at all. Read the full story in Business Week online.

Christmas ebooks

Christmas: an excellent time to try out the library's ebooks collection!

Charles Dickens. A Christmas Carol perhaps or Ron Herbst's The New Wine Lover's Companion and New Food Lover's Companion.

You may need your Athens username and password.

Web 2.0 Library 2.0 (Does this make it a draw?)

A summary for the information overloaded
(with more for those who can't resist a hyperlink...)

"Web 2.0 is an attitude not a technology. It’s about enabling and encouraging participation through open applications and services. By open I mean technically open... but also, more importantly, socially open, with rights granted to use the content in new and exciting contexts. Of course the web has always been about participation, and would be nothing without it. It’s single greatest achievement, the networked hyperlink, encouraged participation from the start. Somehow, through the late nineties, the web lost contact with its roots and selfish interests took hold. This is why I think the Web 2.0 label is cunning: semantically it links us back to that original web and the ideals it championed, but at the same time it implies regeneration with a new version. Technology has moved on and it’s important that the social face of the web keeps pace."

This was originally posted by Ian Davis but I found it quoted on a Business Week blog by Rob Hof who says

"the term has helped define a new generation of technologies whose social nature differs qualitatively from the broadcast-oriented first generation of Web technologies."

Some key features of Web 2.0

• The web is used as the platform, rather than having software installed on a local pc or network
  
• It harnesses collective intelligence via interaction, rather than broadcasting information to a passive audience
  
• Data is key (e.g. Amazon, who added data to basic records to create a superior service)
  
• It requires no software upgrades or reinstallation, but changes through continuous development on a web platform
  
• It makes use of lightweight programming and easy to use systems (e.g. RSS, wikis, blogs)
  
• It has cross platform compatibility
  
• and provides a rich user experience

These are the main points of a long very detailed article on Web 2.0 by Tim O'Reilly

Ken Chad and Paul Miller from Talis have put this in a library context and comment that,

"Library 2.0 is a concept of a very different library service that operates according to the expectations of today’s library users. In this vision, the library makes information available wherever and whenever the user requires it."

It looks like this is going to be major subject of debate in the library and information world.

As a personal view, it looks to me like there is great potential for libraries to work alongside the new breed of internet information sources, such as the ubiquitous Google, rather than trying to compete with them. Web 2.0 Library 2.0 indeed!

Missing out?

I've been running a lot of training sessions for students lately on making the most of library resources. While it's well known that we provide access to the internet and free information - through services like Google - the fact that we also give access to online information that we pay for (like Mintel) is much less widely appreciated. Which is a shame because it looks like people may be missing out on a lot of high quality information that's available to them.

What's an RSS newsfeed, and why would I want one?

Once upon a time the internet was a collection of fairly static pages that people went and browsed. Thus the browser (Netscape, Internet Explorer, Firefox etc) became a key tool.

These days there are a lot more sites that offer up to the minute news (the BBC, FT, Google News, BizEd and blogs) and the RSS newsfeed is as useful for dealing with these as the browser is for static pages.

Basically what a newsfeed does is bring together in one place the latest updates from all the news and updating sites you want to check on a regular basis.

There are several newsfeeds, just as there are several browsers, but as a starting point a particularly user-friendly one is Bloglines.

Courses - Weblogs

Blogging live from the Aslib weblogs course in Birmingham today. I think I'll be posting about RSS feeds next - watch this space!

New book - How to be a Student

It's one of those things that no-one ever actually teaches you, you just work it out as you go along. Unless you get your hands on How to be a Student by Sarah Moore.

I particularly liked these chapter headings.

• Regular 'study snacks' are better than occasional 'study binges'
  
• Understanding boredom
  
• Sleeping enough (but not too much)
  
• Remembering that lecturers and tutors are human too
  
• Recognizing that information is not knowledge
  
• Remembering that people thought Einstein was a slow learner
  
• Getting to know your librarians and lurking in the library
  
• Using all of your brain
  
• Having some time every day when you're doing nothing at all
  
• Reading
  
• Writing a little bit every day
  
• Using images and diagrams when you're taking notes
  
• Believing in yourself

Courses - Developing and managing ebook collections

This was a useful update on the state of ebooks in the UK and confirmed my suspicion that many things that would encourage their takeup are still not happening

• no single comprehensive resource exists for ebook identification and selection
  
  
• no standard business model or licensing agreement exists
  
  
• each provider uses a different interface and software
  
  
• ebook availability varies greatly between subject areas
  
  
• more research needs to be done, especially qualitative analysis (currently being undertaken by JISC)
  
  
• a large number of issues relating to the electronic delivery of information in general, not just ebooks, have not yet been fully resolved (copyright, archiving, security, authentication etc)
  
  During the day we had the chance to get hands on practice with several different systems. I thought it was interesting that one of the childrens ebook services had involved children in the design of the interface, and the result was both intuitive and enjoyable to use. (You can search for short books with blue covers about imaginary characters!) Not something that can honestly be said of many electronic resources, sadly.
  
  We also had the chance to compare our own experience with librarians from other institutions. It was encouraging to find that we are already doing some things that others are considering or are in the process of putting in place.
  
  
• we have fully integrated catalogue records for our ebooks
  
  
• we have a collection development policy that includes ebooks
  
  
• we are using a variety of means to promote the use of ebooks (including blogging!)
  
  There are some areas we could investigate further, such as whether we could provide access to ebooks (and other eresources) for library visitors other than staff and students of the University.

New books - Dark Angels

Can the writing you do at work ever be 'creative'? Dark Angels by John Simmons suggests it can.

"By developing creativity in everyday language and words, this writing guide helps businesses and business professionals strengthen their goals and generate fresh ideas. Suggestions for emails, reports, letters, memos, and proposals show how company communications can be clearer and arguments more effective with a few inspired changes. By allowing their inner dark angels to spread their creative wings, aspiring professionals will learn how to better engage with, and connect to, their audience with stories and emotion rather than cold analysis."

Starting a business in Portsmouth?

The COBRA database now provides local area profiles for those thinking of starting a business in a particular part of the country. There is a profile of the Portsmouth area, but not yet one for Southampton* - more areas are going to be added in future months updates.

* UPDATE! There is now.

ABI Inform - new features for researchers

ABI Inform have recently added some new and improved options for business researchers including:

• Full text US masters and doctoral dissertations
• A new improved 'My Research' area for organising your references
• Automated email alerts on your research topic
• The option to export Harvard format references

Scary?

"And then, of course, there was the sheer size of the library; tens of thousands of books; thousands of shelves; hundreds of narrow rows." (1)

Studies have found that most students suffer some degree of 'library anxiety'. Comments in one study included words like ‘scary’ and ‘lost’. We hope you don't think our library is scary, but if you do feel at all lost when you're first finding your way around, it might help to know that you're not alone in feeling that way.

If you have any trouble finding what you need, please don't hesitate to ask the library staff: we're here to help! Business librarians can be found on floor 1A in office number ML107.

(1.) Rowling, J.K. (2001) Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. London, Bloomsbury.

BlogScholar

I've encountered a fair bit of scepticism about the academic relevance of blogging. If you haven't made your mind up yet BlogScholar might be of interest.

The BBC on the blogosphere

I managed to miss this Radio Four programme* about blogs and the blogosphere, but luckily someone told me about it. If you're not sure what a blog is, or how they might be relevant, it's a good summary of what it's all about.

On the BBC News site this interview with Tim Berners-Lee also talks about blogs.


*It may be in the archives by now, or gone. That's the internet for you, things come and go...

The blog generation?

I emailed a few people asking if they thought the ML107 blog was a good idea. Most replied, "I will be out of the office between..." It's that time of year. One claimed not to be of the 'blog generation'. (And I am!?!)

I'm inclined to agree with Martin Röll who writes on SAP Info "The blogger scene has become as diverse as society itself. From journal-writing adolescents via IT specialists through to university professors – all kinds of people blog. "

Anyway to bring this back to library matters, the term 'blogs' has now been added to our library catalogue key word list, and the latest book on the subject to arrive in stock is Buzz marketing with blogs for dummies.