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What are the benefits/detractions of podcasts vs. text-based blogging?
Since podcasts can be included within text-based blog posts, and blogs can be linked to (or 'pointed to' verbally) from podcasts, they can work together nicely.
Text has the advantage of being easy to scan, but requires being stationary (at least with one’s gaze, even when moving with a mobile device). 
Podcasts require more time to go through, since there’s no way to easily scan them or jump around precisely, but they allow for more versatility (and multi-tasking): you can listen to them while doing dishes, resting, avoiding homework, etc.
If it's necessary to chose one format over another, I'd like to know about the audience: are they likely to already be invested in the topic? Are they likely to be tire kickers? The medium should be gauged appropriately (as well as any 'special effects' like music or images).
One way they can be used in tandem is to provide concise text in a way that’s easy to scan within a few seconds, and then link to the podcast for those who are ready to invest the time...kind of like we did with our homework assignment.
Ear image from Yahoo education.
What would we have to do to effectively utilize the long tail of library collections?
To paraphrase Anderson (2006):
- Make the whole collection available
- Help everybody find it
The library I work at has something over 6.5 million analog items. Needless to say, many of them would fall into the category of "tail". A subset of these are non-copyrighted works. About a million of these are being digitized by -- how did you know? -- Google. In one jump, this brings Princeton significantly closer to making its whole collection available, and to helping anyone to find it (via the Web, as well as the library's OPAC). So, digitization (if it's done well) is one way of achieving these long tail ideals.
Also, Anderson's rules of long tail aggregators (p. 218-224) could be loosely interpreted to apply to libraries, especially in terms of offering variety, letting patrons (rather than "customers") help (e.g., folksonomies), and making both analog and digital items available ("one product doesn't fit all")...
Another thing that comes to mind is that libraries can bring out their tails by putting some serious thought into their interfaces -- all of them, everything that connects the patron with the collection: the online catalog, the physical layout of the building, the positioning of books, the design of the Web site, the reference librarians (who can point to long tail items only if they know about them), etc.
& ANOTHER THOUGHTAnderson says: "...it takes more than the turn of a century or two to change library culture..." (p. 160).
Really?
Sounds like an unexamined claim landing in the middle of an otherwise well-considered argument. It wouldn't follow from slow change in the past few centuries that library culture will take until 2100 to show any significant changes. So, what was he talking about? Does he know much about libraries? What is "library culture," anyway? And how would we gauge its rate of change?
Anderson, C. (2006). The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. New York: Hyperion.
On top of being a mild-mannered library guy by day, I'm preparing myself to go out into the woods and search for real invaders, who threaten to do a lot of damage -- some have done damage already. And the results of my mission will be hard data for a big academic research project.
So, ok. The invaders are just a bunch of plants. And the biggest danger is getting poison ivy or stubbing a toe.
Still, you might want to listen to a very short description here. Or, you can listen to it in this player:
You know what? I think my educational experience at SCILS has largely been one of learning to accept a overwhelm as a lifestyle.
Among all the useful and interesting things I’ve picked up about information seeking behavior, searching techniques, Web design, etc., I’ve been steadily practicing things like being in a constant state of partial attention (multi-tasking) and pushing beyond comfort zones (e.g., the bedtime zone).
It remains to be seen what I’ll actually retain and use from all of this, and which relationships will remain -- ask me in 15 years -- but these are survival skills for the info overload age, or whatever we want to call it. And I guess it does give me an advantage over my former self, and over my more comfortable and overslept colleagues.Anyway, the images of this experience tend to be pretty repetitive: my computer, books, my computer, my tea cup, my computer, etc. I've put some of them up on Flickr, and my classmates have too. Check them out.
The question is: how do libraries/librarians fill roles as Chris Anderson’s (2006) new producers, new markets, and new tastemakers?
It's a big one. Here's my simplistic guess:
Libraries don’t have long-tail thinking built into their basic architecture and traditional mission statements, since they arose in times of (relative) info scarcity. At one point, libraries were hits. Now, they're kind of a niche -- or a meta-niche, maybe, since they provide for multiple niches at once.
Libraries/ians can be new producers both by enabling patrons to produce (making AV equipment available, teaching software classes, providing Web design books, etc.) and by producing their own things: library blogs, wikis, multimedia tutorials, etc.
They can be among the new markets by essentially serving as aggregators for almost any type of published material, and – in some cases – by aggregating trendy technologies as well. Even if many patrons are not first introduced to new gadgets or materials at their libraries, they can get their hands on them and learn more about them.
They can be new trendsetters by serving as multi-faceted filters -- not like in the good old days of being smug authorities about limited information, but in the way they display collections, by the programs they present, by their recommendations, by steering patrons in reference interviews, and possibly by providing for collaborative filtering (social bookmarking) -- not to replace catalogers, but to add a new dimension to their collections.
Librarians can't be the rock stars they used to be, and the future of this business is uncertain. That would really be a problem if we couldn't be flexible or get excited by new toys.
Anderson, C. (2006). The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More. New York: Hyperion.
According to the eminently useful Google Analytics, there have been 135 (brief) visits to this blog as of today, June 17, 2008. That's up from 0 in May, so I guess it's pretty good.
A real surprise came in looking at the map overlay: there have been one-time visitors from 5 other countries, including India and Hungary (?!) Unfortunately, there's no record of what they said before moving on ("Damn. This isn't it...").
Most popular browser: Most used connection speed:
What are the benefits/detractions of podcasts vs. text-based blogging?
