Trends in digital reference
This post is meant to be just a quick list of notable things going on in digital reference in the last few years:
- Library H3lp (allows for collaborative IM reference service)
- Open access software used by L-net's statewide service in Oregon and KnowItNow's statewide service in Ohio
- Increased use of widgets for chat/IM (QuestionPoint's Qwidget, Meebo, Chatango, etc.)
Public sharing of reference interactions
- L-net's Conversation Archive
- Reference Extract
- QuestionPoint's KnowledgeBase (see also related posts on QuestionPoint blog)
Outreach by reference librarians on answer boards
Growing interest in SMS reference (text message reference)
- Mosio's Text A Librarian service
- Southeastern University of Louisiana (a long-running service)
- Yale University's Txt a Science Librarian and Maui Community College's Ask Ellen (related slide presentation)
Increase in collaborative/cooperative reference services
- Collaborative Virtual Reference Symposium 2007
- Library H3lp finally making it possible for IM software to be used for collaborative reference services
- QuestionPoint service adds University of California libraries, New York Public Library, Brooklyn Public Library, and Queens Library to its cooperative reference service
What other trends did I miss?
posted by Stephen Francoeur @ 1:20 PM
3 Comments
Links to this post
3 Comments:
Stephen, along the lines of new IM collaboration opportunities, IM Collaborator was developed at the University of Illinois, http://www.library.uiuc.edu/askus/imcollaborator/.
Would you include Facebook and Twitter in digital reference? Perhaps it's just outreach.
Mara: Would I include Facebook and Twitter in digital reference? Sure, they can be used for it but honestly I haven't seen a whole lot of movement toward using those tools for reference services yet.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home