TECHNOLOGIES WORTH WATCHING

By Richard L. King, Reference Librarian

I attended the Indiana Library Federation annual conference in Ft. Wayne last November 15 and think the Vincennes University community might enjoy some of my notes from the comments of one of the presenters, Stephen Abram, Cengage Learning. Cengage Learning (Gale) is a major publisher of library print and electronic reference works. Some of the technologies and issues he discussed are familiar to me, some are not, and though the focus of his talk was on libraries, all these technologies have relevance to anyone involved in the field of education and teaching.

1. Flipboard/iPad App. Takes all feeds and turns them into a magazine. (Those who have iPads already know about this.)
2. Square. Biggest thing in the world now! This is a phone app that allows you to use your credit info to make instant payments, which he called frictionless payments. This is rapidly coming. Turns your phone into a library card, as well.
3. QR Codes (been around a while, and will die in a few years). Will be replaced by Augmented Reality (you simply take a camera pic which will tell you all about whatever you photograph).
4. Google Analytics. Libraries should be using this. Shows what website people were on before they came to your library pages (for instance 50% were at Amazon because you get a better experience at Amazon than at your library web pages). Allows you to find out what people are doing at your library site. Warning: Some math knowledge is needed with google analytics.
5. Google+: Google's foray into social networking to compete with Facebook is going to die. Important concept because it forbids the user to lie about his/her online identity, no use of fake IDs allowed. Important because of this emphasis of Persistent Identity of users. A library card, for instance, is persistent.
6. BUMP. Allows transfer of data (such as your contact info) by bumping phones with another person. Seemless sharing! Why can’t this be used to check out a library book? You just bump your phone to do it.
7. Comic Creators, such as Xtranormal. Allows you to easily build a video in an anime/cartoon format to tell a story. Good for libraries to teach visitors. Create a storyboard using comics to engage people, teach, use humor.
8. Bibliocommons. Create a community of readers recommending library books and other resources to one another similar to what Amazon does. Use these for your own library, develop a local community, create your own local community.
9. Yammer. Ways librarians (and others) can share information among themselves, such as cooperation with reference questions. Allows you to have a private social network just for your own staff.
10. Polling/survey sites: Surveymonkey, PollDaddy, Zoomerang. Helps answer questions you might have such as “What e-readers --Kindles, iPads, Nooks, etc.?--are you using,” etc., and other important information you as a librarian might want to know about your users. It is a good customer engagement tool.
11. Video: Vimeo, Youtube. Post interviews you do yourself with customers/patrons, question patrons about book talks, any strategy you have. This helps explain to your customers/patrons/students/faculty/staff why your library is different.
12. Skype. Video calling, distance use of your library, librarians can say “we can help you do this.” Even though you are in the army in Afghanistan, your local library still wants to help you with your information needs.
13. Foursquare. Most advanced geopositioning site; provides orienting to people needing your library. You can use this to use Geotagging, providing information to library patrons based on location (high school visitors could be automatically sent to your teen information pages, retirement home visitors send to genealogy sources when they visit your site, for instance).
14. LinkedIn. Huge percentage of journalists are on LinkedIn and use this to find and interview people (thus it is not just for jobs, but a way to facilitate communication, find experts on a variety of subjects). Allows you to be contacted in such a way by them, others, allows you to connect with your markets.
15. Lendle. Allows Amazon Kindle owners to share books with one another. Some major publishers DO NOT allow libraries to have copies of their ebooks, but allow Amazon to have them. What are the long-term implications of this for libraries and others?
16. Bookish is your own ebook library in the cloud, accessible from anywhere and almost anything.
17. Publishing Trend. Nook, Kindle, Lulu, Adobe; specific publishing activities NOT otherwise available. How is this discoverable by you and your library patrons?
18. Slide Share. View, share slides.
19. AccessMyLibrary. Gale databases app. Phone will soon be the dominate device used for research. (Vincennes University Libraries offers this for their Gale products.)