lauralyrics ([info]lauralyrics) wrote,
@ 2008-04-05 17:00:00
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Some weeks ago, I was manning the reference desk and was summoned to the public computers by someone in deep distress. "The library website's changed!" he accused. "Yes," I said, and prepared to enumerate the wonderfulness it had become. "How," he interrupted me, "how am I supposed to get to Google when the link has been taken off the webpage?"

And then I cried.

Well, not literally, I can't deny that a little part of me died.

Now I find myself in charge of the website. (How did that happen? you ask. Funny story. The director came along to my desk--and this is partly why I twitch every time she comes near my desk--and said "Tag! You're it. Website--go.") Ok, maybe this has something to do with my dogged determination to have RSS feeds on our site. Whatever. Here's the crux: I want RSS feeds and I want del.icio.us subject guides and I want fading/marquee-like headlines and I want...you get the picture.

I don't want to have a website that caters to the lowest common denominator (no offense, unnamed patron, but really! Remind me to tell you about address bars sometime.) but I don't want to have something that only librarians can use, either. (I want podcasts, too, but that requires a microphone and someone to *do* the podcasts, so it'll be a few years, I think.) I mean, I don't want to spend time and energy (I have a sneaking suspicion that I'll be the one figuring out how to get RSS feeds on the website) on something no one really looks at anyway. Be honest: how often do you visit your local library's website? But on the other hand: (she says with infinite longing) RSS feeds! Rolling headlines! Wouldn't that be the coolest thing ever?? (It totally would be.)

As an aside, when the director told me she wanted me to revisit the website's content, all I could think about was writing the help page for the RMW Scrapbook digital library...at 2 am...when the website itself was down...the night before it was due to be released. This may--or-may not--explain my marked lack of enthusiasm for this new project.


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[info]eccentric_hat
2008-04-06 03:54 am UTC (link)
Actually, I go to the New York public library's website rather frequently, mostly to look up books and put them on hold and check my queue and see if anything's overdue, but also to use the databases they link to (and I've had some frustration with the way they organize their databases; I had the name of one almost right but couldn't find it until I started going through all the humanities resources alphabetically).

All of which is just to say, library websites can matter, even to us non-library folk. And of course if you have the time/resources to build a website that really presents itself as mattering, people are that much more likely to check the library website for whatever it is they're looking for.

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[info]lauralyrics
2008-04-06 08:58 pm UTC (link)
Really? Huzzah! I did have an epiphany later when I realized that (duh! of course!) the people coming *into* the library to use the computers were not likely to be our savviest customers...because the most computer-literate people likely own a computer. And that made me feeel better, too. :)

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[info]sheilasmiles
2008-04-06 08:07 pm UTC (link)
Just noticed you - Mystic ,CT caught my interest. What library doyou work at- I am at Groton Public Library.

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[info]lauralyrics
2008-04-06 10:07 pm UTC (link)
I had completely forgotten I still have that up! I've had Mystic up as my hometown since I went off to college--some years ago now--and never once changed it during my travels because it has always been home for me...even though, strictly speaking, my home now is some ways to the west, and I anticipate moving again sometime in the fall!

I am very familiar with the Groton Public Library, although I spent more of my high school days at the Mystic and Noank Library.

Out of vulgar curiosity, how did you come to notice my blog?

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[info]sheilasmiles
2008-04-07 06:36 pm UTC (link)
Did a search on regions and Mystic and you came up. All the talk about libraries peaked my interest

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[info]the1butterfly
2008-04-06 09:34 pm UTC (link)
You mean you have to type in www.google.com? Doesn't that involve typing? How could you do that to the poor patrons! Libraries aren't places for things like typing or reading! ;}

Customers suck- that's the only way to explain how they can make a mess of a table of shirts where the sizes for each pile are very clearly labeled. Rocket science? No. If they can't handle that, don't expect them to understand how to get to Google.

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