MLA 2012 Website During the Meeting?

The MLA 2012 website is up and running.  Right now you can find information on Section Program Themes and paper and poster FAQs.  Soon you will be able to get registration, hotel and travel information as well much more. 

The site has always been good for the logistics leading up to the meeting, providing you with things you need to know.  Once you are at the meeting the site seems to become superfluous. You either are not at the meeting or you are and have already registered, have a hotel room and hopefully downloaded your schedule. 

What can we do with the meeting website so that it is more interactive more relevant to people participating in the meeting (on site and e-conference)?  On the day of the meeting should the front page change to focus on the current events like the blog, Twitter feed, CoverItLive, etc.?

How would you make the meeting site a more interactive and engaging online experience during the conference?

All suggestions are wanted and welcome.

Keep Your Ideas Coming

Thursday I posted on my blog, Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ asking for suggestions about what you would like to see at MLA this year in Seattle.  Even though I am leaving tomorrow morning to view the facilities, please keep those ideas coming.  Much can be done via email.  The only suggestions I am discouraging are program session ideas.  Much of the meeting’s programs are done by the MLA Sections and SIGs very early in the planning process (2013 suggestions are already underway), so if you want to see better, different, more programs then you really need to communicate this with your Section or SIG! 

I thought I would share some (non program session) suggestions from people with the hope that it might jog some minds and generate more ideas. (Note: I am just listing ideas, I am not endorsing them or making any promises. This is just to get the brainstorming going.)

  • Bigger sessions rooms with more aisles so people can scoot in and out more easily.
  • Coffee breaks
  • Conference WiFi
  • Behind the scenes tour of Seattle Public Library
  • Wine tour/tasting
  • Space Needle excursions
  • Coupons/Discounts to restaurants in the restaurant guide
  • 7th Inning Stretch get together/meet and mingle with hot dogs, brats, beer, (stadium food).
  • Krafty catching a flying fish at Pike Place Market….ew…I would do it though if I knew how/what to do to do it.
  • More time to visit the exhibit hall

So do you have any other ideas?  What can make this meeting more informative, comfortable, enjoyable, fun for you?  Keep your comments coming! 

 

 

Friday Fun: Get $400 To Go To Seattle, NOW!

Yesterday I posted asking people about what kind of things they want to see at the Seattle meeting.  PLEASE keep the suggestions coming!

In one of the comments Halyna mentioned that some librarians do not get any funding or partial funding so having discounts, coupons available for restaurants, attractions would be very helpful.  I am all about coupons and I like the idea…and I will pass it on to the LAC who would be in the best position to find coupons or discounts as the meeting draws near.  But Halyna’s comment also served as the perfect reminder that librarians facing travel money issues have various opportunities to help pay to attend the meeting. 

There is still time to enter to the contest sponsored by the NPC to win $400 toward the meeting.  How do you win?  Simply submit the best method you used to justify your attendance at an MLA annual meeting to receive funding from their institutions or employers.  Two people with the best stories will win $400 towards either travel expenses or registration for the Seattle meeting.  So far there aren’t a lot of submissions so your odds of winning are VERY good if you submit.  You must enter by November 1, 2011! So get to your computer and type something out and submit it!

You also might want to check out if the MLA Section you belong to is providing scholarships to attend the meeting.  As a member and current Chair of the Medical Informatics Section, I know that we have recently been offering a travel grant each year to an MIS member to help with traveling to the MLA annual meeting.  Perhaps your one of the sections you belong to is doing something similar.

As the dollar gets tighter we have to get more creative about finding ways to be able to attend the meeting.  The travel grants are out there for this meeting, it is up to you to try and get them.  If you don’t apply you certainly won’t get them.  If you do apply and for some unlucky reason you don’t get a travel grant and can’t afford to go, don’t forget about attending as an e-conference participant!

What Do You Want at MLA 2012?

Monday and Tuesday I was in Boston at the New England Journal of Medicine Library Advisory Board Meeting.  This was my final board meeting, my three year term has come to an end.  It was a very wonderful and illuminating experience and I feel honored and lucky to serve.  While on the board I got to work with other librarians and with the fine folks at NEJM discussing issues, trends, technologies, etc. that both librarians and publishers face.

Unfortunately, I have now been playing catch up at home and work since my return and have had little time to blog.  Next week I am off to Seattle as a co-chair of the 2012 NPC to visit the hotel, conference center and to discuss things.  This will be a turn and burn kind of trip.  I get in Tuesday afternoon and leave Wednesday afternoon.  Since I will be there only a very short time, I want to know from you what you want to see at the Seattle meeting.

 What should we do that you have been dying for MLA to do?  Is there something that you keep writing on the feedback forms for MLA to do and we haven’t done it yet?  Let me know.  I can’t promise you anything but I can look into it.

What sort of fun activities would you like to see us do at the meeting?  I firmly believe that we get the most from these meetings by socializing and networking with other librarians.  Discovering that so and so at such and such library is doing exactly what you have been trying to do in your library.  Even though I think librarians in general are a pretty nice lot, willing to share their success and oops stories it can still be intimidating to approach somebody out of the blue.  That is why I think some fun icebreaker mingle type events are great at getting the networking mojo going.  So in keeping with the Growing Opportunities: Changing Our Game baseball type theme, what do you type of social events do think might be fun?

What did you like at the last meeting that you think we should repeat again at this meeting?  Same question in reverse, what do you think we shouldn’t do?

Finally, for those of you who attend the e-conference and those who are plugged in at the conference…  What would you like to see on the MLA Conference home page during the meeting.  In the past we have had a Conference Community web page but it has kind of been buried and a little difficult to access during the conference while the main conference page remained static with information that was necessary prior to the conference but unnecessary during the actual conference days.  What do you think needs to be featured prominently and what would help your overall experience and increase your connectivity for both e-conference participants and wired in person participants?

Comment back, I look forward to reading them.

Apple Makes Finding Medical Apps for Professional A Little Easier

According mobihealthnews, Apple quietly launched a new section on the AppStore directed just towards healthcare professionals.  The section which was referred to as an “iTunes Room for Healthcare,” has apps for both the iPhone and iPad intended specifically for healthcare professionals. (There appears to be about a dozen apps that are also for consumer use.) 

Not only will this section be dedicated to apps for healthcare professionals but it will also internal categorization as well.  There are six categories for the medical apps: reference, educational, EMR and patient monitoring, imaging, point of care, and personal care (for consumers).  Mobihealthnews thinks that the “personal care” apps may have been included “as a means to help care providers recommend popular health apps to their patients.” 

Finally!!!!!  That medical/health section had a lot of junk apps that people had to sift through to find good stuff, it is nice to see this professional section come about. My only question is how/who is adding and vetting the apps?  I hope it isn’t a free for all where app developers can just add their app if they feel like (meaning we could return to problem of chaff out numbering the wheat) but I would like it to be open enough that something that was good but accidentally left out or something newly created could be easily added.

What Is Important in Social Media?

I will be giving a quick 20 minute presentation on social media next week.  I pretty much have the bulk of the presentation together it is just a matter of editing the slides and fine tuning.  However, I thought it might be interesting to see what librarians and medical professionals think about social media and what issues are important…or is social media even important to at all.

I do think social media is important, if not important it is definitely prevalent. According to Nielsen’s just released social media report, “nearly 4 in 5 active Internet users visit social networks and blogs.”  Social media isn’t just a teenager thing or something college kids do.  The biggest users of social media are 25-44 year olds (hmmm in medical libraries that would be your doctors, nurses, physical therapists…not your students).  While the 25-44 year olds are definitely using social media, the biggest growth is from Internet users over the age of 55 through the mobile Internet. 

Since it is apparent that social media is being used and it is here to stay for a while, what are the biggest issues you face personally and professionally?

Do you worry about a lack fo privacy?  As more and more companies are going on Facebook and Twitter what is your thought about following them?  Do you follow them? Why or why not?

What is your library or institution doing on Twitter, Facebook or Foursquare?  Yes if you want your library or institution to participate in social networking they have to have a presence, but simply occupying a space is not social.  How is your library or institution engaging its users?  How do you measure engagement?  Do the increase of bots on Twitter and inactive Facebook followers concern you? 

Is there something else that I am omitting about social media that is important and should be mentioned?  Comment and tell me about it.

Library Disasters Come in All Shapes and Sizes

I have RSS feeds coming out of my ears, but nothing is better than good ol’ Mom.  She recently read article about University of Missouri Ellis Library and forwarded it to me because she knew I would be interested.  Thanks Mom. 🙂

University of Missouri Ellis Library suffered fire and water damage as a result of an arsonist who set fire to an area on the first floor near the circulation department.  Good news the sprinkler system kicked on and stopped the fire, bad news the sprinkler system kicked on causing water damage. (Pictures of the damage and clean up.) I am not saying that the sprinkler system shouldn’t have kicked on, if it hadn’t things would have been much worse.  I am just saying that many things do not go well with water, books, carpeting, walls, computers, etc. do not do well when doused with water.  Some disasters lead to other disasters.  Fire in a library usually leads to water damage which can also lead to mold.  Earthquake could lead to fire, which could lead to water, and so on.  Some disasters are natural and some are man made. 

Some don’t even need to be within the library to affect the library.  A long time ago our library (at its old location) suffered damage because the air conditioner on the roof  next too us was on fire.  Nothing in the library was on fire, but the easiest way for the fire fighters to fight the fire was to break apart the current journal shelf then break through a window to go out to the roof to fight the fire.  In addition the stuff broken, there was water damage. 

Fire, earthquakes, tornadoes, and hurricanes are what we typically think about for library disasters.  However, the mundane can be disaster as well.  An overflowing toilet overnight can cause water damage as well as “other damage.” Disasters come in all shapes and sizes. A good disaster plan is important to cover the basics to get your library on its feet, there are plenty of resources for creating one.  You also will need to update your plan annually to make sure certain things are current (phone numbers contacts) but also to allow for new technology.  In addition to a disaster plan a little bit of creativity and the ability to improvise can be just as important. 

 

 

Friday Fun: About the NLM

Did you know that the National Library of Medicine responds to more than 100,000 questions each year and many more questions are self answered as users search the NLM site including the FAQs. 

Some things that can be answered by NLM’s FAQs:

Other things you probably didn’t know about NLM:

  • More than 1,000 people work at NLM
  • NLM was one of the first institutions to use HDTV for biomedical imaging (started in 1994)
  • NLM has developed two missing persons Web and mobile application

For more fun tid bits that you can share with your friends on Friday and store in your mind to whip out during trivia night go to NLM Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and NLM Factoids: Did you know that NLM…?.

 

False Alarm, There is no money crisis in libraries

Yesterday I posted, “The Well is Dry, What Can We Do?” to try to get librarians to stop lamenting over things we can never change like companies (for profit and non-profit) charging more and more for library resources and try to get us to start looking at things we can change like finding alternative funding, increasing institutional partnerships, or friending the hospital CEO.  (I don’t mean friending as in Facebook, I mean actually talking to him/her and getting your case heard.)   But apparently I was totally wrong, there is no money crisis.  Wow I do I have egg on my face.

I want to thank @re_johns for opening my eyes and directing me to “Uninformed, Unhinged, and Unfair — The Monbiot Rant,” a post by Kent Anderson, the CEO Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, responding to an article in the Guardian, “Academic Publishers Make Murdoch Look Like a Socialist.”     

Anderson says,

“But Monbiot seems ignorant of these economic realities — that scholarly articles are available at rock-bottom prices for the specialists who need them, the very core audience who Murdoch would charge the most. He even goes so far as to insinuate that astronomical journal prices account for tuition increases, when in fact the net expenditures of libraries have moved at a fraction of the pace of tuition hikes.”

“The fact is that librarians are intelligent players in the scholarly space who, working with publishers, have secured excellent, sustainable deals for their constituencies to resources that are almost all online now”

Well damn. I guess I was totally wrong when I said that many libraries face flat or reduced budgets. My bad. I guess being faced with reduced budget means I totally can afford each vendor’s price increase and not cut anything.  Whoa I feel so much better.  Once I am done with the library budget I will move to D.C. I hear they have some budgety type problems too. 

I don’t think everything librarians say about publishers and vendors is fair, and I think there are some publishers and vendors that understand our dollars are shrinking.  However, Anderson’s post really makes me feel like there are still some publishers that don’t freaking get it, we don’t have any more money!  A journal may be the best thing in the world but if a library can’t afford it, they can’t afford it.  The mere fact that a journal (or anybody’s product) is perceived as so uber essential that it is a basic need puts librarians even more in a bind because to us it feels like we’re making a choice between paying the gas bill or the electric bill.  We have long since done away with creature comforts, we are down to basic needs and some of us can’t pay for our basic needs.

Anderson’s post also makes it quite obvious that library vendors are not going to stop raising prices so we best stop ranting and start figuring out what we can do for ourselves. If the well is dry then we either have to dig deeper or find water elsewhere.

The Well is Dry, What Can We Do?

These past few years libraries have either had their budgets held flat or had them cut every year.  It is sad to say that the “lucky” libraries are the ones that have had their budgets held flat.   Yet, library resources continue to increase in number and price.  I am sure it isn’t a news flash or secret to the sales people (although it seems like it when we see the invoice) but libraries have no more money.  We have trimmed all of our fat.  We are skin, bones and a little bit of sinew holding us together.  All superfluous resources were cut years ago.  We are now making hard cuts, getting rid of journals, packages, databases, that we would have never imagined cutting.  We are slicing our book budget (ebook and regular) to nothing.   Yet prices continue to rise. It is sometimes frustrating and depressing to see demos of new products because you can no longer focus on the product and its potential when all you can think about is the price and what you might have to cut.  There is no budget room for new products, we are cutting things we have and don’t want to cut.

I am not going to get into a whole thing about which companies are making a huge profit at the expense of libraries.  Companies make money, that is life.  That is the way it is with Nike, Apple, banks, etc.  Why do you think Nike and Apple make a lot of their products outside of the United States?  Because it is cheaper and it can help boost their profit.  That is life with companies, they make a profit and they squeeze as much profit out of things as possible.  Companies selling to libraries are no different just because what they sell is for the “greater good” or they sell it to predominantly non-profits.  You don’t see medical supply companies cutting hospitals a break because what they sell is for the “greater good.”  You certainly don’t see drug companies doing that.  For profit companies and non-profit companies all want to make money, the details are in the tax codes and what is considered “profit.”  Rest assured they both want to make money.  Why should we expect anything different from library companies? 

Libraries have no more money, they cut to survive.  A library company that has diversified may have originally reduced their risk but now that libraries are robbing Peter to pay Paul, these companies may be shooting themselves in the foot.  If they increase prices on items, we have to make cuts on something in the library.  The more things a company owns/produces increases likelihood we are probably going to cut their stuff in our library.  It isn’t out of malice, they just happen to be large provider of many library things.  

For example AT&T used to be the sole provider of my household’s link to the outside world.  They were our Internet provider, our TV programming, our home phone, and our cell phones.  I was sending close to $400/month to AT&T.  As much as AT&T gets dogged, I actually liked their products and their service.  The Internet worked fine, U-Verse was great I loved its DVR capabilities, and I still get a dreamy look in my eyes thinking of my iPhone.  But, AT&T was quickly growing out my budget.  Despite loving all of those things and thinking of them as necessary, we dumped U-Verse and the iPhones.  We kept AT&T Internet and the home phone went to a 300 minutes monthly package (similar to cell phone talk plans).  We don’t get cable. We get digital TV through an antenna and Netflix through our X-Box.  Instead of $400/month I spend roughly $125/month for TV, Internet, home phone and two smart phones.  AT&T used to get all of the $400, now they get $50.  Like I said, I loved their service for all of their products, but the constant increases in costs and my own flat budget led me to cut things completely. I wasn’t willing to find extra money through a second job or elsewhere to increase my family budget. I am saving a nice amount of money, but it was a huge pain in the butt to do the research and make the cuts. If they had kept their prices I wouldn’t have bothered to cut them. 

Librarians don’t like making the cuts, we have long since past the easy things to cut.  Now the cuts take time, require more and more research, and are frustrating.  However expecting the library vendors not to try and make a profit while we are making cuts is a little bit like me expecting AT&T to give me Internet, U-Verse, home phone and my iPhones for around $125/month….It just isn’t going to freaking happen.  So what can libraries do?

Most libraries are have already dumped a lot and are now down to the bare bones.  So while the idea of cutting is still an option it is getting more and more drastic.  We are probably now at the point of finding a “second job”.  We need to start looking for more funding.  Grants and awards are a good start but they are usually only temporary.  Perhaps endowments are an option, but those take time to grow.  Charging for services, as bitter of a pill that is to swallow, might be something to consider.  However, funding from administration is still going to be a key source of money for most of us. How can we increase our funding from administration in a down economy? Perhaps we need to be thought of as department considered necessary to prevent further loss of money, kind of like the legal department.  

How can this be done? Again I am not sure,  I would love to hear from people with ideas.  One idea that bounces around in my head is that I remember one vendor talking about how their product reduced length of stay thereby reducing costs.  I sure wish they said something like “Institutions that had their product in their LIBRARIES reduced length of stay.”  It would be nice and helpful if there were library vendors that commissioned studies on the impact of libraries and library resources on a hospital’s profit, quality of care, etc.   (It could be designed where there were no conflict of interest.) But that is relying on a third party to help with our situation.  What can we do to prove our worth to administration? Maybe we need to get a “head hunter” for that “second job.” In multi person libraries do we need create a position for somebody to secure funds and to talk money with administration?  Do we need a buisness evangelist on our staff?   Some might say that is the head librarian’s job (or in the case of solos the only librarian’s job).  But when you are sick there are times when you must leave the care of a general practitioner for a specialist.   Are libraries that sick that we need to hire specialists?  I guess it depends on each library.