Social Media Sites

I had my first extensive experience with Flickr the other day when I was creating my multimedia book review. I especially love the Creative Commons and the Getty Collection. In the Creative Commons, I feel confident I won't be stepping on anybody's toes, as long as I cite their work when I use it. With the Getty Collection, I am automatically brought to some of the most creative and visually appealing photographs available on Flickr so I don't have to sort through less professional work when I'm looking for the best. The Getty Collection, unlike the Creative Commons, usually requires that the photographer grant permission before use and there may even be a fee involved. Luckily, viewing human creativity is free, and - for academic projects - there is always Fair Use!

I've had a lot of experience with using YouTube (though I've not uploaded anything myself). I'm a huge sucker for viral videos and also find that it is a great source for tutorials whenever I want to learn how to do something new. YouTube also has a Creative Commons, similar to Flickr, where people trying to use clips can find some with permission already granted. When they use clips in their new videos, the attribution is automatically added.

I've recently been investigation another media site called Turntable.fm. On this site there are several musically themed rooms. When you join a room, such as "Indie Chill/Acoustic," you can listen to and rate music being played in accordance with the theme. You can also take a turn at being a DJ by selecting a track for others to listen to or streaming one of your own. If people like what you spin, you gain points which can be used towards a better avatar. I haven't taken my turn as a DJ, yet, but I've found this site to be a great way to be introduced to new music by aficionados with similar tastes.

Viewing American Class Divisions Through Facebook and MySpace

We've heard from Danah Boyd before. In this informal essay by her we learn about her theory that teens may choose to associate themselves either with MySpace or with Facebook based on their position in the school hierarchy. Boyd provides us with two admittedly imperfect terms to differentiate between the two social groups. Those who gravitate towards Facebook she classifies as "hegemonic" and those who tend to choose MySpace, the less popular of the two, she terms "subaltern," because they tend to be those who are ostracized or rebelling from the groups in power. MySpace is also a place for the musically inclined as it has become the go-to resource for promoting bands of all types. It seems that soon, this area will become a focus for MySpace. It was recently sold to new owners, including Justin Timberlake, and they want to make music its selling point in order to save the sinking ship. MySpace used to be on time, but has since been relegated to the so-called subaltern teens. I wonder if Google+ has the ingenuity and enough cool factor to do the same to Facebook. I, for one, think it does and am excited to jump ship when it launches officially and I have time to set up a profile.

Boyd's unsubstantiated, but plausible theory also has implications for libraries. Libraries are intended to serve all people. How can we make an online presence, even beyond social media, that attracts all classes?

Another Blink Review!

Check out the screencast I created to share my thoughts on Blink by Malcolm Gladwell:

Transcript:

In Blink:The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, author Malcolm Gladwell explores the ability of humans to make unconscious decisions at lightening, or rather blinking, speed. He shares several examples of this phenomenon that support his research. He suggests that people have the ability to “thin slice” a situation – to strip down all incoming information to just the essential pieces and to find a pattern that matches past experiences within them. This ability often allows us to make accurate conclusions in a matter of milliseconds without even realizing what information we have analyzed or how we have processed it. This gift is not without its flaws, however. Our unconscious decisions can also be influenced by our unconscious preconceptions. Humans need to categorize information in order to make sense of the world, but this tendency to group the data that we gather as we go through life also leads to prejudices. While we may consciously combat these prejudices, they are nearly impossible to overcome when nested within our inaccessible subconscious. As a result, we need to be aware of how our preconceptions can bias our capacity to thin slice and take measures to guard against their influence. This can be as simple as training ourselves to slow down before entering a potentially eruptive situation or using a blinding screen when conducting interviews so that our mental associations with race and other physical traits do not taint our choice of employee.

Reading Gladwell is quite enjoyable. He is not your typical dry non-fiction reporter. His use of anecdotes makes the message more personal and more palatable. He employs a witty style that is infused with a passion for his subject, but it is clear that his intent was to create another bestseller in wake of The Tipping Point, perhaps at the loss of an accurate representation of information.  For example, several studies have suggested that Gottman’s research on calculating divorce is not as simple or as flawless as how it is presented in Blink. Gladwell often refers to Gottman’s work as “prediction,” but his actual research involved creating a formula based on cases in which the couple had already either gone through divorce or had remained married after a certain period of time (Heyman & Slep, 2001; Hyoun, Capaldi, & Crosby 2007). While still interesting, Gladwell’s biased word choice betrays his eagerness to sell his book and his idea, instead of faithfully representing the situations he shares.

Although Blink was published just one year after the advent of Facebook, the ideas presented by Gladwell are still relevant to the world of social networking. For example, the theories in Blink suggest that all of the personalized advertisements we have begun receiving as a result of social media actually have an unconscious effect on our attitudes even if we disregard the ad itself. Just seeing an ad may prime you to feel a certain way and will in turn affect your actions even if you are completely uninterested in purchasing the product. Gladwell cited an experiment in which participants arranged sentences that had words which suggested aging. After playing with these sentences, the participants behaved differently. They slowed down and acted old (Gladwell, 2005, p. 58). Online advertisements featured on social networking sites may be priming us in a similar way. 

Libraries creating online social presences should be aware of these effects and also the power of branding. Gladwell presented studies which proposed that the packaging of a product actually affects a user’s experience of that product. Taste testers would rate the same ice cream as more delicious if it came out of a cylindrical instead of a box-like container (Gladwell, 2005, p. 162). Libraries need to create an online image for themselves that goes beyond just stating information if they want to attract their users. Something such as a Facebook page profile is like a thin slice of a physical library experience. Users will judge the library based on their first impression of their online image, so libraries would do well to make sure that first impression is a positive one.

Beyond helping libraries promote their services and develop more interactive relationships with their users, the concepts in Blink imply that social media might be used as a tool for other purposes, as well. For instance, social media might help autistic individuals to connect and communicate with others because there is no need for them to analyze facial expressions. In the book, Gladwell demonstrates how important our fleeting expressions can be for maintaining relationships, but autistic individuals are not able to process these emotional manifestations in the same way (Gladwell, 2005, p. 219). Perhaps the removal of that element through social media would enable people with autism to communicate.

On the other hand, this also suggests that for those without autism trying to build close relationships via social media may be difficult. Some of the appeal of social networks is that people are able to discover others who share the same interests. However, non-verbal communication is essential in maintaining relationships because people often unconsciously reveal their true inner feelings through their expressions and posture that they may be disguising with their voice (Gladwell, 2005, p. 206-11). Reading these cues can enable deeper understanding and connection between two people.

When encountering people for the first time on a social networking site, there is also the issue of prejudice clouding the ability to thin-slice a profile. Some college admissions committees and potential employers are turning to sites like Facebook to prescreen their candidates. This could be helpful in one sense because a face-to-face encounter can lead to information overload and our impressions are often better at predicting the truth of a situation if left with just a few essential details. For instance, in a study cited by Gladwell, strangers asked to spend fifteen minutes in a student’s dorm room were able to accurately judge the character traits of that person (Gladwell, 2005, p. 37). In another example, it was discovered that patients arriving at the ER with a possible heart attack were actually given more appropriate treatment if the doctors performed less tests (Gladwell, 2005, p. 136). 

On the other hand, if an employer looks at a Facebook profile to evaluate an applicant, they may be making a big mistake because thin-slicing must be done in context (Gladwell, 2005, p. 166). The best candidate for the job may not represent that side of themselves to their Facebook audience and therefore be rejected before they are even given a chance for an interview. Additionally, profile pictures and information may bring up unconscious prejudices that will unwittingly affect an important decision about that person’s life (Gladwell, 2005, p. 194). Moreover, the values that people express are often not in line with what they actually believe. This is not intentional, but people are really bad at explaining their unconscious and therefore come up with rationalizations that are not a true picture of their own inner mentality. What candidates may write on a profile about themselves, therefore, might not be an accurate representation of how suited they are for the job (Gladwell, 2005, p. 85), if it is even related at all.

The ultimate message is that the ideas raised in Blink should be something that those engaging in social media should keep in mind, but there is no easy solution for how to deal with their repercussions.

Resources:

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Next Generation Library Catalogs

"WorldCat Local Task Force Report to LAMP" by Boock, Chadwell, and Reese details the process involved in changing to a new library catalog system. In this extensive report, it becomes clear why so many libraries are still stuck with systems them seem like they were developed in the 1980's. There are no easy options available and meticulous research is needed before a library decides to make a move that will affect all aspects of its operations. The best alternative might be, in some cases, to wait until catalogs catch up to more commercial competitors, but if we wait to long, these competitors will only be that much farther ahead.

"Toward a Twenty-First Century Library Catalog" by Antelman, Lynema, and Pace discusses North Carolina State University's attempt to increase the functionality of their library's catalog. They did this by using software developed by Endeca that mimics a more commercial web site, than the traditional, stagnant catalog. The new system improved the catalog's utility with relevance-ranked results like users are used to on sites such as Google, new browsing options so that students could gain the advantages offered by physically scanning the library shelves, and exposed subject vocabularies. The move to this new system improved user success, but I wonder if they might have been missing out by not including more Library 2.0 elements while they were in the process of revamping their system.

"New Generation of Catalogues for the New Generation of Users: A Comparison of Six Library Catalogues" by Merčun and Žumer addresses the issue of including 2.0 features within library catalogs. In their analysis of five next generation catalogs, plus one traditional catalog, and the Amazon.com interface, the authors discovered that the libraries that focused on increasing functionality over including Library 2.0 components received more positive feedback from their users. It seems that NCSU was wise in choosing to go in the direction they did. They can always add new interactive features after developing a strong foundation. Merčun and Žumer also point out another reason for libraries' hesitation to adopt next generation elements like personalisation: providing this feature requires an invasion into users' privacy. It's a tough balance. I think it must ultimately be up to our users to choose if they want the advantages presented by these components at the sake of their privacy.

Survival of the Fittest Tag and Tag Gardening

I really enjoyed Alexis Wichowski's unique take on social tagging. I'm a big fan of the evolutionary perspective and often apply it to my own life so I was excited to see it being employed within the social networking world. Wichowski's premise is that social tagging supports the survival of "long tail" items that might not otherwise be discovered by Internet users. I also liked the article's suggestion that participating in the creation and use of folksonomies actually mirrors more closely the reality of human cognition. It is impossible to fight the evolution of folksonomies, instead, information professionals can help it by providing controlled vocabulary recommendations and guidelines for tagging.

Isabella Peters's and Katrin Weller's research on Tag Gardening further explores the ways in which librarians and other information professionals can support the organization of folksonomies. They used gardening metaphors to describe ways in which folksonomies can become less messy and more productive, without the loss of the open tagging atmosphere that makes them so flexible. One of the methods they are exploring is the development of TagCare, a platform that aggregates all of a users tags from a variety of different social tagging sites, including Del.icio.us. Users are then able to organize their own personal tag language and "weed" out any anomalies. TagCare will also alert users if they ever try to tag something that does not fit with their personomy. It's a pretty neat concept, though I think it would be more useful for highly engaged taggers than a casual tagger, like myself.

Social Tagging as a Knowledge Organization and Resource Discovery Tool

I recently read the article "Social Tagging as a Knowledge Organization and Resource Discovery Tool" by Hesham Allam from the Spring 2010 issue of the Dalhousie Journal of Interdisciplinary Management. Allam provides a review of social tagging and the research surrounding it. I found the studies about tagging motivation to be enlightening. Having just started using Del.icio.us last semester, I am very much a selfish tagger. I create many tags for websites that would not be useful to other users. For example, while doing research for this class, I will often tag a site with the term "LSC597." Outside of my own mind, and perhaps the twenty or so other people in this class, the tag is meaningless. Findings suggest, however, that people who are more aware of their social presence are more likely to participate in "altruistic" tagging for the benefit of the entire community. Clearly I do not have a strongly perceived online social presence yet!

Tips for Writing Facebook and Twitter Updates

Kivi Leroux Miller gave some great advice on how to make the most of Facebook and Twitter posts from libraries or other non-profit organizations. She suggests that, in order to gain the most from our fans, we need to add value to their life through our posts. Only by making them first think and feel will they eventually be encouraged to do something in support of a library. This idea relies heavily on the notion of social capital that we discussed a couple of weeks ago. Social network must be "mutually advantageous" in order to increase social capital. Miller cited some ways to bank social capital and to help libraries make their users more likely to do which we covered previously:

- Offer thanks for every comment.
- Invite convenient user feedback through "like-able" posts
- Don't give TMI! Post about things people actually care about.
- Share the love and retweet.