Sunday, September 09, 2007

Riddle Me This

So, is anyone planning to be on the "answer sites" on September 10 to provide answers as a librarian?

In general, I think it's a cool idea. I think it has the potential to spread "awareness" (for lack of a better word) about libraries, librarians, and what we do. And, I also think it has the potential to become obnoxious - though I have been looking at a number of the answer boards and the answers provided by librarians, and so far I like what I am seeing - friendly answers, nice tone, and SIMPLE, taglines.

Jessamyn has a good post about this topic, especially in relation to Ask MetaFilter, one of the best answer boards out there (and I FINALLY signed up for an account).

I think I will probably participate on some level, even if it's not an all-day thing for me. Now, I just have to decide on the site; Ask MetaFilter seems well-covered, so I will probably end up on Yahoo Answers, which (IMHO) is a site that gets a lot of random crap on it. Or maybe I will haunt Yedda, a site that I think has more potential than Yahoo Answers. Guess I'll decide tomorrow.

3 comments:

Paul Capewell said...

Would you believe, our local authority forced my library to shut on Mondays from the start of September. :(

Admittedly, the idea you talk about could be done from home, and it has a definite US-slant, but there is still quite some irony there...

Joshua M. Neff said...

I think it's a great idea, and I'd love to slam the boards, but...as I said on a recent Uncontrolled Vocabulary, when I'm done for the day, I don't want to do more work as a librarian (as much as I love what I do). And I think I'll be too busy tomorrow to slam any boards during my work hours (and I haven't gotten permission to do so anyway).

jess said...

I don't work at the library on Mondays, so I am free to indulge while I work (unpaid, of course) on building a website for a library program I am presenting next week. Ha - we'll see how much work I get done on either pursuit!