Weblogs 101: What You Need to Know About Blogging

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Weblogs 101 What You Need to Know About
Blogging

• Terence K. Huwe Lincoln Cushing
• Institute of Industrial Relations
• University of California, Berkeley

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Part One The Big Picture

• Terry Will Cover
• Blogging as a new information management tool
• Focus on the question, What for?
• Blogging and organizations
• Applications with broad relevance
• Some guiding reference principles, based on life
  in the Web era
• How the IIR Library developed its Blog
• QA, Short Break

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Part Two Blogging Nuts and Bolts

• Lincoln will cover
• Weblog How Tos
• Using Radio Userland to start Blogging
• XML and HTML in Blogging design
• Desktop Clients
• Other software for Blogging in brief
• Blogging plug-ins and cool applications
• QA and wrap up

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Blogging is Hip High Tech

• Internet Librarian 03 had a full track on
  Blogging, and it was a hit
• Computers in Libraries 04 repeated the blogging
  emphasis
• Librarians look at Blogs and see potential
• Fast movement of content to the Web, without
  touching a serverwhats not to like?
• The platform is ideal for topically focused sites
  you can build on the fly and maintain fairly
  easily

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Two Value Points

• Speed
• Using Rich Site Summary (RSS) to build a
  breaking news resource (RadioUserland)
• Easy Web Publishing and Archiving
• Take a topic, build a resource that has longer
  term value, including news and locally authored
  stories, Web links and articles

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How Relevant is the Blogosphere?

• Can this self-publishing platform become a money
  maker?
• Can it become part of a stable Web-based service?
• Will it morph into something different?

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Blogging And Organizations

• Information management platforms are only useful
  if they meet the needs of users in the local
  information ecology
• Information professionals who are interested in
  Blogging need to survey the information ecology,
  and plan strategic services that Blogging can
  provide

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Academic and Public Organizations

• Quick alerts to patrons, students and faculty
• News aggregation that is pertinent to communities
  of scholars or civic life
• Easy (though limited) repository management of
  past discussion threads, documents and Web links
• Ability to add search features for your Blog
• Blogging can be a very useful add-on to robust
  Web sitesbut probably cant replace them

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Corporate Environments

• Michael Angeles, Information Architect at Lucent
  Technologies
• Weblogs are increasingly important as parts of
  the overall information architecture and ecology
  --Computers in Libraries, March 2004

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Strategic Blogging in Firms

• Verizon tracks competitors with RSS
• Daimler/Chrysler uses Blogs to monitor
  production/quality problems
• A large insurer relies on Blogs to keep track of
  discussion threads about client needshelping the
  sales force remember past lessons

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The Blog as Knowledge Log

• Blogging can be a form of guerrilla IA
• Employees can post anything they wish (within the
  cultural rules of the firm)
• Employees can take a good idea and run with it
• Librarians, with knowledge of metadata, CMS and
  other skills, can turn a Blog into a useful
  element within the overall information ecology

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Perceptions of Blogging Are Evolving

• Deloitte Bridging the gaps between people and
  systems depends on first creating the conditions
  that allow people to participate in KM locally
  rather than enforcing technology-based KM
  policies. These local activities are bridged in
  loosely coupled Knowledge Networks.
• Forrester Organizations have begun to move
  away from single-solution KM packages.

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Important Considerations

• Centralize Bloggingwith a Blog master
• Keeping tabs on whats published
• Decentralized Blogging
• maximizes employee freedom of speech
• Bottom Up IA solution, driven by users
• Mediated Blogging
• hybrid, some control, but a light touch

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Key Value Points for Firms

• Blogs can help foster Communities of Practice
• Blogs can help leverage expertise by improving
  its findability
• People can watch what others publish on their
  Blogssparking creativity

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In Todays Firms, Relationships and Information
Use Are Deeply Entwined
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Some New Examples of the Corporate Information
Ecology
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Blogging Activities with Broad Relevance

• Quick and easy Web posting
• Reference Bloggingpublishing a highly polished,
  thorough Blog on a specific topics
• RSSRich Site Summary
• Aggregating both news and internal information
• Archiving

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Blogging As A Reference Tool

• As a technology that derives from the lifespan of
  the Web, its best seen in tandem with more
  solid resources
• Web content in the form of IP-authenticated
  databases is a foundation upon which to build a
  reference Blog
• Reference-intensive Blogs build on digital
  libraries instead of duplicating them

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The Best Reference Value of Blogs RSS

• Blogging is a craft, often a labor of love
• The people who follow topics on their Blogs are
  often expert in the area they cover
• Newspapers and Blogs are a perfect fit for
  editors who want to publisher between editions

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Comment on the Impact of Blogs on the Press

• Jay Rosen, Chair of the Department of Journalism,
  NYU
• The old system was, Heres our news take it or
  leave itNow, sovereignty over the story is
  shifting.
• --New York Times, Thursday, April 1, 2004, p E3

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Blogging Works Well in Conjunction With Related
Web Pages

• Its effective as a pipeline for email alerts to
  communities served by special librarians
• Other reference librarians can find and use a
  good blog on an ongoing basis
• The general public, citizen-researchers in
  particular, appreciate systematic, topical
  Blogging
• Blogging goes well with standard Web development

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In Our Opinion, Blogs Go Together With Standard
Web Development

• Quick and easy to aggregate news by topic
• Fair easy to create new commentary, opinion and
  stories
• Nice place to build Web links on the fly
• --But not necessarily easier than uploading HTML
  files, by conventional means, for complex pages

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What We Did

• The Institute of Industrial Relations is a unique
  community
• Our Blog reflects our belief about what was
  needed locally
• We didnt dive in over our heads, but got started
  quickly
• Heres an overviewLincoln will demonstrate nuts
  and bolts later

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Recommendations for Special Librarians

• Become familiar with Blogging, or become a
  bloggerfor fun and to hone tech skills
• Keep track whats developing
• Monitor newspaper (and other media outlet)
  Blogging trends closely
• Recognize that much of Blogging may, over the
  long term, turn out to be ephemeral

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If You Become A Blogger

• Know your user population
• Keep it simple
• Be distinctive
• Share your personality, but keep it professional

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Selected References--Kimberly Bridges, MLIS
Student, Texas Womens University

• Carver, Blake.  2003.  Is It Time to Get
  Blogging?  Net Connect 128 (1)  30-32.  In
  Academic
• Search Premier database online.  Accessed 29
  October 03.
•  
• Crawford, Walt.  2001.  "'You Must Read This' 
  Library Weblogs."  American Libraries 32(October
  2001)  74-76.
•  
• Ernst, Warren.  2003.  Building Blogs.  PC
  Magazine 22 (11)  60-61.  In Computer Source
• database online.  Accessed 2 November 30.
• Fichter, Darlene.  2001.  Blogging Your Life
  Away.  Online 25 (3)  68-71.  In Academic Search
• Premiere database online.  Accessed 29 October
  03.
•  
• Fitzpatrick, Brad.  2001.  DeadJournal.Com. 
  Available from http//www.deadjournal.com/. 
  Accessed 14 November 03.
•  

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Selected References, Continued

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• Miller, Ron.  2003.  Blogging for Business. 
  Econtent 26 (10)  30-34.  In Computer Source
• database online.  Accessed 2 November 03.
•  
• Oravec, Jo Ann.  2002.  "Bookmarking the World 
  Weblog Applications in Education."  Journal of
• Adolescent Adult Literacy 45 (April 2002) 
  616-21.
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• Porter, Paula.  2003.  Weblogs Grow in
  Popularity.  Design News 58 (16)  27-29.  In
  Academic
• Search Premiere database online.  Accessed 28
  October 03.
•  
• Rapp, David.  2003.  From Bulletin Boards to
  Blogs.  Technology Review 106 (7)  88.  In
  Academic
• Search Premiere database online.  Accessed 6
  October 03.
•  
• Thomsen, Elizabeth B.  2002.  "Blogging,
  Anyone?"  Collection Building 21, no. 2  76-77.

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Whats Next Part II

• Questions?
• Short Break
• Lincoln will show you how we built our Blog

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Weblogs 101 What You Need to Know About
Blogging

• Terence K. Huwe Lincoln Cushing
• Institute of Industrial Relations
• University of California, Berkeley