I had a thought which is possibly less in the realm of our innovation group and more in the area of the communications team... should the library have its own facebook page?
I remember the idea was brought up (I think it was during one of the service delivery workshops) that we needed to put the library out there in the students' space, rather than waiting for them to come to us. And you couldn't find a more student-y space than facebook.
Manning Bar at the Uni of Sydney has its own facebook page, which is where I got the idea from. Somewhat different in function to a library, you might say, but the bar used the page quite well to network and get information out there about upcoming events, which is something that I think the library could take advantage of.
As I said, possibly not something our group would be involved with directly - just food for thought.
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Yes Jen I like the idea and had similar thoughts to that. I will follow it up with Meredith Martinelli when she gets back from leave :)
ReplyDeleteYes, I think the Library should have a facebook page, so that the library info is communicated with students.. i know students check facebook more often then reading/hearing announcements!!
ReplyDeleteYes this idea has been floated in the comms dept but there was the problem raised of organisations being 'friends', an example that was brought up was that of a bank requesting to be your friend. it depends on how the library is viewed by the students.
ReplyDeleteI am however a Facebook luddite, and don't have a profile.
While seeking out contact emails for interlibrary loans, I came across the University of Canterbury facebook page. There's a link to it from their official library website:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.facebook.com/uclibrary
The second item on their page at the moment is information about a tutorial on "Learning how to use Email alerts and RSS feeds to stay up to date with key journals and other literature in your subject field." Looks like they're on the Web 2.0 wagon!
Hi Jen,
ReplyDeleteThe answer from Meredith is this:
"one question raised about a library Facebook page and yes we did think about this and do some research. What we found through research however was limited response and reaction from students in relation to non-social use of facebook to connect [a why are you in my space type of thinking] although probably worth re-visiting to see what current research is saying"
So my answer to that Jen is that I think we should do some research into how other Libraries are using facebook and what the participation rate is with students and what is the purpose of their facebook page. Of course we'll do this in our spare moments!!! Your thoughts or any other comments from anyone?