Thursday, November 17, 2011

Facebook and libraries

One of my other interest is to write the book on Facebook for Librarians: A Conversational Librarian's Guide. We had a discussion in one of my classes about libraries on Facebook where it was discussed that libraries are not doing Facebook right.

My argument is that librarians and libraries that establish library pages do not do it right, because they approach it as they would traditional media. Facebook is not like a website. A website is a static publication, and as such formal language and editing is definitely important. However, Facebook is more for real time communication, and Facebook pages should aim to be more conversational and informal. It is about conversing with users and striking up conversation with them.

Conversation does not only have to be about library events or activities, but other things that the library may think that users may be interested in. For example, discussing items in the library's collection or current awareness issues that users may be willing to comment on.

No comments:

Post a Comment