Suddenly, it spoke, and a million voices responded...

Billions in fact. In our modern technological age, the internet sits as a crown of information over the heads of its users. Through the use of social media, news sites, and blogs, people have better access to information than could have been imagined hundreds of years ago. There is a slight problem, however. The internet has a massive volume of information because of the millions of users it has. This volume of information is daunting to anyone trying to use the internet to research a topic to any depth. Also, because of the millions of websites to choose from, finding the correct reliable sites has become a bit of an issue. But fear not, because just like many issues modern computer and IT specialists have conquered, there is a solution. And it is as easy as a click of a button.

It is all about organization. A normal session on the internet is filled with checking email, blogs, entertainment sites, and other miscellaneous sites, all of which are not well connected. This usually means that time is wasted every instance you get online, but no longer. With organizational Web 2.0 sites like Google Reader, life on the web is much more organized. This allows you to spend more time actually learning and using the information and less time finding it, which is the bain of every student doing a research topic.

It is interesting that sites like Google Reader (and to a lesser extent Social Media in general) have become popular, noting that all they really do is add a level of internet accessibility via easily understood interfacing and organization. As archivists, a lot of our practice seems to be correct organization of historical materials. As historical archives appear more and more likely to become digitized, proper organization of materials online will probably become a more prevalent issue. One could post archival images and materials on the web in a blog format, and use tools like Google Reader to link them together. In my own department, we use a photo sharing application that show the digitized items of  our archival materials. But what we could do additionally to posting the archival materials is to link these images or collects to other collections from other universities and archives, so that one could get a wide range of collected materials of which to use for research, for entertainment, ect.

In my own department, we have also moved our office to a separate floor. Our old office space was very cramped and had limited areas for storage. Organization has become an issue again for us, because we have a lot more space. We still are contemplating how to use the space to optimize its efficiency, but for now we are chugging away at putting things in their new proper place. I guess its why I have organization on the mind.

And they spoke of mighty things...

Mighty things indeed. In researching for class and/or when using the library in general, I have found that speaking with a librarian can save a valuable amount of time. In fact, noting how many times I have used the knowledge of librarians, they are a near god like force in my quest for knowledge while college. In addition, I have noticed that unlike myself, many people of my own generation do not ask for help in libraries (and some don't even step foot in the library), but this probably relates more to my generation's age demographic (although I have noticed a lot of those in my generation are way too stubborn...not the point). You see, as young adults, we literally know everything. And if we don't readily know it, we wing it and brush it off as something will know later.

Anyways, a lot of this know-it-all sentiment is actually getting in the way of people using the libraries and librarians to their full potential. Just think, if people actually used libraries correctly, they may actually learn something. Knowledge is an addicting drug, one with limitless benefits, and few negatives to boot! Regardless, after reading the 23 Things for Archivists, I have thought of something that could be used to attract more people back to the library and hopefully back to the addictive practice of learning. Libraries could use Meebo or other chat programs to speak directly to librarians, which would directly allow for students to access historical materials and other educational materials quickly and in a professional manner.

For example, lets say a student is researching for a paper for a class that he has no interest in. The easy way to get the paper done would be to search through Google for articles related to that subject. The somewhat easy/somewhat academic way would be to use academic journal articles, found by using a academic journal search engine. Using chat programs, one could research (obviously using credited academic articles and journals) and could use archived materials and other educational materials provided by librarians. This hands on approach to learning, and using real materials, will inevitably lead to a more interactive feel to the established rush of learning. On top of revitalizing one's love of learning, professors and educators will be ecstatic that a student actually attempted to learn outside of a classroom, and will look more favorably on any paper or project submitted by our knowledge driven student.

Noting the extensive archives held by Ohio University, be it the Scripps documentation or the Southeast Asian historical collection, it would be excellent to have a chat system in place that could help archivists, librarians, students, locate important reference material in real time. In the department that I work in, Digital Initiatives, we could use chat programs like Meebo to allow users to ask questions about the digitized versions of our archived material. In general, users of our website may find speaking with one of the archivists/librarians a valuable use of time, and may find it easier to do research on lack luster topics because of the multiple forms of media that we provide.

In the beginning...

Hello Web,

Well, as per the 23 Things for Archivists, I have started a blog... this one specifically. It will be used to complete and log my progress for the other 22 things archivists should know.

More will come later, for right now, enjoy EXPLOSIONS.