Information Center Connections

The rise of infographics

Infographics have become ubiquitous, and with good reason.

For one, they are very often pretty to look at. I've seen all sorts of designs...flow charts, circles, rainbows, maps.  Easy on the eyes. (That's the "graphic" part.)

And the information that's presented is in bite-size portions, easy to scan and digest. Concise. A way to combine and display data to show results and/or tell a story. And, importantly, the information is cited.

Have you thought about how your information center could use infographics to present industry or research information? To market to your clients? To explain a new process or service (either for internal use or for clients/students)?

Here are a few that I found particularly striking and relevant:

+ Anatomy of a librarian

+ A librarian's worth

+ The metadata universe (zoom to view the detail)

+ Usability guide

+ The importance of online training

+ Looking forward to Thanksgiving

 

Now, how to create them? Here are a few resource lists to get you started, plus step-by-step guidance:

+ Suggestions from Problogger

+ Suggestions from Social Networking Librarian

+ Suggestions from Stephen Abram

 

If you see interesting infographics during your travels (or search for them; Visual.ly is a good creating and finding tool), file/bookmark/save them. Let them serve as inspiration for your own storytelling and information sharing.

Have you used infographics to tout your services or present information? If so, tell us the results and how you did it.

Federal library world updates

The Federal Library Directory is a new resource of incredible value.

The directory, organized by FLICC, is searchable and provides detailed information about more than 1,000 U.S. federal libraries worldwide. Contact information, available services, and welcome audiences are listed, among many other characteristics of interest.

Read more about it in the press release.

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As you may know, GPO Access, the federal government's site for documents and reports, is being replaced by FDsys.  The transition has begun, and no new materials will be added to the old site. That site will be "retired" during the 2012 fiscal year, specific date yet undetermined.

FDsys stands for "Federal Digital System" and it is also a product of the U.S. Government Printing Office. The system provides access to information products from all three government branches, including fulltext documents and metadata.

Learn more about this resource on the FDsys site.

Info overload revisited

Did you see the Newsweek article "I Can't Think"?  Information overload can get the best of us to the point of what author Susan Begley calls info-paralysis.  Yep.  Excellent article...take a look when you have a few minutes.

This blog actually started with a post on information overload (aside: I now have 135 messages in my inbox with little hope of seeing my eternal goal of 30 anytime soon), and it seems only to have gotten worse across the board. Twitter, anyone?

Last August, Click U offered two webinars that promised some hope.  Sarah Houghton-Jan (@TheLiB), now the assistant director of the San Rafael Public Library and also known as the Librarian in Black, presented two webinars called "Battling Information Overload."  She offered techniques and tools to get you through the deluge.  Check them out in the replays section of the Click U site, under the 2010 heading "Personal Improvement."

Get to it...don't let info-paralysis get to you.

 

The best intranets

Don't you love "best of" lists?  Top 10/25/101 lists?  From the writer's perspective, it's a concise and eye-catching way to communicate ideas.  From the reader's point of view, it's "I-can-scan-this-easily" time.

The 4 January issue of Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox lists the top ten intranets for 2011.  After the list, trends and common themes are explored.  Some findings:

• Better tools and greater investment in intranets (even in small companies)
• More and better mobile intranets...a captive, defined audience makes it easier to create highly-functional intranets
• Better management of knowledge on intranets through targeted repositories, encouragement of innovation, easy-to-use commenting tools, user rating systems, and customized content collections
• Task-centered information architecture aids usability
• Search capabilities are of utmost importance
• Page templates and content management systems are key to information organization and consistency

Where else can these ideas be applied?  Certainly for websites more generally.  And, we could all use better tools and greater investment in many aspects of our work. 

The full report is available from the Nielsen Norman Group.

New ventures for Gary Price and Shirl Kennedy

Gary Price and Shirl Kennedy, formerly of ResourceShelf and DocuTicker, have launched two new not-to-be-missed resource sites.

INFOdocket brings us industry news, and a whole lot of resources and tools.

FullTextReports...well, it's just what it says!  Reports from think tanks, scholarly organizations, industry analysts, and more.

Each site has an RSS feed and a Twitter feed (@INFOdocket and @fulltextreports), so it's easy to keep up with what's new, and each site is accessible on your mobile device.  How's that for great information service?

 

Worth a click

Prospects for Specialized Libraries: Comments from Colleagues is a report from our friends at SMR International.  What it comes down to is:  what challenges will we be facing, and how do we deal with them?  Read about roles, the collaboration imperative, value (yes), change (and change and change), access issues, and staffing.

More of us are doing Web content and design work.  Need some info on typography?  Look no further than this Speckyboy post.

FUMSI, a FreePint service, offers free articles and a fee-based magazine and research.  Have you taken a look?  Topics of recent free articles include image findability, information risk management, and intranet 2.0.  And, in case you weren't aware, FUMSI = Find Use Manage & Share Information.

Confused about international dialing?  Be confused no longer.

Global trends in special libraries

Although the aim of the report Emerging Trends in New Zealand Special Libraries is to explore the evolution of special libraries in that country, the thoroughness of the research also gives a global snapshot of the special libraries sector.

There are several familiar names in the literature review section (Stephen Abram, Bill Fisher, Guy St. Clair, Priscilla Shontz, Jim Matarazzo, Toby Pearlstein, José-Marie Griffiths, among others), and you'll see the trend towards online services and expanded roles for information professionals.

Library closures, a persistent trend, are explored in depth.  According to the report, in New Zealand, while the number of libraries within commercial entities decreased, the number in non-commercial organizations increased.  Interesting tidbit:  most special librarians in New Zealand work for a governmental organization.

The "Ideas for Further Research" might give us all some direction regarding what to write about and study:  employers' perception of skills, reporting structures, corporate library consortia, recession strategies, what happens after libraries close?

Very interesting.  Take a look.

Special price for the 2008 Salary Survey

Did you know that...

...new for the 2008 SLA Salary Survey was a chapter just for CI and Research responsibilities?

...almost 25% of your U.S.-based SLA colleagues that responded to the survey identified themselves as administrators or managers?

...the median salary for U.S. federal government employees who responded to the survey was $79,000?

...with the purchase of the print/PDF salary survey you receive access to the online calculator, with which you can combine more than one data set?

...now through September 15th, the 2008 SLA Salary Survey is available at the special price of $34.95 for members?

Take this opportunity to find out what you're worth!

Value and costs, value and costs

And, in this installment of "how information professionals provide value," here's a new eBook from Dow Jones that offers concrete suggestions for creating valuable time- and money-saving services for your clients.

Pay Now or Pay Later: Exposing the Hidden Cost of "Free" Information, which I found through a tweet from contributor Mary Ellen Bates (@mebs), is a roadmap for information center planning. In addition to some helpful statistics, there are tips for reputation management, data presentation, and management of projects and information.

What a great way to start the post-summer strategizing.

Information Overload Awareness Day (!)

On this blog, you've read more than you ever cared to about information overload.  I just read that there is now a day devoted to this phenomenon.

Basex has organized Information Overload Awareness Day, which will be held Wednesday, August 12th, at 11 a.m. ET.  The online event will offer strategies for dealing with information overload, information about its costs (an estimated $900 billion per year), and, most importantly, solutions.

Special bonus...if you promise not to multi-task during the program, there's a 50% discount on the $50 registration fee.  Fee includes a copy of The Cost of Not Paying Attention:  How Interruptions Impact Knowledge Worker Productivity ($399 value).  John Seely Brown is the featured keynote speaker. 

For more information, visit the registration page.