[Publib] A blog question

[K.G. Schneider]

> When people mention the time spent on their library blogs they talk about
> using so much time a day.  I have been wondering about this.  I sit down
> about once a month and enter the majority of the things I want in the blog
> and then trigger it so that the pieces show up on the blog throughout the
> month, year or whatever.  So, I don't go to the blog on a daily basis,
> though there are postings almost every day.  Don't others do this?
> 
> I really am interested about this because I really have very limited
> blogging experience.

This is really good blogging practice, Diedre. I have been piling up
"evergreens" for my personal blog because I'm about to enter my last
semester in a masters program I'm in and once I get started my life becomes
work during the day, go to school, work on the night and weekends...
blogging gets very hard to do. In any event, for a library blog it would
certainly behoove a library to pile up some good regular content and then
supplement it with hot-hot-hot items.

I tend to draft rather than go final and schedule publishing only because I
find I constantly twiddle with future posts, so there's really no difference
for me. But post-scheduling allows you to plan around a calendar, which is
helpful. 

For library blogs I'm a great believer in "found content," some of it
published on a regular basis. By "found content," I mean content you have
sitting around that doesn't require a lot of work on your part. That could
be:

* Top reserves for the week
* New book lists
* Top circulating books
* Program flyers
* Anything already used in a newsletter, introduced bit by bit
* New hours
* Town events of relevance to the library
* Pictures of anything interesting in the library accompanied by brief
captions (are digital cameras not amazing?!)
* The copy from any library tip sheets 
* Survey results
* News cribbed from other library blogs, ALA, etc. (Some of this can be read
in automatically if your techy is savvy in this area)
* And...? New items in the library café? Upgraded computers? Staff picks?

Somewhat geeky aside: I wish there were a blog feature where I could
deep-link to a local holding of a book (DVD/etc.) in a library catalog,
complete with its review and a jacket cover, sort of like Open Worldcat
meets Amazon. There's a Movable Type blog plugin called Media Manager that
would be very interesting if it offered the option to display the purchasing
info AND the local holding info. 

As someone who does not currently work in a physical library, my
inside/outside perspective is that libraries often overlook some very
charming and readily available content because we're around it all day and
can't see how interesting it is. I recently visited a library that had been
renovating their library section by section and I felt that their renovation
efforts, plus all the shifting locations, would make for very amusing (as
well as useful) reading. Imagine blog postings with pictures of a little
garden troll or library mascot posed in the latest section to be renovated,
or a picture of the oldest book in the library, or an interesting map. 

Icarus, the blog of Santa Fe Public Library, mixes found content with other
types of content. It's a superior blog: interesting, colorful, engaging. 

You don't have to post daily as long as you post regularly. You could even
state up front that you'll post something on a regular cycle, such as every
Tuesday morning.  

Yes, it takes up some time, but if your library doesn't have a newsletter,
here's a chance to start one without the cost and environmental waste of
printing and mailing (not to mention layout, etc.) (and if your library does
have one, cannibalize the copy). Make it prominent on your library website
and show people how to subscribe to it through simple blog-reading software
such as Bloglines or personalized Google. 

Karen / PUBLIB