Public Services Meeting
October 2, 2007
Using Meebo to handle Instant Messaging at the Reference Desk
- Please be aware that students, faculty, and staff can go to the Ask a Librarian page to instantly chat with the Reference Desk – end users do not need a specific IM account.
- There is a learning curve with using Meebo on the Reference Desk staff side. Here are some tips:
Pay attention to the tab that you are in; if you want to click on the “quick tabs” such as BU mail, for example, you need to be in a tab other then the Meebo tab.
To avoid opening up multiple Meebo pages, do not click on the traditional “home” picture button to go to the Library’s homepage. Scott has created a ‘home’ quick tab that will always take you to the Library’s homepage (not open another Meebo page).
Work with Scott if you need assistance with using this or are experiencing problems; Scott is also trying to tweak things to make this work more seamlessly.
LibGuides
As a point of clarification, while all are welcome to experiment with creating LibGuide pages, our vision in using this tool, at first, is to move over the Subject Guides. While a unit or service area may want to eventually create a LibGuide (ex. ILL), our first foray into this is with the Subject Guides.
There is now a Reference Calendar under Public Folders in Outlook. If you are subbing for someone, please indicate it there. This calendar also provides the opportunity to utilize Group Schedules better.
Announcements/Comments
Donor luncheon is Oct. 15
Sally N. is attending INCOLSA circ. Training Oct. 3
Fall break is coming up; we discussed reduced hours; questioned whether Emily needs to work Wednesday evening (Sally N. will talk to Lewis about)
Sally N. noted that as we start with these PS meetings, she is cognizant that some topics lend themselves more to circ. or reference; she will try to be aware of this and place the topics in the appropriate meetings (reference meetings, PS meetings, etc.); however, there will be times when this demarcation is difficult.
Hi there. I’ve
created a new Public Calendar in the Library folder, called Reference Desk. It’s
in the same place as the Library Schedule and Personnel Calendar. All librarians
should be able to add entries and edit existing ones, which is the primary
function here.
The reason
we’ve got this calendar is so that we can more easily plan meetings and track
subs. Sally is another of our librarians who likes to use the Outlook calendar
to schedule meetings and by having the Reference Desk calendar listing who’s
working the desk, it’s easier to see if someone’s free.
If you
cannot work a shift and you have gotten a sub, please edit that shift’s entry
on the calendar and replace your name with your sub’s name. Be sure to edit
JUST THE OCCURRENCE, not the SERIES. Unless they’re subbing for you on that
shift for the rest of the semester. 🙂
If you have
any questions or problems using this calendar, please let me know.
Thanks.
Scott
Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read is observed during the last week of September each year. This year it is from Sept. 29 – Oct. 6. Observed since 1982, the annual event reminds Americans not to take this precious democratic freedom for granted.
Banned Books Week (BBW) celebrates the freedom to choose or the freedom to express one’s opinion even if that opinion might be considered unorthodox or unpopular. It stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of those unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints to all who wish to read them. After all, intellectual freedom can exist only where these two essential conditions are met.
Between 1990 and 2000, of the 6,364 challenges reported to or recorded by the Office for Intellectual Freedom:
- 1,607 were challenges to “sexually explicit” material (up 161 since 1999)
- 1,427 to material considered to use “offensive language” (up 165 since 1999)
- 1,256 to material considered “unsuited to age group” (up 89 since 1999)
- 842 to material with an “occult theme or promoting the occult or Satanism” (up 69 since 1999)
- 737 to material considered to be “violent” (up 107 since 1999)
- 515 to material with a homosexual theme or “promoting homosexuality” (up 18 since 1999)
- 419 to material “promoting a religious viewpoint” (up 22 since 1999)
- 317 to material involving “nudity” (up 20 since 1999)
- 267 to material involving “racism” (up 22 since 1999)
- 224 to material involving “sex education” (up 7 since 1999)
- 202 to material considered to be “anti-family” (up 9 since 1999)
Links
Proclamation from the Butler Libraries
Quotes relating to Banned Books Week
Introducting OLDO! The Oxford Language Dictionaries Online.
Instant
access to Oxford’s top-of-the-line, unabridged bilingual
dictionaries!
Oxford Language
Dictionaries Online features essential language resources never before
available online – fully searchable, comprehensive, authoritative bilingual
dictionaries and unique study materials that provide extra help with learning
and using an expanding range of languages.
- Initially offering
over 1.2 million words and phrases, and over 2 million translations in
French, German, Spanish and
Italian
- Coming in
2008: Chinese, Russian, and revolutionary pronunciation software
allowing you to hear native speaker stress and intonation
- Unique
language learning support, including usage examples and illustrative
phrases, grammar guidance, click-through verb tables and pronunciation charts,
explanations of grammatical terms, and help with spelling and
pronunciation
- Access to
hundreds of correspondence templates including sample letters,
emails, and resumes to provide practical help with writing
- Regular
updates every six months ensure that the most current meaning
and the latest new words are just a click away
You can access OLDO on the Library Website under Databases or just click the link above.
The Reference Desk is now set up to use Meebo. Meebo does the same thing that Gaim does (which is what we’ve been using), namely combining multiple IM accounts into one interface, so we only have to run one program to allow people with different IM programs to contact us.
BUT (and that’s a big but), there’s a very special thing that Meebo does that programs like Gaim and Trillian do NOT, and that is providing an embedded “widget” allowing people to IM us without having any IM program installed. I’ve already set up a widget for Meebo on our Ask A Librarian page, so give it a click and see what it looks like.
The only thing that Meebo requires is logging into it through a web page and keeping that web page open. If you use Firefox, it’s just an extra tab and I’ve already configured Firefox to open the library website AND Meebo in two different tabs when Firefox is launched. Internet Explorer 6 doesn’t have tabs (and IE7 cannot run on Windows 2000 machines), so if you use Internet Explorer you’ll need to have two browser windows open–one for the library website/catalog and one for Meebo. I’m keeping the library website as the Home Page in IE and have added a link on the toolbar for Meebo. Since we’ve gotten used to having a separate application running with Gaim, it won’t be much different except that both windows will be Internet Explorer. My recommendation: use Firefox. 🙂
(For what it’s worth, Meebo widgets can also be seamlessly used in LibGuides, as you’ll be able to see by looking at my profile.)
(See http://meebo.com for more information about it.)
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