Final Reflection

I have learnt a considerable amount throughout this unit in the lectures, however I feel that I always managed a deeper understanding through the learning journals. I always like to critically reflect on the weekly readings however the journals allowed me a concrete way of doing it.

I particularly liked to use the readings as references to inform my discussion each week as I feel this was a more effective way of engaging with them. My biggest problem with them was that I always left them till the last minute. However I often felt like that was an advantage for this course as I was forced to re-learn about each of the respective week's topics. This actually helped me gain a better understanding and allowed the information to stick a little better in my mind.

I really enjoyed writing about recent events in the area of information organisation through the reflections as it gave me an idea of the things I could be dealing with in my future career. Also discussing the changes to old systems actually helped me to understand the new systems better and realise their advantages. In particular I think learning about the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative in this way helped me immensely in the final assignment.

The focus on user experience has been incredibly valuable to me in my personal life as well. I feel like I have a much greater understanding of just what it is about a system that I am finding to be difficult to use for example. It has also given more patience with some systems as I have a much better understanding of how hard it is to make something user friendly.

Overall I have learned a great deal in this course; all of which I think is important in my future career as much of the content was about what will happen in the future due the rapid changes in technology that has affected the entire Library and Information Science industry.

Week 10 Learning Journal

1. How does user generated content (ie ratings, reviews, tagging) impact upon or change the way in which users interact with or experience the library and its collection?

To many people I have spoken to, the advent of modern technology has rendered the library obsolete. One of the most obvious examples of this is the ease of getting free material from the internet (Greenhill & Wiebrands, 2012). Greenhill and Wiebrands state the advent of people getting e-books from torrent sites for example; these methods are of course illegal but it is still happening on a large scale (2012). There is not much a library can do to combat this; due to the process of renting an ebook being more difficult than pirating one.

However a library can still remain relevant in such an environment through the use of user generated content. If a library can support user generated content within its collection, it provides an avenue for people to discuss the content of the library's collection. This is the sort of thing that does not happen with pirated materials. A library's primary purpose is to supply a service for the local community; it is easy to see how incorporating technologies that allow people to rate or tag material is a service that many people find valuable. People like to discuss books they have read and movies they have watched, by providing this to a library user-base, it will not only provide a useful service but encourage people to access the library catalogue more and there is a good chance they will also utilise the other services that the library offers.



References

Greenhill, K. & Wiebrands, C. (2012). No library required: the free and easy backwaters of online content sharing. Paper presented at VALA2012. Retrieved from: http://www.vala.org.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=580&catid=87&Itemid=159

Week 8 Learning Journal

I think that the biggest issue facing classification today is how rapidly technology is changing. Shirky states that people tend to hang on to old classification conventions that are not relevant to current electronic items (2005). The Dewey Decimal System is a perfect example of a system that was fit for the purpose when it was originally conceived, however is no longer relevant (Shirky 2005). The Dewey Decimal System is known to be rife with bias due to the issues with expanding it as time went on (Shirky 2005), however I think the biggest problem is the difficulty of replacing it with a new system. I have never been to a library that did not use the Dewey Decimal System. A complete overhaul would not just mean that librarians would be implementing a new system, it would mean a vast number of library users would have to learn a new way to find the books they want. However I do think that the very technology that is making it dificult for older classification systems could be the answer to this. With the abilities of modern search engines, finding the record for a book would not be difficult at all. Then it would just be a matter of following the signs on the shelves to the book, or more likely downloading the e-book version.


References
Shirky, C. (2005). Ontology is overrated: Categories, Links and Tags. Retrieved from:  http://www.shirky.com/writings/ontology_overrated.html

Week 6 Learning Journal

I think the move to a new standard from AACR2 was inevitable considering the widespread use of online resources in libraries today. One such use of modern technology is that abbreviations are no longer needed because there is not a limitation on physical space anymore (Zabel & Miller 2011). Despite this embracing of new technologies, RDA does have its faults. Firstly, like most new systems, it can be costly to overhaul a library’s entire cataloguing system. Also beyond the time and effort involved, the RDA toolkit is much more expensive than AACR2 (Zabel & Miller 2011).

One of the more interesting aspects to me regarding the changeover to RDA is that is designed for a semantic internet that does not properly exist yet (Zabel & Miller 2011). This creates obvious complexities as it may turn out that RDA is completely useless in only a few years’ time. I however think something like this does need to be thought about early otherwise we can end up with a completely outdated system not up to the task that is asked of it.

There is another system called Cooperative Cataloguing Rules which is an alternative to RDA that will allow current cataloguing rules to be maintained (Zabel & Miller 2011). However I think that RDA is still the better option as it is designed with the user in mind (Zabel & Miller 2011). I have a problem with current cataloguing rules in that they are very hard to decipher for the average user. When it is the aim of a library to serve the community the best they can, user experience is just as important. 

References

Zabel, D. & Miller, L. (2011). Resource description and access (RDA): An introduction for reference librarians. Reference and User Services Quarterly, 50(3), 216-222. Retrieved from: http://rusa.metapress.com/content/wrg1501514721g7n/

Week 4 Learning Journal

When analysing a website’s information architecture I had always just accepted the notion that the less clicks to perform a task the better. I had not considered this critically before reading Garrett’s article Information Architecture in The Elements of User Experience: User Centred Design for the Web and Beyond. In it he states that it is much more important for the task to make sense to the user (Garret 2011). To me this is a much more important aspect to focus on; if someone is performing a task that makes sense to them they are not going to be thinking about how many clicks they have made. 

For example in the do activity for this week I found it was very easy to find information on pet ownership on the City of Melbourne website as the steps made sense to me, I never thought about how many clicks it took me to get to the information. Hobart City Council’s website took just as many clicks but as it took me ages to find, because it was not under a section I would normally associate with pet ownership I took some time to find the information I was not satisfied with the Information Architecture.

References

Garrett, J.J. (2011). Information Architecture in The Elements of User Experience: User Centred Design for the Web and Beyond, 2nd edition, pp.88-101

Week 2 Learning Journal

I found the most interesting aspect to user experience was that the design of a website or database is based around the fact that a searcher will not actively learn how to perform better searches. Instead they will just persevere with their method until they eventually find what they wanted (Edwards & Bruce 2006). This fact would mean that when creating databases the information should be organised in a way that is based on how people search. It seems that it is easy to create a database in a manner that seems logical at the time but is not conducive to how people actually search for information. Of course the greatest hurdle in overcoming this issue would be that not everyone is the same, therefore while a system could be perfectly designed for a large group of people it will not be as effective for everyone.

When it comes to creating my own database I think the best guide that I have found for creating a user friendly database would be Neilsen’s usability heuristics (Petrie & Bevan, 2009). This is because those guidelines ensure the database is designed around how people naturally search for information. When a database exceeds at Neilsen’s usability heuristics issues such as errors are not just dealt with in a way that is easily understandable to the average user; they insure that errors do not happen in the first place. While all guidelines that I found were clearly designed to create a user friendly system, the in-depth detail and strong focus on the user ensures that Neilsen’s usability heuristics is an excellent guide for creating a user friendly information system.


References:

Edwards, Sylvia L. & Bruce, Christine S. (2006) Panning for gold: understanding students information searching experiences. In Transforming IT Education: Promoting a culture of excellence. Informing Science Press, Santa Rosa, California

Petrie, H. & Bevan, N. (2009). The evaluation of accessibility, usability and user experience. In C. Stepanidis (ed). The Universal Access Handbook, CRC Press. Retrieved from: http://www.nigelbevan.com/papers/The_evaluation_of_accessibility_usability_and_user_experience.pdf