Friday, April 27, 2007

Thoughts on Conference Blogging

Sometimes I feel like a sorry excuse for a blogger. I attended the ACRL Conference and also the Ball State Copyright Conference recently, and have I posted about the sessions? Not really - just one so far, and only because a coworker let me know that someone in the blogosphere was really interested in that particular session. And now that I have a little bit of free time and work is slowing down, I'm sure people have already posted about most of the stuff anyway.

Part of it is that, personally, I don't enjoy reading through people's conference session notes. I have no interest in reading a scattered outline'o'stuff. It's not coherent, I don't understand all the bullet points, and I don't get anything from it really. And if written in paragraph form, the summaries are often so long! Am I just an impatient Millennial?

I think another part of it is that I tend to prefer to research whatever I'm interested in at the moment. Excessively research it. So when I really want to know about a topic, I go out and find the information. Although I do stumble on a lot of interesting stuff in the blogs I read too.

So I'm torn about conference blogging.

However, I intend to start slowly going through all the handouts and such - to see what information I can apply to my library. I've already implemented a few things. I finally surveyed the students on a few things albeit very informally. And also created a student art wall - or rather, asked my student worker to display her beautiful photography on a wall of the library.

Maybe I'll just concentrate on the stuff I think is useful, as opposed to all the sessions I attended - there were so many!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Funny you should mention being torn about conference blogging - I was recently thinking the same thing.

At cil2007, I ended up writing blog posts about most of the sessions I attended. I did this partly as a "report" for my own library. Also, though, I learned so many great things that I wanted to share the highlights with others.

But while writing them, I wondered if anyone cared. I usually don't read other people's conference notes, and I seriously doubt anyone read mine. But it is a good way for me to reorganize my own notes in a way that is useful (meaning, searchable, so I can find things easier).

But about conference blogging in general - I think I'm going to keep doing it, because I heard a rumor that the next conference I plan to attend, NELA Annual, might waive the registration cost for people who blog sessions in real-time. Yay for free.

PS: you used the word "excessively" to refer to yourself; I don't know if that quite captures your research habits.

Kate said...

Yeah, I skimmed through yours. The ones that drive me really crazy are the outlines done in real time. Sometimes the topics have sounded interesting but when I try to read them I get annoyed because there's no context or I don't understand what it means.

I agree it is a good way to reorganize one's notes in a useful way.

And as for blogging and registration being waived - good luck to you! I hope you get to do that! I'd have to buy a laptop before I could do that... haha.

Excessively isn't accurate? Is neurotically better? Obsessively? Compulsively? All of the above?

I can't help it, I like research.

Anonymous said...

After I posted this comment, I checked my blog stats. Of my last hundred visits, half of them where incoming searches for "cil2007" - so I guess somebody is reading these, after all.

As for laptops, luckily for me my library has one - I guess I'm still stuck in the dark ages with a desktop. And no cell phone to light my way, either.

> Excessively isn't accurate? Is
> neurotically better?
> Obsessively? Compulsively?
> All of the above?

Yes, all of the above - and all good. Anything less than obsessive is amateur.

Kate said...

Actually, I could probably get a laptop too, but it seems like so much to lug around at a conference. And call me old-fashioned, but I'm just more of a paper and pen kinda girl.

Well, I guess people are interested in conference blogging after all. I have to say, much of my traffic as of late has come from your blog. Thanks. :)

Yes, my research skills have been honed beyond the amateur point to the level of OCD. :)