A snarky librarian by any other name is still a snarky librarian

So, yes, I've changed the name of the blog, how nice of you to notice! Honestly, I had grown tired of the whole "info babe" moniker (I think I thought it was cute at one point, but it just seems a bit silly now, and I don't really think of myself as a "babe"...) but I thought I was too entrenched in my little social networking world under that username, and I figured I would never get rid of it. But after a particularly good session on social network profile management at last week's Computers in Libraries conference (especially the talk by Greg Schwartz) I decided to make the move to use my real name for all my online identities (val_forrestal or vforrestal).

Another reason for this decision also stems from the conference. I was meeting in person people who I had only previously known through online connections, and I find it incredibly awkward to have to follow my introduction with "you might know me as the info babe?" Ick. And I'm really working on networking and presenting these days (how tacky of me to admit, I know. For shame!), so I'd like to be able to make a more professional impression. I guess I can also use that as a lead in to mention that I'll also now be blogging LISNews.org, so keep an eye out for me over there!

Oh, and if you're wondering where the new blog title came from, it's from the headline I gave my Shovers and Makers profile (which I think I mentioned in the last post, but if you feel so inclined and have not yet done so, you can find here.) I don't know where I came up with it, other than to say that for some reason I enjoy the word 'ubiquitous', and that the time I spend wandering around the vast realms of the internet is nothing short of ridiculous.

About Me

Contact info:

email: vforrestal{a}gmail
work email: valerie.forrestal{a}csi.cuny.edu
twitter: @vforrestal

Official blurb:

Valerie Forrestal is the Web Services Librarian and an Assistant Professor at the College of Staten Island, City University of New York. Her education includes an MA in Media Production from Emerson College, an MLIS from Rutgers University, and an MS in Service-Oriented Computing from Stevens Institute of Technology.

Valerie specializes in web development, social media, technology planning, and innovation in libraries and higher ed. You can find her online at vforrestal.com, vforrestal.info, or on Twitter @vforrestal.


Writing:

Forrestal, Valerie, and Tinamarie Vella. (2018). Using Twitter to Build Communities: A Primer for Libraries, Archives, and Museums. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Forrestal, Valerie. (2015). Knowledge Management for Libraries. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

Forrestal, Valerie. (2013). "Zen and the Art of the Conference Proposal", Letters to a Young Librarian (ISSN 2330-1171). November 21, 2013.

Forrestal, Valerie (2013). "The In Crowd, or Fear and Loathing in Library Land", The Journal of Creative Library Practice (ISSN 2330-4227). September 18, 2013.

Arnett, Barbara, and Valerie Forrestal (2012). "Bridging the Gap from Wikipedia to Scholarly Sources: a Simple Discovery Tool", College & Undergraduate Libraries, (ISSN 1069-1316). 19 (2-4), 176-188. (Full-text available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10760/18839)*

Forrestal, Valerie. (2012). "Hit the Ground Running: Some (Simple) Advice for Job-Hunters", Letters to a Young Librarian (ISSN 2330-1171). June 21, 2012.

Forrestal, Valerie. (2011). "Making Twitter Work: A Guide for the Uninitiated, the Skeptical, and the Pragmatic ", The Reference Librarian, (ISSN 0276-3877). 52 (1-2), 146-151. (Full-text available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10760/18839)*

*Peer-reviewed Article


Speaking:

May 2016: NJLA (New Jersey Library Association) Annual Conference - Presenter/Panelist, “Beyond the CE: Cultivating Your Personal Learning Network”

May 2016: NJLA Annual Conference - Presenter, “The Cats Are Herding Us: Neko Atsume and Mobile Usability”

September 2014: EDUCAUSE Annual Conference - Presenter, "Building Academic Websites (in the Real World)"

September 2014: SLA NY Conference and Expo - Presenter, "Google Drive for Libraries"

April 2014: Urban Librarians' Conference - Speaker/Facilitator, "Web Design for Librarians"

April 2014: New Directions in Information Fluency - Presenter, "Beyond the Citation: Introducing students to scholarly research and writing through strategic collaboration"

December 2013: CUNY IT Conference - Presenter, "Building a Better Website with Wordpress"

October 2013: ACRL NY Chapter Meeting - Invited Speaker, "(Realistic) Website Migration Planning"

October 2013: METRO Code4LibNYC SIG - Presenter, "The Anatomy of a Crash"

June 2013: NJLA Annual Conference - Presenter, “Should you friend your supervisor on Facebook?”

May 2013: Books Expo America Preconference (New York Library Association) - Invited Panelist, “Make Something New. Now.”

July 2012: Library Management Institute Annual Conference - Panelist, "Digital + Libraries | Connectivity, Convergence, Confluence"

October 2011: Metro Science Librarians SIG Research Forum – Invited Speaker, “Building a Simple Library Bookmarklet”

May 2011: NJLA Annual Conference - Presenter/Panelist, "Technology Innovation Forum" and "Web + Mobile Tools for Improving Library Services"

March 2011: Library Technology Conference (Macalester College, St. Paul, MN) - Presenter, "Bridging the gap from Wikipedia to scholarly sources: a simple discovery solution"

January 2011: VALE Annual Conference - Speaker, "Bridging the gap from Wikipedia to scholarly sources"

December 2010: METRO Webinar - Presenter, "Three Tech Tools, One Objective: Improving Library Services"

January 2010: VALE (Virtual Academic Library Environment) Annual Conference - Speaker, "Teaching the New Literacy"

December 2009: Yale Handheld Librarian (Lecture Series) - Speaker, "Twitter for Libraries"

October 2009: NSBE (National Society of Black Engineers) Zone Conference - Speaker, "Internet Literacy and Online Networking"

July 2009: Handheld Librarian (Online Conference) - Speaker, "Twittering in Libraries"

June 2009: METRO Library 2.0 SIG - Featured Speaker, "Twitter for Libraries"

June 2009: LibraryCampNYC 2009 (UnConference) - Co-facilitator, "Social Media Marketing for libraries"

More info:
Curriculum Vitae
Google Scholar Profile
MSN Academic Profile
Slideshare (my presentations)
Twitter (vforrestal)
Facebook

I'd like to take a moment to whine about all your whining. Thank you.

I feel like much ado has been made lately about Twitter. I shouldn't even tell you that Twitter is a micro-blogging service, and instead imply that if you don't know what it is, you live under a rock and should be ashamed of yourself. But the truth is, if you don't know or care what micro-blogging is, I would much rather you didn't know about it, because then you couldn't possibly complain about its existence.

I've been using Twitter for awhile now (not sure about how long, but long enough to have posted 328 updates...) When I first learned about it, I didn't get it either. It seemed silly to me that I would want to post/read status updates all day. So, for awhile, because I thought it was stupid, I just didn't use it. Imagine that. And then at some point I gave it a try, and believe it or not, I managed to find some value in it. I subscribed to the updates of other librarians, and they posted links to interesting things: articles, videos, websites, etc... and that was cool. Plus it created a network of people in my field who could be tapped for impromptu surveys (who's using what technology and how successful has it been?) Sure, there's some lots of "getting my morning coffee"/banal chatter too, but you learn to filter out the noise after awhile.

Recently I also started up a Twitter account for my library (http://twitter.com/scwLibrary), and on there I (we) can subscribe to all sorts of science, technology and engineering people and organizations, so I get fed all kinds of great sources in that area. I can also use that account to broadcast (retweet) those links as well as interesting ones I've found myself. I can also use it as a quick way to post brief communications about the library (see: stapler crisis '09) that don't warrant a blog post or website announcement.

Right. So all I'm saying is that I have found some value in the service. I'm not an evangelist for it though (as I matter of fact I don't even recommend it to people unless I think it would serve a specific purpose for them) because I realize that to a lot of people it just doesn't make any sense. And that's fine. But I feel like the haters reeeeeeally enjoy hating on this one (check out this video, which, I have to admit is kind of funny, but also pretty insulting.)

Still, web 2.0, or whatever you crazy kids are calling it these days, is all about trying new things, and if you don't like them, or see a purpose for them, you don't have to use them. I just don't quite understand the culture of tearing down things we don't understand, or don't think we need. It's so damn hipster if you ask me... Anything mainstream is evil and stupid.

Still, I find Twitter to pretty much be what you make of it. If you and your friends use it as a way to just keep track of what you're all up to, then those "mundane" updates can actually be a way to get more insight into each other's lives, and to effortlessly "keep up" with each other (and also make the whole thing look kind of stupid if you're basing your opinion on the updates of people you don't know or care about.) If you use it in a more professional context, it's actually a wonderful way of communicating amongst colleagues and peers, and a great way to tap into a potentially extremely useful collective mind. (I also thought this was another interesting take on what's so cool about Twitter, found, fittingly, via a tweet from Connie Crosby.)

(UPDATE: I just wanted to add this link to a recent ReadWriteWeb post on Twitter, that elaborates on the potential of Twitter way better than I did here...)

(UPDATE 2: Ok, and here's another good link: The Ultimate Guide for Everything Twitter)

as a form of protest, i refuse to come up with a witty title for this post

ok, i feel like i should maybe weigh in on this whole Rutgers dropping 'library' from SCILS situation. i posted a comment on my friend mike's blog, and i guess if i'm gonna speak my mind there, i might as well post it here as well. since i am lazy and don't really feel like spending much time or effort stressing over the whole thing, i'm just going to copy and paste my comment. (and what an easy way to drop a post in, since i haven't written in awhile. heh.)

this whole debacle annoys me for two reasons:

1) isn't this whole name change thing taking up time and money (meetings, new letterhead, signage, etc) that could be better spent on just improving the school in general, including the library curriculum? i mean, really, all this effort just to remove the word "library" from your name? …and

2) how did they think that going to all that trouble to remove library from the name was not going to insult all of us libeerians? it's like they're distancing themselves from one of their largest constituencies (largest if you're talking about the grad school.) no matter what their reasoning is, that's going to be hurtful, and going to alienate us.

what i really wish is that instead of trying to distance ourselves from the word "librarian", we would redefine it as the tech-savvy, tech-centered, information-aggregating career it should and could be. we don't need to turn ourselves into "information professionals", we need to bring the field of librarianship into the future (and the now…) i know that's a bit off-topic, but i feel like we don't need to scrap the title, it's not completely a lost cause, we can still redeem ourselves! (maybe all we need is a good PR campaign?)

Just shoot me now.

Ok, so I have another entirely non-library related post for you, so bear with me here. Sarah Palin is driving me bonkers. Really. I mean, I'm sure she's actually a fairly intelligent person, or she wouldn't have gotten as far as she has, but did McCain really have to pick someone who comes off so ditsy and quaint? For all the feminists thinking of voting for McCain just because they're pissed off that Hillary didn't get the nomination (and I'm just guessing that there are some of you out there) please don't do it. Palin is the anti-feminist. And I'm not even going to get into the whole abortion/making rape victims pay for rape kits thing, as if that's not bad enough. I'm just annoyed that given all the really smart, independent, well-read, politically-savvy women out there in America, McCain had to go for the folksy, quaint, down-home mother figure. Now I'm sure he just picked her because she's cute and could get his campaign lots of attention, attention that he was aggravated kept being paid to mr. rock-star Obama, but come on! I feel like maybe this country still isn't ready for real women in power, because they're just more comfortable with women who still embody their pretty, dippy, soccer-mom ideal. Everyone was so hard on Hillary for just about everything, but now we should cut Palin some slack because... um... she's cuter than Hillary? Oh, and Mrs. Hockey Mom Joe Sixpack? When it comes to running this country, give me the fancy-shmancy highly educated elites any day of the week. I mean, Joe Sixpack and I are great friends, and I'll grab beers with him whenever, but I don't want dumbasses running my country... anymore, that is.

Hell hath no fury like a pissed-off blogger...

Ok, so I know this is not library-related, but it's about my cat, and it's a very librarian-ish thing to do to have a cat, so, by the transitive property of blogging, this is library-related, no? Anyway, yesterday I had to bring my cat to the vet to have her put to sleep, because she had FIP (Feline Infectious Peritonitis), which is 100% fatal and eventually causes their bodies to attack themselves, and all her organs had begun shutting down. Ridiculously sad, right?

So I call during the day yesterday to make an appointment for today, and they tell me they can take me that same day at 7pm. Not my first choice, because I definitely wanted more time to spend with her, but I know it is selfish to keep her suffering just for me, so I take the appointment. I leave work early and take her in the yard all afternoon, because she loves it there, and then take her right from the yard to the vets', so that her peaceful time outside will be her last memories.

When I get to the vets' office however, I am ignored and left waiting for AN HOUR, with no explainations and no apologies, and when my boyfriend finally has the NERVE to actually complain, the girl at the desk is rude to him and tells us it's our fault for not alerting them when we signed in why we were there. Gee, I'm sorry I'm a wreck because I'm having my beloved pet put down and just assumed that you had an appointment book somewhere with the reason for my visit, which I clearly stated when I made the appointment EARLIER THAT SAME DAY. And nowhere in all her blame-shifting and aggressiveness was there any sort of an apology. Then, when we are finally taken in the room and the procedure is underway, the girl is in the back with some other workers, laughing and joking around, and generally having a merry old time, despite the fact that we are now THE ONLY people left in the office, and she obviously knows what is going on in the room....ARGH!!!!!!!

So maybe there is some small lesson in here for librarians, or anyone who works with the public all day: BE NICE. If she had just apologized when we complained, and was nice to us, it would have ended there and I wouldn't be ranting to everyone I know about how I'm never going back there and how they should tell everyone they know not to ever go there. That's it, just be nice. Even when people are frustrated with you, be nice. Even if they are short with you, be nice.

As a matter of fact, I think Patrick Swayze said it best in roadhouse... Oh the wisdom of the Swayz...

Ennui, setting in...

I know I don't post much here anymore (and I know that the "why I haven't been posting lately" post is one of the blogosphere's most popular refrains), but I'm truly uncertain as to why this poor blog is experiencing such a dry spell. It certainly isn't from a lack of ideas. I think of topics to blog on all the time. In fact, I often compose eloquent (read:verbose) posts in my head while on the way home from work, or while trying to fall asleep at night. There's certainly a lot to talk about in the world of information, and I do a ton of professional reading, but for some reason once I'm in front of a computer, all my inspiration just peters out.

It's true that I've been extremely busy at work, but that's really no excuse either, seeing as I seem to find the time to check Facebook, IM with my peeps and read about a hundred rss feeds a day...

Maybe it is the echo chamber that is the library and tech blogging worlds, making me feel like I just don't have anything unique to say, or maybe it's the frustration of constantly defending the continued existence of my profession making me feel like i don't have anything interesting to say, or maybe, just maybe (and this is probably the most likely excuse) I am simply just too lazy to try and make sense of the sad mish-mash of triage efforts that my job has become.

At some point you become very disillusioned with all the wonderful, helpful things you could be doing for your patrons, because you are too busy trying to be all things to all people. That is the sad life of an 'Information Services' librarian. I mean, what *are* information services anyway? Pretty much only everything that goes on in a library. Sometimes doing a little bit of everything is a great way to keep from getting bored with your career, and sometimes it is just a recipe for feeling like you are constantly trying to move forward in all directions at once, a feat not easily accomplished, and sure to leave you exhausted on a fairly consistent basis.

OK, now I'm just griping, I know. So I guess you should just be thankful for my lack of posting, shouldn't you? I'm sure you have better things to do than listen to me complain... like checking your Facebook.