MY READ POSTERS

I couldn't resist adding one of my cat, Harry Potter. (His sister is Hermione, of course.) In case you can't read the writing at the bottom of his poster, it says "or else..."

WHO IN THE WORLD IS USING SOCIAL MEDIA?

Power to the People Social Media Tracker Wave 3, the third study by Universal McCann, is the result of a survey of 17,000 Internet users in 29 countries. It is surprisingly current—completed in March 2008. Here are some of the more interesting results (to me, at least).

Social media is a global phenomenon happening in all markets regardless of wider economic, social, and cultural development. If you are online you are using social media.

Asian markets are leading in terms of participation, creating more content than any other region.

Video Clips are the quickest growing platform.

57 percent [of those surveyed] have joined a Social Network; 23 percent of users have uploaded photos; 22 percent have uploaded videos

Blogs are a mainstream media world-wide; 73 percent have read a blog; now 184 million bloggers world-wide; the number one thing to blog about is personal life and family; China has the largest blogging community in the world with 42 million bloggers, more than the US and Western Europe combined;

Other interesting stats:
83 percent have ever watched video clips online; 55 percent left a comment on a blog; 45 percent downloaded a podcast; 40 percent started their own blog, and 34 percent , subscribed to an RSS feed.

How many active Internet users are there worldwide? 475 million. Of those, 100 million are in the USA, 61 million in China, 30 million in Japan, 19 million in Germany, 18 million in India, 18 million in the UK, 14 million in South Korea, 14 million in Brazil, 12 million in France, 11 million in Spain, 10 million in Italy. (Australia has about 5 million.)

But what about percentages? The countries rank a bit differently when we look at percentage of all adults online. Number 1 is the Netherlands at 88 percent, followed by Australia (73 percent); USA (71 percent); South Korea, Hong Kong, Switzerland, Denmark, Japan, Taiwan, the UK, Canada, Germany (all 60-70 percent). Brazil has 44 percent, China 12 percent, and India only 5 percent.

The study’s “Final Word” says, “the key technologies that underpin the social media revolution continue their ascent. Social media is established everywhere there is an Internet connection…” They suggest creating content to establish an experience with your customers, “develop widgets applications, services and platforms that create a genuine consumer benefit and drive engagement. Be inventive in connecting with consumers. Integrate it with offline communications and use social media as link or as a story to communicate.” I like this statement: “Consumers are doing it well; well resources brands [libraries] have no excuse.”

URL: http://www.universalmccann.com/Assets/wave_3_20080403093750.pdf

MANAGING KNOWLEDGE IN HEALTH SCIENCES BACK “IN PRINT”

The classic book, Managing Knowledge in Health Sciences, edited by Andrew Booth and Graham Walton, London: Facet, 2000, is now available online. (It had been out of print, but the publisher has allowed it to be placed online). Contributors and subjects are:
Linda Banwell, Evaluating information services
Andrew Booth, Identifying users’ needs; making a case; organizing information resources; delivering and accessing resources; marketing a service, formulating the question; selecting appropriate sources, searching the Internet; organizing a personal knowledge base; keeping up to date with the knowledge base
Sharon Dobbins, Identifying resources
Louise Falzon, searching the databases
John Hewlett, Health service information providers
Alison Hicks, Training the users
Donald Mackay, Consumer health information
Jane Mackenzie, Health service libraries
Suzy Paisley, filtering and evaluating the knowledge base
Christine Urquhart: Health service users of information
Graham Walton, Health services: a contemporary approach; providing direction and management for health library and information services

URL: http://www.shef.ac.uk/scharr/mkhs/

DISAPPEARING TECHNOLOGIES??

Dave Pollard [Meeting of Minds, Caledon, Ontario, Canada] has written an interesting post on his blog, How to Save the World. He lists Twelve Tools That Will Soon Go the Way of Fax and CDs. You should really read the entire post, but here are the 12 tools.

1. Hard Drives:

2. “Wall of Text” Reports & Documents:

3. “Best Practices”:

4. Email and Groupware:

5. Corporate Websites:

6. Corporate Intranets:

7. Corporate Libraries and Purchased Content:

8. Cell Phones:

9. Classrooms:

10. Meetings:

11. Job Titles:

12. Offices:

URL: http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/2008/08/05.html#a2212

DID BILL GATES REALLY SAY THAT?

I ran across a site with quotes from and about Microsoft. Here are some of the ones I really like. You can read the rest at http://www.slothmud.org/~hayward/mic_humor/mic_quotes.html

640 K ought to be enough for anybody (1981)
The Internet? We are not interested in it (1993)
Microsoft products are generally bug free (n.d.)
There are people who don't like capitalism, and there are people who don't like PCs, but there's no one who likes the PC who doesn't like Microsoft (n.d.)

and one about MS...Every time you turn on your new car, you're turning on 20 microprocessors. Every time you use an ATM,you're using a computer. Every time I use a settop box or game machine, I'm using a computer. The only computer you don't know how to work is your Microsoft computer, right? (Scott McNealy, CEO, Sun Microsystems)

(Attention MS: I'm just kidding--please, no black screen of death....I "love" my PC.)

BLOG ON MUSEUMS & DIGITAL MEDIA

I just found this blog, Fresh+New, written primarily by Seb Chan [Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia]. "The purpose of the site is to act as a repository and sounding board for discussions around digital media and its use in museums. It evolved form a team discussion tool into a sector resource."

URL: http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/dmsblog/