Post your evaluation as a comment here, including:
- The name and URL of the blog.
- A brief evaluation, touching on all the points in the readings.
- Sign off with the names of the people in your group.
Carol
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Practice Evaluating a Blog
Before doing the assignment on your own of Evaluating a Blog (due Sept. 25th), here's a chance to get some practice applying the criteria, with input from some other classmates.Using the criteria in the course content, in groups of 3, write an evaluation of the blog Library Garden: http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
Carol
Carol
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The due date here should read Friday, Sept. 26th -- Carol
And, the activity is due on September 22. It gets very confusing working with both a classroom and online section of this course! -- Carol
Library Garden
http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
1. Authority: What expertise does the author have in the subject area? What bias might the author have?
Library Garden is written by seven librarians in New Jersey, who call themselves "contributing editors" on the About page of the blog. Based on their biographies on the site itself, they have wide ranging experiences and expertise in many library specialties. Using google to search their names indicates that their experiences listed on the site itself are valid, and that some of them have articles published by independent publishers. They seem like the kind of people with the kind of knowledge that would be useful to share via a blog.
The authors all come from New Jersey. They probably have biases coming from their geographical and temporal locations - American libraries in the 21st century. Therefore, they may have a limited perspective on the problems and issues faced by libraries in other countries (or other areas of the United States). The fact that they all have experiences in different types of libraries, though, partially mitigates that problem. They can offer perspectives from many different specialties.
2. Publisher/Author Affiliation: Is the author affiliated with an organization that hosts the Blog? What are the author's and/or publishing organization's credentials regarding the subject? What bias might the author/organization have?
The blog appears to be published by the "contributing editors." There does not appear to be published by an organization other than a loose group of librarians in New Jersey.
The authors' credentials appear to be that they are all practicing librarians in New Jersey, with some research and consulting work experiences. They are specialists in their field, with significant amounts of relevant experience in the "real world." That seems to qualify them to write interesting and informative posts on the library world.
We've already covered the authors' apparent sources of bias in the first area, Authority.
3. Scope/Content: What seems to the purpose of the blog and /or the site to which it belongs?
On the Library Garden blog a group of librarians, from varying aspects in the field of library sciences, meet to share conversation and enjoy interviews with fellow members of the library community. Through regular dialogue between the contributing editors the reader is exposed to their individual perspectives developed from experience in their diverse library fields. Ensuring the health and relevance of libraries is a goal common to all of the contributors.
The formality of the site is illustrated in its occasional use of guest contributors. Anyone wishing to take part in a discussion is urged to contact the editors.
The main page of this blog contains links for ‘Previous Posts,’ ‘Archives,’ and a list of blog links entitled ‘Some blogs we’re reading.’ An example of the blogs being read by the group are · Aaron the Librarian (Aaron Dobbs) · ALA Tech Source · The Annoyed Librarian as you can see all relevant sources to form opinions and gain information true to their mission statement.
The current post, Tuesday September 16 2008, deals with blogging itself. Being new to blogging, as perhaps many of my classmates are, makes this an extremely helpful topic for our field of study and research. The blog contains links to sites that deal with blogging styles, strategies to attract readers and commenters, practical advice on blogging and a link to the article from which the opening quote originates.
4. Accuracy and Reliability: Has the author indicated sources for facts being presented?
All comments throughout the blog that refer to an article, or web based site, link to their source so that you may view the original articles. There is also email contact information pertaining to significant individuals named within the blog. It is very helpful to have the opportunity to read the original articles as many things are open to interpretation. Viewing the source information when considering the blog author’s comments validates the authenticity of the blog and would reveal bias if present.
The end of the postings contains tags and labels that link to relevant topics discussed in the blog, there is also an opportunity to email the author.
Thought you might enjoy this quote that I picked up in from one of the linked sites.
To live consciously, optimistically and courageously, to inspire other people to achieve their own missions in life, to resonate with love and compassion, to pay it forward, and to leave this world in peace.
http://jonya.typepad.com/its_my_life/2008/09/increasing-readership.html
5. Audience: Does the Blog deal with the topic at a level that suits you and the requirements of your patrons or project?
The blog is designed for those in the library field, and primarily for librarians. This fact is supported by the commentators on this blog. Almost all are librarians, and nearly all are from New Jersey. Those that are not librarians tend to be academics (such as professors) or professionals (like marketing directors, etc.) with the occasional member of the general public chiming in. As such, Library Garden seems to have a fairly limited audience, as is also aided by the bias discussed under part one: "Authority". Therefore as the main relevance is to librarians in New Jersey, as is the audience, the blog seems to deal with the topic at a level that is appropriate for those who fall into that category: Librarians in New Jersey. However, although occasionally of interest, the blog is not of consistent of value for the requirements of many.
After searching the internet, however, one finds that there are few or seemingly no other blogs that directly deal with the health and relevance of libraries today. Others may post articles about said topic, but none deal with it with such consistency. Thus, although not entirely appropriate for all, Library Garden does effectively deal with its intended topic and does appear to reach the appropriate audience at a level that is easily understandable and suitably.
6. Currency/ Volume: Is the Blog updated regularly? When was the last update? How often are new articles added?
One of the key definitions given by the Merriam Webster dictionary for the word “regular” is “at normal intervals”. Given that definition, Library Garden is not updated regularly. It is updated sporadically and fairly often but not on the set system that that definition requires.
The last update for the blog was on Tuesday, September 16, 2008, that being fourteen days after the previous article was posted. However, if one continues to look at the dates of previous posts, it becomes apparent that there is no set schedule for new articles to appear. New articles seem to appear at the discretion of the contributors (i.e. whenever they feel something is relevant). As such, articles are posted anywhere from every few days to every two weeks.
Diana Robertson
Sierra Stephens
Vincent Gornall
Library Garden
http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
The authors of Library Garden are a group of librarians from the Garden State, New Jersey. They work in a variety of library settings, including public libraries, academic libraries, school, consortial, youth, etc. The stated goal of the blog is to host “an ongoing conversation among librarians with differing perspectives but one shared goal: ensuring the health and relevance of libraries.” As such, the content varies from post to post, ranging from commentary on a recent article on censorship in Time magazine, to one on how to attract more comments to your blog, to a description of how one of the contributors decided to become a librarian. The posts feature links to their sources or references, whether to the full text of articles commented on or to the libraries or websites mentioned. The blog seems to be very active, with updates usually occurring every few days, and has an estimated audience of about 3740 readers. Most of the posts have a number of comments attached. Many of the commentors are also librarians or working in the informaton field, and the articles are written in a way that would suit them but also be accessible to a broader audience that would include many library patrons. The tone and level of formality of the posts varies with the subject matter and author.
Kejo, Linda, and Mwalu
Library Garden
http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
1. Authority : What expertise does the author have in the subject area? What bias might the author have?
A link on this blog’s homepage allows readers to contact its contributors, which consist of three men and four women: two Librarians, a Young Adult Librarian, a Technology Training Librarian in a public library, an Associate Professor-Librarian, a Program Coordinator for a library cooperative and an Associate Professor of Library and Information Science. Some of the contributors have extensive and varied backgrounds in the library field, which surely adds to the breadth of topics and accuracy of information covered in the blog.
As all of the contributors work in New Jersey, there is bound to be little content which is specifically Canadian. One author, however, began her career in Ontario, and was at one point employed by the National Library of Canada, so some Canadian content may find its way in after all.
2. Publisher/Author Affiliation : Is the author affiliated with an organization that hosts the Blog? What are the author's and/or publishing organization’s credentials regarding the subject? What bias might the author/organization have?
A search of the contributors’ names on Google failed to connect them to any organization other than the libraries they work in or schools they teach at. None of these institutions appear to be responsible for, or involved with, the Library Garden blog. One of the blog’s authors produces another blog on his own.
3. Scope/Content : What seems to be the purpose of the Blog and/or the site to which it belongs?
The librarygarden blog takes a relaxed professional tone which makes it somewhat formal. Some posts, however, take a very personal and opinion-based stance and while still presented in a very professional manner, these tend to be a little less formal. The authors link to sites like Time Magazine (www.time.com), the New York Times (www.nytimes.com) and other respected publications or sites as well as sites of libraries and other institutions to which the authors are referring, such as the New Jersey State Library (www.njstatelib.org). All articles referred to or quoted include links to the complete article at its original source. This particular blog posts commentary and links regarding the overall field of librarianship. It is not specific or technical with regards to cataloguing, reference services, or other specific aspects of library work.
4. Accuracy and Reliability : Has the author indicated sources for facts being presented?
The authors are very careful to included references and links to works they are referring to or using. Many of the blog postings are commentaries on published articles and the authors provide a great number of links that back up or contribute in some way to the point they are trying to make. The LISNews blog (http://www.lisnews.org/) covers similar topics but presents its information in a less opinion-driven manner that is much more formal.
5. Audience : Does the Blog deal with the topic at a level that suits you and the requirements of your patrons or project? Who comments on the Blog and what is their affiliation?
The contributers seem to have a lot of experience in the library field and from their articles, one gathers that they have the ear of state administrators. I appreciated the many hyperlinks to other websites and that sources were cited frequently and consistently. This blog is definitely most useful to the American librarian.
After sifting through several articles, a particular article entitled "I Am What I Am" that posted on August 20, 2008 gave me a good picture of the typical LibraryGarden commentors. The majority seem to be librarians with degrees (eg. MS-LIS) rather than library technicians. The remaining audience is made up of academics from various subject fields, but mainly from the arts rather than the sciences fields. Of the 1,211 subscribers, 239 have public links and again, judging from their saved bloglists it seems the majority are higher-level librarians with some educators and academics in the mix as well.
6. Currency/Volume : Is the Blog updated regularly? When was the last update? How often are new articles added?
The LibraryGarden blog seems to be updated every three hours. I discovered that new articles are added about twice per week on average when I went back in the blogs archive (which is available on the homepage) for the last year. The articles were more frequent when the blog was first published in 2006 and were averaging about 20 new articles per month then and at about 14 new articles per month just over one year ago. There is a marked dip in contributed articles from August 2007.
Samantha Wright
Wendy Wright
Vesta Giles
Evaluating a Blog Practice
Group 5: Narges, Tina, Andrew
Blog Name: Library Garden
URL: http://librarygarden.blogspot.com
1) Authority (Andrew)
There are 7 Contributors to “librarygarden.blogspot.com” and all seem to have a long history in the library field in some sort of leadership capacity. I tried to determine whether each person was a credible voice for discussion of the library-related topics on the blog:
Peter Bromberg: His blogger profile has links to his other blogs as well as his personal homepage where links to his job (Assistant Director at the South Jersey Regional Library Cooperative (SJRLC)), and other groups can be found. Personal websites are a good place to explore the author’s connections by following the links and looking for their name within the organization’s personnel.
Janie L. Hermann: I could not find much information about her when I plugged her name into Google. On her blogger profile it stated her occupation was the Technology Training Librarian for Princeton Public Library in New Jersey. It also lists some of her former positions which are all library-related.
Robert Lackie: Using Google I found the University website where he teaches (Rider University) and it lists his various qualifications and his position at the university (Associate professor librarian). His blogger profile also offers many links to his various other projects that can be verified if needed.
Marie Radford: Again using Google I came upon her profile at the Rutgers university (located in NJ) website where she is an Associate Professor and library consultant. There are many other links here to her other connections in order to do a more extensive background check.
Amy Kearns: Her personal website came up first on a Google search and was also listed in her blogger profile. It states that she is the Program Coordinator at the Central Jersey Regional Library Cooperative and a part-time lecturer at the School of Communication, Information and Library studies at Rutgers University. Though she states this on her personal site, I had trouble finding her name or profile on either of their websites.
Tyler Rousseau: His blogger profile states that he is a “Young Adult Librarian at Lakewood Branch of the Ocean County Library system” but I could not find a direct link to his employer’s site where his name would be listed. The Google search did have his name come up quite often from other library-related blogs.
Cynthia Lambert: There was rather scant information about her day job as a Librarian, with there being no links from her blogger profile and not much in the way of anything turned up on Google when performing searches under her name.
Overall, the blog is contributed to by Librarians from different levels which gives a variety of perspectives and a diversity of content. Each of them seems to be qualified to speak about the topics they cover in the blog, judging by their association with various reputable library institutions.
2) Publisher/Author Affiliations (Andrew)
The contributors to Library Garden seem to be under no affiliation with any particular company. They seem to be a collective of individuals from the New Jersey area from different library backgrounds who want to explore the commonalities among all librarians and chronicle the potential changes technology will have on Libraries in the future. I could not see any collective group affiliation anywhere on the blog, though each member is part of various Library committees and groups on their own.
3) Scope/Content (Tina and Narges)
Tina: The Library Garden blog is an informal space on the site claiming to exist for librarians to explore a variety of topics via a diversity of perspectives. The scope of the site is represented by the links that are posted on the home page; anything from a professional slide presentation, a highly personalized blog/diary entry by one of the librarian contributors, technological knowledgeable. The tone of the posts can be playful, humorous, dry, academic, and sometimes mixes all of these.
There are excellent articles for the burgeoning library technician, sometimes too advanced for beginners, but again a wide enough range to almost please everybody. (You can’t please all of the lib. techs. all of the time.)
Narges: Most articles and facts that have been discussed come with reference either from Magazine or from a person, which you can search the details by clicking on them.
4) Accuracy and Reliability (Tina)
Being an informal blog that includes opinion pieces, there are not always sources presented. A most recent example being an article about Sarah Palin and book banning where there were both unsubstantiated and substantiated facts. It was a case of some people relaying information they heard from someone else who heard from someone else….And others posting a sourced article to be commented on. At least one posted article is a homemade survey to find out how much emailing library workers engage in as opposed to other industries, that’s a built-in source!
Perusing through various posts showed some other sources with similar facts; i.e. Tech Talk Blog (http://www.princetonlibrary.org/techtalks/), some Technorati links that are related, the Educator’s Reference Desk (http://www.eduref.org/), School Library Journal http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/, as well as regularly adding a link to the full article of an excerpt used. Though many links will follow different formats, maybe being more formal, the same information is often reported.
5) Audience (Narges)
The blog discussed mostly general library issues not much technical related topics. In my opinion the blog did not cover all the topics at the level to suits wide range of project searches. Regarding the comments on the blog, I checked the month of September and found that they consisted of the general public and some of the Blog contributors themselves. I didn’t find this part as strong as it has to be.
6) Currency/ Volume (Andrew)
The blog seems to be updated fairly regularly, with the frequency of posts being one or two per week and sometimes more. There doesn’t seem to be any schedule to the blog posts, with some coming two days apart and other times 10 days apart. It seems that the contributors only make posts when they have something worthwhile to share with the blog’s readers. The posts are seldom slight, and usually produce a small discussion (around 10 comments on average) in the comments area. The most current post was on September the 16th of 2008 and the first post ever was on February 17th 2006.
September 21, 2008
Activity: Practice Evaluating a Blog
These are the interesting facts we found regarding the Library Garden blog site at: “http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
Authority: Most of the blogs were written by librarians or people with occupations related to library work, program coordinators and teacher librarians. Some articles were written by bloggers whose identity or credentials could not be found anywhere.
Publisher/Author: The publisher is affiliated with libraries of differing perspectives: public, academic, school and youth.
Scope/Content: It is mostly informal discussion with links to journal articles or events that had taken place in communities and sometimes there were links to related topics of research. We found that there was a lot of advertising of products related to IT.
Accuracy and Reliability: The author indicates sources for facts being presented especially regarding anything to do with upcoming technology or statistics and surveys conducted and their outcomes. Some links did not have access to a blog so we found it to be inconsistent. The blogs were presented by librarians and visited by library staff, with concerns regarding their patrons’ best interest in mind.
Currency/Volume: We found that the blogs were updated twice a month and the latest updates we found were posted on September 16 and 17, 2008 which is quite current. Many blogs had limited audience participation, mostly “lurkers” just fishing for information.
Nimisha Kuber
Joanne Dawe
Library Garden Evaluation
Authority:
There are seven authors of this blog. They have each included their profiles for readers to peruse. After reading the individual profiles, I conclude that they are what they represent themselves to be, professionals in the library business.
Peter Bromberg – Although Peter’s profile on the librarygarden blog states he is ‘just a simple librarian’, if one goes to his website and reads his profile , he is responsible in his job, for providing continuing education opportunities for library staff. In addition, he has been significantly involved in the American Library Association (ALA) for several years. I verified this information by going to both the South Jersey Library Cooperative website HYPERLINK "http://www.sjrlc.org/aboutsjr.shtml" http://www.sjrlc.org/aboutsjr.shtml and the ALA website HYPERLINK "http://www.ala.org/ala/clenert/clenert.cfm" http://www.ala.org/ala/clenert/clenert.cfm.
Janie Hermann is the Technology Training Librarian for Princeton Public Library (NJ). I was able to verify this independently by finding the Princeton Library website and searching on her last name. Indeed, she has posted updates in the ‘Talking Technology’ portion of their website. HYPERLINK "http://www.princetonlibrary.org/techtalks/" http://www.princetonlibrary.org/techtalks/
Robert J. Lackie – is an Associate Professor – Librarian at Rider University in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. I was able to verify this by going to the Rider website HYPERLINK "http://www.rider.edu/15478_6128.htm" http://www.rider.edu/15478_6128.htm. The university website also contains an announcement that Robert won the ALA Ken Haycock award in April 2006, for promoting Librarianship.
Marie L. Radford – is an Associate Professor of Library & Information Science at Rutgers University in New Jersey. HYPERLINK "http://www.acs.rutgers.edu/pls/pdb_p/Pdb_Display.search_results" http://www.acs.rutgers.edu/pls/pdb_p/Pdb_Display.search_results
Amy J. Kearns, MLIS – is the program coordinator for the Central Jersey Regional Library Cooperative HYPERLINK "http://cjrlc.org/breakingnews.htm" http://cjrlc.org/breakingnews.htm and lectures part time at Rutgers University in Library & Information Science HYPERLINK "http://www.acs.rutgers.edu/pls/pdb_p/Pdb_Display.search_results" http://www.acs.rutgers.edu/pls/pdb_p/Pdb_Display.search_results.
Tyler Rousseau works as a Young Adult Librarian in the Ocean County Library System. He is also a member of the Information Technology of the New Jersey Library Association. HYPERLINK "http://www.njla.org/sections/youngadult/minutes.pdf" http://www.njla.org/sections/youngadult/minutes.pdf HYPERLINK "http://njla.pbwiki.org/it" http://njla.pbwiki.org/it
Cynthia Lambert – Her profile states she is a Librarian and she is in Rocky Hill New Jersey. I was unable to verify this, but it is pretty safe to assume that given the credentials of the others, she is known to them.
Publisher/Author Affiliation
Library Garden is published by an editorial team of seven individuals who bring differing perspectives to the blog. The stated goal of the blog is to allow a voice to the many faces of library, i.e. public, academic, youth through the comments by contributing editors. The blog also invites submissions from guest editors and strives to offer interviews with people from the library world.
There does not seem to be a publishing organization involved with this blog, nor any indication that the blog exists to promote a product or act as a soapbox for a cause. Searching the names of the seven participating editors reveals that most of them have other incarnations on the Net, either hosting their own blogs on offshoots in which they are particularly interested, or on websites where they offer expertise in various areas within the library science field. There is a wealth of combined experience and wisdom present with the blog authors; the bios included on the blog include academic credentials which indicate many years of experience and education in many facets of library science.
3. Scope/Content:
Library Garden is a semi-formal blog with articles from the contributing editors who are all librarians, on topics relating to libraries of all types. They have conversations between the contributors, invited guests and also with the readers of the blog. Library Garden also posts interviews with the library community, and invites guest editors to submit works or discussions they would like to be included in.
The links that Library Garden provides can be broken up into two categories: the blogs, journals, wikis and news sites that they permanently link to on the side menu and the articles and links that the editors link to in stories on the blog. The side menu links are made up of sites from library professionals, book lovers, news of the library world, wikis on blogging and tools for organization, and blogs on technology that would interest library enthusiasts. It is a useful resource for anyone who is studying library course, but also it is a fascinating introduction to people who value discussion and information on all sorts of topics.
Accuracy and Reliability:
I reviewed two blog entries for accuracy and reliability:
Blogs that Attract Comments… dated Sept 16. The links in this article worked. The articles linked to, are authoritative.
Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) Provides More "What Works" Than You Probably Knew, dated Aug. 6 2008. This is an article about research databases, in particular, “ERIC” and “The Educators Reference Desk”. All links in the article worked correctly. The information is current and provides a valuable update for those who might need or want to refer to these databases for work or study.
Audience:
Most of the commentors on this blog are academics and professionals working or teaching in the library field. Some could be from the general public as there are anonymous postings and also comments from people who have not included a blogger profile. Following links on some of the commentors shows that many have their own blogs in related fields of interest, including Library 2.0, Youth Services, etc.
In terms of topics, recent posting referred to the attempt by Sarah Palin to have certain books banned from the public library in the town for which she was mayor at the time. The post included an excerpt from a Time Magazine article and asked for opinions regarding government inclusion in library decisions and policy making. This post was open ended, allowing for freedom of thought and expression and did not label the blog as politically left or right.
The most recent post was very appropriate, relating to creating blogs that attracted bloggers who actually post comments. There is reference made to several pertinent articles; the editor who posted this comment was linking anyone reading the post to articles he thought valuable and insightful based on his experience in the field.
Both of the above examples, along with the bloggers posting comments, illustrate that this blog is valuable both for academics, for library professionals working in the field, and for anyone else who is interested in what appears to be a thoughtfully collected, well-written blog about libraries and issues associated with the profession.
6. Currency/Volume:
Library Garden is updated every week or two weeks, with the last update on Sept 16, 2008. This was an article on having a blog “in the active 1%.”
Authors:
Jane-Marie James
Marion Cross
Susan Grant
These are the interesting facts I found regarding the Library Garden blog site at: “http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
Authority: After spending some time reading and evaluating the Library Garden blog I discovered that there was not one author but a team of seven editors, all working together to give insight to the ever changing Library world. Each editor is either a Librarian or Library professor in the public, academic or archives segment of the library system.Most of the blogs were written by librarians or people with occupations related to library work, program coordinators and teacher librarians. I found some articles written by bloggers whose identity or credentials could not be found anywhere.
Publisher is affiliated with libraries of differing perspectives: public, academic, school and youth.
Scope: mostly informal discussion with links to journal articles or events that had taken place in communities and sometimes there were links to related topics of research. I found that there was a lot of advertising of products related to IT.
Accuracy and reliability: the author does indicate sources for facts being presented especially regarding anything to do with upcoming technology or statistics and surveys conducted and their outcomes. Some links did not have access to a blog so I found it to be inconsistent.
Audience: the blogs were presented by librarians and visited by library staff, with concerns regarding their patrons’ best interest in mind.
Currency/Volume: I found that the blogs were updated monthly and the latest update I found was posted on September 16, 2008 which is quite current. Many blogs had limited audience participation, mostly “lurkers” just fishing for information.
Presented by: Nimisha Kuber & Joanne Dawe
librarygarden.blogspot.com
Review by Randy Wick, Susan McCowan, Elizabeth Alexander
This blog is authored by 7 people, 5 of them librarians, who mostly work at universities and live in the New Jersey area. There are also occasional guest posts. This blog is not associated with any particular institution. The stated goal of the blog is to have an "ongoing conversation among librarians with differing perspectives (public, academic, school, consortial, youth) but one shared goal: ensuring the health and relevance of libraries".
Although that seems almost too broad, the focus is mostly on the use of Web 2.0 tools, and other online resources to connect libraries to the community. They also indicate a preference for interviews over articles, which are interesting but unfortunately not numerous - more would definitely be welcomed.
Like most blogs, there are many links to external articles, which are often from major publications. There are also posts that survey their readers on issues of interest and give tabulated results. However, this blog is not primarily technical, and most of the posts are personal reflections on the use of technology.
Library Garden is updated fairly regularly, maybe 6-10 times/month, with old posts available in the Archives. It has a layout which is very eyecatching, without any excessive animation that bogs down the loading of some sites. It seems to be a popular site, with about 3700 readers according to Feedburner.
Library Garden
http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
1. Authority:
The Library Garden blog is written and maintained by a group of individuals: Peter Bromberg, librarian; Janie Hermann, Technology Training librarian; Robert J. Lackie, Professor-Librarian; Marie L. Radford, Associate Professor for the Library Department; Amy J. Kearns, Program Coordinator; Tyler Rousseau, Librarian; and Cynthia Lambert, who is also a Librarian.
2. Publisher/Author Affiliation:
As there are many authors that are located all over New Jersey, I do not feel that affiliation to an organization is relevant. Unless of course we are referring to being affiliated with libraries, of which they are all guilty.
3. Scope/Content:
This blog publishes articles on books, current events, and any information the authors find interesting. The entries are very well written, and obviously they come from experienced writers. I didn’t find the entries particularly formal, and the comments posted were very warm and open.
4. Accuracy and Reliability:
Many of the blog articles are objectively stated, and the articles that make reference to another article or video usually have a link to the original source.
5. Audience:
This blog is very open to all types of readers, not strictly librarians or library types. There are articles about current events, books, websites, and other areas of interest.
6. Currency/Volume:
The blog is updated regularly and frequently and there are many comments at all times.
Natasha, Morgan, Joel
ibrary Garden:
1. Name: Library Garden URL: http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
2. Authority: excellent background information offered on blog authors. Not only do they include a brief bio, including credentials and interests of the authors, they provide links to their web pages and their contact info and pictures! Katherine searched a random blogger, Robert J. Lackie, and found his teaching website and articles which was written for other web sites. At the end of each article is a link to write to the author.
3.Publisher/Author affiliation: each of the contributing editors comes from a different background within the library system (public, academic, youth, etc.), but their common ground in the fact that they're from New Jersey. The site in lisenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License, which specifies that the users are free to publish as they see for as long as they are legitimately in the field that they claim to be in and that they are non-profit.
Some biases that a bloggers might experience are:
*its invested in New Jersey
*their are separate positions
However, these are not overwhelming issues in regards to a New Jersey library blog. :)
4. Scope/content: It's hard to tell if this is formal or informal. Some of the blogs are a little more formal in tone than others, but everything is accessible and not overly academic. The authors provide links to several sites, including journals and other blogs.
5. Accuracy: the linked references which Katherine reviewed was functioning we’ll and come from a huge variety of sources. The works used in the Library Garden blog are all correctly referenced and provide the relevant backups to their sources.
6. Audience: very accessible. This blog is open to the general public and anyone could read this site without being overwhelmed by library or blogger jargon. Our group noticed that the latest articles included links to "technorati tags", terms that have to do with blogging or library references. Very nice touch.
7. Currency/volume: updated regulary. Given the specific nature of the site and the amount of links and research involved, there seems to be a new posting 1-3 weeks, varying. The last post was September 16, about 2 weeks after the preceding.
Katherine McAdams, Stephanie Jit & Colette Helm
Practice Evaluating Blog (06)
Contribution to Exercise:
The Library Garden http://librarygarden.blogspot.com/
Library Garden is run by a team of contributors headed by Peter Bromberg
1&2. AUTHORITY/AFFILIATIONS
Information on:
http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6535117.html regarding Library Garden contributor Peter Bromberg
Bromberg's day-to-day work is transforming librarians. He delivers what Rider University librarian Robert Lackie calls “state-of-the-art technology training programs and staff development opportunities for SJRLC's 630 member libraries.” He coaches librarians as they move into leadership positions and shares best practices on blogs, wikis, electronic discussion lists, and chat.
Vitals
CURRENT POSITION Assistant Director, South Jersey Regional Library Cooperative, Gibbsboro, NJ
DEGREE MLS, Rutgers School of Communication, Information and Library Studies, 1992
24/7 REFERENCE QandANJ.org
BLOGS librarygarden.blogspot.com; cebuzz.wordpress.com
BIASES: articles reviewed seem to be of a varying topic nature.
3. PURPOSE: as quoted from Library Garden’s Home page; “An ongoing conversation among libraries with differing perspectives…but one shared goal: ensuring the health and relevance of libraries.
4. ACCURACY/RELIABILITY: at the end of each blog post there are numerous links for fact sources (ie Technorati) as well as link to related topics and contacts
5. AUDIENCE: blog deals with subjects relevant to books/library work and seems to be easy to navigate.
Commentators on the blog are often listed by first name with no reference to their affiliation.
6. CURRENCY/VOLUME: blog appears to be updated at least weekly with comment postings daily
group of cheryl, kym & darciesn
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