explodedlibrary.info

random thoughts about the end of Google Reader

• It's an understatement to say that Google is a rich and powerful company on the internet. Google is reputed to be a very smart company. Scrapping the Google Reader seems to be a public declaration that the days of blogging are numbered. Once I move on from feeling sad about this, and feeling annoyed about the disruption it will cause in my life, I wonder if it will also be a good thing for blogs to be slightly extricated from Google. This company is not infallible - I remember Google Buzz and other misteps.
• It's interesting that Google's focus on Google+ has been provided as the real reason why the Google Reader is being discontinued. I used to use the liking and sharing features on Google Reader, but stopped using these when they were assimilated into Google+. There is no way that I'll be using Google+ more when Google Reader is gone.
• Feedburner will be next - I wonder if losing the Google Reader and Feedburner will cause any disruption in libraries, particularly special libraries?
• Twitter is not the answer - at least for my blog reading. I always appreciate it when people tweet about a new blog post, but the chance that I will always see these tweets is zero. I simply subscribe to too many feeds and I'm not in a work environment where I can keep an eye on them all day. The upshot is that I miss a lot of stuff. Google Reader and other dedicated blog readers made it possible infrequent  readers like me not to miss things. In Twitter and Facebook, the ethos seems to be, "you snooze, you lose."
• I think I'll give NetNewsWire for Mac another go. I used to like it back in the day (2002-04) when it was my main way of reading blogs before I switched to Bloglines and then Google Reader. Although I like Flipboard and other tablet apps, for me it's more important that my blog reading happens in an environment which also allows me to write blog posts (should I feel inspired to do so).
• I don't cull my blog subscriptions frequently. It's not an activity I particularly enjoy, but I have decided to give my subscriptions an autumn cleaning before I leave the Google Reader. There's no point in subscribing to blogs which have become infested with spam posts or haven't been updated since 2007. I'm an occasional blogger and I can make all sorts of arguments that there is no downside to subscribing to an infrequent blogger in RSS, but even I have my limits, and for me that's twelve months. If you haven't posted in a year, I'll assume that you're no longer blogging. I'll also be dropping a few blogs which may still be active, but which I have drifted from in the last few years.
• At first I was shocked when I heard the news about the Google Reader, then angry and then depressed. Now I feel ok about it. Google was so dominant with its Google Reader, I am glad that there will be some diversity in this space again.
• Nonetheless, I will miss using the Google Reader. It was very well done, especially before they integrated it with Google+. But I am also glad that one part of my online life will not be completely dependent on Google.
• When I first started blogging over ten years ago, I was very aware of the disjunction between my online life and everyone else in my life. At the time this disjunction annoyed and frustrated me. But over the years it has gradually eroded and has virtually disappeared, thanks to the likes of Facebook and Twitter. Now I kind of miss how it was in those early years when things weren't so integrated. I wonder if this is just regular nostalgia, or could it be that there's something positive to be said for a more fractured life?

alternate realities

[Photo credit: tfangel on flickr, Creative Commons License]

One of my hobbies outside of blogging is gaming. It goes way back for me, from ancient computer games like Wizardry and Ultima III to online games (MMOs) like World of Warcraft (WoW). I have some ambivalence about the role of gaming in my life. It’s possible that if I didn’t spend time on gaming that I’d be a better person in some way - doing more creative writing, more blogging, getting more exercise, doing something amazing in the world. It’s also possible that if I didn’t do gaming, I’d just waste time on something else.

Then I think about the beginning of Mary Oliver’s Wild Geese, one of my favourite poems.
“You do not have to be good. / You do not have to walk on your knees / For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. / You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves”
When I think about lines like this, I think that what’s important is passion, and we are fools to stifle this. And it doesn’t matter if other people approve or not.

So I’ve decided to accept gaming in my life, acknowledging its potential to consume too much of my free time and work to keep it under control and in balance.

The good thing about this is that leaves me open to experience some amazing games which can only be described as artistic. Do many people dispute that film and TV can be artistic media these days? It’s happening with games. Think movies with beautiful cinematography, compelling plots, well written and voiced characters, but with the innovation that they are also interactive, where you decide if your character will be hero or villain and what they do. It’s true there are a lot of crap games out there, just like there are crap films, TV shows, novels, blogs, paintings, plays, poems, you name it. The artistic spark is in this new media, and I think that it’s sad that so many people have decided games are just frivolous time wasters. Similar things were said about novels when they were new.

This blog is not going to morph into a gaming blog, but I have decided that it’s time to break down the barriers I’ve made which separate my gaming interests from my other interests.

I’ve been spending a bit of time on the Secret World lately. After playing games like World of Warcraft for years, it’s refreshing to play an MMO with a contemporary setting, with no Elves, Dwarves, Orcs and Trolls. Playing the Secret World is like being able to live in the Buffyverse or a gory zombie invasion. Although I have never been a big fan of games involving puzzles, I like how the Secret World has included some missions with puzzle elements. It creates a more diverse questing experience, and work well with the recurring themes of espionage and hidden knowledge.

I really like how the Secret World does factions. I was getting tired of the absolute factions which exist in WoW, where the Alliance and the Horde are at war with each other, and it’s impossible to meaningfully communicate with members of the opposing faction or enter their cities without being killed on sight. Factions in WoW have become an annoying zero sum game and it doesn’t help me that the most recent expansion, Mists of Pandaria, has a particular focus on the inter-faction conflict. Factions are less absolute in the Secret World. The choice is one of three secret societies, each with its own flavour. It’s possible to talk with members of the other factions, and even group up and run instances with them. Faction only really seems matter in the voluntary PVP battlegrounds.

The Secret World is not without its faults. I have not found its crafting system to be particularly fun or rewarding - maybe that will change as I progress further in the game. Several commentators have found its combat system unsatisfactory and difficult. As someone who has played WoW for several years and witnessed what happened to the game’s culture when everything was progressively made easier, I don’t mind the challenge of the Secret World’s combat system. I am not quite used to character progression that is without levels and clearly defined classes, but still appreciate that they’ve made a game which is quite different.

But I’m not in the mood for gaming tonight. For the first time in a while, I’m drawn to poetry.

confession of a lapsed Apple fan boy

There was a period of time when I was quite the Apple fan boy. I have bought Apple computers exclusively since 2001. I have grown up with Apple computers, starting with an Apple 2+ and then the first Macintosh computers. I have tried to stay out of the which platform is better arguments. It’s not that I have anything against PCs, but the Mac have always seemed to suit my needs better.

That changed the other day when I bought a Windows PC.

The decision to buy a computer is an interesting purchasing decision. Although PCs are no longer our exclusive gateways to the internet, thanks to smart phones and tablets, they provide the deepest connection - at least from my point of view. Although it is possible for me to blog from my iPhone or iPad, it's not ideal, and definitely not my first choice for writing. The same applies with games - there are some great games for smart phones and tablets, but they are not the same or as immersive as the games you can get on consoles or desktop / laptop computers.

I think about how many angry words on internet discussion boards have been spilled about whether Macs or PCs are better. How many people have been involved in these arguments, and how much time has been wasted following and participating in these arguments? The internet is full of these arguments. Scratch any topic and there will be an equivalent and it’s likely that it will have some similar unresolvable controversial fault line - but that's a post for another day.

Although I’m buying a Windows PC, it doesn’t mean that I hate Apple or the computers which I’ve bought over the years. The reasons for this change are not particularly profound. I wanted a computer for gaming - I was tired of the limited gaming choices I had on the Mac and I was also tired of paying the premium which makes Macs automatically significantly more expensive than an equivalent Windows computer. Yes, the design of Macs and their operating system is exceptional. It almost leads to the computer being enjoyable to use in its own right. But I’ve decided that I no longer need this. It’s ok if a computer is a just a tool which allows me to run various software, especially if such a computer gives me a lot more bang for my buck.

Related to this is that I have become increasingly disenchanted with Apple’s arrogance. I expressed some of this in a post over two years ago, and the problem has worsened since then. The Apple Maps debacle has caused me to consider whether I want to be so dependent on a company which has done such a stupid thing, seemingly motivated by vindictiveness against Google and a complete disregard for what it best for its customers.

So I’ve made my decision, and I’m not regretting it. For the first time I’ve chosen not a buy a brand name computer at all, but one built for me at a local computer shop. It’s nice to know that if I have any problems with it, I can take the computer to be fixed by the guy who assembled it, rather than putting up with more remote support hell.

My new no name computer is powerful (compared with what I had before) and wasn’t that expensive. It didn’t come arrive in a box which made me feel special even as I was opening it, but my impression is that the components are of a higher quality. The Mac wins hands down when it comes to marketing and packaging, and that’s fine.

enantiodromia and values

A year ago, I was at the heart of Australian law librarianship when I assisted with the 2011 national conference in Canberra. This year, not only didn’t I attend for the first time in four years, but I didn’t even follow it on Twitter. It reminds me of enantiodroima, a concept that was one of themes of Brian Aldiss’ Helliconia trilogy. Described as the process “by which things constantly turn in to their opposite.” At the moment when it appeared that I was most involved with law libraries and the professional association, I was actually on a trajectory which would take me beyond the periphery of law libraries.

It’s not as if I had any qualms about attending this year’s conference in Brisbane - which I would have loved to attend because two former colleagues of mine were giving papers and I know they would have been great. 

The real reason is I’m not working as a law librarian, or any other type of librarian right now. I’ve written about this already. If this years blogging has a theme, this is it.

Tonight I’m going to write about two things I’ve noticed about this change. 

The first thing is that I’m still glad that I made this change. Working in libraries can be great, but if you ever faced with choosing between a dysfunctional library which is not amenable to improvement and a good job somewhere else, leave the library. What’s interesting is that I’ve been in my new job long enough that I’m gradually developing subject specific knowledge. The more of this knowledge I get, the more valuable I find it when combined with the generalist research skills I developed as a librarian. The synergy between regulatory policy work and “thinking like a librarian” is not as obvious as the “thinking like a lawyer” connection, but it’s there and it gives me a unique perspective.

The second thing is that I didn’t appreciate, when working as a librarian, just how protected I was from getting my hands dirty. Most of the time when I did legal reference in the big law firm, I had no idea what my specific research was really contributing to. And if I did know, it was fairly superficial knowledge. It seemed that my job was to gather components - statutes, cases, articles and other useful things - which somebody else would work with and build into something tangible.

Now I am that somebody else. The work is different and exciting, but I am keenly aware of the outcomes and how my work contributes to those outcomes. The work is more demanding intellectually and emotionally. When it leads to an outcome which I like, it’s extremely rewarding, but there are times when the work leads inexorably to an outcome at odds with my own values - that’s when I feel that I have dirty hands.

There have been instances where I have needed to sublimate my own values in favour of my employer’s, and make arguments which - on a personal basis - I am completely opposed to. This is just a part of the job and being a professional. I had no idea how right I was four and a half years ago when I pondered in the law firm library, “maybe this lack of context is a mercy”?

ten years ago

Handwritten version of this post

It's been ten years since I started blogging. It wasn't this blog and I didn't call it blogging at first, but that's what it was. I was writing directly online, where anyone could read my words - which were published in reverse chronological order. Everything about this new medium excited me back then.

Now I'm excited by the act of writing this post on paper, in long hand with a fountain pen. It seems almost subversive.

This form of writing is not new to me - not exactly. I've been using word processors for writing since I was in grade 6. Back then I was an early adopter - the first kid in my class to hand in a piece of creative writing printed by a jagged dot matrix printer.

Since then I've done most of my writing on computers. I've liked it and it's seemed to work for me. The only exceptions have been my diaries which I started in 1988 and stopped ten years ago, in 2002, when I started blogging.

I've been thinking if I'd like to blog during every day in June, as I did (well, tried) last year. I won't. For one thing, I'm getting married on June 6 and after that I'll be on a honeymoon for a couple more weeks. It's going to be a busy time. I'll probably be connected to the internet via my iPhone for most of my travels, and so it would be possible to do something. But I think I'll keep an old fashioned travel diary and send the occasional tweet.

2012 is proving to be a very big year.

• I've had not just a job change but a career change
• One of those scary milestone birthdays
• Getting married
• And now, a strong questioning of the method of writing which has underpinned my blogging for the last ten years

I've just finished reading the Shallows. I found it both insightful and disturbing. Its premise resonated for me. I had hoped that it would end with some ideas about how to constructively deal with the situation we're in. Maybe it was the author's intention that each reader should contemplate these things for him/herself.

My initial reaction is that it's pointless to consider turning back the clock to how things were 20 years. No, that's crazy neo-Luddite talk. I'm more interested in reaching some balance in how I personally engage with the internet. I would like to relearn different ways of writing and thinking which don't involve internet-connected computers, tablet devices or smart phones. I could never imagine abandoning those devices, but I'd like not to be so completely dependent on them.

first impressions

really reading

 One of the most annoying annoying thing anyone can say to a librarian is this: “Oh, so you work in a library? That’s great, it must be really nice to be able to spend your whole day reading.”

 No, it really doesn’t work like this. Librarians are so busy guiding their clients to information, that it is very rare that they have the luxury of reading a book or article from start to finish, deeply, with no skimming. It’s different in my new job - having a deep understanding of the details is what I need to have. This doesn’t happen by osmosis. It comes from in-depth reading.

 

print is not dead 

As a librarian it used to annoy me when people would insist that they needed the printed annual volume of the Corporations Act or the Income Tax Assessment Act or the Competition and Consumer Act. We have it all online, I would say, with hyperlinks to great commentary and other bells and whistles. I was often disappointed with the response. 

Now I’m starting to see the other point of view. If you need to return again and again to particular sections of your Act, and you have those sections flagged, it’s faster to just use the books. I’m no slouch when it comes to using online materials - I’ve discreetly raced my new colleagues when they’re looking up a section of our Act. By the time it takes me to get to the Library page on the intranet, navigate to the relevant database and look up a section, if all goes well for me, they’ve been reading their section for about 30 seconds.

Although the better legal databases make it easier to see the context of a particular section in legislation, it’s hard to beat just turning to the next page or the previous page.

 

no more existential angst

 Given that there’s often some personal angst in job changes and career changes, I wasn’t aware of this change at first. But I’m starting to notice this, and it is amazing. I no longer feel that I have to constantly justify my existence. This is the worst thing about being a librarian, and it’s huge relief to be free of it!

The questions have been similar in the last five libraries I’ve worked in - “why do you need so many staff, why do you need so much space, do you have to pay for all these books, journals and databases, can the library really help me / my department / my organization?”

I know, each of these questions poses a challenge, and each challenge is actually an opportunity and we should embrace these opportunities with a positive attitude. Because sometimes you (or your team) can answer these challenges successfully and it’s great. I’ve also been on the losing end and have worked in libraries which have lost most of their space or have been merged out of existence. I’m not going to turn this into a “future of libraries” post, I’m just making the observation that whether we’re winning or losing these challenges, it’s exhausting and I can’t see an end in sight - that one glorious day everybody will realize how terribly wrong they were to think that Google or wikipedia or something else could replace librarians, and so we could all live happily ever after.

The work I do in my new job is very specific and if my team doesn’t do it, nobody will. It’s not going to be outsourced and it’s not going to go away. There won’t be too many quiet moments, but if there are any, I’m going to savour them, knowing that at some point it will be extremely busy.

The existential angst I had in libraries was worst on the quiet days. They were slightly tinged with dread and guilt - that things were quiet because we had done a bad job with our marketing.

preparing to leave libraryland

Ok, first things first. The possibility which I was writing about in my last post has become real. I have been offered - and have accepted - a job outside of libraries. I’m feeling both excitement and trepidation about this. It’s similar to how I felt when I first decided to move from Australia to the USA.

I am packing my bags and moving from Libraryland to Regulatoryland*. I don’t know if I’ll return to Libraryland or not, but I’m planning on taking my new life in Regulatoryland seriously. I’m certainly not visiting for a short holiday.

Although sometimes I have been pessimistic about the future of libraries, those notions are not what is driving this decision. It’s ultimately a personal choice about what is best for me at this moment. The bigger questions about the future of librarians are just background.

How can I continue to maintain a blog called the exploded library if I am not actually working in a library?
This blog has rarely been about my day-to-day work in a library. It’s been more about various ideas seen through a library-related lens. That’s unlikely to change, because for the time being I’ll keep my librarian’s perspective - it’s who I am. The difference is that now I’ll be someone who uses libraries, and who cares a lot about libraries. I will represent that important but sometimes challenging client, the librarian client.

Until next Thursday, I’m working at the Australian Taxation Office’s library. The ATO** is a very large organization - employing over 25,000 people. Serving that many potential clients is not easy, and so something the ATO Library is constantly doing is getting into the heads of our clients (and potential clients), to work out better ways of helping them do their work. In my current position, it would be very helpful know what a very engaged user is thinking about library-related issues. That’s something I may be doing here in this blog.

This blog is about to enter a busy period, as it does occasionally. There are quite a few ideas for posts floating around in my head, which I’d like to write down before I start my new job. This means I’ll be posting every other day for the next two weeks or so.


*Because of how I interpret the APSC social media rules, it’s better if I don’t disclose here which agency I’ll be working for. It’s just simpler this way.

**My experience of working for a tax collecting agency will be something I’m blogging about soon.

the path not taken

I’ve been fortunate to work as a librarian in libraries for most of my career. There have been three exceptions, and they corresponded with particular transitional moments in my life.

[If you’re curious about the three exceptions]

Now I’m seriously considering a job outside of libraries. This would be the first time I’ve deliberately left a library job to work in a position that is not library related.

I do this with some trepidation. Why am I considering something like this?

I feel that I’m approaching the point in my career and age where it’s going to start to become difficult to change careers. If I want to try something different, I should try it now, or it may not happen, and then I’ll be forever wondering about the path not taken.

I have a law degree, and although I find that it gives me a good grounding in the legal and tax research which I do in my current job, I’m not using that degree as much as I’d like to.  I do feel frustrated sometimes, that I’m just helping people find information - and then they use it to make decisions and take actions. Being a generalist is great and necessary I think, but a part of me is craving to go really deep into a subject and be a part of that team which is actually using the information to make decisions.

I expect that I may need to work for 30 or so more years. Libraries are definitely changing - and they need to change to survive (I don’t think this idea is controversial any more). I’m realizing that a part of me loves the old school research role. That’s what I really enjoy - the thrill of the chase. I’m worried that this role may become more marginal in libraries. I see the former pillars of the profession - cataloguing, circulation and even reference - in decline, systems continuing to grow and new areas developing. Training is not really new for libraries, but if we do what needs to be done in this space, our training and our libraries may be unrecognizable from what we have today. A commitment to marketing and client management that is deadly serious and overriding. Developing new roles such as co-designing content for clients.

I want to develop a second string for my bow. Just in case libraries change in such a way that the work I really enjoy becomes less important in the future. In previous jobs I’ve locked horns with some librarians who hate how libraries have changed recently, but they don’t feel qualified to do anything else and so they’re just hanging in there until retirement, disengaged and completely miserable - and making their colleagues miserable. I really don’t want to be that sort of librarian in 20-30 years! So I want to be proactive and think about the actual work I’d like to be doing, rather than thinking “I have always been and will always be a librarian, and will go wherever that path takes me.”

It’s not definite yet that my career is changing in this direction, but I’ll know for sure soon. The librarian leaving the exploded library is not necessarily the end of this blog. Who knows, the change could give it a new lease of life.

weather

The 2011 Australian law librarian conference, ACTioning the Law, starts tomorrow afternoon in Canberra. I’m a little worried about the weather. The conference opens with the Publisher’s Panel at the National Library, this is followed by the Welcome Reception at the High Court. Normally it’s a very easy walk, from the National Library just walk past Questacon and the National Portrait Gallery, and you’re at the High Court. But if it’s raining quite heavily, then that won’t be so fun. I suspect that tomorrow morning the organizing committee will be looking into booking taxis or some other contingency plan.

This will be the fourth consecutive law librarian conference I’ve attended. I blogged during both the Perth and Darwin conferences, and I tweeted last year at Melbourne. I’m not sure what I’ll do be doing this year, because it’s different when you’re on the organizing committee. I’ll definitely be maintaining the @actioningthelaw twitter account as well as attending to any urgent updates which need to be made on the conference web site. I’ll be spending some time at the registration desk and the trade show, and if things go well, I’ll be able to enjoy some of the sessions and hopefully tweeting under the @explodedlibrary handle.

I’m really looking forward to catching up with colleagues and former co-workers who are attending from interstate - we know that Canberra is not considered the most exciting venue for a conference and I certainly appreciate every registration.

Right now I’m suffering from some pre-conference nerves, hoping that everything goes ok and if there are any problems (as there are in any conference), that we can respond to them effectively and that people will be forgiving. I expect that it’s going to be crazy few days for me and other people on the committee, but I’m looking forward to enjoying what I can and doing what I can help with whatever comes up.

Being on this conference committee has been my recent excuse for not blogging here lately. That’s about to end too.

why I left the ACCC

[This post cannot be read in isolation. I have also written about why I liked working for the ACCC and the small criticisms which I make here must be read in the context of that post]

If working at the ACCC was so exciting and rewarding, then why did I choose to leave? I’ll need to be circumspect here. The ACCC, like every organization, public or private sector, is not perfect. It’s extremely normal for a place to have a particular external image, but to have negatives which are more apparent to people on the inside. I’m not interested in airing the dirty laundry, but there’s one specific issue I’d like to discuss.

My time at the ACCC has coincided with a period of transition for the organization. It was noticeably smaller even a few years ago. Many of my former co-workers who had been there at that time said that the organization was very different then. It was less bureaucratic and it was easier to know who did what.

Outgoing ACCC chair, Graeme Samuel, gives a helpful summary about how the ACCC has grown during his tenure:

When I first joined the ACCC [eight years ago], we had a budget of $62.5 million a year. That budget is now close to $150 million. The number of staff has increased from something less than 500 individuals to well over 800.
The additional powers and responsibilities entrusted to us range across the board:
 
We have been given, for example:
– new tools under the Australian Consumer Law to protect consumers from dishonest commercial conduct
– substantially enhanced powers to regulate telecommunications, with, most recently, key roles in Telstra’s structural separation and the transition to and operation of the National Broadband Network
– oversight of a new, national product-safety system with the ACCC now being the single national regulator in relation to product safety issues
– oversight of industry codes for the franchising, horticulture and petroleum industries
– enhancements to the laws guarding against businesses abusing their market power to damage rivals; and
– enhancements to laws letting businesses band together in negotiations with, for example, suppliers or buyers of their produce.
We were asked to devise, and now help enforce, rules encouraging the efficient trading of water in the Murray-Darling Basin, so this precious resource can literally flow more readily to its best uses.
– We have been asked by successive governments to undertake various monitoring tasks and to produce reports on various sectors as a way of increasing the transparency of the competitive processes in these industries and sectors.
– We have played an important role in establishing various third party access regimes particularly in important export industries such as wheat and coal.
 
The Australian Energy Regulator within the ACCC started with responsibility for energy generation with separate State regulators being responsible for distribution and retail energy regulation

The problem has been that the ACCC Library has not been allowed to grow with the rest of organization. Its funding and staffing levels have not grown to meet the demands of the ACCC’s increasing responsibilities. If anything things have gone backwards, as the library’s physical collection was downsized in 2010.

One of the difficulties is that in the eyes of decision makers, it is very difficult to see a direct relationship between library resources (staff and databases and physical collection) and the ability of the ACCC to do its mission. I saw that connection every single day, but I can understand how some people would not be inclined to assign such importance to the library.

There’s a prevalent view that disintermediation has already happened. This is the notion that most people do their own research these days so the library’s workload should be lighter now, and its need for resources reduced or steady. That argument assumes that all the necessary research resources are being provided, along with adequate training and support, which is rarely true. I also disagree with the view that disintermediation is this prevalent. I always encouraged people to do their own research when possible, but some people do not have the time and in my mind, their brain power may be better utilised analysing and working with the information.

Forget libraries and librarians for a moment, I am still concerned that ACCC investigators don’t have the research resources to do their work effectively. I have heard stories of ACCC staff with university connections - maybe through a spouse, or being involved in part-time study - using those academic databases for ACCC work because they were so much better than what the ACCC library could afford.

I have heard it said that the ACCC doesn’t need so many research resources because it often has the authority to demand particular information from companies being investigated. The stakes can be very high in these investigations. Companies have been known to provide a distorted picture when it’s in their interest and they don’t think they’ll get caught. That’s when third party research resources come to the fore, verifying this information.

The work which the ACCC does is too important for it be relying on second rate research resources, especially when the law firms who represent the companies which regularly go head to head against the ACCC aren’t so constrained in this manner. I’ve worked for one of those firms and have first hand experience of this difference.

Although working at the ACCC was inspiring, it became increasingly frustrating to know that I couldn’t provide the research service it needed, because it didn’t give me the research tools which I needed.