Wow, what a great tip that almost-ALA-president-elect Leslie Burger has a blog. I believe it’s possible to be technically literate, a good leader, and not have a blog. But I love that she grasps her role as communicator and is flexing her blog muscle accordingly. (I supported Christine Hage for ALA president, and only regret ALA pitted two great librarians against one another.)
Now, in all fairness, to say Leslie blogs is a little bit of a stretch. I see a month between posts, which even by Samuel Johnson’s standards–once or twice a week–doesn’t exactly feel like blogging. Plus she needs to get Her People to fix the blog’s title, since she’s already elected. But I expect that she’ll warm up soon.
Three reasons you gotta subscribe to Leslie’s blog:
1. She’s really strong on issues such as intellectual freedom.
2. You get a bird’s-eye view of ALA activities.
3. She listens to NPR and lives on the East Coast–which means she’s blogging good stuff hours before most of us on this coast are up. A nice early-warning indicator of hot topics!
O.k., and you know the fourth already: to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Several tips for Leslie:
1. Don’t feel you have to blog every day. But if you’re going to maintain a blog, don’t wait months between posts.
2. Collar some techy to make your blog a little more accessible. You’re using pixels for font sizes, which means the font can’t be enlarged in Internet Explorer. Also, your default font is a bit eensy.
3. Don’t be shy about photos with captions, or quick how-they-done-it good examples such as links to library blogs. Both are great ways to do good “content” without a lot of writing… and there’s nothing wrong with that.
4. If you are so moved, share some of your travels and travails. What’s it like to be the almost-president-elect? Do you get stuck in airports, have some fun hotel room experiences (at LITA’s last meeting, where we stayed at the Hotel Monaco, Pat Mullins was able to request a live goldfish for his room), or even some less-than-stellar moments? How about pictures of your audiences?
5. In looking at it, maybe more than the title of that blog needs to change… consider leslieburger.org, or something like it.
Back to using notoriously inefficient search engines to instantaneously request complex texts, which when I get them in three or four days, due to the magic of the Internet and Link Plus, will require Sustained Reading to fully grasp.
Posted on this day, other years:
- Thirty years later, Harvey lives on - 2009
- NASIG 2007 Presentation: State of Emergency - 2007
- Free Range Librarian for Rent - 2007
- entry - 2004
- Test Entry - 2004
- Amazon's Plogs - 2004
- Comment Registration, Again - 2004
When LISNews linked to Ms. Burger’s blog during the election, I commented thusly: “When I went over to check out Ms. Burger’s blog, I was a bit discouraged that not a single comment had been added to any of her posts. Perhaps this is just lack of exposure, but I think we need to support the efforts of the new Prez-Elect towards being open-minded, transparent and forward-thinking. Not that the mere existence of a weblog indicates the manifestation of any of these traits, but regular interaction with the LIS blogosphere will certainly stimulate thinking in that direction. Or am I wrong?” Sadly, one month later, there are only two comments in the entirety of her postings. One of them is from me. If we hope/expect “people in high places” to take an active and ongoing interest in the blogosphere, then shouldn’t we try to be more encouraging (or at least engaging) when they make those forays themselves?
Thank you, Karen and Greg, and Leslie. I was happy to subscribe to Burger for ALA after seeing it on LISNews. I was frustrated by the lack of postings, and thought about unsubscribing as it seemed to be dying on the vine. It would be great to see some more activity, and at least some of the changes Karen suggests. I can’t offer assistance, but I do want to offer encouragement.