Ask a Northfield librarian via their new Meebo chat widget; will Twitter be next?

librarian meebo chat windowI have a Meebo chat widget for Locally Grown at the bottom of our LG Live page, below our Twitter widgets.

And I just discovered that the Northfield Public Library has one, too. It’s on their Ask a Librarian page. I used it this week to get a reference question answered and to renew my card. Waaaaaay cool, IMHO.

This will likely make Ross furious, however, as he sees the library as one of the three legs of a stool that anchors downtown (along with the post office and the liquor store). By using this chat tool, I didn’t drive (or bike or walk) downtown to complete this task and then stop by a local downtown store to buy something. Ah well, he probably wants them to disconnect their phones, too, for the same reason. No pleasing that guy.

I hope the library is also considering using Twitter, as these Twittering libraries are doing.

8 Comments

  1. Ross Currier said:

    Well Griff,

    if you’d prefer being hunched over your desk, blinking at your flickering computer screen, in the solitude and semi-darkness of your personal fortress, to leisurely strolling up to that historic Carnegie Library on a sunny day, spending a little quiet time sitting in that beautiful biography room as you flip through the pages considering the possibilities, and then taking your selection down to be checked out by one of the pleasant people working behind the counter…

    …then there’s just no talking with you.

    April 9, 2009
  2. kiffi summa said:

    I MUST agree with Ross… There are entirely too many reasons to put people into some hellacious virtual half-life by electronic communication, rather than real interaction.
    Electronic social networking is a great tool for group communication, distant relatives communication, when-you’re- ill- and -can’t-get-out communication, and other related uses but it CANNOT replace face to face social interaction.

    Look at the sick, Yes I said SICK, use of e-talk by those trolls over at the NFNews site. I know you don’t like the NFNews brought up, Griff, ( except when you bring it up ? ) but look at the destructive mode of social behavior some e- communications can create, especially when the mode is anonymous, and therefore unaccountable.

    Keep e-talk in its productive and rightful spheres, otherwise … get out there, face to face!

    April 9, 2009
  3. Jerry Bilek said:

    why does a kindle owner need a library card?

    April 9, 2009
  4. Mary Rossing said:

    I’m waiting for the punchline, Jerry!

    April 10, 2009
  5. Jerry Bilek said:

    so am I? no twitters no tweets no meebos no library card. Griff?

    Mary, I’ll get two tin cans and some string and we can twitter and tweet all day long.

    April 10, 2009
  6. Griff Wigley said:

    Jerry, we Kindle owners are an oppressed minority so until Amazon out-googles Google and digitizes all the books in this part of the Milky Way, we’ll be forced into occasionally patronizing the institutions that thrive on the rape and pillaging of our forests.

    April 10, 2009
  7. Jerry Bilek said:

    thanks for the update Griff, you made my day.

    I’ll continue to rape and pillage the forests in my used book recycling kind of way. If I’m not in my store you can find me digging through the recycling bin out back looking for old tin cans and string to make my high tech meebo-tweeter communication device. if you want to join in, we could rig up some kind of party line.

    April 10, 2009
  8. David Henson said:

    I now we have “Knol” by Google http://knol.google.com/k to rival Wiki but with real authors

    April 11, 2009

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