Because we’re talking about immersion this week, my Vista post dealt with my own experiences in Second Life. I’ll sum it up: while it was an interesting experience, I don’t think that I would use this immersive environment again. Long story short, I found the experience to be rather stilted (although some of the blame can be put on my computer) and I don’t enjoy gaming or RPG anyway. However, I am aware that Second Life has a large group of users – some estimate that there are 750,000 registered Second Life users, although not all of these users sign-on frequently. One group of users is particularly interesting to me – can you guess which?
Yep, it’s librarians! I read Marilyn Johnson’s lukewarm This Book Is Overdue: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All and found that one of the more interesting chapters was about librarians in Second Life. Johnson seemed to believe that it was necessary that librarians make their presence known in virtual worlds, but I’m on the fence. After all, if virtual users want to reach a librarian, why not simply find a library with email or IM services and get in touch with them? However, I understand that some librarians are quite interested in making information services available everywhere (a noble and valid goal). Because of the rather low number of users in Second Life, though, I don’t feel that librarians (in most cases) should be paid to work a Second Life reference desk. I appreciate that there are librarians who enjoy working in Second Life, but I think that this is best left as a volunteer position. When I used Second Life, I visited Info Island (here’s a short YouTube video about it) and didn’t get the impression that it was an incredibly popular, well-used service. Again, I applaud librarians who answer questions across all platforms, real and virtual, but don’t think a Second Life librarians meets any unmet needs.
While I don’t feel as though I’ll be a Second Life librarian, I would love to hear from anyone that has experience providing or receiving reference services in Second Life. Please, comment away!
P.S. As it’s the end of the semester, I’d just like to take a moment to thank all of my classmates for their thought-provoking comments on my blog, and for the incredibly intelligent and interesting posts on their own blogs. I’ve enjoyed this experience and will try to blog about a library-related topic of interest to me once a week throughout the next couple of semesters. Please feel free to continue to comment!
4 replies on “Does Second Life Need Librarians?”
Thank for your post about second life!
After trying Second life out, I quickly realised it’s not for me nor do I know many people in my personal, work and/or online life that use it. I find it serves a particular community of users, yet does not reflect the majority of people interacting online.
I’m a librarian that chooses not to be on second life, yet support colleagues of mine that enjoy building a librarian identity on SL. I guess in many ways, I would rather be tweeting or blogging. That’s the beauty of being online and librarians – the tools we use are diverse as we are…what does not work for one person, is another person’s pleasure…
Maggie, have you explored other visual worlds? I personally tend to want to look at the more serious sites, namely ones that have a stronger focus in a certain subject area, namely education. The Croquet Project has some interesting possiblities, where 3-D modeling is exploited for relevant disciplines. Biology, architecture, and CAD just to name a few. How might something like this fit in with information agencies?
Hi Patty!
Thanks for your comment. No, I have not explored other worlds. I am very interested in checking out the sites/worlds that you listed, because they seem to have more structure. While I’m not completely against having librarians in virtual worlds, it seems to me that their presence in Second Life is not well understood or utilized. However, I agree that there is enormous potential for librarians to enter other virtual worlds, and to be very useful in them. To me, it all depends on whether or not there is a pre-determined purpose for the librarian and the users in the virtual world.
I’ll check out your recommendations and maybe we’ll have a chance to chat about them at SLAIS in only a few weeks!
Maggie
I agree with your point re: paid work/volunteering. Unless the library (employer) has done sufficient needs analysis and has determined that establishing a second life presence is an effective use of staff hours, volunteers only please. Is an hour of reference service on second life worth $30-$40/hour to an institution?