UK Public Libraries and Social Networking Services
| Pages | 5-7 |
| Published date | 02 May 2008 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07419050810890602 |
| Date | 02 May 2008 |
| Author | Jim Burton |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science |
UK Public Libraries and Social Networking
Services
Jim Burton
LIBRARY HITECH NEWS Number 4 2008, pp. 5-7, #Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 0741-9058, DOI: 10.1108/07419050810890602 5
Libraries are increasingly seeking to
integrate social interaction and
networking into their services and to
encourage their users to form groups of
interest around topics, authors or books
of interest. The development of Web
2.0, and the growth of social networks,
community-created data, and many-to-
many publishing, has led users and
service providers to perceive that
information provision is at its best as an
interactive, two-way activity. They
expect to be able to provide feedback on
data, be it providing peer reviews,
gaining insight from other experienced
users in the community or even
updating incorrect or outdated
information themselves.
The move towards integrated,
personalised information operates at an
organisational level, as well as at an
individual level. Local Authorities want
a 360view of citizens. Integration of
information through a customer
relationship management system, will
allow staff to better service their citizens
by being able to see all relevant service
and demographic information for each
in a single place, with the ability to
cross-reference. Cross-department co-
ordination of activities becomes
possible, leading Libraries and Social
Services to be able to all be aware for
example, of a older person moving
temporarily into a respite care home and
rerouting services accordingly. A single
account and payment interface is also
possible, making service payments more
efficient for the citizen and allowing the
local authority to address social
inclusion, poverty and debt collection in
a holistic manner.
The citizen-centric philosophy
within Local government means that
increasingly citizens will have both
service commissioning and personal
information access themselves, through
a single, person-centric local-authority
web space. Users will be able to
check information on any interaction
with the Authority, and to move from
task to task, e.g. from Library renewals
to arranging a refuse collection,
simply, without moving from bespoke
system to bespoke system, and without
needing to log in to each individual
system. Local authorities now have a
clear vision regarding such citizen
portals and increasingly these services
are available – typically marketed as the
‘‘My Council’’ service. Where the
vision is lacking is in relation to
information discovery and associated
social networking for Council citizens.
There is a real opportunity for library
and information services to deliver
services in this space and thereby
redefine and extend their service
offering to the citizen.
DS, the library management
specialist in UK public libraries and
archives, has worked with Nordic
library management systems leader
Axiell to develop a technology solution
which can act as the local authority’s
information discovery service and offer
community and social networking
functions not yet seen in public libraries.
This solution can be accessed directly or
can integrate with the council’s web
presence to offer these additional
services through an existing portal. DS
Arena has been designed through
extensive marketplace feedback and in
response to the changing face of local
authorities and public libraries.
DS Arena is built on modern
foundations which is critical in service
delivery in the rapidly evolving Web 2.0
landscape. It uses a framework of web
services to provide content and
interactive services; these web services
can be extended and revised in an
incremental manner over time.
Figure 1. The DS Arena locality information model
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