As requested, I am very pleased to provide a brief primer on Twitter. Here goes:
“Twitter for Librarians.”
1- Sign up and get an app. First off, sign up with Twitter. It can be anonymous. I go by a nickname, Jim Hortis, and have a twitter handle @jeffhort. Keep the name fairly short as people will need to type it to reply to you. Also, post a bit of bio so people will know that you are a student, your interests, etc. On to the app: Twitter is a platform upon which other tools are constructed. Whether you’re using your phone or desktop, you should get one of those tools because it makes it easier to organize and search for the info you seek. So you should download TweetDeck (or something similar), it’s free and will help you organize and search through your data like a proper librarian.
2- Get in a conversation. Structured conversations are built around hashtags. The one I recommend is #libchat. Type #libchat into the search field at Twitter or by using the + symbol on TweetDeck. You will see the tweets of people who participate in the weekly #libchat. This really gets going every Wednesday at 5:00pm PST when everyone tweets their input, including the hashtag #libchat, and you can follow along with what everyone is saying. I will not go into much more length, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, this is also extremely useful when attending a conference, such as #ala11 (search for it and you’ll see coverage of many of the sessions at this year’s ALA!). Make sure you hash tag when participate in these discussions.
3- Twitter in the broader world of MLIS studies. It’s just another tool for communication among students and professionals. One way to look at Twitter is by reading an MLIS-focused blog:HackLibSchool, which is run by students, for students. The blog tweets at @hacklibschool, and all of the contributors promote their blog posts via twitter (as to many other blog writers). I mention blogs after you actually get into using Twitter, because I get a bit bored reading blogs sometimes and prefer the back-and-forth communication that is possible with social media, rather than the semi-interactive journalism of blogs. But some people love MLIS blogs—more power to them.
4- Build lists. Librarians are excellent organizers, so if you follow a librarian on Twitter, you will benefit from taking a look at their contacts and lists they’ve formed. You can search for my list of library students by searching for @jeffhort/mliscsious. You can also see a few lists that have categorized me, here: @jeffhort lists. Lists can make your twitter reading much easier, because you can follow a list of people in one column of TweetDeck, without following all of those people all of the time.
5- Have fun. I use Twitter for a lot more than my Graduate degree. Some people use it solely to participate in #libchat every week, and I know some of those people are very serious about maintaining a constant stream of their own MLIS-based blog posts and other library news. This is the group who wants to maintain a vibrant source of online activity for potential employers to find if/when they are Googled. It doesn’t need to be a lot of stress, though—I suggest having fun with it. Follow a bunch of people who participate in #libchat and respond when they inevitably post pictures of their cat, new cardigan, or particularly vicious fiddle duel.
6- A few people to follow. There are many different types of people I follow, so let me give you a few classes and you can decide how you want to interact based on their tweets.
“The consummate professionals” are folks whose job it is to tweet and blog about their jobs, generally at academic or government libraries, but also sometimes corporate/vendor professionals; I suggest @ARLpolicy @Copycense @copyrightlibn (these folks know one another and frequently chat about copyright-related topics (if you didn’t pick that up from their names) if that topic interests you, you could also search for #copyright or #fairuse).
“Other professionals” include two guys who work at academic libraries in Los Angeles and keep their tweets to mainly LIS topics: @johnxlibris and @leebrarian
“#libchat friends” are manifold; in particular, I’ve had many excellent chats with two MLIS students @bibliosaurusrex (Pratt - Brooklyn) and @catladylib (Indiana University – Indianapolis)
“UW iSchool” I believe these people studied at UW, some may be in your classes starting 9/28! @hfkittle (contributor to @hacklibschool) @lyrca (Carly D.) @alex_uw_mlis (Alex Burkes) @skipeight (Helena Bristow – knitter extraordinaire) @splatteredw (Claire D’Mura) @katie_westlake (UW grad?) @jeffhort (me, don’t forget to follow me)
Sooooo..that should do it. I have more tips and am learning how it goes. Please send me a message if you give it a try—just type “@jeffhort werd I’m doing it! no hands!” and press enter.
