Back to the future and into the cloud: 24th February event

The JIBS User Group's winter event this year was both a celebration of 21 years since the formation of the group (previously known as the BIDS User Group) and a look forward to the future of cloud computing and applications.

Over seventy attendees from across HE, FE, and intermediaries assembled at the Brunei Gallery at SOAS to hear presentations from a range of speakers including Tony Hirst, Mary Auckland, Ben Showers, Antony Brewerton, Robert Bley, and Ian Corns.

Kicking off proceedings was former JIBS User Group chair Sue Cumberpatch, who puzzled us with long-forgotten acronyms (Alfi, anyone?) and the wisdom of previous chairs who worked towards the ethos we now have of being independent and interested in any resource from a user point of view. JIBS User Group members now sit on the boards of various providers, lead groups in different areas of interest, and participate in the JISC working groups.

Next up was Tony Hirst from the Open University, an academic who is clearly well-enveloped in 'the cloud' and its possibilities. His title for the day was 'The Frictionless Library', and he took his inspiration from the five laws of library science created by S.R. Ranganathan (which those of us who attended library school will remember well). Tony's presentation was wide ranging and thought-provoking - including such soundbites as 'the library is at the heart of the university system', the library is about 'knowledge and engagement with other people, not just resources', we need to 'know when to stop', 'the library lives in a networked world', 'visualisation [macroscopes, finding out what makes the customer tick and what interests them] is going to become more important', and the future of the library is 'the invisible librarian' [one who guides and ranks resources for relevance and provenance].

Hirst talked about the causes of 'friction' in relation to web resources, such as licensing restrictions and authentication hurdles. In his words 'patience is short on the web' so a one-click environment is preferable to one which means a customer needs to browse through several levels. He also referred to the power of systems such as Google+ (and Custom Search), Facebook, Twitter (and TweetDeck), and much more. In his arguments about relevance, rediscovery, and influence, he sees a powerful, if different, role for the librarian of the future.

Tony can be reached through his blog, http://blog.ouseful.info/, where a draft of his presentation can be found.

Mary Auckland, a consultant, chose for her title 'You need wings to fly in the clouds: future skills for librarians', and focused on two studies in which she has been involved: an internal one for the Open University, and a publicly available study for RLUK entitled 'Reskilling for research'.

Although the studies focused on subject librarians, many of the skills identified can carry across to other professional roles as we move forward. Auckland mentioned a quotation from Alice Crawford at the University of St Andrews: "Confidence is the key ... in product and our roles", as well as something which came from the OU report: "using and thinking the language of learning, not professional jargon ... mutually understood language". In Auckland's view, "if we don't use these [new] skills we will become archaic."

The RLUK study looked specifically at the information needs and behaviours of researchers, and identified a set of skills and knowledge that were relevant to these needs. Auckland's view is that librarians 'must respond well to change ... may be early adopters'. She queries whether the digital revolution is relevant and here to stay, and whether there is any scope for further evolution. If there is going to be no further evolution [and there may not be] it is still necessary to develop the skills to change. The customer now has higher expectations -so we need to 'redefine core skills ... and ensure we can deliver expertly'.

The library is no longer a place for purely information-based activities, argues Auckland, so we 'need to listen and deliver what customers want ... and don't try to influence them or change their behaviour. They will use Google!' So the librarian needs to build their soft skills (influencing, persuasion) as well as hard skills relating directly to data management.

In conclusion, Auckland focused on the need to not just identify skills but also acquire them, and to develop and focus job descriptions and person specs away from generic descriptors.

The RLUK report can be viewed at http://www.rluk.ac.uk/content/re-skilling-research.

On to Antony Brewerton from the University of Warwick, and 'There's a lot more to the library than the building itself'. Again nodding back to Ranganathan, Brewerton started his presentation with the news that the library is now about relationships and networks - 'from collections to connections'. The customer is the person of most importance, wherever they are.

Long known for his seminars on marketing and branding, Brewerton shared an entertaining video where students at Warwick spoke to camera about their interpretation of library services, with the main message 'there is a lot more to the library ...'. Brewerton's ideas are interesting: 'it's all about relationships ... information ... support ... community.'

At Warwick the traditional shape of library teams has been restructured into areas such as research and development [idea generating], with roving teams working on low-level enquiries, freeing professional staff time for more quality work such as bringing resources together in portals, encouraging comments and discussions online, encouraging student interactivity, and working on high-end, in-depth enquiries. This all allows preparation for the future.

Brewerton's main message was 'be traditional! ... but don't lose sight of the core parts of the job'. He also argues that we shouldn't 'throw the baby out with the bath water' but instead 'decide which babies we want to keep'. Looking to the future we need to talk to the customers and recognise 'when it is time to let go', instead focusing on what is needed, collaboration, marketing. We need to 'bring people in and get out in the world'.

Antony Brewerton is @librarian_boy on Twitter.

Robert Bley from ExLibris was next up with 'Cloud computing: what it means'. His focus was firmly that of a provider of cloud solutions, and he started his presentation from a viewpoint of looking back to 2005 when the first cloud and mobile topics started. Many popular applications we use every day are already in the cloud [Google, Amazon, eBay] as well as the main social networking solutions. Now library management systems are moving the same way - especially with the introduction of the ExLibris solution, Alma.

Bley went over what cloud computing is and isn't [it isn't hosting legacy systems, or a client server; it is web or app based]. It is a changing business model for libraries and providers, with the safety and reliability of services a paramount concern. The 'cloud' requires support staff who are not just techies but also proactive problem solvers. This might impact on libraries as those who used to look after servers can be redeployed into 'innovation and development', focusing on 'mashups not backups'. It isn't about cutting numbers of staff, it 'frees people up to do more creative things ... facilitates collaboration....'

Robert Bley is @RobertBley on Twitter.

Ben Showers, from the JISC Infrastructure team, spoke about 'KnowledgeBase+', a new cloud-based community knowledge base, currently in its first stage. It links to other projects such as KBART, the JISC Entitlement Registry, and JUSP, and is helping to analyse data in a variety of new ways.

Showers discussed the benefits and problems of such a project, as well as the basic principles surrounding it. He also talked about issues relating directly to the 'cloud': infrastructure and skills, the obsolesence of services and hardware, and the need for standard formats across cloud providers [making the traditional part of the job as efficient and simple as possible]. In standardising system, there is a 'new approach to skills', which might well be the 'silver lining'.

The KnowledgeBase+ project has a blog at http://knowledgebaseplus.wordpress.com.

Finally, to wrap up the day, Ian Corns from Talis Aspire, presented 'Re-imagining the delivery of course resources with Talis Aspire'. His focus was on reading lists and much more, encouraging the interactivity referred to by earlier speakers. Aspire's primary purpose was 'to provide the resources the students need' [although it can be argued that reading lists are not necessarily the main driver for this].

In discussing Aspire, Corns brought up themes which had already been mentioned earlier in the day: changing local dynamics, moving from a 'formalised and formulaic' acquisitions policy to one that is 'shared and open', building better relationships, increased interaction between library and academics. The cloud solution allows a saving of time/cost, a reduction of risk, and business scaleability.

Corns argues that in some ways, the cloud is 'old hat' as we have had Gmail, Hotmail, Facebook and the like for many years now - but the potential to libraries to lead and generate discussion (within an institution or cross-institution) and to bring different resources and groups together, is an interesting new use of the technology.

Ian Corns is @theagileanalyst on Twitter.

I was struck by the potential of many of the ideas raised across the day. Tony Hirst's presentation might have been deliberately off-the-wall and provocative, but Mary Auckland and Antony Brewerton's studies and experience bear some of his points out. From a provider point of view it was good to hear beyond the product pitch to see what value these new solutions have. I feel this has been one of our more successful events and it certainly left me leaving with lots of ideas and positivity about what the future holds for us as professionals in the library sector.

ePetition on Fair VAT for academic libraries

Fair VAT on e-publications for the academic community

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/28226

Responsible department: Her Majesty's Treasury

Universities and colleges are obliged to pay VAT at the full standard rate, currently 20%, on their subscriptions to electronic academic journals, books, newspapers and magazines. Printed versions of these resources are zero-rated in the UK; in the rest of the EU VAT is applied at the reduced rate, currently 5%. E-publications are greener, save valuable storage space and offer increased availability for the majority of users. They should be treated in the same way for VAT as printed publications. This VAT burden means that libraries have less to spend on electronic publications and makes it very difficult for them to move towards e-provision. We urge our government to do one of two things; 1. Introduce zero-rated VAT on electronic academic publications or 2. If it is not feasible to add electronic publications to the list of zero-rated goods then to follow other European countries and apply VAT at the reduced rate now and consider reducing this to 0% as soon as possible.

2011 JIBS Student Prize Winner

The JIBS User Group Committee are pleased to announce that the 2011 JIBS Student Prize was awarded to Andrea Ennis for her Masters Dissertation "Indicators of content: the role of word clouds in the creation of summaries".

An MSc student in the Department of Information Science at Loughborough University, Andrea examined the potential use of word clouds as content indicators in summaries of academic papers. Despite the small scale of her study her area of research was particularly innovative and, we think, has great potential for future development and practical application.

We hope that Andrea will be joining us on 24th February for our Workshop and AGM to give us a brief overview of her research. We will also make her dissertation available on our website very soon.

Details of the 2012 JIBS Student Prize will be posted on our website in early March.

Research evaluation event brief survey results

A survey was sent out to attendees prior to the JIBS research evaluation event to find out about how institutions are supporting research evaluation and the tools they are using.

• Most respondents to the survey are librarians indicating that the role of supporting the institutional repository (IR) or working with the Research Office on current research information system (CRIS) developments is just another responsibility to fit in with their main duties.

• About half of respondents (25) have some kind of system for managing research most using a commercial system (16) or using in-house solutions (9). The other half does not have a CRIS.

• Only 34 people responded to question 6 (If you do not currently have a commercial CRIS, are you investigating the possibility of buying one?), with 10 aware of plans to purchase a commercial system in their institution. The majority did not know (15) or didn’t answer (19), illustrating that the library is not always included in these decisions and much depends on the working relationship between the Research Office and the Library and whether there is already an institutional repository in place.

• Just over half of people did not answer question 7 (If you are a librarian/repository manager were you involved in the choice of the CRIS?), because it was not applicable to their role, grade or area of responsibility.

• A quarter of institutions have a CRIS (25) that integrates primarily with the institutional repository (20) and the web pages – staff profile pages (16) and departmental web pages (8).

• Of the 24 people who support bibliometrics, 19 have sole responsibility for it within the library service. Only 2 people provided comments in response to the question about other departments providing support with 1 referring to a bibliometrician who carried out this function.

• Overwhelming interest in joining an InCites mailing list (91%) indicates recognition of the importance of bibliometric tools. However take-up is likely to be hindered by budget constraints and less involvement with bibliometrics. A mailing list provides opportunities for InCites users to share information about its use with each other and the wider sector. The library can play a role in advising the Research Office to purchase InCites, rather than purchasing it as part of a library budget.

In summary, no clear picture has emerged but more discussion and sharing of experiences / good practice may see more uptake / understanding of bibliometrics and the need for repositories and CRIS to work together. But this depends on the institutional structure and level at which decisions about these services are taken and implemented.

The findings of the JIBS survey will be disseminated and available on the JIBS website after the results have been fully analysed.

Update on JIBS student Prize and LIRG prize winner announced

JIBS offers an annual prize for a student dissertation focusing on the area of library information systems, bibliographic databases or other resource discovery technologies and how such resources or technologies are being developed or exploited. The deadline for submissions has now past and judging will take place over the next couple of months with a winner announced in late September.

The JIBS prize is partnered with the annual LIRG Student Award. LIRG announced their prize winner earlier this month. Their prize went to Thomas Muggleton, a student at the Department of Computer and Information Sciences at Strathclyde University, for his study entitled "The effect of homelessness on information access, identity formation and social interaction". More information on their pages: http://www.cilip.org.uk/get-involved/special-interest-groups/research/awards/pages/lirg-student-prize.aspx

Research evaluation – is it our business? The role of librarians in the brave new world of research evaluation

JIBS User Group - Workshop 29 June 2010 – University of Birmingham

As the tweets (#JIBSre) appear to indicate, this JIBS workshop apparently hit just the right topic at just the right time. People came with all different levels of experience, and being so well-attended the workshop opened up many opportunities for sharing that experience. Whether embedded in your work already or not no-one could have left the day without gaining a wide array of ideas for practical action to take back to institutions. And the venue was the stunning campus of Birmingham University – on a stunning June day.

The workshop’s remit was inspired by institutions’ interest in procuring a CRIS (Current Research Information System) and the perceived and growing requirement from multiple points of view – both internal and external – for analysis of bibliometric information. Procurement of a CRIS is one solution among many (and there are as many hybrid as PURE solutions) that comprises re-tooling of current internal systems, and alternative uses to those originally intended for institutional repositories. At the centre is the librarian – or is s/he? “Is it our business?” It was one of the day’s main aims to contribute ideas to feed into librarians’ individual and collective strategies for getting involved in this new area of work; an area that is of crucial significance for institutions as they face the REF in 2014 . Equally librarians find they must step up to calls to assist in and facilitate the supply of information to researchers for enhancing the visibility of their research output and their personal and research teams’ profiles as institutions manage their internal promotions and their outward-facing impact globally.

Read a report of the workshop here.

Minutes of the JIBS EBSCO meeting

The minutes of the last JIBS EBSCO meeting are now available at JIBS Ebsco Enhancement Group

JIBS Student Prize 2011

We are again inviting entries for this year's JIBS Student Prize. For more information please see: http://www.jibs.ac.uk/prize/JIBSprize.pdf. You can still read our winning entry (by Nicky Ransom) from last year at: http://www.jibs.ac.uk/prize/ransom.pdf

New member

I recently joined the JIBS User Group Committee and enjoyed the recent meeting I attended. The group is very active, experienced at running events with members engaged with a range of professional issues. The group is looking for an additional Committee member, preferably from further education. 


At the University of Greenwich we are involved in a number of collaborations with partner colleges and the partner colleges librarians group, meets regularly. After emailing them I've already had a response from a librarian at Greenwich Community College who would like to join the Committee which is a really good start.


Nadine Edwards

New member - short thoughts

As mentioned in the last post, I (Catherine Robertson) am a new member of the JIBS committee group and it is a very active group indeed!

So far I have started to investigate locations in Birmingham for a JIBS meeting (I have my fingers crossed for Winterbourne as it’s beautiful in the summer) and am trying to keep abreast of the emails flying about regarding the annual conference topic. As it stands I am 10 days away from my wedding(!) but when I’m back from honeymoon I’ll be able to give the emails the attention they fully deserve J. I am looking forward to getting fully involved asap!