Late yesterday, I found out that my professional organization’s membership – the Special Library Association – voted down it’s name change proposal. The reasons were fairly obvious. While a most members think that we need to branch out to other disciplines (which we do) the alternative name, well, sucked. The Association for Strategic Knowledge Professionals just didn’t strike a chord. Neither did it’s acronym of ASKPro.

You would think, then, that the leadership would tread more carefully when posting news to the internet on the topic but this hasn’t been the case. An already oft-quoted blurb from the SLA website reads, “voting in record numbers, SLA members failed to approve a proposal to change the organization’s name to the Association for Strategic Knowledge Professionals.” Note the word failed. While I will admit that I did vote for the name change I’m a little relieved that it didn’t go through. Most importantly, it’s also worth pointing out that the real failure here wasn’t on the part of SLA’s membership. It was on the part of name change proponents to find an adequate replacement.

This week the Special Library Association’s leadership announced a new name… which they recommend we adopt as part of their ongoing realignment project. Henceforth, there is a chance I’ll be a member of the Association of Knowledge Professionals or “ASKPro.” The chance is small, for sure, but it’s not completely out of the question. Like my Millennial peers I’m torn as to how I’ll vote .

I am sure of two things though:

1) I am Librarian. This doesn’t change the fact that I can fill into multiple roles either. That’s the nature of the profession. It’s changing along with technology and as a traditionally older group retires. We are vast. We contain multitudes.

2) This issue/debate won’t be resolved until I’m much older. Anything and everything that has to do with the transmittal of information is in flux. It’s going to take people a long time to adapt to any switch from analog to digital technology. We don’t even know how far the shift will go.

Based off of the “23 Things,”  SLA’s Transportation Division is in the process of encouraging it’s members to try “7 Things.” That is, seven things that librarians should know about online tools and resources. I’m already familiar with them, but in the spirit of sharing I’m going to try and help others through the process by displaying my work.

Blogging - This is my blog. In case you are interested, I bought some server space last summer (2008) and installed WordPress using PHP and a MySQL database. WordPress is free open source software . My “microblog”  (Twitter account)  feeds into my “Currently” page. You can visit it separately for a more detail view.

RSS Feeds – Personally, I’m less interested in RSS feeds as a tool to keep updated with than I am in using them to build websites and other cool stuff. RSS stands for “really simple syndication” and is basically data formatted in XML. The cool thing about XML is that it is awesome for data interchange. My point? Well, not only does RSS let you update information using feed readers but it also lets you pull out information  from other RSS feeds… and manipulate it! My blog’s RSS feed is available here.

Photo Sharing – I have a mixed relationship with photo sharing. On one hand I like photos and they are an ideal media format for sprucing things  up (like my blog). On the other hand, since digital cameras are so easy to get a hold of many people just slap random content online. Case in point: here. Sorry Mr. Powell. You’re usually more photogenic.

Social Bookmarking – Social bookmarking is a handy tool for people “on the go.” Delicious lets you create an account, save hyperlinks, login, and share information from computer to computer. It also allows you to view items by popularity. As part of the “7 Things” I created a Delicious account (my second one in two years), but dunno if I’ll keep using it.

Social Networking – I am on Facebook. You can visit me there. You can also visit MoDOT too. :)

Wikis – For those of you unaware, “Wiki” is Hawaiian for “fast.” Publishing online usually requires HTML and other markup languages, but a wiki doesn’t even need that. Wiki’s simplified markup make it where almost anyone can use them. They’re also very useful for collaboration. The SLA Transportation Wiki serves as the SLA Transportation Division’s webpage, and I personally use a password protected one to document my daily work.

Working in the Cloud – Cloud computing refers to working with Web 2.o tools. Originally the web was static. Now, it’s much more interactive. Things that were desktop based several years ago are now online. This can be a little daunting, but once people realize that working in a “cloud” envrionment is a more transparent than most people seem to adapt.