Aha! Pessimism or Optimism

Are you a Library 2.0 optimist or pessimist?

Answer:

Optimist!

 

Then again, I tend to be an optimist about everything.  But especially about Library 2.0 and social technology in general.  I very much agree with the camp that says social media is just a digital expression of the things human's look for anyway: a way to interact. I see this personally in my own life with my inability to survive as a stay-at-home mom.  I needed that social interaction, that shared experience with people, and social media gave me that.  However, I think it's only one of many ways that need can be met.  But I do think the benefits of social media outweigh the negative aspects.

A question was posed in our first class regarding this same sort of thing.   I think it's both a natural and necessary change for libraries.  The videos that we watching this week from Michael Stephens really hit home for me this principle.  It was my "aha!" moment.  It was all those library signs!  Michael Stephens compared signs like this:

to signs like this:

The general philosophy of anything 2.0 has behind it a sense of respect that the top-down model does not.  I think this is one reason young people have gotten behind 2.0 technologies.  They go beyond age and experience.  I am an optimist and perhaps an idealist, when it comes to believing everyone has something to contribute.  The 2.0 model mirrors this belief, and I work best in an environment that supports this as well. 

I recently met an author who does some amazing things with social media.  She made a youtube video about, I think, 18 things she made.  Then she called for anyone in the Chicago area to meet at a certain place (the Bean, if you know what that is!) and they would make something together.  Below is the story, and it's a perfect example of the kind of idealism I'm talking about.