Intro

Hello fellow Library and Information students,

Thank you, Kirsten, for setting up this Blog.

I am in my third year of the MLIS at VUW, studying by distance. I changed career in middle age and have never once regretted my decision. After having spent 2 years as an "unemployed student", I have been lucky enough to obtain employment as a library assistant in an academic law library and after 8 months I still love my job to bits. The MLIS has been challenging, but rewarding, and I know that in the coming years I will revisit many of the things we have studied and gain even more from them now that I am getting some practical experience. The final hurdle for me is the INFO 580 research project. I think it scares most of us, (if we are honest), but the people I have spoken to who have come through it don't seem to regard is as such a big deal, which surprised me at first. I think it is probably like anything you do for the first time - the fear of the unknown and of dipping your toe in the water, so to speak, is probably worse than the reality of actually getting on and doing it.

I look forward to sharing experiences and ideas with you all.

Best wishes,
Caroline Anderson

National Digital Forum

A quiet couple of weeks on the blog front...handed in my Topic Approval Form for INFO580, but haven't made much progress writing up my research proposal...must not procrastinate hmmmm...

Helpful diversions
I attended the National Digital Forum annual conference which was fun & humbling (so many great projects out there!) Besides many calories (from the free ice-cream), I gained some interesting ideas from the conference, particularly relating to the importance of developing wonderful web access to your projects. A number of presentors demonstrated how they had done this, either by employing a web developer or revamping their digitisation projects (for example, Sustaining Gathering the Jewels and Revitalising the papers past historic newspaper collection.)

One of the standout presentations for me was from Chris Hay who must have one of the coolest jobs at Lumen. He works on tactile digital experiences in museums and other heritage institutions. Check out some of Lumen's work. His work shows the importance of using convergent disciplines to inspire your project - very inspiring stuff! (Hmmm.. I feel another degree coming on...)

Another point I took away from the conference is that specific social groups have very different digital needs or concerns; varying from access, the protection/respect for the heritage object, copyright and intellectual property, metadata/ technical practicalites, permanence...the list is endless - how digitisation professionals navigate and come up with solutions to these issues are really fascinating. Did anyone else go and get inspired?