Real People Don't Do Boolean: How to Teach End Users to Find High-Quality Information on the Internet
by Rita Vine
Real people want advice, not technique. They want us, the information professionals, to simplify their lives. They want us to help them identify a few really great resources quickly and help them avoid false drops and crass promotions. They are tired of having pop-up windows bark unwanted ads at them. They want a simple methodology for information retrieval that they can use repeatedly to deliver selective, high quality information quickly and efficiently. Good advice, simple tips, and a method that they can do themselvesthese three points form the basis of teaching good web searching. Rita Vine shows how to help real people make mental sense of the web.
Information Professionals: Changing Tools, Changing Roles
by Nils C. Newman, Alan L. Porter, and Julie Yang
No profession will undergo more radical change between 2000 and 2010 than will the Information Professional. This presumptuous prediction is based on a set of convergent trends that, taken together, imply a coming new world for information professionals. We associate these trends with a series of studies we have performed for industry, government, and academia to draw implications for information professionals. We make the case for dramatic changes, then recommend particular actions to the profession and to its individual members. Within the scope of this short article, we don't try to distinguish implications specifically for various information professionals (e.g., information managers, database searchers, marketing research supporters). We address these generally to "you" to determine how they come to bear personally.
Would You Buy SLA?
Branding is the seemingly magical process that teaches us to buy a specific product in the first place, and then return to it unwaveringly. Every one of the products we chose today has changed since the first time we purchased it. Perhaps it has a "new and improved" formula? A new type of delivery mechanism flip top or "push down while turning"? New packaging? Or does it now come in gelcaps and tablets, and in three sizes instead of just one? Branding - the product evolves, but the customer remains steadfast and true. The successful brand continually evolves, just as their customer's expectations of these qualities evolve. The SLA Task Force on Branding explores this phenomenon.
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