PennTags, developed by librarians at the University of Pennsylvania Library, is a tagging tool very similar to del.icio.us, but was created specifically for this academic community. Like del.icio.us it is designed to allow a user to bookmark, label, organize, and share online resources. Tags and annotations are assigned to each saved resource, called a post, so that they can be easily retrieved at a later date. PennTags and del.icio.us are also collaborative. Users can see what others are posting, what tags they are using, and can save and edit them for their own collection. RSS feed are available so that users can be notified whenever a site is tagged with a certain tag, or a certain user creates a new posting, or any combination of the two. Users can also manage their PennTags by editing or deleting his/her tags and posts at any time.

While the two are similar in function, there are some advantages for library patrons using PennTags over del.icio.us. PennTags is somewhat integrated into the library catalogue. Items in the catalogue can be tagged by clicking a direct “Add to PennTags” link at the bottom of each catalogue record. Two developers of PennTags state in a presentation, PennTags: Pedagogical and Academic Uses of Tagging, that tags and descriptions are displayed in the catalogue records. I, however, couldn’t find an example of this in the OPAC. I’m guessing that one needs to be signed in as a PennTags user, and unfortunately this service is not open to individuals without a University of Pennsylvania Library card. Another extra feature of PennTags is the option to create a “project” – a collection of related links, tags, and descriptions in a specific list. This creates an annotated bibliography that can be useful for collecting resources for a specific purpose or subject. Users can also browse or search for projects of other users as a starting point on a topic. This can be a powerful tool for discovery as PennTags acts to store information relevant to the University of Pennsylvania community. In addition, while I personally find some of the more in-depth functions in del.icio.us to be somewhat clunky and counter-intuitive, PennTags does have a tremendous “help” menu for completing basic and more advanced tasks, along with some tips and suggestions for people new to tagging, and a glossary of terms used in the help section. Unfortunately, however, the link to all of this useful information is labeled “about” on the PennTags homepage, and not “help”.

There are some other aspects of PennTags that could be improved. Unfortunately there are several different methods for bookmarking resources, depending the type of resource they are. While there are quite detailed instructions about how to perform each of these actions, the system seems somewhat less fluid and intuitive than it could be. Another area for improvement lies in the searchability. Tags and subject heading are both searchable, but in separate places – subject headings in the traditional catalogue search and tags only from the PennTags site. I could see incorporating a tag search function into the main catalogue search being much more useful and convenient for users. In addition, while there is a link to PennTags from the “Toolbox” on the library’s homepage, it is quite small and there is no explanation of the tool for new users. The library does host a “News and Events” website that may have been a useful place to highlight the tool. However outside of the posting that was most likely created upon PennTags’ launch, the tool is not featured and there is no search function to find such a post. This makes me wonder how new users discover PennTags. I could see a more prominent display of a link to PennTags, accompanied by a short description, on the library’s homepage, being a more effective way of educating more library users about its presence and option as an organizational tool for resources.

While it may not be the most eloquently designed tool, its ability to facilitate the sharing of lists of useful resources does make me think I might find PennTags useful within an academic setting.

While Hennepin County Library’s (HCL) innovative Bookspace site doesn’t incorporate the use of tags per se, I’ve included a review of it because the overview here of interactive library catalogues – with LibraryThing, Scriblio, and SOPAC – wouldn’t be complete without mentioning this fantastic site.

According to the Missouri River Regional Library’s conference blog, which gives some background information about the service, Bookspace was created to “bring together all the resources for readers that they had scattered throughout the site into one place and allow both librarians and patrons to contribute even more content to the site than they already had”. The site, launched in February 2007, allows users to comment or write brief reviews on items in the catalogue, as well as create booklists and share them with other users. Much like SOPAC, an account is required to contribute to the site, but access is not restricted to users that have a HCL library card.

(image source: http://www.hclib.org/pub/bookspace/Login.cfm – the author’s personal account)

Bookspace, however, goes one step further than LibraryThing, Scriblio, and SOPAC, with its interactive homepage. In addition to the “My Bookspace” area for keeping track of your profile, booklists, and comments, the site acts as a sort of “hub” for readers’ resources. The site features booklists created by readers, librarians, and automatically generated from the catalogue; links to book-related events in the library; resources for book clubs; links to audio books; and “Find a Good Book” pages that allow users to browse subjects, genres, lists, and websites to find good books. Users can also receive email or RSS alerts about new books published by a favourite author, or daily excerpts from books.

(image source: http://www.hclib.org/pub/bookspace/)

The use of descriptive headings and related links on almost every page make this site very easy and intuitive to navigate. Users’ comments and reviews are also incorporated into the individual item catalogue records, and so are also useful for book selection by patrons that don’t otherwise participate in Bookspace.

Other tools used by the library are also somewhat integrated into Bookspace. On the site there are links to the library’s blog where books are reviewed weekly, as well as a link to the e-newsletter that also contains useful reader information. In an article about the launch of Bookspace, Library Journal talks about HCL’s invitation for readers to send in a photo of them reading in a favourite space. These photos are posted on Flickr, and now rotate on the Bookspace homepage.

Bookspace was smart to create the easy-to-remember domain name of bookspace.org. This allows for easier access for patrons that regularly use the site. As The Librarian in Black mentions in her blog posting about the service, many libraries keep the library domain name for a new site, and “ask users to remember something like: www.co.library.state.us/books/homepage.html“. For new users, a link to Bookspace is also prominently displayed on the library’s homepage.

Being “The Tagging Librarian” it almost goes without saying that I would very much like to see the option for user tagging in Bookspace. Much like tags used in other OPAC enhancements mentioned previously, I believe they would enhance users’ ability to search for books of certain genres or characteristics. In addition it would allow individual users to track the tags they’ve applied to books they’ve read. However, tagging aside, Bookspace does in fact seem to be the “ultimate” interactive environment for recreational readers. In fact, this may be the site I return to to create my Christmas reading list!

Ann Arbor District Library (AADL) launched their version of a social catalogue in January 2007. “SOPAC”, short for “social OPAC”, was developed by the library as a way of integrating social software tools such as tags, ratings, reviews, and comments into the catalogue.

The developers of SOPAC have been successful in truly integrating all of these options throughout the library catalogue. In addition to the traditional search box on the catalogue home page the user is also presented with a list of the most commonly used tags, a link to a view of the catalog as a tag cloud, as well as the most recent and randomly selected tags and reviews. Once a user has arrived at an item record, they are presented with the average rating of the book, a link to user reviews, and the tags that have been used to label the item.

(Click image to enlarge – image source: http://www.aadl.org/sopac/viewrev/?bnum=1211031)

In the spirit of Web 2.0, the added features of SOPAC are entirely user-driven – the tags, ratings, reviews, and comments are all generated by SOPAC users. To participate, an account must be created, however one does not need to be a member of AADL to do this. This participation and service is open to all web users. The advantage of having an account is the ability to track the tags and other additions you, as an individual, have made to the catalogue. You can view your tags in a tag cloud, or in a list where they can be managed – viewed, modified, deleted, etc. The optional functions – tagging, rating, reviewing, and commenting – are all very integrated. A user has the option of participating in all four activities from the same screen, but is in no way obligated, for instance, to tag an item because he/she also reviewed it. Other options for user participation include commenting on other reviews or rating their usefulness. There are many more intricacies to these aspects of the catalogue than can be covered here. To see more details about these features, this 15 minute screencast by SOPAC developer John Blyberg is excellent.

When SOPAC had just been released, Blygerg posted in his blog Blyberg.net that he was “rather excited to see if library users will respond to these tools in an OPAC setting as much as Web 2.0 users have to commercial social networking sites”. Well, I’m sure by now he’s pleased with the outcome. Browsing through the catalogue, the added social features seem to be well used, for a service that’s not even a year old. Personally, I’m not sure I would create my own set of tags or write too many reviews. But, as with other services that utilize similar tools such as Amazon.com, I would definitely utilize ratings and reviews left by others, when selecting an item. This raises another point – many more users are most likely gaining benefit from the tags, ratings, and reviews than are actually creating them. The amount of use, then, is difficult to gauge, but I imagine it’s high in the case of SOPAC. The features are easy to use, easy to navigate between, and clearly give added value to the catalogue. The only improvement I would ideally like to see is faster loading times for the tags and reviews in the right-hand column, as there is a delay, similar to that in Scriblio.

There are many other interesting features incorporated into SOPAC, such as the inclusion of colour book jackets; links to profiles of the items including plot summary, character profiles, etc.; links to the item records in Google Books; recommended similar items based on past user patterns; and permalinks for each record which enable them to be searched with tools such as Google. Users also have the option of collecting electronic catalogue cards where they can write their comments about the item.

(Click image to enlarge – image source: http://www.blyberg.net/downloads/iConn-SOPAC-110807.pdf)

Another great aspect of SOPAC is that the source code is free to download from Blyberg.net, for any library that would like to enhance their catalogue in a similar way.

Scriblio is an OPAC (online public access catalogue) used by the Lamson Library at Plymouth State University, and was developed by their information architect Casey Bisson. Because this free open source software is based on the WordPress platform, it comes with many of the blogging software’s capabilities such as tagging and comments.

When performing a catalogue search, the search results are displayed with standard information such as title and author, but the tags associated with the items are also displayed. As with other uses of tags, clicking on a tag brings the user to a list of other items also labeled with that tag. Once a user selects an item to view from their search results the tags are then displayed in a column to the right of the item record. Unfortunately, there is no indication that this list, though cleverly grouped into facets that I could see being very useful, is in fact a list of tags. The familiar associations with tags, including the blue hyperlinked colour and the tag cloud format, are abandoned. In fact, the right-hand column is so far over that it is entirely cut off when viewing the website on a smaller monitor. This may result in some confused patrons wondering where the tag cloud they saw on the results page went to. The origin of the tags for the different records is unclear. There appears to be no method for library patrons’ input, so they can be assumed to be created by a cataloguer or from an imported source. As Karen Schneider’s post on ALA Tech Source exemplifies, much of the literature about Scriblio is focused on its availability and compatibility for all library systems, and details such as tagging are not emphasized. In the spirit of Library 2.0 I would, of course, prefer to see the option for users to input their own tags for library holdings. Without that function, the tags in this catalogue simply act as an alternate (and effective) search method.

(image source: http://flickr.com/photos/scriblio/1691023808/)

One participatory feature that does seem to be very well designed is the ability for users to comment within the catalogue. There is a place to comment on almost every library page and every item record. Through the use of the library blog the staff seem very encouraging of patrons posting feedback about their satisfaction with the new catalogue system. While there appears not to be too many comments throughout the catalogue presently, the system did just launch recently in September 2007.

The catalogue does include other interesting features that make it unique and quite useful: imported book summaries from Amazon.com; the ability to view item records in the former catalogue format; a colour image of the book jacket for many holdings; and automatically generated lists of similar items. In addition, as explained by Jenny Levine in an ALA Tech Source blog posting, because the catalogue is web-based, each item record has its own permanent online location, and can therefore be indexed and searched by tools such as Google.

Even though Scriblio’s use of tagging could be improved, the catalogue is nonetheless innovative. As Michael Stephens reports in Technology Trends for a 2.0 World, an article in the Sept/Oct 2007 edition of Library Technology Reports, Scriblio’s use of Library 2.0 tools does “point to what our future catalogs should do”.

LibraryThing is an online service that allows individuals to catalog, tag, and classify their books, and share them with others. Currently there are over 200,000 online members using the service, tagging 16 million books. The company has come up with an application for libraries, called LibraryThing for Libraries, that allows these and other features to be applied to library catalogues. Libraries receive from LibraryThing information about tags and similar books for all of the books in the library’s catalogue. This information is then incorporated to produce a value-added catalogue.

Danbury Public Library (DPL) was the first to try out LibraryThing for Libraries. The majority of the monographs in their catalogue have records that display LibraryThing information. For instance, in addition to subject headings, the catalogue user is presented with a tag cloud taken from the user-supplied LibraryThing tags. Similar to the use of hyperlinked subject headings in a catalogue, clicking on any of these tags brings the searcher to a list of books labeled with that tag. In addition, beside the list of books with that tag, the user is also presented with other tags that are often associated with their chosen tag.

(image source: http://flickr.com/photos/pollyalida/1715830436/)

As mentioned in the LibraryThing’s Thing-ology Blog, tags give the user the option for searching with simpler terms, as well as allowing for more exact searching. They give the example of searching for the tags “Usability” or “Information Architecture” – both of which would have been lumped into “Web sites—Design” as a subject heading. Melissa L. Rethlefson of Library Journal explains that searching in a catalogue using tags also allows a patron to find materials with certain characteristics – such as a written by a female author, or including dark humour – that are not normally searchable in traditional catalogues.

DPL’s catalogue records also include book recommendations based on similarity to the book that was searched for. For instance, a search for Tolstoy’s War and Peace produced the catalogue record that included other recommended books by Tolstoy and other Russian authors from a similar time period.

Other features of DPL’s LibraryThing for Libraries catalogue are the referral of the user to other editions, translations, and formats of the requested work, and the inclusion of an enlargeable picture of the book jacket next to the title in the record.

(image source: http://flickr.com/photos/pollyalida/1714980205/)

There are definitely some improvements to be made, however, to DPL’s catalog and LibraryThing for Libraries in general. There is no indication of exactly which materials include the LibraryThing information (it seems to be the majority of the library’s books but no other media), or which books include information about other editions and formats (it seems to be very few). The “extras” – the tags and the recommended books – are much slower to load than the rest of the catalogue record. These are recognized by LibraryThing for Libraries, and are currently being worked out.

Also being developed by LibraryThing is the option for more involvement of users at the library level. Currently it is the input of LibraryThing users that supplies the tags for individual books. However, under development is the ability for users of catalogues supplemented by LibraryThing for Libraries to also supply tagging information, as well as reviews and ratings. While DPL’s current catalogue and use of LibraryThing for Libraries is an impressive and user-friendly tool, I think the increased ability for users to interact and contribute to the catalogue would be a boon to the library.

Tags can also be used to enhance and organize information within blogs. A very effective use of this can be seen in the Williamsburg Regional Library Blogging for a Good Book blog. The staff at this library post one blog entry per day, reviewing a book or movie in the library. The goal is to help users find a book they might like. On the blog page, the right side of the screen consists of a list of tags used to label the various book reviews, as well as the number of posts that are labelled with that tag. Tags, labeled here as “categories”, include the genre of the book (eg. Graphic Novel), strengths of the book (eg. Clever Dialogue), age level (eg. Children’s), and who wrote the review (eg. Charlotte’s Picks).

(image source: http://bfgb.wordpress.com/)

In Web 2.0 & Libraries: Best Practices for Social Software revisited, Micheal Stephens includes the impressions of a Williamsburg Regional Library librarian, Jessica Zellers, on the usefulness of the tagging and the blog. She explains that the tags make the librarians’ jobs of readers’ advisory easier. Users can, with just one click, see a list of books owned by the library that have a particular attribute. For instance, if the book is tagged with “Sense of Place”, then it is understood that that is a strong aspect of the book, and it might be suitable for readers that enjoy a well developed sense of place in a book.

The blog is easily accessed from the library’s homepage, by clicking on the prominent “Looking for a good blog?”. However I would have liked to see the link emphasize the purpose of the blog and the readers’ advisory role more with, for instance “Looking for a good book?”. Unless the user is familiar with the blog and already knows that it serves as a good way to find an interesting book, one may not necessarily think of clicking on a link to a blog when looking for a book to read.

The blog is extremely intuitive and easy to use, and the tags definitely help with that. A nice feature is the link at the end of each post to the record of the book in the library catalogue – easily allowing an interested patron to find the call number and the current status of the book. The option for library users or other interested web surfers to leave comments about a post is a nice feature as well. I wonder, however, if a way to get interested users even more involved and engaged in the readers’ advisory process would be to allow them to also post reviews and tags of their own.

The librarian, Jessica Zellers, has also mentioned the importance the blog has played in outreach – reaching users that wouldn’t normally benefit from the readers’ advisory services of Williamsburg Regional Library. Internet users from across the continent have posted comments on the blog. This blog and its effective use of tagging seem so useful that I too may become a regular visitor at Blogging for a Good Book.

(image source: http://flickr.com/photos/mimiw/1878041247/)

Another Library 2.0 tool that utilizes tags, and is commonly used in libraries, is Flickr. With Flickr a library can upload pictures – such as those from events, conferences, or of the building itself – and tag them with relevant tags. Any other user can also tag the photos with tags relevant to them, exemplifying the participatory nature of Web 2.0. Michael Stephens, in the July/August 2006 issue of Library Technology Reports, states that posting photos is an effective way of creating a presence within a popular tool such as Flickr. An individual may search for photos tagged with his/her city name, stumble upon pictures from a library event of interest, and click through to the library website, learning about services offered.

Colorado College Tutt Library is one library that posts its pictures on Flickr. The link to the photos is a widget with constantly changing images, at the top of the library blog page. I think making tools such as the blog and Flickr photos available in the same space is very effective, and may lead to an increased usage of both.

It seems that this library posts pictures quite regularly on Flickr, as there are currently 14 sets of images. A wide variety of tags are used, with each photo being tagged by approximately 6-10. One feature I found particularly useful with this library’s use of Flickr is the quite detailed sentence-structured captions, that nicely complement the tags. Tagging is very useful for organizing and searching photos, but the captions describe to the user a more complete context for the photo. Often included in the caption is also a link to the relevant section of the library’s webpage. This actually follows a recommendation by Michael Stephens in the September/October 2007 issue of Library Technology Reports, where he encourages the use of notes and links. If users are to take an interest in the library, they need an easy way to pursue that and visit the library website. I think Colorado College Tutt Library has something quite unique here, as I have not come across many other libraries taking this kind of care with their Flickr accounts. However, I would like to see them link more consistently, as not all photos are linked to the library website.

The library is also a part of the Libraries and Librarians Group (among others) in Flickr. This group acts as a gathering space for libraries and librarians from all over the world to pool their photos and create discussion boards. This group’s almost extreme encouragement of tagging is very interesting. The group’s website lists a controlled vocabulary and data dictionary to be used when tagging images, and warns users that “If you do not add concise tags to the photos you add to this group you may find that someone else does.” This seems to be in slight conflict with the, “Tagging lets us organize the Net our way” philosophy presented by the Pew Internet and American Life Project and others. However, like the use of a controlled vocabulary in subject indexing for a library catalogue, this can allow for more effective retrieval.