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By Jill Hurst-Wahl
 The official theme of this year's Computers in Libraries (CIL) conference was 'Creating Tomorrow: Spreading Ideas & Learning', but it is the concept of spreading ideas that CIL is all about. With three keynotes, 75 sessions, two days of Cyber Tours, a host of workshops, a busy exhibit hall, and the events related to Internet@Schools East, Computers in Libraries is a very full event. With all of that, what stood out? Here are my top four.....
First, the economy. Organisations are slashing their travel and training budgets, which has left many saying 'I'd like to come to your event, but I can't.' Conference organisers argue that you cannot sacrifice learning or networking when the economy takes a downturn. Indeed, in order to stay competitive, each person should be looking to improve his or her skills. With that as a backdrop, would people find organisational or personal funding to come to Computers in Libraries? The answer was 'yes'. Tom Hogan, Sr. announced that the total attendance for CIL was over 2100. While that is not a record, it was good to see that people still value learning and spreading ideas even when times are tough. CIL's attendance should be a positive indicator for other library and information conferences this year.
Bringing fresh air to libraries
Second, on Tuesday, Paul Holdengraber, Director of Public Programs at the New York Public Library (NYPL) was interviewed by Erik Boekesteijn from Delft Public Library. Holdengraber was recruited to come to NYPL in order to 'oxygenate the library'. As the head of public programmes, he wanted to create a library without walls; a library that was viewed as exciting and sexy. (Yes, he used that word!) He believes that the library should be porous and be everywhere. Holdengraber wants the conversations that begin during his events to continue and to have life through blogs, Twitter, Flickr etc. Those conversations not only will help people learn, but should also connect them to where the conversations started - at the library.
Holdengraber noted that during his tenure, the email distribution list for the series 'Live from the NYPL' has grown from 500 to 25,000 people. He said that people are hungry for substance, and that fact seems to bear that out.
During the interview, Boekesteijn and Holdengraber agree that maybe a librarian needs to become a live-brarian/life-brarian. In other words, librarians are available to provide information that relates to your life. Holdengraber noted our job is to get people to desire the books that are on the shelves in a library. We need to connect people to the books, events and conversations that are occurring in and through libraries.
In a bold move, Computers in Libraries live streamed (video) the interview between Erik Boekesteijn and Paul Holdengraber, and more than 300 people viewed it. CIL also live streamed the Wednesday keynote with Michael Edson from Smithsonian Institute. Edson's keynote is still available online (http://www.infotodayblog.com/2009/04/01/closing-keynote-video-is-now-online/), but unfortunately Holdengraber's keynote was not archived due to a technical problem.
Web 2.0 - a moving target
Third, web 2.0 continued to be discussed in sessions and used throughout the conference. It is a bit amazing that we're still talking about how to do web 2.0. It seems that after years of web 2.0, we still have libraries that need to learn about it. Sadly, web 2.0 is a moving target, so those who are not 'web2.0ed' already are falling further behind. With a substantial part of the library community using web 2.0 tools as a normal part of their day, what do we need to do to ensure that web 2.0 is normal for the rest of our colleagues? Unfortunately, there is no magic answer.
At CIL most of the speakers and many of the attendees were blogging, tweeting and uploading photos and videos. They were passing information out to the 'interweb', being part of conversations that crossed sessions as well as locations on the map, and ensuring that those who could not attend CIL knew what was going on. CIL was so dominant on Twitter, that the hashtag #cil2009 was one of the hottest tags on Twitter globally during the event.
Fourth, while the formal sessions are wonderful, for some the real learning happened during what was called lobbycon (the conference in the lobby). Lobbycon - or tablecon or carpetcon - sessions began occurring over the weekend and extended throughout the conference. These were the informal conversations where people built upon what they had heard in CIL sessions, talked about other topics of deep interest, renewed friendships, made new connections, and ensure that their thinking was on the right track. Lobbycon exists at every conference, but it was interesting to hear so many people (okay, twitterers) talk about it at CIL. The question now should be asked, if lobbycon is important to conference attendees, what do they need in order to ensure that it is productive?
Finally, Computers in Libraries will be staying at the Crystal City Hyatt for one more year, which is also the conference's 25th annual event. CILers will invade Crystal City on April 12-14, 2010.
By Jill Hurst-Wahl
Jill Hurst-Wahl is President Hurst Associates, Ltd. (www.HurstAssociates.com)
and a Professor of Practice in Syracuse University's School of
Information Studies. She is a frequent speaker and blogger on
digitization and social networking tools, both of which help
organizations connect themselves and their content with the world.
FUMSI articles by Jill Hurst-Wahl »
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