LibraryTechtonics

I wasn’t the only librarian who registered to go to PodCamp Boston. As a matter of fact, I have contact information for some Chelmsford librarians, a tip given to me by another PodCamp attendee within the first hour of PodCamp.

See, my Book Club T shirt, having made me somewhat famous in my first hour at the conference, had prompted people to talk to me, including Bryan Person. He was stoked to see other librarians registered for the event, and since I hadn’t been able to touch base with them before heading to the conference, I metioned I’d love to interview them if I could find them. Bryan asked for my card and my mobile number, and within 1/2 hour he’d found 2 librarians for me to talk to (I need to call them!). I *heart* networking with geeks.

I must say, the conversations I had about being a librarian and about libraries weren’t your typical, “Didn’t Google kill you guys?” sort of chats. The most common question was, “What are you doing here?” in that “What are you hoping to learn?” sort of way. I went to PodCamp because:

1. I’m a geek
2. It was free, and a 10 minute drive from my apartment with free parking
3. I love hanging out with smart geeks
4. The best way to learn about podcasting and the podcasting culture is to hang out with the source
5. Meeting new people is groovy
6. I’m not sure how to fit podcasting into the PLA Blog now that we have the capabilities

It was interesting to give a sort of elevator pitch-style explanation of my job, the love/hate relationship between technology and librarianship, and to have non-librarians be so interested in what I do for a living, and how technology fits in.

There were conversations about kids quoting Wikipedia, the complications and inconveniences of interlibrary loan systems, how the library business is tough to break into, a benevolent “You need a degree for that?” chat, the lament that people don’t ask librarians for help more often, how libraries are dealing with social software and tagging, and more. I even ran into a self-proclaimed “library whore” who not only knew the Dewey Decimal System by heart, but apparently was a huge fan of my library. Most often, the podcasters I talked to were stoked to know that a librarian was interested in the technology, and a few were a bit confused as to why libraries weren’t already doing more with it.

In the midst of the organized chaos that was this unconference, I think I’ve learned more about podcasting and the podcasting race of geeks than I’ve learned about any other given subject at any other conference I’ve been to, virtual or IRL (in real life). I already had a significant number of neat ideas on how to use podcasts at Reading Public Library and on my blog, but my real conundrum was the PLA Blog, and I actually collected a series of really interesting ideas that I’ll probably talk about a bit over on the PLA Blog to wrap up my posts there (read more about my experience at PodCamp Boston 2006).

Tags: conference