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Weblogs:
Their Use and Application
in Science and Technology Libraries
Randy Reichardt
Geoffrey Harder
ABSTRACT. Weblogs, or blogs, emerged in the late 1990s on the Web,
quickly becoming a new way to communicate ideas, opinions, resources
and news. Since that time, the community of blogs has grown to encom-
pass specific subject areas of study and research. This article briefly dis-
cusses the history and background of blogs, including blogging
software. Literature searches suggest very little has been published on
subject-specific blogs in scientific and technical publications. Applica-
tions in science and technology librarianship are discussed, including
team and project management, reference work, current awareness, and
the librarian as blog mentor for students. [Article copies available for a fee
from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address:
<docdelivery@haworthpress.com> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com>
© 2005 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]
KEYWORDS. Weblogs, blogs, project management, scientific com-
munication, engineering, science and technology libraries, mentoring
Randy Reichardt, MLS, is Engineering Librarian responsible for Chemical/Mate-
rial and Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton AB (E-mail:
randy.reichart@ualberta.ca). Geoffrey Harder, MLIS, is Biological Sciences and Com-
puting Science Librarian, and Manager of the Knowledge Common, University of Al-
berta, Edmonton AB (E-mail: geoffrey.harder@ualberta.ca).
Science & Technology Libraries, Vol. 25(3) 2005
http://www.haworthpress.com/web/STL
 2005 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.
Digital Object Identifier:10.1300/J122v25n03_07 105
INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND
What Is a Weblog?
In very simple terms, a weblog, or blog, is a Web site resembling a personal
journal that is updated with individual entries or postings. The entries are
dated, and in many cases, assigned category headings and keywords. Blogs of-
ten appear as a two or three column Web page, with one or more columns fea-
turing lists of links to other sites of related or common interest. Essentially, a
blog is the online equivalent of a paper diary, reading list, newspaper, and ad-
dress book all rolled into one.
A distinguishing feature of blogging software is the facility to automati-
cally archive entries, allowing stories and postings to be searched, browsed,
and reviewed at any time. As with all online content, the utility of a weblog’s
archive is only as good as is the lifespan of the Web site. Nevertheless, this ar-
chiving function is a timely and useful feature now that major search engines
are indexing weblogs.
The intellectual content of blogs ranges from the very personal to the very
practical, from tales of shopping adventures to detailed logging of corporate
projects. Blog entries can contain news items, photographs, information, and
links of interest based on the subject coverage. Personal blogs are often used
as a means to share opinions and editorials covering events of interest to the
writer. Subject-specific blogs can focus on a single topic, or on broader disci-
pline divisions in which issues of interest to those working in that area are
posted. An example of the former includes blogs devoted to the periodic table
(Heilman, accessed December 7, 2004) or mass spectrometry (Murray Mass
Spectrometry Group, accessed December 7, 2004), and of the latter, a blog
covering any and all things related to nanotechnology (Lovy, accessed Decem-
ber 7, 2004). Blogs are commonly solo projects, but are also extremely success-
ful as community projects. Slashdot’s “News for Nerds. Stuff That Matters”
typifies the community blog, as demonstrated by its core group of authors and
thousands of story-seekers who contribute news items and ideas for the site.
Essentially, weblogs allow for simplified Web publishing (Lindahl 2003).
History
Dave Winer, creator of Scripting News and current Harvard weblog editor,
writes that the first weblog was the first Web site created by Tim Berners-Lee,
http://info.cern.ch/, while he worked at CERN. Berners-Lee used the site to
point to Web sites when they first appeared. (This link is no longer active, but
has been archived at http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/
106 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
WWW/News/9201.html.) Rebecca Blood suggests the “What’s New?” site
from Mosaic, which ran from June 1993 until June 1996, laid the foundation
for what blogs would become. The site provided links to the newest and most
interesting Web sites out there, and was updated a few times a week (Blood
2002, p. 2). Jorn Barger first used the term “weblog” in December 1997, on his
site, Robot Wisdom. In her essay, “Weblogs: A History and Perspective,”
Blood writes that in 1998, there were only a handful of sites that one would
now consider to have been weblogs. However, blogs began growing in num-
ber, even until the summer of 1999, when the first free blogging software and
tools appeared. After this time, the number began to increase exponentially
(Blood 2002). A natural outcome was the beginning of the “blogosphere,” a
term used to describe the larger, burgeoning community of webloggers, now
numbering in the millions.
The idea of online communities is anything but new, and can be traced back
to the creation and rise of BBSs (Bulletin Board Systems) in the late 1970s.
Begun in Chicago in early 1978, BBSs spread quickly and were very popular
until the advent of e-mail, electronic discussion lists, discussion groups, and
the browseable Web. The notion of online community-fostered via BBSs con-
tinues to exist in today’s online forums and weblogs (Rapp 2003). In today’s
world, there are many different applications designed to facilitate online com-
munication and collaboration, a segment of which have commonly come to be
known as “social software.”
Social software “ . . . refers to various, loosely connected types of applica-
tions that allow individuals to communicate with one another, and to track
discussions across the Web as they happen” (Tepper 2003). Boyd identified
three principles of social software, which he suggests paint a picture of a
“bottom-up” rather than a “top-down” application of the technology. In his
view, social software offers: “Support for conversational interaction be-
tween individuals or groups”; “Support for social feedback”; and “Support
for social networks” (Boyd, accessed December 7, 2004). Social software in-
vites individuals to collaborate, share, and interact with one another. It is an
invitation. It is not something foisted on individuals from above. In many
ways, blogging fits this profile. As Boyd suggests, bloggers and their blogs
form an interlaced network of contacts and communications: stories, links,
discussions, and dialogue interconnected across space and time: Social soft-
ware reflects the “juice” that arises from people’s personal interactions. It’s
not about control, it’s about co-evolution: people in personal contact, inter-
acting towards their own ends, influencing each other. But there isn’t a sin-
gle clearly defined project, per se. It’s a sprawling, tentacled world, where
social dealings are inductive, going from the individual, to a group, to many
Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 107
groups and, finally, to the universe. Or at least the itty-bitty universe of all
people using the Internet.
Blogging Software
The popularity of blogging is due in great part to the development of many
simple, out-of-the-box products that allow for the uncomplicated creation and
maintenance of a blog. A quick Web search for “blogging software” reveals a
wide spectrum of choices, from free hosted packages, requiring nothing more
than an e-mail address and a witty blog name, to robust packages offering
hardy content management systems, news aggregation, and other advanced
features worthy of a sophisticated enterprise package.
In general, blogging software provides the author with an easy-to-use
graphical interface for posting to the weblog. Most interfaces resemble the
screen of a basic word processor; complete with familiar one-click formatting
commands to change the look of one’s text or to insert a hyperlink into a sen-
tence. Once the content of the post has been typed or copied, it is often one
more click “to post,” at which time the posting (or entry) is automatically
added to both the Web page and archive. The customization of blogging soft-
ware allows for one author or many authors to post, often with permission
settings that can restrict the editing, creating, or deleting powers of blog
members. The same can be said for the “comment” feature, which many blog
authors enable to allow readers of postings to add their reactions and commen-
tary. Personal blogs thrive on feedback and responses to postings. However, it
may not be in one’s best interest to allow comments on all postings (particu-
larly those where you wish to have the last word).
The point here is not to highlight or endorse any one package over another,
but simply to suggest to the reader that the customization options are enor-
mous and that neither one’s budget nor expertise need be great in order to give
blogging a try. Peter Scott’s excellent site, “Weblogs Compendium,” available
at http://www.lights.com/weblogs/, offers a wide range of resources about
weblogs, including lists of hosting services, tools, directories, and definitions.
LITERATURE SEARCH
Literature searches were conducted on eighteen major subject-specific da-
tabases in science, engineering, and agriculture, to determine if coverage of
the weblogging phenomenon has reached the trade, or even scholarly journals
in these fields of study. Results were restricted to a time period beginning in
108 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
the late-1990s, when weblogs first began to appear. Search terms used in-
cluded: weblog (and its truncations), and a number of terms beginning with
“blog,” including blogs, blogosphere, blogger, blogged, and blogging.
Databases that produced search results included: INSPEC, Ei Compendex,
General Science Abstracts, Applied Science and Technology Abstracts, and
Internet & Personal Computing Abstracts. Most of the articles retrieved from
these searches appeared in trade journals such as Online, Information Today,
InfoWorld, and Technology Review. Any scholarly articles found in these
searches dealt with the technology of blogging (i.e., software, hardware, etc.)
rather than the application and use of blogs in a particular field of research,
such as engineering or physics.
The search was run on LISA: Library and Information Science Abstracts
and Library Literature and Information Science Full-Text (LLISFT). The
LLISFT search produced 27 results, and the search on LISA produced 29 re-
sults, some of which were irrelevant. While many of the citations retrieved
were to publications of a general nature, examining the phenomenon of
blogging, it is in the library literature that articles focusing on the application
of weblogs to library issues and concerns have appeared. Topics such as k-log-
ging, a term used for knowledge management blogging (Angeles 2003),
blogging software in intranets (Fichter 2003), and use of weblogs to build
communication and research skills (Embrey 2002) have appeared in the pro-
fessional literature.
No articles were found which specifically discussed the use or potential use
of blogs in a science and technology library setting.
APPLICATIONS IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIANSHIP
Managing Teams and Projects
Blogging software is a very useful tool for assisting teams to collaborate,
focus, and communicate tasks and responsibilities that come with working
together on projects. The advancement of e-mail has allowed for an acceler-
ated method of sharing information–a gigantic leap forward, at least in terms
of fleetness, from the snail-mail paper trails and telephone messages of the
past (although the strengths of these latter methods often remain unmatched).
The drawbacks of e-mail, which most have experienced, are the rapidity and
bulk at which these messages can be delivered into one’s inbox. Often, a sim-
ple communiqué passed between team members can be transformed into a
chain of messages preceded by “re:”, often doubling the contents of one’s
inbox quickly. Even those who make the most of e-mail software’s sorting
Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 109
options and folders can still experience the difficulty of trying to go back to
find that one key piece of pertinent information that will answer the question
at hand.
Blog postings and comments, unlike e-mail, create a time-stamped and of-
ten categorized trail of discussion that can be easily searched and browsed so
that the former mishaps need not occur. Consider an e-mail asking team mem-
bers’ opinions on a new policy document. A flurry of e-mails batted back and
forth between members is almost sure to occur, each requiring the context of
e-mails falling prior and subsequent to its creation time in order to properly
understand what is being discussed. A time stamped blog posting will au-
tomatically archive what was to be the original e-mail, allowing others to
respond with their comments in a sequential posting pattern very easily inter-
preted by those who are involved in the discussion. The discussion is archived
for all to read, and no one person is left “out of the loop” should they happen to
delete any of the e-mails or bits of information from their inbox. This is only
one small example of blogging at work.
The simplicity of blogging and the practicality of putting much of our
shared information on a Web site, allows for easy searchability and up-to-the-
minute awareness for all team members. Blog postings can move from topic to
topic, and commenting features and cross-linking can allow for discussion
threads to continue with communication trails that are both traceable and easy
to access. Many discussions on electronic mailing lists would make excellent
blogging fodder if they were to be posted in an archive that was easily search-
able and available for comment.
A criticism of blogging is that it requires the reader to come to the Web
site–a challenge that isn’t perceived to be an issue with discussion lists and
group e-mails, at least beyond the initial sign-up. However, many blogs have
implemented notification features whereby readers can register for notifica-
tions of new blog posting and comments, with either all of the entry or only ex-
cerpts of the discussion to be forwarded to them. This “push” technology then
reminds the reader that there is a place where they can go to read the posting, if
in fact it has not already been delivered to them, regardless of whether they de-
lete their e-mail or not.
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds have also become a burgeoning
means of accessing blogs and other types of digital content. Many blogging
software packages automatically generate a so-called “syndicated” news feed,
in simple terms, a news-channel summary of the blogs content. This neatly
packaged, XML version of the content, allows newsreader software and Web
scripts to display and repurpose the material in a variety of different ways. For
example, users can subscribe to RSS feeds using any number of different free
110 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
or reasonably priced news aggregators (Scott, accessed December 7, 2004).
These tools allow for filtered reading of the Web in a fraction of the time re-
quired for traditional Web browsing.
Beyond news aggregators, RSS feeds can also be parsed and displayed
within a single page or site, delivering a one-stop current awareness service
for interested readers. LISFeeds is a good example of a site that aggregates
library-related RSS news feeds to provide library workers with a simple way
to stay current. Other Web pages, such as a library resource guide on medicine,
or perhaps a guide on physics, may have news feeds from a publisher of rele-
vant scientific information embedded directly into the guide. BiomedCentral
and Institute of Physics are examples of two publishers who have recognized
these opportunities and who have recently begun to offer feeds of their own.
(BioMed Central, IOP, both accessed December 7, 2004). These are but a
few of the many ways that RSS feeds, particularly those originating from
blogs, can be used within a library setting. The fact that blogging software
can so easily provide a springboard for this form of dynamic publishing and
syndication, speaks much to the blog’s usefulness as a collaborative tool.
Reference Desk Blogging
The reference team of any library must regularly communicate all sorts of
items: schedules, shift reports, breakdowns, changes to information resources,
and other items of day-to-day library life. Again, e-mail and face-to-face dis-
cussion is often the communication vehicle of choice. However, e-mails in an
already overflowing inbox can often be overlooked, and it’s difficult to keep
everyone up to speed when meetings and face-to-face encounters do not al-
ways involve the whole team. The traditional solution for many reference
teams has been to develop a reference binder or book: an often overflowing
and well-weathered bible of everything one needs to know while working a
reference shift. This is all well and good, but, it is often difficult to alert staff to
new items in the book, and many staff members grow so accustomed to find-
ing information online that they understandably fail to keep themselves cur-
rent on what has changed. Even if they do try, the book itself is sometimes not
user-friendly. Tabs, post-it notes, dog-eared corners, and scribbles in the mar-
gin often make a difficult index for staff less familiar with its contents, espe-
cially when they are under pressure to find answers in a hurry.
A reference blog is one alternative that could possibly help this situation. A
blog, like others previously discussed, can be quickly setup with permissions
granted for all members of the reference team to post to and comment. Post-
ings, given simple subject headings and concise topic headings, will be auto-
Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 111
matically filed in the online archive, browseable by subject or date, and
keyword searchable at the stroke of a hand. The Science Library at Loyola
University maintains Sci Li Ref, described as “keeping the reference desk staff
up-to-date!” (Science Library, Loyola, accessed December 7, 2004). A simi-
lar blog was created for the staff of the University of Alberta Libraries’
Knowledge Common, and has become a welcome tool for both training and
communication amongst its members.
Student Blogging
Librarians working in public service, information, and reference, can en-
courage students working in groups to create blogs, to be used as a project
management tools. For example, at the University of Alberta, students in the
fourth-year mechanical engineering design course must work in groups of four
on their capstone projects. The mechanical engineering librarian was ap-
proached by students interested in ways of managing the amount of informa-
tion being shared between group members. Was there a way to deal with
multiple e-mails, phone calls, paper trails? (See Figure 1 and Figure 2.)
With basic guidance and assistance from the mechanical engineering li-
brarian, a number of these groups are using blogs as a central online location
for information sharing, gathering, and comments. Minutes of their meetings,
allowing for future reference to past decisions, are posted, as are links to sites
of interest, including patents, and design examples.
Students working in a group of four, who make use of a weblog for their
project, will shift their study habits and communication patterns accordingly.
Group e-mails will drop considerably, as well as the need to phone and/or meet
in person to discuss project concerns. In essence, the weblog’s existence will
contribute to community building. “On a large university campus, especially
in a program that suffers from large class sizes, a blog can help students find
each other and connect over similar interests” (Radzikowska, accessed De-
cember 7, 2004).
The editor of Design News, Karen Auguston Field, believes engineers are
best qualified to blog about technology. In her article, “Why Every Engineer
Needs a Weblog,” Field suggests that by creating a blog in an area of expertise
or interest, engineers can connect with those sharing the same curiosity and
zeal for the subject. The engineer would also be provided the forum to critique
less credible sources, which might be misleading or inaccurate (Field 2003).
The blogs used for design project management by students in the Univer-
sity of Alberta mechanical engineering design class were created using soft-
ware from Blogger.com. Blogger was chosen because of its ease of use and its
capability to host blogs on its own site.
112 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 113
FIGURE 1. University of Alberta Knowledge Common Staff Blog
FIGURE 2. Example of a Student Design Group Blog in Mechanical Engineering
Reference and public services librarians who choose to encourage students
to set up their own blogs need to be familiar with this software, or others of a
similar nature. There are two reasons to do so: to help students create their first
blogs, and to be a resource for questions in the future. One of the features of
Blogger’s editing screen is a Knowledge Base, which includes good instruc-
tions on posting, making links to other sites, editing, deleting, and more.
The option exists for the librarian to offer to participate as a project collabo-
rator with one or more student groups. The librarian can monitor the blog(s),
and provide input, information, or assistance if needed, and the occasional ap-
propriate posting. Such activity could suggest a new, perhaps emerging model
for a different kind of reference service, one in which the librarian responds to
queries by regularly checking users’ weblogs. Of course, having to check
more than a handful would quickly become unmanageable and overwhelming.
One solution is to make use of the blogs’ RSS feeds to very quickly and unob-
trusively survey how the students are progressing.
Are libraries and librarians willing to support initiative to provide weblog
support for their community? The University of Minnesota Libraries think so:
“It is our goal to develop a blog server through which everyone in the univer-
sity community (faculty, staff, and student) can have access to their own indi-
vidual blog” (University of Minnesota Libraries, accessed December 7, 2004).
Other campuses are also providing students and staff with the means to create
their own blogs. Though not library-initiated, the Berkman Center for Internet &
Society at Harvard Law School hosts “Weblogs at Harvard Law,” which al-
lows anyone with a harvard.edu e-mail address to create their own weblog.
(John Harvard’s Journal 2004) Seton Hall University students can create their
own weblogs with a service provided by the Humanities Division and the New
Media Journalism program ([Jerz], accessed December 7, 2004).
Current Awareness for Science and Technology Librarians,
Scientists, and Engineers
The growth of weblogs has resulted in the evolution of their coverage, from
subject-general to subject-specific. A few general library weblogs began ap-
pearing in the late 1990s, and continue to this day. Since then, a number of
weblogs created and maintained by science and technology librarians have
emerged. These weblogs provide coverage of issues of importance to librari-
ans working in the science and technology environment (Reichardt, accessed
December 7, 2004; Lavallé-Welch, accessed December 7, 2004; Dupuis, ac-
cessed December 7, 2004).
Weblogs covering science and technology subjects, such as nanotechnology,
are providing subject experts with a new way to stay current in their areas of
114 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
research. Users and patrons of science and technology libraries are not being
left out of the weblog loop either, although the movement in this direction is
emerging at a much slower pace. The Rowland Institute Library Blog features
“links to websites, articles and resources of interest to Rowland scientists as
well as material about issues concerning science libraries” (Eastman, ac-
cessed December 7, 2004). Visit the homepage of the Olin Library, at the
Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, and you are greeted with The Olin
Library Blog, which serves as a library news portal for its users (Olin Library,
accessed December 7, 2004).
CONCLUSIONS
With weblogs now providing coverage of issues relevant to science and
technology librarians and their clients, we are seeing the beginning of a shift in
the communication habits and patterns of these groups. Weblogs are providing
an alterative to multiple electronic discuss list subscriptions and ever-increas-
ing amounts of e-mail, as well as a new mechanism for current awareness and
professional development. Librarians in science and technology, and in fact
all areas of librarianship, can employ blogs in project and team management as
well as reference desk training and scheduling. As mentors, librarians can as-
sist students in creating and maintaining weblogs for their assignments and
projects. This work can be viewed as an extension of reference service. The
challenge for librarians is to become familiar with the weblog and its potential,
and explore new ways to further its development and application in science
and technology librarianship.
Received: January 22, 2004
Revised: April 15, 2004
Accepted: June 1, 2004
REFERENCES
Angeles, Michael. 2003. “K-Logging: Supporting KM with web logs.” Library Journal
Spring 2003 Net Connect 128(7): 20-22.
Blood, Rebecca. “Weblogs: A history and perspective.” Available at: <http://www.
rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Boyd, Stowe. 2003. “Are you ready for social software?” Darwin: Information Tech-
nology for Executives. Available at: <http://www.darwinmag.com/read/050103/
social.html> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Dupuis, John. “Confessions of a science librarian.” Available at: <http://www.jdupuis.
blogspot.com/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 115
Eastman, Garrett. Rowland Institute Library blog. Available at: <http://blogs.law.harvard.
edu/rihlib/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Embrey, Theresa-Ross. 2002. “You blog, we blog: A guide to how teacher-librarians
can use weblogs to build communication and research skills.” Teacher Librarian
30(2): 7-9.
Fichter,Darlene.2003.“Blogging software for intranet applications.” Online 27(1): 61-63.
Field, Karen Auguston. 2003. “Why every engineer needs a weblog.” Design News
58(11): 11.
Heilman, Chris. “Periodic: Postings about the periodic table.” Available at: < http://
radio.weblogs.com/0101365/categories/periodic/> (accessed December 7 2004).
IOP: Syndication.iop.org. Institute of Physics. <http://syndication.iop.org/?site> (ac-
cessed December 7, 2004).
[Jerz, Dennis G.] blogs.setonhall.edu. Available at: <http://blogs.setonhill.edu/> (ac-
cessed December 7, 2004).
2004. “John Harvard’s Journal: Creating community, on-line and off.” Harvard Magazine
106(3): 64-67.
Lavalléé-Welch, Catherine. EngLib. Available at: <http://www.englib.info/> (accessed
December 7, 2004).
Lindahl, Charlie, and Elise Blount. 2003. “Weblogs: Simplifying web publishing.”
Computer 31(11): 114-116.
Lovy, Howard. “Howard Lovy’s Nanobot.” Available at: <http://nanobot.blogspot.com/>
(accessed December 7, 2004).
Murray Mass Spectrometry Group. Mass spectrometry blog. Available at: <http://
ch335c.chem.lsu.edu/resources/ms/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Olin Library. The Olin Library blog. Available at: <http://library.olin.edu/index.cfm>
(accessed December 7, 2004).
Radzikowska, Milena. “Conversation by blog: Expanding personal technology into the ac-
ademic community.” Available at: <http://www.ualberta.ca/COMSPACE/coneng/
html/papers/MRadzikowska.pdf> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Rapp, David. 2003. “From bulletin boards to blogs.” Technology Review 106(7): 88.
BioMed Central. “Receiving content from BioMed Central and The Scientist as an RSS
headline feed.” Available at: <http://www.biomedcentral.com/info/about/rss> (accessed
December 7, 2004).
Reichardt, Randy and Geoffrey Harder. “The SciTech library question.” Available at:
<http://stlq.info/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Science Library, Loyola University. Sci Li Ref. Available at: <http://sciref.blogspot.
com/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Scott, Peter. “RSS Compendium–RSS Readers.” Available at: <http://allrss.com/
rssreaders.html> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Tepper, Michele. 2003. “The rise of social software.” netWorker 7(3), 19-23.
University of Minnesota Libraries. “Uthink: Blogs at the University Libraries.” Avail-
able at: <http://blog.lib.umn.edu/> (accessed December 7, 2004).
Winer, Dave. 2002. “The History of Weblogs.” Available at: <http://newhome.
weblogs.com/historyOfWeblogs> (accessed December 7, 2004).
116 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES

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  • 1. Weblogs: Their Use and Application in Science and Technology Libraries Randy Reichardt Geoffrey Harder ABSTRACT. Weblogs, or blogs, emerged in the late 1990s on the Web, quickly becoming a new way to communicate ideas, opinions, resources and news. Since that time, the community of blogs has grown to encom- pass specific subject areas of study and research. This article briefly dis- cusses the history and background of blogs, including blogging software. Literature searches suggest very little has been published on subject-specific blogs in scientific and technical publications. Applica- tions in science and technology librarianship are discussed, including team and project management, reference work, current awareness, and the librarian as blog mentor for students. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <docdelivery@haworthpress.com> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2005 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.] KEYWORDS. Weblogs, blogs, project management, scientific com- munication, engineering, science and technology libraries, mentoring Randy Reichardt, MLS, is Engineering Librarian responsible for Chemical/Mate- rial and Mechanical Engineering, University of Alberta, Edmonton AB (E-mail: randy.reichart@ualberta.ca). Geoffrey Harder, MLIS, is Biological Sciences and Com- puting Science Librarian, and Manager of the Knowledge Common, University of Al- berta, Edmonton AB (E-mail: geoffrey.harder@ualberta.ca). Science & Technology Libraries, Vol. 25(3) 2005 http://www.haworthpress.com/web/STL  2005 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved. Digital Object Identifier:10.1300/J122v25n03_07 105
  • 2. INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND What Is a Weblog? In very simple terms, a weblog, or blog, is a Web site resembling a personal journal that is updated with individual entries or postings. The entries are dated, and in many cases, assigned category headings and keywords. Blogs of- ten appear as a two or three column Web page, with one or more columns fea- turing lists of links to other sites of related or common interest. Essentially, a blog is the online equivalent of a paper diary, reading list, newspaper, and ad- dress book all rolled into one. A distinguishing feature of blogging software is the facility to automati- cally archive entries, allowing stories and postings to be searched, browsed, and reviewed at any time. As with all online content, the utility of a weblog’s archive is only as good as is the lifespan of the Web site. Nevertheless, this ar- chiving function is a timely and useful feature now that major search engines are indexing weblogs. The intellectual content of blogs ranges from the very personal to the very practical, from tales of shopping adventures to detailed logging of corporate projects. Blog entries can contain news items, photographs, information, and links of interest based on the subject coverage. Personal blogs are often used as a means to share opinions and editorials covering events of interest to the writer. Subject-specific blogs can focus on a single topic, or on broader disci- pline divisions in which issues of interest to those working in that area are posted. An example of the former includes blogs devoted to the periodic table (Heilman, accessed December 7, 2004) or mass spectrometry (Murray Mass Spectrometry Group, accessed December 7, 2004), and of the latter, a blog covering any and all things related to nanotechnology (Lovy, accessed Decem- ber 7, 2004). Blogs are commonly solo projects, but are also extremely success- ful as community projects. Slashdot’s “News for Nerds. Stuff That Matters” typifies the community blog, as demonstrated by its core group of authors and thousands of story-seekers who contribute news items and ideas for the site. Essentially, weblogs allow for simplified Web publishing (Lindahl 2003). History Dave Winer, creator of Scripting News and current Harvard weblog editor, writes that the first weblog was the first Web site created by Tim Berners-Lee, http://info.cern.ch/, while he worked at CERN. Berners-Lee used the site to point to Web sites when they first appeared. (This link is no longer active, but has been archived at http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/ 106 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
  • 3. WWW/News/9201.html.) Rebecca Blood suggests the “What’s New?” site from Mosaic, which ran from June 1993 until June 1996, laid the foundation for what blogs would become. The site provided links to the newest and most interesting Web sites out there, and was updated a few times a week (Blood 2002, p. 2). Jorn Barger first used the term “weblog” in December 1997, on his site, Robot Wisdom. In her essay, “Weblogs: A History and Perspective,” Blood writes that in 1998, there were only a handful of sites that one would now consider to have been weblogs. However, blogs began growing in num- ber, even until the summer of 1999, when the first free blogging software and tools appeared. After this time, the number began to increase exponentially (Blood 2002). A natural outcome was the beginning of the “blogosphere,” a term used to describe the larger, burgeoning community of webloggers, now numbering in the millions. The idea of online communities is anything but new, and can be traced back to the creation and rise of BBSs (Bulletin Board Systems) in the late 1970s. Begun in Chicago in early 1978, BBSs spread quickly and were very popular until the advent of e-mail, electronic discussion lists, discussion groups, and the browseable Web. The notion of online community-fostered via BBSs con- tinues to exist in today’s online forums and weblogs (Rapp 2003). In today’s world, there are many different applications designed to facilitate online com- munication and collaboration, a segment of which have commonly come to be known as “social software.” Social software “ . . . refers to various, loosely connected types of applica- tions that allow individuals to communicate with one another, and to track discussions across the Web as they happen” (Tepper 2003). Boyd identified three principles of social software, which he suggests paint a picture of a “bottom-up” rather than a “top-down” application of the technology. In his view, social software offers: “Support for conversational interaction be- tween individuals or groups”; “Support for social feedback”; and “Support for social networks” (Boyd, accessed December 7, 2004). Social software in- vites individuals to collaborate, share, and interact with one another. It is an invitation. It is not something foisted on individuals from above. In many ways, blogging fits this profile. As Boyd suggests, bloggers and their blogs form an interlaced network of contacts and communications: stories, links, discussions, and dialogue interconnected across space and time: Social soft- ware reflects the “juice” that arises from people’s personal interactions. It’s not about control, it’s about co-evolution: people in personal contact, inter- acting towards their own ends, influencing each other. But there isn’t a sin- gle clearly defined project, per se. It’s a sprawling, tentacled world, where social dealings are inductive, going from the individual, to a group, to many Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 107
  • 4. groups and, finally, to the universe. Or at least the itty-bitty universe of all people using the Internet. Blogging Software The popularity of blogging is due in great part to the development of many simple, out-of-the-box products that allow for the uncomplicated creation and maintenance of a blog. A quick Web search for “blogging software” reveals a wide spectrum of choices, from free hosted packages, requiring nothing more than an e-mail address and a witty blog name, to robust packages offering hardy content management systems, news aggregation, and other advanced features worthy of a sophisticated enterprise package. In general, blogging software provides the author with an easy-to-use graphical interface for posting to the weblog. Most interfaces resemble the screen of a basic word processor; complete with familiar one-click formatting commands to change the look of one’s text or to insert a hyperlink into a sen- tence. Once the content of the post has been typed or copied, it is often one more click “to post,” at which time the posting (or entry) is automatically added to both the Web page and archive. The customization of blogging soft- ware allows for one author or many authors to post, often with permission settings that can restrict the editing, creating, or deleting powers of blog members. The same can be said for the “comment” feature, which many blog authors enable to allow readers of postings to add their reactions and commen- tary. Personal blogs thrive on feedback and responses to postings. However, it may not be in one’s best interest to allow comments on all postings (particu- larly those where you wish to have the last word). The point here is not to highlight or endorse any one package over another, but simply to suggest to the reader that the customization options are enor- mous and that neither one’s budget nor expertise need be great in order to give blogging a try. Peter Scott’s excellent site, “Weblogs Compendium,” available at http://www.lights.com/weblogs/, offers a wide range of resources about weblogs, including lists of hosting services, tools, directories, and definitions. LITERATURE SEARCH Literature searches were conducted on eighteen major subject-specific da- tabases in science, engineering, and agriculture, to determine if coverage of the weblogging phenomenon has reached the trade, or even scholarly journals in these fields of study. Results were restricted to a time period beginning in 108 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
  • 5. the late-1990s, when weblogs first began to appear. Search terms used in- cluded: weblog (and its truncations), and a number of terms beginning with “blog,” including blogs, blogosphere, blogger, blogged, and blogging. Databases that produced search results included: INSPEC, Ei Compendex, General Science Abstracts, Applied Science and Technology Abstracts, and Internet & Personal Computing Abstracts. Most of the articles retrieved from these searches appeared in trade journals such as Online, Information Today, InfoWorld, and Technology Review. Any scholarly articles found in these searches dealt with the technology of blogging (i.e., software, hardware, etc.) rather than the application and use of blogs in a particular field of research, such as engineering or physics. The search was run on LISA: Library and Information Science Abstracts and Library Literature and Information Science Full-Text (LLISFT). The LLISFT search produced 27 results, and the search on LISA produced 29 re- sults, some of which were irrelevant. While many of the citations retrieved were to publications of a general nature, examining the phenomenon of blogging, it is in the library literature that articles focusing on the application of weblogs to library issues and concerns have appeared. Topics such as k-log- ging, a term used for knowledge management blogging (Angeles 2003), blogging software in intranets (Fichter 2003), and use of weblogs to build communication and research skills (Embrey 2002) have appeared in the pro- fessional literature. No articles were found which specifically discussed the use or potential use of blogs in a science and technology library setting. APPLICATIONS IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIANSHIP Managing Teams and Projects Blogging software is a very useful tool for assisting teams to collaborate, focus, and communicate tasks and responsibilities that come with working together on projects. The advancement of e-mail has allowed for an acceler- ated method of sharing information–a gigantic leap forward, at least in terms of fleetness, from the snail-mail paper trails and telephone messages of the past (although the strengths of these latter methods often remain unmatched). The drawbacks of e-mail, which most have experienced, are the rapidity and bulk at which these messages can be delivered into one’s inbox. Often, a sim- ple communiqué passed between team members can be transformed into a chain of messages preceded by “re:”, often doubling the contents of one’s inbox quickly. Even those who make the most of e-mail software’s sorting Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 109
  • 6. options and folders can still experience the difficulty of trying to go back to find that one key piece of pertinent information that will answer the question at hand. Blog postings and comments, unlike e-mail, create a time-stamped and of- ten categorized trail of discussion that can be easily searched and browsed so that the former mishaps need not occur. Consider an e-mail asking team mem- bers’ opinions on a new policy document. A flurry of e-mails batted back and forth between members is almost sure to occur, each requiring the context of e-mails falling prior and subsequent to its creation time in order to properly understand what is being discussed. A time stamped blog posting will au- tomatically archive what was to be the original e-mail, allowing others to respond with their comments in a sequential posting pattern very easily inter- preted by those who are involved in the discussion. The discussion is archived for all to read, and no one person is left “out of the loop” should they happen to delete any of the e-mails or bits of information from their inbox. This is only one small example of blogging at work. The simplicity of blogging and the practicality of putting much of our shared information on a Web site, allows for easy searchability and up-to-the- minute awareness for all team members. Blog postings can move from topic to topic, and commenting features and cross-linking can allow for discussion threads to continue with communication trails that are both traceable and easy to access. Many discussions on electronic mailing lists would make excellent blogging fodder if they were to be posted in an archive that was easily search- able and available for comment. A criticism of blogging is that it requires the reader to come to the Web site–a challenge that isn’t perceived to be an issue with discussion lists and group e-mails, at least beyond the initial sign-up. However, many blogs have implemented notification features whereby readers can register for notifica- tions of new blog posting and comments, with either all of the entry or only ex- cerpts of the discussion to be forwarded to them. This “push” technology then reminds the reader that there is a place where they can go to read the posting, if in fact it has not already been delivered to them, regardless of whether they de- lete their e-mail or not. RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds have also become a burgeoning means of accessing blogs and other types of digital content. Many blogging software packages automatically generate a so-called “syndicated” news feed, in simple terms, a news-channel summary of the blogs content. This neatly packaged, XML version of the content, allows newsreader software and Web scripts to display and repurpose the material in a variety of different ways. For example, users can subscribe to RSS feeds using any number of different free 110 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
  • 7. or reasonably priced news aggregators (Scott, accessed December 7, 2004). These tools allow for filtered reading of the Web in a fraction of the time re- quired for traditional Web browsing. Beyond news aggregators, RSS feeds can also be parsed and displayed within a single page or site, delivering a one-stop current awareness service for interested readers. LISFeeds is a good example of a site that aggregates library-related RSS news feeds to provide library workers with a simple way to stay current. Other Web pages, such as a library resource guide on medicine, or perhaps a guide on physics, may have news feeds from a publisher of rele- vant scientific information embedded directly into the guide. BiomedCentral and Institute of Physics are examples of two publishers who have recognized these opportunities and who have recently begun to offer feeds of their own. (BioMed Central, IOP, both accessed December 7, 2004). These are but a few of the many ways that RSS feeds, particularly those originating from blogs, can be used within a library setting. The fact that blogging software can so easily provide a springboard for this form of dynamic publishing and syndication, speaks much to the blog’s usefulness as a collaborative tool. Reference Desk Blogging The reference team of any library must regularly communicate all sorts of items: schedules, shift reports, breakdowns, changes to information resources, and other items of day-to-day library life. Again, e-mail and face-to-face dis- cussion is often the communication vehicle of choice. However, e-mails in an already overflowing inbox can often be overlooked, and it’s difficult to keep everyone up to speed when meetings and face-to-face encounters do not al- ways involve the whole team. The traditional solution for many reference teams has been to develop a reference binder or book: an often overflowing and well-weathered bible of everything one needs to know while working a reference shift. This is all well and good, but, it is often difficult to alert staff to new items in the book, and many staff members grow so accustomed to find- ing information online that they understandably fail to keep themselves cur- rent on what has changed. Even if they do try, the book itself is sometimes not user-friendly. Tabs, post-it notes, dog-eared corners, and scribbles in the mar- gin often make a difficult index for staff less familiar with its contents, espe- cially when they are under pressure to find answers in a hurry. A reference blog is one alternative that could possibly help this situation. A blog, like others previously discussed, can be quickly setup with permissions granted for all members of the reference team to post to and comment. Post- ings, given simple subject headings and concise topic headings, will be auto- Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 111
  • 8. matically filed in the online archive, browseable by subject or date, and keyword searchable at the stroke of a hand. The Science Library at Loyola University maintains Sci Li Ref, described as “keeping the reference desk staff up-to-date!” (Science Library, Loyola, accessed December 7, 2004). A simi- lar blog was created for the staff of the University of Alberta Libraries’ Knowledge Common, and has become a welcome tool for both training and communication amongst its members. Student Blogging Librarians working in public service, information, and reference, can en- courage students working in groups to create blogs, to be used as a project management tools. For example, at the University of Alberta, students in the fourth-year mechanical engineering design course must work in groups of four on their capstone projects. The mechanical engineering librarian was ap- proached by students interested in ways of managing the amount of informa- tion being shared between group members. Was there a way to deal with multiple e-mails, phone calls, paper trails? (See Figure 1 and Figure 2.) With basic guidance and assistance from the mechanical engineering li- brarian, a number of these groups are using blogs as a central online location for information sharing, gathering, and comments. Minutes of their meetings, allowing for future reference to past decisions, are posted, as are links to sites of interest, including patents, and design examples. Students working in a group of four, who make use of a weblog for their project, will shift their study habits and communication patterns accordingly. Group e-mails will drop considerably, as well as the need to phone and/or meet in person to discuss project concerns. In essence, the weblog’s existence will contribute to community building. “On a large university campus, especially in a program that suffers from large class sizes, a blog can help students find each other and connect over similar interests” (Radzikowska, accessed De- cember 7, 2004). The editor of Design News, Karen Auguston Field, believes engineers are best qualified to blog about technology. In her article, “Why Every Engineer Needs a Weblog,” Field suggests that by creating a blog in an area of expertise or interest, engineers can connect with those sharing the same curiosity and zeal for the subject. The engineer would also be provided the forum to critique less credible sources, which might be misleading or inaccurate (Field 2003). The blogs used for design project management by students in the Univer- sity of Alberta mechanical engineering design class were created using soft- ware from Blogger.com. Blogger was chosen because of its ease of use and its capability to host blogs on its own site. 112 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
  • 9. Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 113 FIGURE 1. University of Alberta Knowledge Common Staff Blog FIGURE 2. Example of a Student Design Group Blog in Mechanical Engineering
  • 10. Reference and public services librarians who choose to encourage students to set up their own blogs need to be familiar with this software, or others of a similar nature. There are two reasons to do so: to help students create their first blogs, and to be a resource for questions in the future. One of the features of Blogger’s editing screen is a Knowledge Base, which includes good instruc- tions on posting, making links to other sites, editing, deleting, and more. The option exists for the librarian to offer to participate as a project collabo- rator with one or more student groups. The librarian can monitor the blog(s), and provide input, information, or assistance if needed, and the occasional ap- propriate posting. Such activity could suggest a new, perhaps emerging model for a different kind of reference service, one in which the librarian responds to queries by regularly checking users’ weblogs. Of course, having to check more than a handful would quickly become unmanageable and overwhelming. One solution is to make use of the blogs’ RSS feeds to very quickly and unob- trusively survey how the students are progressing. Are libraries and librarians willing to support initiative to provide weblog support for their community? The University of Minnesota Libraries think so: “It is our goal to develop a blog server through which everyone in the univer- sity community (faculty, staff, and student) can have access to their own indi- vidual blog” (University of Minnesota Libraries, accessed December 7, 2004). Other campuses are also providing students and staff with the means to create their own blogs. Though not library-initiated, the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School hosts “Weblogs at Harvard Law,” which al- lows anyone with a harvard.edu e-mail address to create their own weblog. (John Harvard’s Journal 2004) Seton Hall University students can create their own weblogs with a service provided by the Humanities Division and the New Media Journalism program ([Jerz], accessed December 7, 2004). Current Awareness for Science and Technology Librarians, Scientists, and Engineers The growth of weblogs has resulted in the evolution of their coverage, from subject-general to subject-specific. A few general library weblogs began ap- pearing in the late 1990s, and continue to this day. Since then, a number of weblogs created and maintained by science and technology librarians have emerged. These weblogs provide coverage of issues of importance to librari- ans working in the science and technology environment (Reichardt, accessed December 7, 2004; Lavallé-Welch, accessed December 7, 2004; Dupuis, ac- cessed December 7, 2004). Weblogs covering science and technology subjects, such as nanotechnology, are providing subject experts with a new way to stay current in their areas of 114 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES
  • 11. research. Users and patrons of science and technology libraries are not being left out of the weblog loop either, although the movement in this direction is emerging at a much slower pace. The Rowland Institute Library Blog features “links to websites, articles and resources of interest to Rowland scientists as well as material about issues concerning science libraries” (Eastman, ac- cessed December 7, 2004). Visit the homepage of the Olin Library, at the Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, and you are greeted with The Olin Library Blog, which serves as a library news portal for its users (Olin Library, accessed December 7, 2004). CONCLUSIONS With weblogs now providing coverage of issues relevant to science and technology librarians and their clients, we are seeing the beginning of a shift in the communication habits and patterns of these groups. Weblogs are providing an alterative to multiple electronic discuss list subscriptions and ever-increas- ing amounts of e-mail, as well as a new mechanism for current awareness and professional development. Librarians in science and technology, and in fact all areas of librarianship, can employ blogs in project and team management as well as reference desk training and scheduling. As mentors, librarians can as- sist students in creating and maintaining weblogs for their assignments and projects. This work can be viewed as an extension of reference service. The challenge for librarians is to become familiar with the weblog and its potential, and explore new ways to further its development and application in science and technology librarianship. Received: January 22, 2004 Revised: April 15, 2004 Accepted: June 1, 2004 REFERENCES Angeles, Michael. 2003. “K-Logging: Supporting KM with web logs.” Library Journal Spring 2003 Net Connect 128(7): 20-22. Blood, Rebecca. “Weblogs: A history and perspective.” Available at: <http://www. rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html> (accessed December 7, 2004). Boyd, Stowe. 2003. “Are you ready for social software?” Darwin: Information Tech- nology for Executives. Available at: <http://www.darwinmag.com/read/050103/ social.html> (accessed December 7, 2004). Dupuis, John. “Confessions of a science librarian.” Available at: <http://www.jdupuis. blogspot.com/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Randy Reichardt and Geoffrey Harder 115
  • 12. Eastman, Garrett. Rowland Institute Library blog. Available at: <http://blogs.law.harvard. edu/rihlib/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Embrey, Theresa-Ross. 2002. “You blog, we blog: A guide to how teacher-librarians can use weblogs to build communication and research skills.” Teacher Librarian 30(2): 7-9. Fichter,Darlene.2003.“Blogging software for intranet applications.” Online 27(1): 61-63. Field, Karen Auguston. 2003. “Why every engineer needs a weblog.” Design News 58(11): 11. Heilman, Chris. “Periodic: Postings about the periodic table.” Available at: < http:// radio.weblogs.com/0101365/categories/periodic/> (accessed December 7 2004). IOP: Syndication.iop.org. Institute of Physics. <http://syndication.iop.org/?site> (ac- cessed December 7, 2004). [Jerz, Dennis G.] blogs.setonhall.edu. Available at: <http://blogs.setonhill.edu/> (ac- cessed December 7, 2004). 2004. “John Harvard’s Journal: Creating community, on-line and off.” Harvard Magazine 106(3): 64-67. Lavalléé-Welch, Catherine. EngLib. Available at: <http://www.englib.info/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Lindahl, Charlie, and Elise Blount. 2003. “Weblogs: Simplifying web publishing.” Computer 31(11): 114-116. Lovy, Howard. “Howard Lovy’s Nanobot.” Available at: <http://nanobot.blogspot.com/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Murray Mass Spectrometry Group. Mass spectrometry blog. Available at: <http:// ch335c.chem.lsu.edu/resources/ms/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Olin Library. The Olin Library blog. Available at: <http://library.olin.edu/index.cfm> (accessed December 7, 2004). Radzikowska, Milena. “Conversation by blog: Expanding personal technology into the ac- ademic community.” Available at: <http://www.ualberta.ca/COMSPACE/coneng/ html/papers/MRadzikowska.pdf> (accessed December 7, 2004). Rapp, David. 2003. “From bulletin boards to blogs.” Technology Review 106(7): 88. BioMed Central. “Receiving content from BioMed Central and The Scientist as an RSS headline feed.” Available at: <http://www.biomedcentral.com/info/about/rss> (accessed December 7, 2004). Reichardt, Randy and Geoffrey Harder. “The SciTech library question.” Available at: <http://stlq.info/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Science Library, Loyola University. Sci Li Ref. Available at: <http://sciref.blogspot. com/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Scott, Peter. “RSS Compendium–RSS Readers.” Available at: <http://allrss.com/ rssreaders.html> (accessed December 7, 2004). Tepper, Michele. 2003. “The rise of social software.” netWorker 7(3), 19-23. University of Minnesota Libraries. “Uthink: Blogs at the University Libraries.” Avail- able at: <http://blog.lib.umn.edu/> (accessed December 7, 2004). Winer, Dave. 2002. “The History of Weblogs.” Available at: <http://newhome. weblogs.com/historyOfWeblogs> (accessed December 7, 2004). 116 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY LIBRARIES