3. Who’s Helping?
✤ For this project, I followed a number of different librarians.
These were the most active in twitter reference
4. How to Find Questions
✤ Direct Tweets and Private Messages
✤ Hashtags
✤ Some useful ones may be #enquire, #refdesk, or #answers
✤ Advanced Search
✤ Twitter users can search using key words (eg. library) and may use
boolean operators (eg. cite AND paper)
5. How to Find Questions
✤ Although direct tweets are easiest to access, they are also fairly rare
✤ Most of the reference I observed occurred when the librarian
approached the information-seeker (a manifestation of embedded
librarianship)
6. How to Answer
✤ Answers may be presented in 2 styles
✤ 1. Written in 140 characters or less
✤ 2. Given via link in tweet
7. Challenges
✤ 1. Many reference questions cannot be answered in 140 characters (to
any level of quality)
✤ 2. Reference questions requiring a reference interview can be difficult
to conduct. Conversations can be long, and ultimately, abandoned.
8. Challenges
✤ 3. The biggest challenge is engagement. Of those twitter accounts I
followed, most of the tweets were advertising library service
(including twitter reference) rather than conducting any actually
reference assistance.
9. Should Libraries Bother with
Twitter Reference?
✤ Erin Fields in her 2010 article, “A Unique Twitter Use For Reference
Service,” identifies tweeting reference desk questions as a useful
behaviour.
✤ It communicates the type of research being done at an institution
✤ Demonstrates the types of questions librarians can answer
✤ Ultimately, it becomes a valuable promotion tool
10. What Does the Future Look Like?
✤ It seems that, for the time being, twitter is here to stay. While its
strength may not be in providing high-quality reference, it may
certainly be a valuable tool to be used in conjunction with other
services offered to distance users.
✤ These services may include chat reference, email reference, etc.
✤ Ultimately, twitter creates an access point for reference services
outside of the traditional reference model. The ease of which
librarians and information-seekers may collaborate is not equalled in
any other media, and creates an environment where embedded
librarianship may thrive.
11. @PractRef
✤ I have set up a twitter account for reference service. The purpose
behind it is to practice/see examples of reference on twitter.
✤ Give it a try! I welcome any and all tweets :)
✤ Twitter handle: @PractRef
12. Sources & Further Reading
✤ List of libraries on twitter:
http://www.libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Twitter
✤ Burkhardt, Andy. “Ambient Awareness in Twitter for Reference”
http://andyburkhardt.com/2010/02/12/ambient-awareness-in-
twitter-for-reference/
✤ Fields, Erin. “A Unique Twitter Use for Reference Services.”Library Hi
Tech News, No. 6/7, 2010.
✤ Milstein, S. ‘‘Twitter for Libraries and Librarians’’, Computers in
Libraries, Vol. 29 No. 5, 2009.
