Mobile Devices Are Changing Our Lives

I recently signed out magazines from my nearby public library for recreational reading on a flight. I still like reading print, but don't like spending the $6 or more magazine now costs. Granted they were a bit old, but applicable to my research interests.

Toronto Life Magazine had an excellent article on the problems with RIM, "Lazaridis and Balsillie Meet Their Waterloo" (unfortunately, not available online).

Time magazine had a "Wireless Issues" this past August that discussed "10 Ways Your Phone Is Changing the World". These ways and their respective articles are:

1. Democracy - elections will never be the same
2. Giving - doing good by texting
3. Spending - bye-bye, wallets
4. Secrets (and surveillance) - the phone knows all
5. Attitudes (socializing & communicating) - your life is fully mobile
6. Talking (rural telecommunications) - the grid is winning
7. Seeing (photography) - a camera goes anywhere
8. Play - toys get unplugged
9. Learning - gadgets go to class
10. Health - disease can't hide

I'm planning a class (hopefully to teach sometime soon) on how mobile devices have affected our society and identified these areas as the major ways mobiles are changing our lives. But I wondered what other areas are changing as a result of the increasingly global, ubiquitous access to mobiles?

I was thinking this blog post would be a good place to iteratively document mobiles impact from the major to the minor. So I would love for readers to add their thoughts or experiences with this. Here are my observations:

• Socializing and Lifestreaming - our ever-present mobile devices enables us to share the magnificent and minute details of our lives
• Identity and Memory - not only do mobile devices allow us to record and reflect on the events and images of our lives, but they provide a way to craft and project our identity and serve as memory aids and diaries
• Personal efficiency - from digital to-do lists, calling the spouse at the grocery store, or proximal reminders - mobile devices help us manage our lives for efficiently (and also prevent us from ever escaping it)
• Information and m-Libraries - through either e-books, online news, reviews or facts, or mobile friendly info databases, we have more ready access to information than ever possible
• Maps - do we need them any more with GPS and maps on our phone or in our car (but we do need to learn to not drive into the ocean or onto logging roads because or device told us too)
• Accessibility - there are strong barriers to use of mobile devices based on ability literacy, and finances - but mobile devices are providing new forms of information and communication access to groups that have not otherwise had it such as in the developing world or for the deaf and their use of instant messaging as a readily available mass communication method.

That's all I can think of now, but I'm sure there are many other ways mobile devices are changing our lives - so please share your thoughts here.

Libraries and the Mobile Web 2.0

Earlier this year, I looked at the convergence of social media and mobile library applications. I found this was an area that could have a lot of potential to augment information services, but found little innovation in this area. The intersection of increasing user involvement in creating, finding, and sharing their own information, combined with the direct and ubiquitous access of mobiles has prompted discussion in library literature, but it appears little action - yet.

It appears that initial usage of social media by libraries focused on promotion and communication between librarians and patrons. For example, social networking sites, podcasts, and blogs were used to share library information and news (e.g., location, hours, new collections, events, etc.).

Libraries are also using social media to build a sense of community around the library through such means as book blogs and online forums (for example, a book club). Rather than focus on specific technologies, Rutherford attempted to examine the role of social media by libraries (2008). She interviewed public librarians and found social media used for four main purposes: 1) community development, 2) patron outreach and acquisition, 3) communication expansion, and 4) power distribution.

Rutherford found on the whole, that social media was not often used by libraries, and when it was, that it was used predominantly in a limited way. For example, libraries are allowing patrons to comment on library information or submit questions in new ways, but are not offering users the functionality to create content. This may be due to the profession wishing to maintain expertise and information authority and accuracy standards (Rutherford, 2008).

My review of the literature revealed the following types of social media usage by libraries:

1. collaborative information filtering and recommendation via user-generated ratings and reviews and collective usage data)
2. enhanced information retrieval via user-generated metadata and social search
3. content and annotation creation by users individually and collectively (e.g., via wikis, blogs)
   
4. information sharing via social networking sites and syndication.

I found no examples of mobile libraries social media functions other than the viewing of user-generated content (please let me know of any). There are signs, however, that social media for m-libraries have emerged this year.

In January 2010, Library Thing released their Library Anywhere mobile application that connects a library's online public access catalog (OPAC with Library Thing’s user-supplied rating and review data.

Similarly, SirsiDynix upgraded their BookMyne mobile application in November 2010 to add social recommendation data provided by the book social network Goodreads. Such user-generated metadata has been added as an information overlay of OPAC displays before. This functionality allows users to see how others have tagged a book and browse resources tagged similarly.

In addition to social metadata, researchers have found that mobile users want to annotate information resources for individual organization and/or social sharing. Amazon has demonstrated the potential of harnessing collective annotations Their e-Reader, Kindle, has a highlights feature that allows users to upload their e-book highlights. Amazon aggregates these highlights to display the collective sense of a work’s key passages.

The importance for libraries to offer similarly innovative functionality is highlighted by Lippincott who wonders,

Will libraries move quickly to implement strategies for mobile devices, moving beyond pilot projects, such as SMS text message in reference, that address only one segment of user needs? Will the library be perceived as less and less central to the academy’s content needs? (p. 212)