So, I - The _Overly_ Caffeinated Librarian (recently updated ;) apparently did a blogging no-no when I hurriedly set up this temporary blogger blog (temporary, because I've just been waiting to move to a university run blog platform, since this is a work-related blog) - I didn't check to see if anyone else had registered, trademarked, or in any other way planted a flag on the phrase "Caffeinated Librarian". I did make sure that the domain name bit caflib was fairly unique - and I choose to use caflib instead of the spelled-out, and hard to key in, caffeinatedlibrarian, because I knew that would make it easier for my co-workers to jot down and find. There is one site using caflib as an actual domain, a company that sells a chicory-coffee mix (maybe something one of the other caffeinated librarians could comment on, because I've never been brave enough to try adulterating my coffee with chicory- it sounds a little -ew- to me), but I figured we could co-exist in peace ;) . I've recently had it pointed out to me that there are at least two other bloggers that have already laid claim to variations of the blog title " Caffeinated Librarian"; "Coffee|Code : Dan Scott, Caffeinated Librarian Geek" (posting since April 2005), and "The Caffeinated Librarian" (posting since Oct 2005) first at live and then on blogger. Mea culpa. I've gone ahead and updated my own blog title to "The Overly Caffeinated Librarian" to facilitate disambiguation. I'm sure there are actually thousands of caffeinated librarians out there (of both the regular and overly-caffed varieties) and it's inevitable that someone else will come along later and use yet another variation of this phrase- coffee and librarianship seem to go hand in hand. Of course, this is not actually an unusual occurrence on the web in general. Try this search for "Megan's blog"- now, find the unique Megan's blog you where theoretically looking for. I'll wait… done? No easy task, is it? I've never told people to look for me online as any variation of "The Caffeinated Librarian"- I always tell them to search for "Robert Slater" (with some extra word like librarian or UIUC) to find my web presence. I never really expected anyone to stumble across my blog accidentally; I don't really think I have that kind of a blog, nor am I an interesting enough person or blogger to attract any fans. I latched on to the phrase "caffeinated librarian" because it aptly described me to those people I was in direct contact/communication with- they knew I'd never be seen without my trusty mug of coffee (at one time, referred to as my coffee barrel).
I do want to take a moment to talk about anonymity and the web- when people mask their actual identities- whether for good reasons or not- it makes it very difficult to locate them. It's also very difficult to establish a base-line level of credibility for any information you find on anonymously posted documents (no news to any info lit librarians out there, I'm sure- I've taught how difficult it is to evaluate web sites as information sources myself occasionally). I'd encourage all bloggers out there who want their information cited/referenced and easily locatable to link your actual identity to your blogs (like Dan Scott and I both did)- it makes it easier for everyone to figure out who we individually are, as well as making your posts discussing the intelligence of fellow librarians more credible and, generally, more civil. Remember, bloggers are people too (despite what some professional journalists may say to the contrary ;) . Just like you, they are blogging for fun, not profit, so we should try to set a friendly tone. Now, since the first Caffeinated Librarian's blog is just a really fun place to chat about recreational activities, there's no real reason for her (I think, without id verification I can't be sure it's her, and not him ;) to post her actual identity, but I've always been straightforward about stating who I am up front- so at the very least, it would be difficult for someone to mistake us for each other.
I hope that this change to my blog title is enough to placate "_The_ Caffeinated Librarian," and that this is the start of a beautiful, very (virtually) caffeinated friendship. :) Oh, and thanks for being the first real human commenter on my blog (until now I've only attracted the attention of some bots…). Okay, enough off topic posting, back to working my lit review of e-book research. Oh, and don't forget to sign up for openCMS training!
9 comments:
Good job, Bob, on the name change! Can't have 2 Caffeinated Librarians running around at the same time! :)
At least not if anyone is concerned for the general safety and well-being of the internet- too many jittery caffeinated librarians bouncing around in too small a space might just lead to the inadvertent construction of a paradox machine...
;P
Now where did I put my Jelly Babies...
Hey - I commented in January! I'm a real person (aren't I - hmmm.... maybe you're trying to tell me something!)....
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=8336936317435536012&postID=264793815229808926
Lisa Hinchliffe
*chuckle* Nice change - I approve, sir (if you in fact need or desire my approval, which you probably don't). Now, if I were the REALLY competitive sort, I would feel the need to change my blog title to the "The-Even-More Caffeinated-Than-You Librarian" - but that might be taking the whole thing a bit far. :-)
As long as everyone can tell us from each other, I'm very happy with my fellow Caffeinated Blog Brothers and Sisters. I can't imagine anyone getting so territorial over a name that they would insist that no one but them could use "Caffeinated Librarian" as some part of a phrase of a blog title, which is why the "Coffee|Code" blog has never bothered me (and thus I've never mentioned it on blog) even though I've known about it for a while. To paraphrase Methos again, it's not like anyone's got a patent on the phrase. I guess if you were trying to turn your blog into a money maker it would be a different story - but that's a headache I can do without, personally. I do think that it's important, both for practical and for personal reasons, to make clear, easily distinguishable differences between blogs (or websites, or books). I'm sure you are just as aware as I am that ppl don't look at urls to differentiate one website from another, which is one reason why scams that try to imitate actual commercial websites work so often - as long as the title is the same and the page looks official, few ppl notice that the url is different from the one they usually go to.
But anyway, adding that one word to the title fixes that problem as far as your blog and my blog are concerned, imho.
As the "old timer" in the crowd (don't worry, I'll spare you from the "back in MY day, we had to walk our css to the server, in snow, barefoot, up hill, both ways), I'll say you're probably wise to pick the shorter url; if I had it to do all over again I'd have done that. And I've had more problems getting ppl to understand that my blog is not a work blog and that, since I don't talk about what I do EVER, it's exactly like any other personal blog just written by a librarian. A lot of people can't seem to wrap their heads around that concept - I'm not quite sure why.
And while I agree with you to a certain extent that ppl need to be careful to doing research on who/what their sources of information are, what their background is, and what their motivations are (which is just as true with online sources as with paper-based ones) - I'd say that having your name on your blog doesn't necessarily make any of that clearer than not having your name on your blog. If having your name on things was all it took to prove that someone was reputable, then I doubt we'd have had all these scandals about newspaper reporters/authors plagiarizing or outright making-up "facts" in their articles/books. Which means ppl just need to make sure not to check their brains at the door when they read, no matter what or who they're reading.
But all of that is academic here. I'll look forward to reading what you have to say in the future and I'll try to be less of a pain in your posterior from now on. Sorry about the long comment too - I'm pretty infamous for being wordy.
Sorry, back again. Something in your post bothered me overnight, so I came back to check and saw on closer reading - "I'd encourage all bloggers out there who want their information cited/referenced and easily locatable to link your actual identity to your blogs (like Dan Scott and I both did)- it makes it easier for everyone to figure out who we individually are, as well as making your posts discussing the intelligence of fellow librarians more credible and, generally, more civil."
Ah yes. The snide comment slipped into an apology. You sure you're not an old hat at this blogging thing? And here I missed it because I simply assumed that a "mea culpa" mean "my fault" not "it's my fault but you're really wrong and mean for pointing it out because you don't have a name on your blog like I do so THERE!"
If you'd bothered to read any of my blog, you'd know that I don't question the intelligence of my fellow librarians on a regular basis.
"Remember, bloggers are people too (despite what some professional journalists may say to the contrary ;) . Just like you, they are blogging for fun, not profit, so we should try to set a friendly tone."
I agree. And we should set that friendly tone by first Googling to make sure we're not taking someone else's blog name. Or you could have seen it on Technorati or, hell's bells, on Blogs of Note on Blogger.
Sweetheart, if your point is to make me feel guilty and start questioning my professional integrity because I'm a pseudonymous blogger - *laugh* - give it up. And your apology would have been much more effective if you hadn't tried something like that...
Lisa,
We all know that you are actually an incarnation of Athena, so you get elevated above "real human" to demigod.
Actually, I had forgotten about that first comment. Since then I've had about 20 bot postings to manage/delete.
CL,
Sorry to have offended you again. I wasn’t suggesting at all that you needed to reveal your identity on your blog (quite the opposite, but it feels weird quoting myself, so I’ll leave the fact-checking to the readers). I was just encouraging people to use their real identities online in the absence of good reasons not to (say, you’re blogging about the evil corporation you work for and are secretly trying to take down by alerting the unwitting public to their nefarious plans on your anonymous blog, but don’t want to be outted and fired before you accomplish your mission- or take advantage of that primo dental plan). It was just unfortunate timing that our discussion started while I’ve been in the midst of other, ongoing discussions with colleagues about the two-edge nature of internet anonymity. Yes, on the one hand, anonymity can be a good thing, freeing people to make statements or ask questions that they wouldn’t otherwise. That’s why my blog is open for anonymous comments- I want to make sure that anyone I work with feels like they can be as critical as the situation calls for, be it regarding my own work or that of others at UIUC. I don’t want people holding back for fear they’ll hurt my feelings, and possibly incur some form of reprisal. On the other hand, there is a tendency for the shield of anonymity to make people throw out any notion of politeness or decorum, because no one can really link what they’ve said to their real identity.
Not searching for other web sites (of any kind, including blogs) title “caffeinated librarian” was an oversight on my part, and one that I sincerely apologized for. Normally when I’m setting up a web site or some type of branding, I do background research to make sure (just as with my scholarship) I’m not treading on someone else’s intellectual property. Like most librarians, I have more tasks to accomplish than I have time to accomplish them. I rushed my blog up, and then, for the most part, forgot about the title. I’m mostly leveraging my blog to pipe rss feeds from it into multiple web pages that my colleagues may be viewing. I never really expected that very many people would go directly to my blog. The choice of the name wasn’t meant to be a slight, or purposeful violation of etiquette. It was just a mistake.
Regarding my own comment about your impugning the intelligence of other librarians- that was neither civil nor polite, and if editing my own posts wasn’t such a big blogging faux pas, I’d go in and take that comment out. I was feeling tetchy because it seemed, at first blush, as if your original post was calling my general competence as a Web Tech & Content Coordinator into question. I am very proud to be working at U of I, it’s where I’ve wanted to work since I was a grad student here, and perhaps I’m overly protective of its reputation (there were a few good-natured but heated debates when I worked up in Michigan regarding the whole UI/UM is #1 for LIS issue). I initially interpreted your comment as a slight aimed at both myself as well as U of I (taken along the lines of “Surely U of I would employ someone who knows better”). It was childish of me to respond that way, and impertinent of me not to wait and reflect on your entire post before I responded. So, I’m sorry (part 2 ;) .
Encouraging people to use their real identities is just a practice I wish more people would use, and not specifically aimed at you. I just thought this was a good place to toss that idea out there. Not only does it promote politeness, but it provides alternative avenues of communication. If I let someone know who I actually am, they can decide if the information they want to share should be directed to the world in general or me in particular. Then they can decide if they want to post to my blog, or email/im me directly. I would have changed my blog title even if you had just emailed me letting me know that you were already using it (yes, even if you had used an anonymous email account). It didn’t require a call to arms to your readers to fill my blog with comments until I did the right thing.
So, to sum up- grabbing the title without researching it first was a mistake, and I’m sorry (part 1); the general call for people to use their real identities was just that, a general call, not directed specifically at you; my comment about your blog posts regarding librarian’s intelligence was out of line, and I’m sorry (part 2); and finally, if you’re ever in Urbana-Champaign stop by my office (316 Main Library) and we’ll head out to the Moonstruck Chocolatier to get a cup of (and I know this will definitely start a flame war ;) what is possibly the finest Café Mocha around- on me. :)
Having been elevated to demigod(des?) I'm fine with not being human. :)
Lisa
Well done, sir. That was quite classy. Apology accepted and if I'm ever in your neck of the woods I'll take you up on your offer.
Your defense of your institution is admirable; I feel the same way about mine. And no, I wasn't trying to cast aspersions on your intelligence or your institution. I was just bumfuzzled - I mean, I knew I wasn't a complete unethical wack-job (technical term), but you didn't know me from Eve so you didn't know that. And no one who is thinking things through would ever want to take a chance that they or their institution might inadvertently be..."held culpable" (for lack of a better phrase) for any crazy thing that some wild card (like me) might say! And I just know people - they take the path of least resistance online. I mean, I can't even get my mother to click on links in my blog and read articles before she comments on my blog. Why would complete strangers take the time to click on both of our profiles in order to figure out which one of us was which or who was associated with your institution and who wasn't? It just wouldn't happen. And that'd be all fabulous for me - but I'm not sure my geeky Battlestar Galactica discussions would do all that much for you and UIUC.
So it didn't make sense. But now it does. As for the anonymous thing - there are pluses and minuses to it. On the plus side, I can be utterly geeky and blog about music, tv, movies, etc., without worrying that my abiding love of The Monkees is somehow going to blow-back on my institution. On the downside, I can't put the experience on my resume, which is a bit of a bummer. As far as the professional world is concerned, I don't have almost 4 years of blogging experience - I have zero. But that's part of the choice you make when you decide how you're going to blog and you have to accept the consequences of that choice.
But, anonymous or pseudonymous or whatever, my blog is still my baby. I'd like to protect what little integrity she has for as long as I can.
On a side note, you might be surprised how many people might end up reading your blog. When I started I wasn't even sure my friends would read my blog and I certainly couldn't imagine anyone who didn't know me would want to. I mean, who the hell am I? I've been amazed (and often a little dismayed) at how far this thing has exceeded my expectations. I am glad that you're doing a professional library blog - I think more institutions ought to start at least stepping a toe into that area. But dude, professional blogs can be tough - figuring out what to write about, keeping it interesting, keeping the tone right - I don't envy you that. But good luck.
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