Web 2.0 implications on knowledge management

Moria Levy authored the article Web 2.0 implications on knowledge management to determine how Web 2.0’s concepts and success can be applied to knowledge management. In this post I will be reviewing this article.

Levy divided her article to three parts: Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0, and Knowledge Management (KM) 2.0. The author does not provide her own definition of Web 2.0 but instead offers definitions from various authors. She then explains eight principals of a Web 2.0 as set out by O’Reilly. She provides a summary of each principle and also shows how websites can be classified in different levels of Web 2.0 based on how they follow Web 2.0 principals. Finally she provides a good definition of what Web 2.0 applications are.

She then moves onto the concept of Enterprise 2.0. She states the usage of Web 2.0 by organisations needs to be analysed in the technology adoption type and user orientation dimensions. She provides a helpful chart showing how Enterprise 2.0 can be roughly divided into segments in relation to KM.

The final part of the article deals with how KM can become KM 2.0 with the use of Web 2.0 tools and applications. The author compares the four aspects of KM with Web 2.0. She concludes that Web 2.0 and KM 2.0 have much in common and KM can benefit from these tools by incrementally introducing the tools, perhaps starting by adding Blogs and Wikis to their Web 2.0 toolkit. There are also two tables in this article one comparing KM principals and tools to the attributes of Web 2.0.

The strength of this article lies in its ambition to bring concepts of Enterprise 2.0 and KM together with Web 2.0. This article would be an ideal read for a KM professional who wants to know how Web 2.0 can be best utilised for their work. Levy provides an excellent summary of Web 2.0 applications such as blogs and wikis. The two comparative tables she created would be important tools for KM professionals who are familiar with KM concepts and wish to learn about Web 2.0.

The author sets out an ambitious target of talking about implications of Web 2.0 on KM but other than the two tables there isn’t much original information in the article. Levy seems to be content with quoting others’ research and definitions rather than contributing new knowledge or analysis. The part of Web 2.0 is almost an exact paraphrasing of the 2005 article of O’Reilly ‘What is Web 2.0’ At the Web 2.0 section of the paper, Levy talks about four levels of Web 2.0 websites which is again taken directly from an O’Reilly Radar blog entry (O'Reilly, 2006).

The author’s representation of non-academic sources as facts or principals is another shortcoming of this article. She quotes O’Reilly’s ‘levels of Web 2.0 applications’ in the paper as if it was generally accepted information by many. However as the author of a Web 2.0 applications should know, blogs are usually personal opinions, not necessarily principles accepted by researchers, to be precise. The author not only depends on personal blogs for information, she also cites Wikipedia to back up her claims. Wikipedia articles should not be directly cited for academic research as the author should know that it is an open-source encyclopaedia which anyone can edit. According to the Chronicle of Higher education even the creator of Wikipedia discourages people from using Wikipedia for their research (Young, 2006).

Not all the information in this article is accurate which reduces the credibility of the author. When she is explaining the four levels of Web 2.0 applications she paraphrases incorrectly. For example she writes that Flickr can operate offline but gains advantages from going online. Flickr is an application that could theoretically exist offline, but it actually does not. Levy also writes that O’Reilly was the person that coined the term Web 2.0 when in fact Dale Dougherty, a vice president of O’Reilly Media Inc, had first used the term (Anderson, 2007).

This article was difficult to read as it was riddled with grammatical, formatting and factual errors. Levy does a good job bringing together different ideas, opinions, and theories about Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0, KM 2.0. She, however, fails to provide her own analysis or research into these concepts and she is too content to rely on quotes and paraphrases of others analysis and research.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Monia Levy is the CEO of ROM Knowledgeware, Reut, Israel.
Her personal blog was recently published as a book titled “21ST Century Management: A personal blog.”
Her twitter account can be followed at: http://twitter.com/moria_levy

REFERENCES

Anderson, P. (2007). `All That Glisters Is Not Gold' -- Web 2.0 And The Librarian. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 39(4), 195-198.

Levy, M. (2009). WEB 2.0 implications on knowledge management. Journal of Knowledge Management, 13 (1), 120 - 134. doi: 10.1108/13673270910931215

O'Reilly, T. (2006). The hierarchy of Web 2.0 applications. Retrieved from http://radar.oreilly.com/2006/07/levels-of-the-game-the-hierarc.html

Young, J. (2006). Citing Wikipedia. Chronicle of Higher Education, 52(42), A39-A39.

Relevancy of Libraries in a Digital World

The arrival and the consequent widespread use of the web has started to threaten the future of libraries just like it had the industries of newspaper, music and book publishing, and higher education.

Fred Heath, the Vice Provost and Director of the University of Texas libraries wrote the article ‘Documenting the Global Conversation: Relevancy of Libraries in a Digital World’ to explain what libraries, especially research libraries, need to do to survive and even thrive in the digital age where people are even questioning the future existence of libraries (Waller, 2008). Heath argues that the libraries don’t have to disappear; they just have to rethink and find their place in the digital age.

Heath begins by analysing various fields of the information sector and their subsequent demise in the digital age. He paints a grim picture for the industries. Newspapers are stopping daily publication, laying off employees, and some declaring bankruptcy. In the music industry CD sales are dwindling and even paid downloads, once considered the saviour of the industry, are down. Book publishers are scrambling to deal with ever diminishing book sales and reducing the number of new manuscripts they accept to publish. And the higher education sector is struggling to retain their status as the knowledge providers. In each one of these cases the author points the finger to the web as the cause of the problems. He asks and answers the question “what are the survival strategies” for these industries. The answers differ slightly for each sector but the message is the same: stop resisting the inevitability of change and look for ways to deliver your products the way people wish to obtain it. And the way people wish to obtain is through the web.

Heath then moves onto future of libraries and argues that libraries are just as susceptible to changes brought on by the web as other information society sectors, if not more. Research libraries, the information they hold and their services are being made obsolete with increasing self-reliance of the students and online publishing services. The author, however, argues that the libraries can survive in the digital age “by doing the things they do best.” He gives examples of what they are doing at University of Texas libraries that have been working well for them.

The author answers the question of what libraries must do to stay relevant in an increasingly digital world. He contributes to our knowledge of techniques libraries utilise to provide the services their clients are needing in the current times. University of Texas (UT) is the United States’ fifth largest research library therefore the strategies they use are very relevant and important to the work of other libraries that are trying to stay relevant in the digital world (Texas, 2010).

The author provides a valuable analysis of what is happening in other information sectors and why are doing so badly. He is correct in his observation that the culprit in each case is the web. It is also helpful that he shows what the other industries are doing or should do to keep functioning. It is important to look at what is happening with the sectors in the same field as libraries are in, in order to learn from their experiences and their mistakes. It is just as important for Heath that he explains what his library has been doing that has been working well for them.

The article would have been improved by him offering ideas to other libraries on how they can apply these ideas to their libraries. After all not all libraries have the same amount of staff and budget to implement changes in the scale UT has, nor do they have the same amount of tech savvy users.

One glaring omission in the article was the use of e-books in the libraries. Heath briefly mentions e-books as the silver lining of the book publishing sector. He writes that the sales for e-books have increased by 64 % while other forms of book sales have been going down. It would have been helpful for him to describe how they are using e-book technology in the UT libraries. They are actually piloting a “pay-per-view” model of e-books in UT libraries (Macicak & Schell, 2009).

Heath concludes on a hopeful note that the information sector will not only survive but get better in the digital age. And the role of the libraries will change but their task of “facilitating critical inquiry on part of university community” will stay the same. They might have to use tools and techniques different to the ones traditionally used in the libraries to adapt to their new task, but the libraries are here to stay.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Fred Heath, the Vice Provost and Director of the University of Texas Libraries.

His biography can be found here

REFERENCES

Macicak, S., & Schell, L. E. (2009). Patron-driven, librarian-approved: a pay-per-view model for e-books. Serials: The Journal for the Serials Community, 22(3 suppl.), S31-S38.

Texas, U. o. (2010). Arts & Attractions Retrieved 19 December, 2010, from http://www.utexas.edu/about-ut/arts-attractions

Waller, V. (2008). Legitimacy for large public libraries in the digital age. Library Review, 57(5), 372-385.

Encouraging the digital economy and digital citizenship

In this post I will be reviewing titled Encouraging the digital economy and digital citizenship by Roxanne Missingham.

“A flourishing digital economy needs broadband access and content relevant to people’s lives,” Missingham states at the beginning of the article. The past and current Australian governments recognise the importance of this. A number of initiatives, such as Gov 2.0, has been put forth to get Australians to become digital citizens. Access to online services and the ability to use them are key areas that needs to be considered before all Australian citizens can become digital citizens by participating in the digital economy. Missingham sets out to discuss “some of the challenges and some of the achievements of the libraries” in this area.

At first glance, Australia’s internet access levels seem high with 64% of the households having access to the internet. However when looked closely, one realises that there are rural areas in Australia with little or no access to the internet. For those with access to the internet, accessing high quality and reliable content becomes an issue. Through four forums organised by the National library of Australia, an agreement among libraries were reached regarding developing a consortium to purchase subscriptions to websites and databases that offer high quality information for a fee. A national purchasing consortium with an opt-in approach called the Electronic Resources Australia (ERA) was created. Now in its second phase (2009) ERA provides free access to quality information for 8,500,000 Australians. School libraries have been especially enthusiastic participants in the ERA which enabled them to purchase widely used resources such as World Book Online (Darby, 2008).

Missingham talks about the importance of ERA to the library users and society at large. She emphasises that it was libraries coming together that made possible the access to high quality digital resources for free for the users.

Missingham does not shy away from the problems that are yet to be tackled. She concludes her article by stating that there are three challenges that Australia needs to tackle before the entire nation could become digital citizens. These challenges are: providing greater connectivity to the internet, creating access to greater number of Australians to reliable digital content, and teaching users how to use the content they access. She hopes that the creation of the National Broadband Network (NBN) will help eradicate the connectivity problem.

A major shortcoming of this article is that the author provides no definition of the “digital economy” ora “digital citizen”. It would be easier for the reader to understand the article if the author defined these terms. Digital citizenship is defined as “the ability to participate in society online.” (Mossberger, 2007) The digital economy is defined as “the global network of economic and social activities that are enabled by information and communications technologies, such as the internet, mobile and sensor networks.” (Australia, 2009)

The author writes in detail about the establishment of ERA and the participation rates. What the author does not explain is how a library “opts in” to ERA and the costs of the products. One might assume even though the price negotiated through the consortium might be lower than to subscribe individually, it still must be considerable.

When looking at the number of libraries that participate in the ERA, it becomes clear that there is more work to be done to provide access to all Australians especially in the Northern Territory and Tasmania. The author should have provided more information on what the ERA is doing to get more libraries in different states to subscribe to the service. Access to these resources could help provide digital literacy to Australians which in turn not only help them become digital citizens but also have better document literacy.

What this article adds to new knowledge is to show others what the libraries are doing to try to conquer the digital divide that exists between the rural and urban Australia. The author’s arguments are clearly laid out and backed up by research. Her direct quote of two people’s submission to the Senate inquiry on the role of the libraries in the online environment is especially powerful.

Missingham is clearly passionate about providing access and content to all Australians and she believes that libraries have an important role to play in the effort. This was a good and informative article on what has been done so far in providing access and content and what more needs to be done to make all Australians digital citizens who participate freely in the digital economy.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Roxanne Missingham is a Parliamentary Librarian.

She blogs at http://roxannemissingham.blogspot.com/

REFERENCES

Australia. (2009). Australia's Digital Economy: Future Directions. Retrieved from www.dbcde.gov.au/digital_economy/final_report.

Mossberger, K. (2007). Digital Citizenship: The Internet, Society, and Participation. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Missingham, R. (2009). Encouraging the digital economy and the digital citizen. Australian Library Journal, 58(4), 386-399.

All that glisters is not gold – Web 2.0 and the Librarian

Paul Anderson, a technology writer, authored the article ’All that Glisters is not Gold’ – Web 2.0 and the Librarian to provide a brief introduction of what Web 2.0 means to the librarians and how they can use it in their libraries. In this post I will be reviewing this article.

Anderson provides a very short historical introduction to Web 2.0, suggests a great framework to analyse Web 2.0 and concludes with very few examples of Web 2.0 implications in libraries. In the introduction the author sets out to define and explain many concepts and ideas for further research. Unfortunately the article does not quite satisfy all of what the author had set out to cover.

Anderson starts out by defining Web 2.0. Next he proposes a three part framework to analyse Web 2.0. First part deals with the visible surface of Web 2.0 which consists of social software applications, media-sharing services, and social networking services. In the second part he offers six ideas that power Web 2.0 based on a Tim O'Reilly article. He writes summaries of each one of the six ideas (Individual Production and User-generated Content, Harness the Power of the Crowd, Data on an Epic Scale, Architecture of Participation, Network Effects, and Openness) and how they are related to current and future developments in Web 2.0. Finally in the third part he emphasises looking at the use of web technologies and standards.

In the end of the article the author provides his views on impact of Web 2.0 on libraries. He introduces the term ‘Library 2.0’ and explains how this concept is being viewed in the academic world. He argues that there is an urgent need to come up with an official definition of Library 2.0. He gives two examples of how libraries are using Web 2.0 now and suggests that librarians can play a critical role in the future as the debate around privacy and copyright issues intensifies.

Having a theoretical framework to develop new research questions and theories is extremely important (Botha 1989), especially in newly developed subjects such as Web 2.0 (Rathi 2010). Anderson’s proposal of a three part framework to analyse Web 2.0 provides a much needed lens to view the literature and research written about Web 2.0. It is of particular importance to include the visible surface of Web 2.0 but also not to forget more abstract concepts that a researcher needs to deal with. This is where Anderson’s adaptation of O’Reilly’s original ideas about Web 2.0 becomes important. The six ideas he identifies and defines are must-consider ideas for any researcher who ponders to write on the subject of Web 2.0.

While rich on the detail of proposed framework to analyse Web 2.0, the author does not deliver as much information on the two other parts of the article, namely History of the ‘Web 2.0’ and Web 2.0 and the Library. History of Web 2.0 only offers the reader an explanation of where the term ‘Web 2.0’ originated from. There is no further discussion about how Web 2.0 came to be, why the need to name a new version of the web arose or not even a history of the services that make up Web 2.0.

In the abstract of the article, Anderson says he will discuss “some of the areas in which librarians are positioned to provide a unique contribution to the further development of … services.” However he only mentions the librarian’s potential in having a say in the privacy and ethics area of Web 2.0. The other examples the author provides are the ways libraries use and can use Web 2.0 services, not how librarians can provide unique contributions. Use of Facebook to track down a patron can hardly be considered revolutionary today, although it might have been in 2007 when the article was published. The author could have provided more detail on what he thought the definition of Library 2.0 should be rather than just pointing out the need for an agreed definition of Library 2.0. This was a missed opportunity for him to start the conversation on what exactly Library 2.0 is.

The topics of Web 2.0 and Library 2.0 are being discussed and researched frequently (see Arch 2010, Coyle 2007 for examples). The framework Anderson provides will no doubt play an important part in developing and researching new theories. It is possible to find a more in-depth analysis of Web 2.0 and its history in another article by the same author published in JISC (Anderson 2007).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Paul Anderson until recently was the Technical Editor of the JISC Technology and Standards watch. He is currently working on a book on Web 2.0.
His blog can be viewed at http://techlun.ch/
His twitter account can be followed at http://twitter.com/pdanderson

REFERENCES

Anderson, P. (2007). What is Web 2.0? ideas, technologies and implications for
education. JISC. Retrieved from
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/techwatch/tsw0701b.pdf

Anderson, P. (2007). `All That Glisters Is Not Gold' -- Web 2.0 And The Librarian.
Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 39(4), 195-198.

Arch, X. (2010). The Ultimate Debate 2009: Has Library 2.0 Fulfilled Its Promise? A
Report of the Library and Information Technology Association Internet Resources and Services Interest Group Program, American Library Association Annual Conference, Chicago, July 2009. Technical Services Quarterly, 27(4), 369-371. doi:10.1080/07317131.2010.500982

Botha, M. (1989). Theory development in perspective: the role of conceptual
frameworks and models in theory development. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 14(1), 49-55. Retrieved from CINAHL Plus with Full Text database.

Coyle, K. (2007). The Library Catalog in a 2.0 World. Journal of Academic
Librarianship, 33(2), 289-291. Retrieved from Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts with Full Text database.

Dinesh Rathi, Lisa M. Given, "Research 2.0: A Framework for Qualitative and
Quantitative Research in Web 2.0 Environments," Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, pp. 1-10, 2010 43rd Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2010