Friday was the annual Bike to Work Day in Seattle. It’s part of a Bike to Work Month program that last year saw 7,500 local cyclists pedal more than a million miles. This year WebJunction fielded a team of 12 bike commuters willing to brave the iffy Seattle weather on two wheels. Early 2008 reports show a record setting pace across the entire contest.

A few of us at the office are year-round bike commuters, a few ride when the weather is good and time allows, and the remainder on team BikeJunction are using this month to try bike commuting for the first time. Not surprisingly we report varied reasons for participating:

• Fitness
• The sheer joy of it
• Traffic Congestion
• So we can eat ice cream
• Gas Prices (!)
• The environment
• Bragging rights
• And more…

By now you are probably wondering what this has to do with the stuff I normally write about on BlogJunction. Well, since I’m a community dork, it’s fairly easy to tie everything to community. Even with our different riding motivations, skill levels, and experience, we’ve developed into a small but vibrant commuting community. We support each other, offer route tips, provide encouragement about big hills or bad weather, and act as sounding board for major life decisions—like new bike purchases.

When you look at our support roles, it’s easy to see our group of bike commuters isn’t much different than any other community. We have information needs and interpersonal needs and depend on real human interaction (virtual or f2f) to help us through those needs.

I’ve noticed cyclists are especially drawn to community. In our spare time my wife and I blog quite a bit about our family cycling activities. I can tell you first hand that cyclists are avid online community engagers. I’m not sure the bonding need comes from the bike-versus-car thing, the gear culture, or what (though that would be a great paper. Anyone?). Whatever it is, it’s strong.

I’ll be interested to see how the BikeJunction community matures after this “official” bike month. Will we still feel like a community in the fall when the rain returns and our numbers decrease? Will the remaining members stick together?

My guess is we’ll rise and fall somewhat like a “conference community.” At conference time (ie, the peak bike commute months), we’ll be strong and vibrant, with our numbers and activity fading during the off months. Come spring we’ll probably ramp up all over around the remaing “core.” That’s my five-minute theory, anyway. I’ll keep you posted on how it shakes out.

Do we have any WebJunction members who bike commute with others in your branch, office, or neighborhood? Have you seen the cycling community angle up close? I’d love to hear about it.

I thought it might be fitting to end the Happy Birthday celebrations this week with a link (right here? from the blog?) to a clandestine view of the new WebJunction home page. Cleverly titled “sneaky peeky” this is the view that WJ staff have themselves been playing with in our “sandbox” for the last couple of weeks. It’s not nearly ready for beta release yet, but as you can see, My WebJunction is right there at the top of the page, along with our fancy new brand, just waiting for me/you/us to populate it with whatever i/you/we care about. It’s gonna be rockin’ and we can’t wait to start evolving this with more than just a few of us with our eyes on it.

Next week we get together with all of our current community partners for some good old fashioned f2f training, and this will be our first chance to show off and gather input on the new system with people outside of the WJ staff. Next? Our WJ Advocates will get a sneak peek and they’ll tell us what they think. Then? Well, by that time I think we’ll all be ready for a broader audience. And that’s where we all get to tell each other what we think. And it will grow from there.

Stay tuned…

1. It’s not about technology. WJ is successful because we have great people and we work with great people–and those people make great things happen. That is our not-so-secret weapon.

2. Hang in there. There are few virtues as valuable as persistence. There have always been and will always be tons of new and creative initiatives in libraryland: I think what sets us apart is that we just keep at it and keep at it and find ways to keep it stable and keep it going. I love that!

3. Take the middle path. It’s not content or community, it’s not big libraries or small libraries, it’s not folksonomy or taxonomy, it’s not top-down or bottom-up. Balancing seemingly irreconcilable opposites is one of the main keys to our character and our strength.

4. If it’s going to be difficult, it might as well be fun. Humor has saved us from ourselves over and over again. This is a high-stress business and it helps enormously to find and enjoy the absurdity of it all. I am so grateful for the amazing collection of funnybones that I’ve been privileged to work with.

5. We’ve only just begun. As our Seattle staff has grown from 3 to 30 and our network of partners has exploded exponentially, it’s become ever clearer that WebJunction has the potential to represent and support the consciousness and vitality of the library world in even greater ways than we have so far. Building on our considerable success so far to realize WJ’s potential as a comprehensive platform for library staff–that’s what keeps me excited and motivated and passionate about WJ.

OK, I am an old-timer so I will maunder on a bit more, as old-timers are wont to do. Here are a few select memories from my five years at the WJ:

2003. Writing my first Crossroads newsletter in June 2003 a few weeks after I started at WJ (Web-what?), and getting markup from Chrystie Hill on my copy, in which every instance of the word “you” was crossed out and replaced with the word “we”. The beginning of my online community education.
2004. Putting the one-year anniversary cupcake on the site in May 2004, one of our first custom home page graphics, I shudder to admit, but at least it was a small step toward the much more graphically dynamic site we have today.
2005. The first OCLC blog salon at ALA 2005 in Chicago, when it seemed like we really hit a new critical mass of awareness and interest. There were people who actually recognized what we had started writing on our baby-infant blog. (And I got inspired to write my very first parody song ever, “The Blog Party“.)
2006. Getting a fresh round of funding, validating the work we’ve done and propelling us into the future. “You mean we’re for real?” Boy that feels good.
2007. Presenting the Government Documents librarians workshop in Denver in spring 2007, and seeing the palpable excitement in a room of a whole new type of mostly non-WJ-savvy users about the possibilities for the site. Something clicks: hmm, maybe this really is real.
2008. Welcoming an influx of dedicated, professional, committed staff who see WebJunction as, yep, a real thing, not just an idea. This is great–they actually know what they’re doing AND they think WJ is a cool place to be? Wow, that is an accomplishment!

And the best is yet to come…

I admit it. I like shoes. They’re fun. It’s one of my little things that keeps me going - when otherwise things might feel a little blah, a cute pair of shoes (on me or someone else) literally makes my day. Voila!

Personal faves from around the office? Kathleen (yellow sling-backs or teal clogs, I can’t decide). Jennifer (the ones that go perfectly with the plaids!) Dave (the old ones). Rachel (black sandals or red patten flats, I can’t decide). Michael (I can’t decide). Laura (plum ankle straps, hands down).

For WebJunction’s birthday, I decided to highlight my five favorite WebJunction moments *that have to do with shoes*. Whatever does this have to do with supporting libraries, you ask? Read on…

1. The photo you see here is me, Rachel, and Laura from the audience at CIL 2007. We were listening to the librarian from the National Geographic Society library talk about some cool 2.0 stuff they were doing with their intranet. Thanks to Rachel, we visited their library later that day.

2. This photo gives you a glimpse of one of our card-carrying shoe-lovers here around the office, and one of the 365 Days at WJ set that we started last year (before we started really planning for the new WJ in earnest, which is why we haven’t kept it up…shame on us!)

3. On the way to Midwinter Meeting in San Antonio 2006 I found myself without anything to wear but tennis shoes because my luggage had been lost on the way by United. Luckily, the conference center was practically attached to a mall and I was able to get some cute metallic silver flats to wear to my fancy dinner with Patrick Hogan. These shoes remind me of the shoes Sharon Streams is wearing this very minute! (This is also the blog post where I suggest that OCLC pick up Library Thing. Hmmm.)

4. When visiting the bay area just before the Online Community Uncoference in 2007, I sent a tweet about a cute pair of shoes I’d just bought. Colleague Dave Ungar (located in Dublin) picked it up and asked for a picture, which I posted on flickr. Several days later, our online exchange culminated in a spoof on some secret brand stuff another colleague had going on at work. You cannot hide on the tubes!

5. Finally, Michael Porter blogs his first (or was it second?) post at BlogJunction after accepting a transfer here from OCLC Western. In the post, libraryman admits to having purchased shoes from his WebJunction desk’s internet connection. It was after-hours, so we gave him a pass, but it brings me to my point about what any of this has to do with libraries…

We all work in or around libraries. We often struggle through the same challenges and share similar joys or successes. But we often don’t know each other personally, mainly because we work in diverse locations, and not just geographically. We can get together at library conferences, meetings, trainings, workshops, or other convenes, but even that’s limited by our niche in the library space, or our availability to physically get together; it’s never all of us.

Connecting online is relatively new to our profession, considering our extremely long history of shared professional practice. But by now most of us have felt the power of making those connections. Together we support and rely on one another, on everything from printers to politics. Once you’re online (not under-estimating how difficult that can still be) it’s possible to cross the boundaries that typically keep us from connecting with one another.

One key to making meaningful connections possible online has been revealing who we are as the people behind the text and even the avatars. When we open up and talk about otherwise superfluous things like shoes, we show that we are real people, and we build trust and connections that support the rest of our work, and perhaps more importantly, connections that will likely last far beyond our day jobs, whatever they be.

Happy Birthday WebJunction. Here’s to many more…

In honor of the occasion, we thought it appropriate to share some of our memories, invite you to share yours, and generally enjoy a fun week of both looking back and looking forward.
Where shall we start?

First of all we have a little recap of WebJunction history. We take you from the the WebJunction launch in 2003 at the Library of Congress to updates on some of our favorite programs and events.

We’ve also thought it would be fun to share our personal memories of WebJunction and related library experiences. We’ve created a discussion forum where we hope members will share some of their favorites. Already we have well wishes (thanks Maddog!) and a few WJ team recollections. Please add yours!

Also this week WJ staffers plan to share some of our personal “top fives” on the blog. The scuttlebutt I hear around the office hints at topics like favorite programs, shoes, WJ member milestones, memorable meals, conference swag, stories and more. I can’t wait to see what surfaces.

If you’d like to get in on the action and share a five (or two), I invite you to either drop us a note in the blog comments or add your list of five to the memories discussion thread.

It should be fun week. Stay tuned!

All you need to do is stop by a participating comic store and make your free pick from a selection of titles like Archie, Superman, Hellboy, World of Aspen, X-men, Tiny Titans and many more. Seriously. These are free. I know you are thinking: “What’s the catch?” Nothing is free, right?

Well, apparently this is. Thanks to some major discounts from comic publishers, the past few years have allowed thousands of comic retailers in the US, Canada, and internationally to give away millions of comics to happy readers.

Hard to believe but this year is the 7th Annual event. Retailers decide at what level they want to participate and can set their own eligibility rules, but the basic premise boils down to free comic books for readers on May 3, 2008. For full details you can refer to the FAQ, check out the Free Comic Book Day, website, or see what the good folks at I Love Libraries have to say.

Whatever you do, don’t wait too long. This is only happening on Saturday. Check out the Comic Shop Locater to find your nearest store. Then get out there and get your (or send your patrons out for their) free comics! Because in my book free comics beat free cones any day!

I’ll highlight specific resources and activities later in the post, but right now I’ve got to tell you how excited I am about the wacky-good promotional Library Week videos you can download from the AL Focus site.

These videos turn normally stale library stats (”Reference librarians in the nation’s public and academic libraries answer more than 7.2 million questions weekly“) on their ear. I mean, where else are you going to find a video campaign that combines romance novels and vending machines, brings literature and Johnny Depp to the McDonalds Drive-in window, stumps viewers with the really important reference questions, and takes them inside a high-stakes game of ID-card Go Fish.Genius!The shelf life of this campaign is sure to extend well beyond next week and should make for clever marketing videos for the entire year. Instructions are available for downloading and embedding. You are even invited to use the the animated intro as a lead-in to your own library cinematic creation. Let us know if you make one!

All right, on to the rest of the week’s goodies. Individual events for the week include:

• Monday: Submit your library star nominee
• Tuesday: National Library Workers Day
• Thursday: YALSA Support Teen Literature Day
• Friday: Library Gaming Day (Gaming @ Your Library)

And a smattering of resources to help you plan your events:

• ALA National Library Week Fact Sheet (and don’t forget the Julie Andrews promos)
• Who needs the Public Library video via WebJunction
• Lesson Plans, Projects and Resources from Education World
• Library Week Activity Page at I Love Libraries
• Library Postal Art History
• Chicagoist Blog Celebrates Libraries
• Special Library Celebration Ideas from WJ-Illinois
• National Library Week South Africa from “It’s All Good“
• Inspirational ideas for children

As the week goes on this list should get even more rich thanks to all the nuggets you’ll submit via comments (You are planning to comment, aren’t you?), your blog posts out there on the interweb, your ticklish, snippet-filled tweets (I’m thinking “#NatLibWk08″ hashtag could work), and so on.

And if it turns out that a whole week still doesn’t allow enough time to get your library groove on, you can relax— you’ve got more time. April is School Library Media Month. Phew! I think LibraryLand has us Aries covered.

Do you have something fun planned for National Library Week? As always, let us know here in the comments or in the National Library Week discussion thread on WebJunction.

Dear Curious George:

Will this winter never cease? I am mentally exhausted by the endless gray weather that seems to have been hanging around my community since the Eisenhower administration. I fear that I am starting to take out my frustrations on my library’s guests. Just the other day, I spoke sharply to a child whose only offense was to leave a lollipop in a Dr. Seuss book. What can I do to get back my old fervor?

Seasonally Affected in Decatur

Dear SAD:

I share your pain. I grew up in Buffalo, where, as the saying goes, we had two seasons: winter and six weeks of bad skiing. Now I live in Columbus, where, from October to April, the sun is barely a rumor. As I write this response, the weather out my window looks like the set for a big budget presentation of King Lear, complete with thunder, lightning and floods. The sky is the color of an old mattress cover.

So how do we beat the seasonal blues? Assuming we are not about to fly off for two weeks at an all-inclusive resort in Jamaica, let us consider our options.

First, the Girl Scout cookies were just delivered, so we could break open a bottle of red wine and devour of box of Thin Mints. This is not recommended. The additional tonnage will carry your depression right into bathing suit season.

Or we could get the entire DVD collections of Lost, The X-Files, and 24 Hours, and just have a paranoia-athon. Again, not recommended. This time of year, you don’t need to feel that the government is as vindictive as Mother Nature is.

No, I am going to suggest that the best way to get over your blues is to get involved. There are so many ways to be active in the library community that it is an embarrassment of riches.

WebJunction provides many avenues for you to participate, through taking a course, adding your ideas and comments to the discussion boards, or gaining new insights through one of our webinars.

There are any number of library and computer conferences scheduled around the US this winter and spring. If you are attending the PLA Conference in Minneapolis at the end of March, please attend one or more of the programs WebJunction is offering. (If you can’t attend PLA in person, you might try signing up for the virtual conference.) Your correspondent will also be presenting at PLA on Saturday at 8:45 am, with Joan Frye Williams. Our program is titled “It Ain’t Necessarily So: Challenging the Assumptions of Legacy Librarianship,” and will take place in Room M101 at the Convention Center.

The key is to keep your mind busy even while getting enough exercise to prevent your body from slowly morphing into a pale version of Jabba the Hutt. And if that doesn’t work, where did you hide the Thin Mints?

George

Check out this fantastic collaborative national effort brought to my attention at the PLA WJ Member Reception by Denise Raleigh from the Gail Borden Public Library District in Illinois.Based on the library’s Storypalooza project of 2007, the contest is sweeping across the country as kids create 2-minute videos about their favorite book. The entry deadline is April 20, so spread the word with the kids in your library community.

Voting mania will happen each week in May with winners each week receiving $500 in books. Their sponsoring organization (school, library or designated organization for home-schooled youth) will receive $1,000 in books.

At a Friday luncheon, I heard Nan Kari speak about her work with the Jane Addams School for Democracy, a civic engagement and democratic education initiative for immigrant families and college students located in St. Paul’s multi-cultural West Side neighborhood. Kudos to hosts Libraries for the Future and Diantha Schull for continuing to draw libraries into thinking about Library Placemaking and the development of libraries as vital civic places.

Have you engaged your civic skills lately?

Nan Kari began her eloquent presentation with observations about a shift in American civil life. She notes that the values of the market place have permeated the ways we choose to prioritize our time and resources, and as a result our civic skills have begun to atrophy. We have become more accustomed to experiencing public life at the mall (an interesting juxtaposition considering the appearance of library branches in a number of suburban malls) than in the democratic process. There are many ambiguities and dynamics surrounding this shift (including some positive impacts, on youth—seen in the numbers in this year’s caucuses and primaries—and increases in entrepreneurial civic engagement), but ultimately, there has been a shift away from inquiry and engagement around our authority as citizens.

Before Nan detailed the School’s advocacy for community engagement, she defined citizenship in 3 ways, acknowledging that they overlap and co-mingle in the real world:

1. A civics view of citizenship in which democracy is mainly reflective of government.
2. A “communitarian” view where civil society is manifested in shared values and strong community.
3. And one in which citizens are public problem solvers and co-creators of the community commons. Here authorship resides among citizens and democracy is an unfinished work that needs to be taken up by all citizens.

Case for Community Commons

If you know me at all, you’ll know that I was nearly leaping off my chair by this point, very excited to hear more especially about how to apply these precepts to our work. As Nan began to share about her work with the Jane Addams School, she spoke of the opportunities for us to develop libraries as “democratic spaces” (both social and physical) where a diverse mix of people interact, engage in dialogue, solve problems and exercise civic engagement that builds and sustains public goods and resources. She used the new Minneapolis Public Library (where we met) as a way to talk about democratic spaces being shaped by physical elements and the need for civic imagery, accessibility and flexibility. Working with an online community, I recognize these as parallel principles of web design (UI, IA, flexible tools etc.) but certainly see how these apply to physical spaces in libraries, especially those with meeting rooms and other public gathering spaces which can be opened up to serve needs identified via the community commons. But whether we’re looking to present our libraries as core to civic engagement in virtual or f2f communities, I think this next bit hit me the hardest.

Deprogram the space

In libraryland we are busy working to design programming and services that meet the needs of our users. In order to provide a truly democratic experience for their diverse community, the Jane Addams School chose a different approach, in order to “pull the circle open.” The tendency to fill up spaces with programming and services can leave little or no room for civic engagement. They found that when you stop programming all the spaces, the “tapestry of lived experiences” are welcomed into the community, bringing their cultural learning into an environment where everyone is considered both a teacher and a learner. The Jane Addams School “facilitates” the use of the spaces, but the participants organize themselves into “learning circles” based on their interests and objectives. Nan admits that this is not a clean process, quite messy in fact, but they all recognize that the learning that comes from the experience is expansive and not just academic. Participants become part of the “Crossing Borders Leadership Team,” a citizen-based committee which further facilitates the creative engagement.

Changes can happen when people work together

I know there’s a lot in here, even without the fantastic pictures (check out their site!) and details that Nan shared from her work but the message is certainly timely. While we need to continue doing all that we do to provide information, resources, services, and programming, we need to be equally accountable to our communities as space facilitators ensuring platforms for collaborative inquiry and public creation. I can’t think of a more fitting mandate for all of us in this, the community that is WebJunction, as we move through this year. We are in the process of developing a number of exciting enhancements to the site, all part of our ongoing goal to facilitate a highly engaged online community for library staff. We’ll continue to look to you, the WebJunction community, for your participation and leadership in the co-creation of a “community commons”—as we refine and sustain the tools for facilitation and as you continue to share your strategies that ensure libraries remain core to civic engagement. So yes Paula, we are meeting about change.