About Val Skelton

I am the editor of Information Today, Europe. On the main site, we cover news and publish feature articles by information, research and knoweldge practitioners and thought leaders. On this blog, we aim to cover other topics of interest to our readers.

Author Archive | Val Skelton

Travelling on the technology curve

By on August 12, 2011 in Post, Trends and Statistics, Web Technology & The Cloud

The theory of how new ideas, innovations and technology are spread is something we should be well aware of.  In our own organisations, we know it pays to identify those who are ‘early adopters’ or members of the ‘early majority’ – and who are influential.   And we also know that sometimes it’s as unhelpful to be too far ahead of the curve as it is to be behind it.

This week, ReadWriteWeb reports on the latest changes to Gartner’s HypeCycle.  HypeCycle seeks to map technological innovations along a timeline from ‘technology trigger’ and through key stages including the ‘peak of inflated expectations’(!) to the ‘plateau of productivity’, when innovation can be seen to be truly impactful and has been adopted by 20-30% of the potential audience.  The latest additions to the service include ‘big data’ and ‘gamification’.

Technologies may follow the curve, but each travels at a different speed.  HypeCycle places eBook readers beyond any disillusionment and at the beginning of the ‘slope of enlightenment’ and big data climbing up towards the ‘peak’ (and likely to do so quite rapidly).

You can view images and read the reseach summary here.

 

Information professionals – unsung ‘good fairies’?

By on August 4, 2011 in Events, Information and Knowledge Management, Professional Development

This week’s Sue Hill breakfast meeting provided a compelling snapshot of what is exercising information professionals across a wide range of sectors (health, law, property and more were represented).

Several delegates reported that their organisations are working to develop new strategies and models to reflect the changing business landscape.  Collaboration, both internally, but increasingly externally, is seen as a strategy for success – or at least survival.  Organisational websites are no longer static ‘repositories’ but are being opened up to collaborative content creation – with all the challenges that this might generate.  Colleagues must learn to work more openly and in new matrix structures.  There are opportunities for knowledge and information people to act as role models when it comes to collaborative working.  It may not come as easily to others as it does to our profession.

But it’s not just our customers with whom we need to collaborate.  There is also work to be done educating, informing, and exerting influence on those who seek to regulate and measure our business.  We can assist in raising the profile, not just of our profession, but of our organisations and the sectors in which we work.  We can help share success stories, internally and externally and have a role to play in helping our colleagues interpret, and maximise, internally generated knowledge.  We can help our organisations mitigate information risk and maximise information value.

Even against the backdrop of a challenging business landscape, the conversation was positive and energised.  In hard times, we are the ‘good fairies’ of our organisations – our good deeds bring business benefits!

Suzanne from Sue Hill Recruitment has also blogged about this event.  Click here for her review.

The cultured traveller in Europe

By on August 3, 2011 in Europe

Thanks to Library Stuff for highlighting this article in the New York Times written with the ‘cultured traveller’ in mind.  Readers are recommended to visit European city libraries because they offer ‘respite’ from the crowds.  Hopefully this is not a euphemistic way of saying they are underused.

Libraries recommended include the Austrian National Library in Vienna and the Strahov Monastery and Library in Prague.  If you feel your European library could benefit from cultured visitors from overseas, why not add in your own recommendations in the comments field on the New York Times website?  And share your suggestions here too!

How to maximise the impact of a conference

By on August 1, 2011 in Post

Have you have ever attended – or even organised – an event and felt concerned that the energy and learnings are quickly lost as delegates are dispersed and return to their ‘day jobs’?

The Library and Information Science Research Coalition has just published a post on the DREaM project launch event that was held at the British Library in July.  The post pulls together all the blog posts written (fourteen so far!); photographs of the event; video interviews with delegates; and links to the archived social media coverage including a summary of the Twitter activity.  Presentations from the event are also available.

The post shows the highly participative and interactive nature of the event and captures the energy of the day.  It’s a great example of how to extend the impact of conference, beyond its time frame and its attending delegates.

Clear, concise, accurate – what all information managers should aim for

By on July 20, 2011 in Information and Knowledge Management, Post

Information is an organisational resource that needs to be managed, just like any other.  It needs to be allowed to flow appropriately and effectively if its value is to be maximised – and its potential to harm is to be minimised.

Our second speaker at the NetIKX Information Risk Management workshop was Patricia (Pat) Bryant – a risk manager with experience of advocating the benefits of managing risks at a senior level in the public, private and third sectors.

Pat used the recent events at News Corp and Westminster to highlight some key lessons about managing information risk.   Poor information management combined with alleged criminality has created financial problems for that organisation and raised political implications in three continents.

Key lessons from Pat’s presentation and the discussion that followed it:

  • ‘Secrecy’ is the enemy of information security.  If information is locked down, then it becomes siloed.  Information lock-down creates a barrier which can lead the disaffected to believe that you have something to hide.
  • It is possible to manage information boundaries, but organisations are not very good at it!  Organisations should aim for information transparency within clear boundaries.
  • Organisations should consider who is best placed to control and manage information flows
  • Similarly communications are vital and serious consideration should be given to who is the best person to do it!
  • Your information should be concise, factual and the person who communicates it should be trustworthy
  • Leaks tarnish people and organisation
  • Get your information right in the first place
  • Organisations should seek to move from ‘risk averse’ to ‘risk managed’
  • Has your organisation defined its ‘appetite for risk’? – you should work within that framework
  • The watchwords should be ‘Clear, Concise, Accurate‘

How to align IM with organisational risk management

By on July 20, 2011 in Information and Knowledge Management, Information Security

As recent events have only too clearly shown, poor information management and control (particularly when combined with a ‘flexible’ appreciation of information ethics and legislation) can lead to financial and reputational loss.

It was an extraordinary coincidence of timing that while a UK Government Select Committee was in progress in Westminster, members of NetIKX were discussing the concept of organisational information risk management.

Liz Scott-Wilson, currently an information architect at a large law firm, has years of experience in information management and consulting roles in both the public and private sectors.  In her presentation she shared what she considers to be the most valuable lesson of her career.  When it comes to exerting influence within your organisation the key to success is to focus on what keeps senior people in your organisation awake at night.

Senior managers are unlikely to care much about the intricacies of information governance but they will be concerned about organisational risk.  Liz outlined how in a previous role, she had analysed a (very detailed) organisational risk register and identified information pressure points.  She then used these to demonstrate how effective information management could help mitigate organisational risk at key pressure points.

Key lessons from Liz’s presentation:

  • Focus on real pain points for senior managers
  • Ensure you understand the power systems in your organisation
  • Find friends in your organisation’s governance/risk teams
  • Reflect organisational language in your strategy
  • Demonstrate how IM can bring plausible and affordable processes to mitigate risk

The key call for action was to encourage anyone interested in demonstrating the importance of IM to organisations to meet with organisational risk managers.

 

(There were two speakers at the event.  Watch out for a second blog entry!)

The gamification of content – what marketers are saying

By on July 19, 2011 in Content, Post, Social Media

Gamification means that content need no longer remain ‘passive’.  Gamification techniques can help ensure your content will work harder for you, for longer.

Two recent articles in the professional magazine Marketing Week summarise the ways in which gamification is being used to enhance brand awareness and to support customer loyalty programmes.  It is an approach that has already been adopted by such brands as Kellog, Disney and (as featured here) Marriott International.  Future developments mentioned look set to help customers manage their household energy  and petrol consumption.

And of course gamification techniques have already been used successfully by libraries.  Finland’s National Library, for example, has used gamification techniques to enhance the crowdsourced, collaborative nature of its archive digitisation project.  We can look forward to hearing of more gamification-based library projects in the months to come.

Is the internet changing our brains?

By on July 7, 2011 in Post

As people’s lives are becoming increasingly immersed in technology, questions arise about the impact this might be having on us – both physiologically and socially.  The Nominet Trust is exploring how digital technologies are impacting on human wellbeing.  As part of this process, Dr Paul Howard-Jones, an expert in neuroscience and education, was invited to review the research in the internet’s impact on the human brain. He presented a summary of his findings at the RSA this week.

A review of the evidence

What exactly is the truth behind such headlines as ‘Facebook and Bebo risk infantilising the human mind’? Howard-Jones reviewed 178 studies across a range of subjects in an attempt to ascertain the science behind such popular concepts of the impact of the internet.

Information gathering

Howard-Jones describes a study that monitored the brain activity of people using an internet search engine that seemed to show that different parts of the brain were activated when compared to reading.  However, it seems more likely that the users – particularly those less experienced online searchers – were simply learning new tasks which involved other parts of the brain.  In fact, the human brain is not actually as ‘hard-wired’ as many of us might suspect and any brain may be ‘changed’ by any learning experience. But in Howard-Jones’ words, ‘some brains are more plastic than others’ – the brains of children.  So it is the use of the internet by children and young people that causes concern for many people.

Social networking

The latest evidence suggests that online social networks actually stimulate connectness and support existing friendships rather than encouraging isolation in young people.  It is also true that where problems exist digitally, they would probably exist elsewhere. Young victims of cyberbullying for example are likely to have been victims offline.  There is little evidence to show that networking, or other types of online communication, are in themselves a source of special risk.

Addictive behaviour?

One of the other questions that the review covers is whether or not the internet can be an addiction.  Howard-Jones’ view is that anything is problematic if it is difficult to control, or interfering with normal daily life.  Common sense and moderation must be applied to internet usage and the concept of digital ‘hygiene’ – for parents, teachers and others – should be explored and developed.

Brain training – what works and what doesn’t

There is no evidence that commercial brain training has transferable everyday applications (but rather users simply get better at the brain training itself).  However, there IS evidence to show that working memory can be trained.  When young adults undertook a 19-day computer based training program that focused on developing working memory for 30 minutes a day, it was found that not only had their working memory improved.  The training also developed what is known as ‘fluid (tranferable) intelligence’ – they had developed their ability to solve problems in new situations.

Gaming

Neuroscience research can provide some insight into why computer games are so engaging.  Studies have suggested that mid-brain dopamine is released during gaming – and more frequently than in ‘real life’.  But there is no concensus as to how and when to diagnose ‘problematic’ or excessive gaming as an addiction.  It’s not all bad as far as mid-brain dopamine is concerned – it is also associated with the ability to store and recall information.

There is also evidence to show that gaming improves visual perceptual and motor skills.  Gamers may have enhanced visual attention capacity, superior spatial awareness and improved temporal processing of visual information.  Gaming enhances the learning process.

The report, which is available to download from the Nominet Trust website, also considers the effects of digital technology on sleep patterns, attention problems, multi-tasking and affective responses.  The research has helped to highlight where there are gaps in the research literature.  There is still a lot of work to be done in this field.

However, what is certain is that gaming in particular can be used to improve learning, and to engage with audiences in new ways.  It seems likely that ‘gamification’ will continue to grow.

 

A ‘new’ model for ebooks

By on July 6, 2011 in E-books

If Amazon’s Kindle device (other devices are available!) is ‘the iTunes for ebooks’ then what is the Spotify equivalent? (Spotify provides free and fee music streaming to users in a number of European countries).

This week, the Spanish initiative 24symbols has announced it is to offer on-demand access to a library of popular ebooks in a model similar to that of music streaming.  Integration with Facebook provides a social element to the service.

You can read more about 24symbols, including a review of its current, beta format on thenextweb.com.

Wikipedia – spread the love

By on July 4, 2011 in Digital Publishing

Wikipedia has announced it is testing a new way of sharing accolades for content.

In a blog post, the organisation outlines how important positive feedback is to contributors and editors.  78% of contributors stated that they are more likely to contribute in the future if others are complimentary about their efforts.

Wikipedia calls the ‘Wikilove’ initiative ‘an experiment in appreciation’.  It simplifies the feedback process and enables users to send barnstars or other (even customised) symbols of appreciation.