How are blogs useful for librarians?

Blogs are a great tool for professional development, to keep current on what is happening in the field, as well as to get ideas that you might want to implement in your library. Not only do blogs help spread ideas, but the interactive nature of posts and comments help to exchange information, generate discussion and build knowledge amongst colleagues.

How can librarians find blogs of interest?

There are hundreds of blogs written by librarians, for librarians. Some of my favorite "biblioblogs" that I keep up with are:

• See Also... by Steve Lawson
• Tame the Web by Michael Stephens
• The Shifted Librarian by Jenny Levine
• Information Wants to be Free by Meredith Farkas
• Burger's Blog by ALA President Leslie Burger
• ALA President-Elect Blog by Loriene Roy

A list of over 600 library blogs may be found using LISZen at Library Zen, which is also a search engine. In addition to blogs written by individuals, many of the associations in library land (ACRL, PLA, YALSA) maintain blogs which help members stay current on news items worth noting or other events that might be of interest to association members.

Finding the time to keep up with all of the reading

In the interest of saving time, I use a feedreader (specifically Bloglines), to manage all of the blogs that I would like to read on a regular basis. Click here for a peek into my Bloglines account to see my subscriptions.