Where should libraries go if Twitter becomes a wasteland?

[Emrys]

Elon Musk has bought Twitter, he’s all but guaranteed to make terrible decisions about how to run it, and high-profile users are already leaving the platform due to the already-significant increase in hate-speech and misinformation. Of course this has wider implications for the world at large, but where does it leave libraries seeking to connect with users on the platform? Should we stay, or find a new home?

tl;dr - in a way it doesn’t matter what we want to do, we have to follow the lead of our communites. If they stay put then so should we; if they fragment then it becomes a lot more complicated.
...
SHOULD WE SIMPLY LEAVE TWITTER ON PRINCIPLE?

Ultimately, my view is that libraries leaving Twitter on principle is self-defeating and too selective. Facebook is so incredibly problematic and has been for at least a decade, so if we’re leaving Twitter we should probably be leaving FB, right? And they own Instagram so we should leave that too. Which means we’re left with TikTok, which is hardly a bed of ethical roses and is especially problematic around data.

So do we leave all of them on principle? You could certainly make a case for it - but I don’t think most of us will because it would destroy our ability to interact with our communities. So if the answer is ‘no we’re not leaving all of them,’ then leaving just Twitter seems like a misstep: if you’ll forgive the extended metaphor, it’s like cutting off your unethical nose to spite your face, when the cheeks, eyes, chin and mouth are equally guilty.

https://www.ned-potter.com/blog/where-should-libraries-go-if-twitter-becomes-a-wasteland

[sanatanadharma]

1. Good Lord! Where the libraries pre-Twitter

Is there no Carnegie, are there no bookshelves, does Twitter own the card catalogs?
Did civilization begin with a bird?
Have we all become 144 character cartoon caricatures in a crumbling civilization?

[Emrys]

4. Libraries struggle nowadays.

They're at constant risk from funding cuts, face severe competition from other sources of access to media, and have had to broaden the services they offer to keep footfall up and offer what their users and prospective users want, and that includes moving with the times in term of technology.

Twitter has been a useful way for them to engage with their users, as the article describes. In Scotland, for instance, many libraries have quite skilled social media - ironically, much more skilled than Musk's proving himself to be - that often go viral. Orkney Library's one of the more successful with 80,000 followers: https://twitter.com/OrkneyLibrary Not bad for a place many would consider quite remote, with a small population catchment.

[Skittles]

11. thank you

and yes, please do leave FB too......

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

2. Huh? Are libraries somehow dependent on Twitter to buy books, check out books,

help people do research?

What am I missing?

[Emrys]

5. In today's environment, they need sustained outreach to bring in users.

If they're not used enough, they lose funding and may close. We lost our local library's council funding, and it's had to continue with volunteers rather than a qualified (and paid) librarian.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. People need Twitter to remind them to use the local library?

The mind boggles.

Honestly, I'd think that heavy Twitter users rarely, if ever, use a library. So that's hardly a reliable source of getting users. Better enlist the local public school teachers.

And it's sad to think that a local library could that easily lose funding. My local library (Santa Fe, NM, three libraries) shut down to in-person use for over a year during the pandemic, but we could reserve books on line, show up, and check them out. Masking required. At some point I asked one of the librarians if usage was down because of this, and he said, No, not at all.

When I first moved here in 2008, one of the first things I did after renting an apartment, was get a library card. It wasn't very long before I had an overdue book. I brought it back, and asked what the fine was. No fine, I was told. They'd eliminated them some years before. I have actually never had an overdue book since then. It helps that these days their computer will automatically renew a book for me.

I love libraries.

[Emrys]

8. Maybe argue about that with the libraries and librarians who use social media for outreach.

I think they know their jobs, and they know their audiences. They can use social media to advertise opening times, unexpected closures, new facilities (our nearest large town library has a large computer section that's always been well used when I've been in), exhibitions, new accessions of books, occasionally leavened with something humorous or interesting to keep people engaged. And so far, it doesn't cost them anything but some staff time every now and then.

They've moved with the times. They've had to.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

10. Hmmm. Interesting.

I don't use much social media, and I use the library regularly.

I will still suggest that those who don't use libraries to begin with, will not be enticed by social media.

[liberal N proud]

3. Back to where they were before they got on twitter

Why is a library on twitter?

[Emrys]

6. For outreach. See replies above. n/t

[masmdu]

9. https://wt.social/

https://wt.social/

[muriel_volestrangler]

12. I think this guy's a bit clueless

A quick disclaimer is that I’m focusing on organisational accounts here. When it comes to us as individuals, there’s certainly an argument that we should be getting out - but this post is about libraries, not librarians.

OK, that makes sense. So, obviously, this is about using social media to get as much engagement from the public with the library in the real world where libraries have resources for them.

So do we leave all of them on principle? You could certainly make a case for it

Well, no, you can't make a case for that. That's just giving up on the public.

IF WE’RE STAYING, WHAT SHOULD WE DO DIFFERENTLY?
One of the key things you can do if you haven’t already is mute more. Go to Settings and Support > Settings and privacy > Privacy and Safety > Mute and block and finally Muted notifications. On the resulting screen you can mute default-profile-pic accounts, or unconfirmed accounts, meaning you’ll be less exposed to mass-produced trolling or bots.

Again, just no. That just fucks the average person, who doesn't confirm their account, and who couldn't give a toss about profile pics. This author is just thinking about how he can enjoy his time as a librarian on social media, not how you use social media to benefit the library and the public.

[Emrys]

13. I saw this article more as a microcosm of some of the functions of social media,

and Twitter in particular, that folks sometimes don't consider. Witness some of the "why the hell do libraries need to be on Twitter, they should be loaning out books, dammit" pushback above. I won't defend the guy's advice about how to use Twitter because that wasn't why I posted it.

It's arguable that presences on Facebook might be more useful for libraries because of the way it's used to help keep families in touch etc., not to mention the larger user base, but so far they haven't had to choose one or the other. (I don't have a Facebook account, and it's barely worth visiting without one, but the impression I get is that it's more fragmented and cluttered than Twitter can be.)

Are there that many people who look at Twitter without an account nowadays? I assumed Twitter's arsing around with login nags etc. had chased a lot of casual visitors off. It was creeping "innovations" like that which led me to set up a stealth Twitter account so I had more control and fewer annoyances.

[muriel_volestrangler]

14. I don't know how many people look at Twitter without being signed in

either because they don't have an account, or they just don't need to send tweets themselves. But it's the "stealth accounts" like yours that would be blocked by this guy's advice - not verified, and not used enough for them to bother setting up profile pictures. This would catch my account too, for that matter.

[Emrys]

15. Well, I did say I wasn't going to defend his advice there.

Last edited Fri Nov 4, 2022, 11:13 AM - Edit history (1)

I don't believe my Twitter account would be rendered unable to see his library's output by what he suggests - muting his notifications. I could set up a browser bookmark if I wanted to see his library's tweets, or add the account to a Twitter list, as I do nowadays with any accounts whose tweets I want to read regularly.

If he blocked my account, that would be different, and I'd have to log out to see anything his account tweeted, but he'd have to find my account in the first place and single it out!

Anyone not logged in could still see his library's tweets - they just wouldn't be able to reply, which is what his countermeasures focused on, because they didn't have a Twitter account ...

[Lars39]

16. Robber barons gaveth and robber barons taketh away