Over the next week, I need to write my column for September’s American Libraries magazine. I’ve already decided that I want to write something about libraries and Flickr, but I’m not sure which library (or perhaps 2 libraries) to focus on. I have a few ideas, but I thought I’d put it out to my readers to see if you know of any examples of a library using Flickr that you think are particularly cool. There are so many libraries now using Flickr, and I’m pretty sure there must be great examples out there that I know nothing about. If you know of one, just link to their photos in the comments on this post.
Thanks!
Hi Meredith,
I’ve more of a no-brainer example rather than anything cool or revolutionary. I’m using a blog / Flickr to communicate major renovation changes we’re undertaking. We’ve shut down 30,000 sq ft to create more user-focused library space and I needed a way to show our users what is going on behind the construction walls and that progress is actually being made! The blog/Flickr combo just made sense in my example.
See the “Cameron Library Renovation News” link on our home page: http://www.library.ualberta.ca/
Cheers,
Pam
Well, our library has moved the periodicals section to another part of the building to make room for a Starbucks. If that counts, check out the ongoing construction at our Flickr page at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bsulibrary/
Thanks!
Memo
Does it need to be specifically Flickr? One example that I often use for photo application in libraries is this one through Oakville Public Library:
http://images.oakville.halinet.on.ca/details.asp?ID=17255&number=1
They’ve posted historical photos of Oakville on the Oakville Images site and have invited the general public to add information about the images.
They use their own software, but this sort of thing could easily be done in Flickr.
Dave
I use Flickr at our library to promote our collections and use the Flickr notes to link directly into our catalog: http://www.flickr.com/photos/csbsjulibrary/. Our collections are promoted through the This Day in History series and two of our popular reads shelves are displayed every 3 or so weeks. Some of the photos are viewed hundreds of time, and I have received so many emails from people telling me that they love this.
We use it to promote teen bookmark and poster contest winners on our teen site – http://teens.denverlibrary.org/involved/view_links.html#bookmark. We also post a link to Flickr photos of the library taken by others on our Central Library locations page at http://denverlibrary.org/locations_hours/central.html
Hi Meredith,
when I was still working at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam we used Flickr to let the customers know we were having a huge renovating. From the first pictures for promotion untill the re-opening, you all find them here – http://www.flickr.com/photos/51274412@N00/.
Okay it’s a Dutch Library, but I really liked the idea!
Moqub / Elisabeth
We use flickr to promote displays and for our annual art contest http://www.flickr.com/photos/dclibrary/. You may also want to check out the flickr group 365lib – by joining this group you are committing your library to uploading 365 photos within a year’s time.
We’re using Flickr at Z Smith Reynolds Library at Wake Forest University: http://flickr.com/photos/zsrlibrary/ It’s a pretty standard use, but we’re using it a lot. We range from pictures of events within the library to our Read posters to art exhibits. We also have “private” sets for photos of internal activities (like our campus olympics team) so that staff members can see them, but they aren’t out in the public. FWIW!
This is a great little list developing. We use it to highlight our teen programs:
http://www.library.nashville.org/teens/teenweb.asp
Great idea for an article, Meredith.
Pierce County’s Flickr page started to feed images into our blogs but we’ve been consistently adding a pic a day for the 365 project Michael Porter suggested a while back. I’m trying to vary the images (people and things, ordinary and out-of-the-ordinary) so it shows the art of library life rather than sinking into endless bookshelves. A local newspaper even picked up on our first 30 day effort and we hope for more community publicity as time goes on.
Now that ALA is over, we’ve also got our eyes on a few other Flickr-related library projects to reinforce with the public all the other things we already do.
There’s a Libraries and Librarians group on Flickr, too:
http://www.bookism.org/open/2006/07/21/flickr-in-libraries/
Lincoln City Library’s Bennett Martin branch is using Flickr to promote their Courtyard Book Chats. They are also using the Notes to link to the books in their catalog.
http://flickr.com/photos/bookguide/
We use Flickr to highlight our Digital Library collections. We created a slideshow on Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/59804400@N00/sets/72157600402628412/show/
of our Image collection and then this in turn I transformed into a Flash video using Adobe Captivate http://carlbookblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/carl-digital-library-flash-movie.html
Interesting uses of flickr – most of the above flickr collections appear to be created /contributed by the library. Are there libraries out there that are encouraging their patrons to upload their own items as well? Patrons could be asked to tag their images with a certain phrase to be sure their images are returned in the relevant results.
We have a Flickr Pro account for pictures from the Penn State Libraries Open House: http://www.flickr.com/photos/8312170@N02/
This year, we are going to encourage everyone involved with the Open House–faculty, staff, attendees to upload and tag their photos so that we can access them all easily in one place.
At Redwood City Public Library, we’re using Flickr to expose some of our local history collection and allow discovery by a much broader audience:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/redwoodcitylibrary/sets/72157600508615810/
I also love what Westmont has done for new materials by using the notes tool to link into their catalog:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/westmontlibrary/566717727/
Thank you all so much for these wonderful links. I wish I had more than 600 words to highlight them all! 🙂
The column on Flickr will be coming out in September’s American Libraries.
I think like many libraries, mine kind of has a token flickr presence (http://flickr.com/photos/chelmsfordpubliclibrary). The only two things of note that were are doing with it are 1) documenting the painting of mural covering all the walls in our children’s room (http://flickr.com/photos/chelmsfordpubliclibrary/sets/72157600142184933/), and 2) making available to the public 100+ historical photographs (taken in our town around 1901) which had previous been tucked away and forgotten in our archive (http://flickr.com/photos/chelmsfordpubliclibrary/sets/72157600000139715/ – a local group scanned them all and gave them on disk to the library, and I uploaded them all to flickr).
Hi Meredith
At the National Library of Australia Flickr is used as a way of linking with the AUstralian community to collect pictures for the resource dsicovery service PictureAustralia – see http://www.pictureaustralia.org/index.html. It has been very intersting to see the thematic content collected and, perhaps more importantly, the enw engagement with communities. Pictures from Flick have also been acquired for the Library’s collection. It enables a social networking focused on images of Australia and the ability for the LIbrary to itneract with a community that may never walk into a library or think of going to a library website.
regards
Roxanne