Meredith Farkas is a faculty librarian at Portland Community College in Oregon. From 2007-2021, she wrote the monthly column “Technology in Practice” for American Libraries. Meredith was honored in 2014 with the ACRL Instruction Section Innovation Award, in 2008 and 2011 with the WISE Excellence in Online Education Award and in 2009 with the LITA/Library Hi Tech award for Outstanding Communication in Library and Information Technology. She has been writing the blog Information Wants to be Free since 2004.
Wow! I can't believe we've just finished Week 4. It's definitely a bittersweet feeling. I can't imagine waking up in a little over a week and not finding new posts…
Every day, I see something amazing and creative that people have done online with photos, audio or video content. Whether they are creating something totally new or remixing things to…
Update: I received an e-mail from one of the creators of Ask Dr. Wiki stating that they are now requiring folks to prove that they have medical credentials before they…
Could you ever have imagined a couple of years ago that a candidate for ALA President would have a campaign video on YouTube??? :) This isn't why I personally endorsed…
Social Software in Libraries cover Originally uploaded by librarianmer. I just heard from the folks at Information Today that my book is heading off to the printer tomorrow! I think…
Week two of Five Weeks to a Social Library is now over. RSS and del.icio.us really generated a lot of excitement for our participants and many could see the personal…
I never thought I'd say this... but I want to go work for the Pentagon! Lewis Shepherd sent me this Computer World article about some of the cool things they…
I mentioned PBWiki's new editing interface a few weeks ago, but this week was the official launch of this tool. I truly think that having a WYSIWYG editor like PBWiki…
mk1_1024 Originally uploaded by Dave & Bry. This is so cool! Visit the picture in Flickr and click on All Sizes and you can actually see the individual books! And…
I always tease Roy Tennant about how so many geek girls (me included) -- and probably geek boys too -- are totally crushing on him. He doesn't really "get it".…
The weeks and months before the start of Five Weeks to a Social Library required a significant amount of work, but I don't think I was prepared for how much…
I have always been an idea person. I probably get that from my dad who has had dozens of business ideas in the 29 years I've known him. However, before…
Honeymoon in Big Sur Originally uploaded by librarianmer. My husband, Adam, never likes taking credit for the things he's done, though he deserves an absolute boatload of it when it…
chickadee Originally uploaded by withrow. To the chickadees, blue jay and brilliant red cardinal I saw in the pine tree just outside my kitchen window as I made breakfast this…
I've been meaning to write about Walt's great Cites and Insights piece on conference speaking. If you haven't already read it, do take a look. He combines insights from Rachel…
I just wanted to give people a head's up that the wiki for this year's Computers in Libraries conference is up and people are already starting to add content. I've…
I'm so happy to finally be able to publicly congratulate Dorothea Salo on her new job as Digital Repository Librarian at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. I knew Dorothea…
One thing I was really excited about with Five Weeks to a Social Library was playing around with Odeo. I'd seen a lot of people using it and it looked…
On a happy note, a friend of mine has recently started a blog in an area of librarianship that doesn't get enough discussion in the blogosphere: access services. Mary Chimato…