Walt at Random

I don’t know that my German grandparents (the Gruenig side) ever said it that way to me, but I’ve certainly heard the English version often enough:

We grow too soon old and too late smart.

I’m not sure why, but Roy Tennant’s response to my comment on this blog post brought that saying to mind. To wit:

• Roy said “I’ve been to more ALA conferences than I care to count, and know exactly how I can be most effective there (even if I don’t always completely follow through…)”
• I commented (among other things): “You know exactly how you can be most effective at ALA? I’ve been going for 33 years, and I’m still not sure…”
• Roy responded: “Yes, Walt, I DO know how I can be most effective, and I can say it one word: Bars. That’s right, I can be most effective having conversations with people over our favorite drinks, whether it be diet soda or The Macallan. You won’t find it on the official schedule but there it is. Set up your meetings in advance with the folks you most want to hook up with. The rest is, well, up to you. As I’m sure you know.

Now, before you think I’m poking fun at Roy Tennant for achieving age before wisdom, be aware that the title of this post is reflexive: I’m talking about myself, not Tennant.

I’d guess I had no bar-style meetings set up in advance with the people I should have been meeting with for most of the Midwinters and Annuals I’ve attended (and certainly not for most conferences I’ve attended as a speaker). Oh, sure, some of them–but even then, maybe one or at most two per conference. And I suspect that’s been a mistake all along the way–that I’ve let my introversion get the better of me, failing to do enough networking.

I won’t say “and that’s why Roy Tennant is Roy Tennant and I’m not.” There’s much more to it than that. But it probably plays a small part.

So am I going to reform–make sure that Anaheim is chock-full of bar sessions with people I want to hook up with, for our mutual benefit? And Denver after that? And Chicago, Boston, Washington, San Diego, New Orleans… (Hey! Where’s San Antonio? Dallas for Midwinter but not San Antonio? Really?)

Probably not. I don’t think I’m angling to be the next Walt Crawford, whatever that might mean.

But that’s my failing. As they said in the old country, “wir werden zu früh altes und zu spätes intelligentes”

Update: Title and last line modified, although I have no idea which “original saying” is really original.

You know, that explains a lot…

Your Annnual Conference and You

Cites & Insights 8:2 (February 2008) is now available. The 24-page issue (PDF as always, but all articles are also available as HTML separates) includes:

• Announcing Academic Library Blogs: 231 Examples - The latest from Cites & Insights Books, a $29.50 289-page paperback that complements Public Library Blogs: 252 Examples. Included are brief notes, the list of academic institutions represented, examples of blog coverage for both books, the announcement of $20 PDF downloads for those who just can’t stand print books–and a few notes on the status of Cites & Insights Books.
• Trends & Quick Takes: Trends and Forecasts - Time to look at some pundits’ scorecards and forecasts, along with some of the trends from the LITA Top Tech Trendspotters, with some of my comments interleaved.
• Bibs & Blather: Midwinter Musings - Notes on a much warmer Philadelphia Midwinter, along with a special essay based on an odd but not unique occurrence: “Leadership and Initiative: The Case of the Empty Chairs.”
• Offtopic Perspective: 50 Movie Western Classics, Part 1 - Roy Rogers is riding tonight, as are Tex Ritter, Gene Autry, John Wayne and a slew of others. A bunch of one hour “oaters” and a handful of pretty good pictures.

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When I chatted with a few of you at Midwinter, I may have expressed concern that the February issue might be some combination of late, short and peculiar, since I didn’t think I had any of it written (I forgot about the Offtopic Perspective). Well, one out of three ain’t bad: It’s not late and it’s not short. Enjoy.

Call it ego, but I don’t think I can let this go unremarked, although I apparently tried for three days…

“This” is a really interesting post by Dorothea Salo about the power of blogging in specific situations–but that’s not the reason I’m linking to it. (It might be the reason it turns up in a C&I piece–or might not–but that would be because of the real content.)

Nope. It’s this paragraph:

Over the last couple years I’ve learned that I can do professional writing, though it takes a hell of a lot out of me and I don’t think I will ever find it easy. Speaking is worlds easier, and whole universes more fun. (Combine Walt Crawford, to whom good writing comes as naturally as breathing, and me and you’d have one frighteningly effective public-figure librarian.)

Thanks, Dorothea. Not that I wasn’t a pretty good speaker back when I was in demand, but “to whom good writing comes as naturally as breathing…” Wow. Them’s kind words.

And, as I noted back to her in email, “Sometimes I have trouble breathing.” Which, fortunately, is not true (although if I ate a banana I might have terminal trouble in that regard)…but there are certainly times I have trouble with (some forms of) writing. Naturally, I’ve written about that too. When I had two monthly print columns, a bimonthly print column, and Cites & Insights, I managed to use “if you’re not ready to write X, write Y instead” to keep from missing deadlines. With two bimonthly print columns and a supposed state of semi-retirement, it’s easier to say “if you’re not ready to write X, read something instead–you’ll get around to it.”

Which I usually do, but it can be painful. When life offers a range of excellent excuses to avoid writing, it can be really painful.

Which is another way of saying that I haven’t written any of the essays for C&I 8:2 yet–and by now, I should have about a third of an issue ready. (Well, I do, but it’s another Offtopic Perspective.) As acute observers of C&I 8:1 may guess, I haven’t really focused on the range of usual C&I topics for a while now, making an exception for book digitization projects… I’m sure that will change after Midwinter. It had better. Of course, now that I’ve published a January issue on January 1, I could theoretically publish a February issue even a little later in February…

What was that slogan from a six-book trilogy (which we saw as a not-all-that-good flick)? Don’t Panic? I won’t. Of course, writing this post (and another one to come) is one way of procrastinating… (I’ve already done the “do Y”: I’m my usual month early on “disContent” with what I think is a tightly focused 850 words that came about partly because I wasn’t ready to work on C&I. And, for that matter, I finished writing Academic Library Blogs: 231 Examples partly to avoid working on C&I; it will be available in two or three weeks, after I receive and approve proof copies from Lulu and CreateSpace. $29.50, of course, and just a few pages shorter than Public Library Blogs: 252 Examples. So far, I’m disinclined to combine the two into Walt’s Big Book of Library Blogs, but if I thought there was a market for that $50 580-page combination…)

Serious rambling here. Short form: Thanks, Dorothea. It ain’t always as easy as it looks–although, once I’m ready to write something, the words do flow. (No, I can’t and don’t do “15 minutes every day regardless.” For me, at least, that would yield choppy writing that read like it was written in little pieces…and probably take a lot longer than just not writing on Those Days and settling in when the time is right. My practice. Not suggested or recommended for anyone else.)

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I didn’t really do a “here’s what I did last year and am going to do better this year” post, except by inference here and there. Fact is, last year was traumatic in some ways, enormously productive in others, and I don’t regard it as emblematic of any sort of succession. At least I hope not: I’m not sure I could cope.

One motto that popped up at several key points last year and that resounds in my mind when I read certain bits of advice these days does apply–for me, at least.

Life is too short.

Yes, I’ve turned down an invitation because it would put me on the same program with someone who I really couldn’t abide (worse, it would have me introducing someone as a principal speaker, someone who’s insulted me in writing and in public). Either I was being asked to increase the audience size, in which case I’d be lending my cachet (my cachet? I have a cachet?) under false pretenses, since I fundamentally disagree with this other person’s approach and persona–or I was being asked either to create a controversy or out of ignorance as to my stance. Either way, I lose. I’d do the same thing again with no apologies. Life is too short.

Oh, and yes, I’ve avoided some situations because I was pretty sure they’d put me in contact with one of maybe three people in the whole field who I really find grating on a personal level, and the situations didn’t have enough going for them to overbalance that. Why not? Life is too short.

That’s also getting to be my internal response when I see someone with a high-profile speaking or writing gig and think maybe I could have done a better job on it, if I was more of a go-getter. Life is too short, and since I’ve made a deliberate practice of encouraging new writers/speakers and treating people as people regardless of their highfalutin’ reputation or lack thereof, it’s absurd to grump when other people do well. I should celebrate their successes. Mostly, these days, I do. Life is too short to do otherwise.

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The trifecta section: Why I’m not posting a Midwinter schedule.

Oh, I’ll be there–from Friday afternoon through Monday night (leaving way too early Tuesday morning, to match my middle-of-the-night drive to SFO on Friday), at the Embassy Suites Center City. I could even say “Of course I’ll be there. Midwinter 2008 is the formal launch of the PALINET Leadership Network. How am I not going to be there?”

But that formal launch also means my schedule will be changing up to the last working hour on Thursday and quite possibly beyond. If I can talk to people from library publications about PLN (open to all English-reading [potential] library leaders, free, great stuff), I will, and those who are trying to set things up know that. I’ll probably spend some time at the PALINET booth as well, although maybe not a lot–PALINET has a lot going on this conference, what with VuFind, Villanova University’s “open source discovery tool that replaces the traditional online public access catalog (OPAC) without requiring a new integrated library system (ILS).”

What I think I know so far, all subject to change:

• I hope to make part of the LITA Happy Hour Friday, and maybe head off with some strange colleagues (you know who you are) afterwards, but it’s a hope, not an expectation.
• I plan to attend the ALCTS Medium Heads DG on Saturday morning, since it’s on a topic of particular interest for PLN (succession planning).
• I will most definitely attend PALINET’s member reception, which probably means I’ll miss another reception that I would normally make a point of attending.
• I might hit LITA Public Library Technology IG on Saturday morning and NextGen Catalogs IG Sunday afternoon. I might not.
• I’ll probably be at part or all of that saloon thingy–oh, wait, Blogger’s Salon, not saloon. Or not: There may be conflicts there as well.
• So far, Monday’s wide open. I imagine that will change.

I anticipate having at least two and maybe four or more other meetings scheduled while I’m there. I also anticipate lots of time in the exhibits–and if the weather turns out to be nice, Philadelphia is a great walking town.

Want to get together? Send me a note before Thursday evening. I’ll have a cell phone, but only outbound and only for emergencies–and no, I’m not Twittering.

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Ah, what the heck. Now that I’ve killed three birds with one post, why not go for a foursome?

I don’t carry a portable computer. My wife owns one, but it’s one designed for good value rather than light weight.

I’ve thought about the possibility that what I’m doing might make it much more desirable at some point to change that practice–to have “something” along when I’m traveling so I can do web-based things and maybe a little lightweight writing. I’ve also thought about my desire for traveling light, my sometimes-frugal nature, and my bad habit of leaving valuable things sitting around places (otherwise known as “Why I carry a $5 compact umbrella, not a $20 Totes”).

If I did need access on the road, I’m pretty sure I know what I’d buy, at least in today’s market. Hmm. Inexpensive. Semi-decent full keyboard. Decent screen. VERY lightweight and fairly rugged.

Nope, not that one. I’d give you the reasons, but only in person.

This one, silly as its name is: eee–by Asus. Two pounds, 7″ screen, not touch-typable but a plausible undersize keyboard, wifi built in, 4GB memory (flash, of course) for $400…

Yes, it runs Linux (Ubuntu, I think). That seems like the sensible thing to use on this kind of cut-down, hard-diskless PC.

Am I likely to get one of these (or some equivalent)? Unless someone’s in a silly mood, only time will tell. Frankly, all else being equal, I really rather like being off the air when I’m traveling.

A word to the wise:

Housing reservations online for ALA Annual opened today.

I just finished making reservations. And got, oh, maybe my 15th choice of place–the others being waitlisted, already full, or only suite/concierge availability.

(It will probably turn out to be a decent choice for someone with a sense of humor…never thought I’d be staying at a mid-level Disneyland Resort hotel for ALA, though. Not a “good neighbor”–a Disney property.)

A more important word to the wise:

Some of the distance indicators on the online search-response form are just plain wrong. In one case, the form shows half a block and the hotel’s own website says “2 miles.” I’ve never heard of a hotel overstating its distance from a convention center… (Too bad. Otherwise, that hotel looks like an interesting choice.)

If I do a “year in review,” it would come a week or so from now–but I’m unlikely to do one anyway. You’ve already heard enough here and in Cites & Insights. Meanwhile, a few random notes…

• We’d always been ones to get stuff done at work over the “missing week” (between Christmas and New Year’s). With no place of work to go to in any case, that’s gotten a little stranger. Still, we’ll go spend the day with my immediate family tomorrow and go celebrate the new year (and our 30th anniversary) a week from tomorrow with an old and dear friend…and in between, well, carry on.
• One or two of you might be surprised that the first 2008 Cites & Insights isn’t out yet, given past history. It’s mostly written (and an odd one it is), with one probable exception (see next bullet). My current plan is to publish it very early in the new year–say January 1 or 2. After all, most of you aren’t around anyway, and if you are, the last thing you want to do is read a 15,000-word retrospective and commentary on Google Book Search and the Open Content Alliance (and a couple of shorter essays). Right?
• The exception: I’m almost certainly going to do a book version of Cites & Insights 6: 2006; I really like having a paperback instead of a Velobound cumulation, even if nobody else buys it. There will be something extra for those who do buy it, though. With Volume 7, it’s the phantom issue. With Volume 6, it’s a prefatory essay that I’ll start writing today, and which will include some details on losses and major changes among the liblogs profiled in 2005 and 2006. I’ll probably do a summary post, but the details will only be in the book. Of course, it’s also a neat packaged way to get both of my major essays on Library 2.0, and it will cost the same as (or less than) that separate package would have, if I’d had the will to do all the footnotes and bibliography/index needed to make it a book. (Which is to say: $29.50, only from Lulu. I’ll post an announcement when it is available.) If I do the book version, I’ll probably open C&I 8:1 with an announcement for both book versions…and, as time permits, see whether it’s feasible to do earlier volumes in book form.
• I am going to Midwinter, and other than Saturday evening and Sunday early evening, my schedule’s still pretty much open. If you’d like to get together for something, send me a note. Given that I didn’t have a big network of local friends, telecommuting can be a trifle isolating–Midwinter will be a nice chance to spend some face-to-face time with people.
• If you’re wondering about the Academic Library Blogs project (is anyone?): The research portion is done. Now it’s a matter of crunching numbers, writing the first few chapters, editing the blog-based chapters, choosing a cover image…possibly sometime in January. Possibly later.
• You’re still invited to join the PALINET Leadership Network; go to PLN and click on “Log in/Create account” and create an account. Good stuff!

Have a good whatever it is you have. Enjoy; life’s too short not to.

Appreciate Cites & Insights? Want to support it? Why not pick up this year’s issues in a single, convenient, indexed, perfect-bound package?

Cites & Insights Volume 7, 2007 is available now, for $35 plus shipping, only from Lulu. (Amazon/CreateSpace doesn’t do full 8.5×11 books, so it’s not feasible to do a duplicate edition there.)

It’s a 405-page volume including everything you’ll find at the website–but also something you won’t find there: The 38-page phantom issue, Cites on a Plane, which was only available for ten days in January 2007, right around Midwinter. I believe it’s on bright white book paper, so it should read very well.

Oh, and as a bonus you get two library pictures–one from Alaska covering about half of the front cover, one from Hawaii covering the whole back cover.

I’d be delighted to autograph this or any of my other books during Midwinter, if you want them defaced. Chances are, I’ll be at the PALINET booth for some stretches, but I don’t know when–and, of course, I’ll be focusing on the PALINET Leadership Network then, but you can come look at the network and get a book signed.

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As noted earlier, I’d consider putting out book versions of (some) earlier volumes if there’s some demand for them, probably with a bonus essay in each volume. I’m not sure it’s feasible to do volumes of the pre-2005 volumes (there may be a PDF issue), but…

For a while now, I’ve turned off comments for posts more than a year old–the hard way, going in and editing each comment, a month at a time. A nuisance, but it cuts the amount of spam even further, particularly the “meaningful spam” (most of which is something along the lines of

I’m not sure I understand everything you say about [title of post is automatically inserted here], but I’ll have to read more about it.

Or something along those lines. The purpose of the spam is, presumably, to increase the visibility or PageRank of the URL the commenter provides. There are variations, of course, but the message is typically innocuous and sounds as though someone could have said it–except that I use a lot of post titles that really don’t make sense as part of that sentence. This kind of spam is almost always attached to old messages, where I’m presumably paying less attention. (Spam Karma 2 actually catches it pretty much all the time–but that means more spam for me to check, to rescue legitimate comments.)

Somebody–Jessamyn West? Somebody else–recently noted a newish WordPress plugin, comment-timeout, that does this automatically at whatever interval I choose. Getting a little braver (and with better SFTP tools at home), I actually downloaded, uploaded, and activated this one on my own, instead of asking Blake Carver to do it. (Taking off the training wheels? Maybe. At least this time.) The plugin has some nice nuances: You can set it so that ongoing discussions don’t get trapped at the timeout mark and so that popular discussions (you set the level of popularity) can go on even longer.

Looking at the reality of comments around here, particularly comments from my core audience, I’ve set it up like this, subject to change down the road:

• For most posts, commenting gets turned off six months (actually 180 days) after the post. If you look at the May 2007 archives right now, you’ll see that: You can comment on some posts but not others.
• For posts with ongoing discussions, commenting can extend 60 days after the most recent approved comment.
• For posts with more than 20 comments (the default measure for “popular” and certainly a solid count for any liblog post), commenting can extend 90 days after the most recent approved comment.

Coincidence that I had to clear more spam today (before installing the plugin) than I’ve had any day in more than a week? Who knows?

Oh, then there’s another frequently-occurring spam text–one where I really wonder what universe the spammers operate in. The text refers to my “awesome guest book.” I don’t have a guest book. I can’t think of a single blog that I read that does have a guest book. At least “awesome blogroll” would have some faint hope of success–not here, but elsewhere.

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The ALA note (hmm, I grumped about ALA interactive services a year ago–for much the same reason):I got the email asking me to renew my personal membership online. Logged in (the password sent in the email–password sent in gmail, which is a really stupid idea, ALA–was wrong, but that was OK: I know my ALA password). Got to the “category of member” page…and thought about it. Hmm. I’m not salaried (the new part-time position is a contract position). I’m semi-retired. I’m not really a librarian. Should I be paying $180? ($120 ALA, $60 LITA) I needed more info, so clicked on the appropriate link.

Which goes to a list of division memberships. Not to the page that explains the rules for different categories of ALA personal membership. Indeed, using the site’s search function

Stop laughing. Site search functions do work in some cases.

I was unable to find a page that defined “non-salaried librarian.”

I was about to choose that $42 category–well, actually, I did, but hadn’t checked out yet.

I mentioned it to my wife. She’s fully retired now, but was in a similar “unsalaried, but still doing some work” situation for 2007. (Of course, she is a degreed librarian.) She said something about “I think you have to earn less than X.” X being somewhat less than my contract and other library-related earnings should total next year.

So I canceled the transaction. Today, I went in via a different route and found the appropriate page–not by searching, to be sure. Indeed there is a limit of X for “non-salaried.”

I still have a mild quandary. My new position isn’t managerial as usually defined: Nobody reports to me. It doesn’t require an MLS or state certification. Come to think of it, that’s been true of my work for close to a decade…

Does that mean I’m library support staff and can get by for $42 instead of $120?

I’ll probably pay the $180 for 2008. Oh, and check my preferences again to see where ALA will send various emails this time around.

I discussed this with appropriate people at ALA and will act accordingly.

ALA TechSource occasionally sends me copies of Library Technology Reports in the hope I’ll mention them here or in Cites & Insights. (I wrote an LTR issue a couple of years back.)

The July/August 2007 issue is Next-Generation Library Catalogs by Marshall Breeding. It’s short, even by LTR standards: 42 pages plus two blank pages for notes. It’s also well done, offering a fair amount of information on a range of newer catalog interfaces in a readable manner.

Unfortunately, it could be considerably more useful, if it was 53 or 54 pages instead of 42 pages. How so? Because most of the 25 figures, screen shots from catalog interfaces, are simply too small to be effective.

Twentyone of the 25 figures are full or nearly full screen shots. They’re reproduced one column wide (on a two-column page) and roughly one-third of a page high. And most of them are too small.

The screen shots should have been reproduced using the full width of the text area, which means they’d also be two-thirds of a page high. Yes, they’d be a little on the large side–but they’d also be gloriously easy to make sense of, instead of requiring a magnifying glass in some cases.

For 21 figures, making them 2/3 of a page instead of 1/6 of a page adds 10.5 pages total (half a page per figure). The way chapters break, it might turn out to add 12 pages instead of 11–but that would still be well within LTR’s normal range.

It’s a good report. (Is it worth the price? That’s not for me to say.) It’s too bad the layout people didn’t spot the problem and make it an even better report.

I think it’s worth noting that the PALINET position discussed here didn’t just come to me–and I didn’t happen upon the job posting by scouring all available library jobsites.

A friend forwarded the job posting to me, with the thought that I might find it interesting.

Dr. Peggy Sullivan was ALA Executive Director when I was LITA President. A few years before that, she was ALA President. She was a pleasure to work with back then (when I was LITA President–when she was ALA President, I was a fledgling in the organization and exclusively associated with ISAD, the former name of LITA). She believes in what she does and believes in people. She’s had a distinguished career. I’m honored to call her a friend.

And, to be sure, as promised in a very early job-related posting, I’ll be sending her a complete autographed set of my books–past, present and future.

Good things about going to ALA Annual this year (partial):

• Another chance to see people I only see twice a year–and a few I’ve never met face-to-face before.
• Some good conversations about possible personal futures. (Nothing solid yet; there’s one big contracting situation that I think would be a real win_win situation, but no decision’s been made yet. As a result, I’m still open to contacts and offers.)
• Much better weather than expected–in DC, that is.
• The exhibits felt a little more varied and interesting than in some other cases (and better attended).
• The distances were such that this was mostly a walking conference for me (during the day, I’ll typically prefer walking for up to 1.5 miles), which is always a good thing.
• Great LISHost dinner, great OCLC Bloggers Salon, I was very pleased with LITA TopTechTrends, the other program I attended (!), on orphan works, was first-rate.
• My earlier decision not to base essays or commentary on “second-hand conference reporting” was confirmed by reading reports on my own TopTechTrends comments: Some big differences between what I believe I said and the spins put on it by various writers.

Not-so-good things about going to ALA Annual this year:

• Missing six days of Blenheim apricots at the peak of ripeness: Our tree yielded a large number of small (unfortunately) apricots, nearly all of which were ready to pick during the same week. My wife gave away scores of them, and based on what I’m eating now, I could have had six or eight a day of the kind of fruit that inspires passionate writing; Blenheims are simply magnificent.
• Missing six days of being at home, my wife, our cats, writing, etc…but that’s a direct tradeoff with getting (back) in touch with lots of other people.
• The prices, especially for breakfast and a glass of wine here and there…
• Having to spend time thinking about my personal future in terms of income rather than in terms of possibilities for extracurricular stuff.
• The journey back home (already discussed), although it clearly wasn’t as bad as some others endured. Still, it took me until Saturday to fully recover from the process.

Next up: Philly in January. All my Pennsylvania friends assure me that the frigid conditions last time around were an aberration. I’m not sure. Will I be there? That depends in part on how things go with the search for a personal future…

For those who care, I think all I have to say about the job situation appears here. I hope the one “majority of time” contracting possibility works out; it’s one where I think I’d bring a lot to the work–and it’s work with a group I respect. But it’s just not feasible to stop looking elsewhere, given the uncertain nature of when (and whether) a decision will be made… Otherwise, some interesting discussions about piecemeal possibilities–training, teaching, and exploring the kinds of things I’m good at and that are in demand.

As for my Twitter experiment: That’s already been covered. I’m still being “friended” by new people. But, account or no account, I’m just not there.

These comments apply only to my own situation. For you, Twitter may be wonderful.

Some of you have already figured out that I’m sort of an introvert, with a wide circle of friends and acquaintances but not too many that I strive to keep up with on a minute-by-minute (or week-by-week) basis. That I enjoy getting together with people at ALA (and occasionally other conferences) but don’t go to great pains to make that happen–and am perfectly comfortable dining by myself.

I’m clearly not the world’s greatest social-network participant, by personality or preference. I probably still have an Orkut account and haven’t been back in more than a year. I probably have a Second Life avatar and have no idea what my name or password are. I dropped out of Ning (Library 2.0 and library bloggers) because it just didn’t work for me–I wasn’t able or willing to spend the time there, and its slowness and confused interface didn’t help a lot.

Or at least I think I dropped out of Ning. I haven’t been back to check; for all I know, I may still have a page there. More about that in a bit.

Twitter? In general, I can’t imagine why anyone would care what I’m doing at any given time. But…well, the use of Twitter to get together during a conference seemed at least plausible. And, breaking with my long tradition of traveling entirely without technology, I’d picked up a cheap text-oriented cell phone (with what may be the world’s smallest QWERTY keyboard) on a Virgin Mobile pay-as-you-go basis, with a $10/1,000 text message package…if only so I could contact people I was talking to about future contract or job possibilities. So I thought I’d sign up for Twitter just to see if it would be helpful during ALA. And, after using it (Web-based) a few days prior, cut back “friends” (I’m getting to hate that overused word for people I’ve never met and never really talked to, but who feel some vague connection) to those who I thought would be at ALA.

I didn’t keep the phone on all the time–I just can’t deal with that level of connectedness–but I made a point of checking it at least every hour or two, and did send out Twitters when I was going to be in one place for a while.

My conclusion? For me, for this equipment and service plan, for this type of conference, it’s a flat-out failure. Here’s why:

• One or two of the dozen “friends” was, shall we say, Twitter-happy, with what seemed like an endless flood of little messages. I’m seeing that elsewhere; in one case, where a liblogger is having twitters posted as blog posts, I’m about ready to unsubscribe.
• I don’t know whether it’s Twitter, Virgin Mobile, or the way I was using it, but I got messages in big clumps, sometimes a day or more after they’d been sent. For a while, it appeared that I wouldn’t get any messages until I sent one; I’m still not sure what was actually happening. In any case, this made the tool useless as a “gathering” system: Knowing where someone was yesterday is not real helpful.
• Maybe it’s different at a small or very specialized conference, but there just weren’t any instances in which my “friends” and I had any reason to meet up that Twitter helped with. A lot of that may be because I don’t have that circle of people I want to get together with as often as possible.

The cell phone itself proved useful primarily because of my little 36-hour travel problem (which, after reading Michael Golrick’s ordeal, I realize was only a little problem): It was nice to be able to keep my wife informed without coping with a cell phone, and I even called the airline once or twice to help things along. Naturally, the phone started losing charge halfway through the adventure…

So I came back and immediately set my Twitter account to “web only.” Recharged the phone. Didn’t use it on Thursday. Canceled our Cingular account (which we’d already planned to do). When my wife wanted minimal instructions on the Kyocera/Virgin Mobile phone (we now have two sick cats instead of one, and we’re still not sure what’s going on with the younger one), as soon as I turned it on I started getting a flood of Twitter messages…even though I’d cleared it after resetting the account. I think all the messages were from late Tuesday and the first half of Wednesday; I’m not sure, since I was just deleting them. (For some reason, the phone’s “erase all messages” feature doesn’t actually do anything. I think they’re taking lessons from the social software people.)

Again: for you it may be brilliant. For me it’s the wrong medium, either on the web or on the go–and the last thing I want is various hunks of text that aren’t even real messages from real people!

So here’s the coda, at least for now: I logged on to Twitter, said I wanted to erase my account, went through the “Are you sure?” step, clicked on the appropriate button…

and was taken back to my home page.

Did the process again. Signed out. Was able to sign back in and there’s the same#*!@% home page again.

Sent a help message, basically saying “Is there any way to actually leave Twitter?” We’ll see what response I get.

And this morning, checking email, there’s another new “friend” on Twitter–friending an account that should not even be there.

This seems to be typical of (some) social software applications, and certainly helps them claim very large usage numbers. It’s the Hotel California syndrome–you can check out any time you like, but you can never really leave. I think it stinks; I’m tempted to sue a five-letter word beginning with “f” and ending with “d,” but I won’t for the moment.

If you’re a Twitterer who doesn’t read this blog and you’ve “friended” or “followed” me–well, here’s why you’re not getting any reciprocity. I’m not really there and don’t intend to return. Don’t be insulted. (In any case, why on earth would you be friending me on Twitter if you don’t read my blog?)

If you’re one who does want to follow me both places, I won’t be there; I will be here. (Assuming sick cats, job issues, etc. don’t completely take over my life, which isn’t an entirely safe assumption.)

This post probably makes me sound antisocial. Sorry about that. Fact is, we each have different levels of tolerance for interruption and need for connectedness. I find email, blogs, face-to-face conversations and (for now) Meebo rooms to be connecting at my level. I found Twitter to be enormously distracting and not at all useful, for me, in these circumstances.

I discussed the lead essay in the forthcoming July 2007 Cites & Insights with some of you during ALA, noting that the issue was basically written, just needed a little more trimming and editing, and would probably come out the day after I got back from DC–which, presumably, would be today.

I still hope to publish the issue the day after I get back from DC. But that turns out to be tomorrow. After decades of luck in avoiding snowin during Midwinter, my luck ran out (at least a little bit) with a different sort of weather problem. To wit, I got to San Jose International Airport today at about 1 p.m. PDT–roughly 33.5 hours after leaving the Grand Hyatt in Washington to catch a shuttle to Dulles. I expected to get home around 3 p.m. Tuesday; instead, I got home around 1:30 p.m. Wednesday.

I’m sure some of you have experienced worse–heck, you may even be experiencing worse as I write this. My brief chronology:

• 6:20 a.m. Tuesday 6/26: Shuttle to Dulles, reaching airport at around 7 a.m.
• 9:30 a.m.: American flight to DFW takes off a few minutes early, gets in right on time (11:35 a.m.)
• 12:25 p.m.: I’m at the gate where the American 12:55 p.m. flight to San Jose is supposed to be loading–but it’s now scheduled for departure at something like 1:45 p.m.
• 2 p.m.: The plane (100% full) pulls back from the gate and gets in line for takeoff.
• 3 p.m.: Given rain, progress has been slow, but this flight is now the first in line for westbound takeoff. And westbound takeoffs are shut down. We pull onto a midfield taxiway.
• 6 p.m.: We return to the gate; after four hours of running the plane generators, there’s not enough fuel.
• Everybody on the plane is told to go back out to the ticket counters to rebook. After various attempts at standby or rebooking, I run out of options…along with several hundred others. (The only San Jose flight later than 11:20 a.m. to go out at all is the 3:15 p.m. flight–which departs at around 9:45 p.m., and probably incurred a penalty for violating San Jose’s noise curfew.)
• Even in the first class/Gold/Platinum frequent flyer line–or maybe particularly there–it’s VERY slow going to try to get Wednesday standby or new confirmed seats (everybody’s told that everything’s sold out until Thursday or maybe Friday; this turns out to be either false or intermittently true), and I finally wind up with a baroque confirmed booking (flying to Orange County and from there to San Jose, leaving midafternoon when storms are likely to be troublesome and not getting in until 7:30 p.m.) and a standby boarding pass for the first SJC flight out (7:55 a.m.)
• At this point, getting a hotel room makes very little sense: Everything near the airport is sold out, and the only deals I can find are $200 to $250 plus a $20-$25 30-minute shuttle ride each way. Since it’s now 1 a.m. and I’d obviously need to be back at the airport by 6:30 or so to be there for possible 7:55 a.m. takeoff, that figures to be $300 for about 3 hours of sleep and a shower. Not worth it. So, along with a few hundred others, I head back through security (before it shuts down at 1:30-2 a.m.) to sleep inside the airport (there’s really no place to even sit outside the security area, at least in the American complex). I believe some 600 people couldn’t get standby passes before the ticketing shut down at 1 a.m., and were stuck either going to a hotel or making the best of the outside facilities.
• American did at least one thing right: They invested in a few hundred lightweight foldable cots, so people could do something better than lie on the floor–and they made several hundred blankets available. With such comfort, I probably got an easy 60-90 minutes of something resembling sleep.
• Based on weather forecasts, we were hearing the worst–it might be even worse today and continuing until Sunday. I figured that if the 3:25 flight didn’t get out, I’d give up at that point, get a hotel room, and try for Thursday…
• Fortunately, American’s standby-rollover algorithms are pretty clean (placement is almost entirely based on when your original flight was scheduled to take off). I wind up #15 on standby for the 7:55 a.m. flight–and get real hopeful when they’ve gotten to #11 and I see that 12-14 all have the same last name. Turns out there’s exactly one seat left–but the parents of the teen in the family decide to send him ahead.
• Next flight 10 a.m. This time, I’m #8. Then #9. Then, glory be, #4. The flight’s delayed (but mostly preboarding, then a little because of catering), but I get on, the weather seems to be holding at overcast–and at 11:15 (I think) we pull back. As promised, once we’re past the Sangre de Cristo mountains, it’s a pretty smooth ride (and the $5 turkey/shaved parmesan/turkey ham/lettuce wrap isn’t half bad, actually).

So there it is: My 24 hours (almost precisely) at DFW. Right now, I’m running nearly on empty, with no real deep sleep for a day and a half. This could clearly have been a lot worse. OK, so they didn’t feed us (except first class) or give us free drinks during the four hours, but the lights and air conditioning were on, the johns were functioning, and it was clearly a legitimate weather problem, not an airline issue. (They did provide water or orange juice after a couple of hours.) Four hours isn’t seven; some people spent two days getting through DFW, not just one.

Odd. My wife suggested that maybe I was getting too old for the outbound flights–American Eagle to LAX midafternoon on Thursday, June 22, followed by the red-eye from LAX to Dulles, But even in coach, I did get 2-3 hours reasonably decent sleep on that flight–and Grand Hyatt gave me my room at 6:15 when I got to the hotel, so I could crash for a few more hours. This was my first experience “sleeping” in an airport; I hope it will be my last. Maybe I am getting too old for that sort of nonsense. Maybe not.

So, maybe I’ll have C&I ready tomorrow. Maybe Friday. Maybe not. I think it’s a good issue, with a section on copyright, a Library Access to Scholarship piece, another chunk of Making it Work, a couple of other features–and a lead essay that I’ve already mentioned to a few people. Soon.

I may post later about why Twitter-during-conference really didn’t work for me, for ALA. I might post about other things…

Meanwhile, a little thought experiment (”picture in your mind’s eye”) that may say something about the underwhelming success of a revolutionary mode of transport.

Picture in your mind’s eye half a dozen really cool people. Let’s say Halle Berry, Will Smith, George Clooney, Angelina Jolie, Bruce Willis–I don’t know. Choose your own.

Line them up. What a spectacle of coolness!

Now put them all on Segways and get them moving.

What do you have? Dorks on Parade.

At least most of the security guards at the DC Convention Center didn’t have the “I love this Segway because it means I don’t use up any of those doughnut calories” look I’ve seen in some other cases of “official Segway” use–but still…

And that’s it for a highly unofficial and inconsequential ALA post that at least says why I’m a little slow with some other things. If the above is a little less coherent than usual, you can guess why.

I was going to post a tentative ALA Annual Conference schedule–but I don’t think so. A lot of that schedule is likely to be fluid, especially if there are other people who would like to talk to me about future possibilities.

If there are such people (and you’re one of them or in contact with one of them), then please get in touch–gmail, waltcrawford–by Thursday morning, preferably by Wednesday afternoon, to set up a meeting. Or, I suppose, sign up for Twitter and “follow waltcrawford1″–but I don’t know whether that will help.

There are more programs than usual that I might attend. Exhibit time is always sort of an unknown. Meanwhile, here’s a non-schedule: When I get there, when I leave, and when I know I won’t be available:

• Arriving Friday morning (Dulles at 5:20 a.m.)
• Friday: Not available 4:45 p.m.-7 p.m.
• Saturday: Lots of possibilities, but no absolutely blocked spots except that I do have plans 6 p.m. and beyond.
• Sunday: Not available 1:15-3:15 p.m. (LITA Top Tech Trends ex-”spotter” cameo) and will certainly be at the OCLC Bloggers Salon a substantial portion of 5:45-8 p.m.
• Monday: Not available 2:45-5:45 p.m.
• Leaving early Tuesday morning (at Dulles by 7:30 a.m.)

I have 10 or 15 optional events within those unblocked areas, but they’re just that: Optional. If it’s important enough, I could miss them. The most open times in general are late morning through early afternoon Friday and any time Monday until 2:45 or so (or possibly Monday dinner).

Update Thursday: As you might guess, I’ll be pretty much off the air from now through next Tuesday–not posting, not responding to comments, not checking Bloglines, not visiting the LSW Meebo room. I will be Twittering, for what it’s worth (checking the new cell phone every hour or two, not leaving it on)…and we’ll see how that goes. See y’all next week, unless I run into you in DC.

Suppressing the “bah humbugs” for now…

Since I picked up a text-oriented cell phone in time for ALA (but it will mostly be off, and only people I’ve arranged to meet with will get the number), and

Since I said in COAP2 that “I think Twitter was made for conferences” even if you’re not the kind who would normally be twittering up a storm (see pages 4 & 5), well, then, to follow my own advice…

I have a Twitter account. waltcrawford: What did you expect? I have notifications set to web-only, but I’ll turn them back to phone notifications before I leave for ALA Annual. If you think you’ll want to know where I’m likely to be, or want to set up a meeting, maybe you want to follow me (I barely understand this stuff–heck, I got the reply and all that for phone verification, but the verification screen still shows up). I guess you’re supposed to invite me as a friend if you think I should be tracking your activities there–is that right?

And if you do want to meet (for job offers or whatever), let me know. I do plan to check the phone periodically, even if I’m still too “disconnected” by nature to leave it on all the time. And that teeny little QWERTY keyboard isn’t wonderful, but it works OK with one finger. (Too small for thumbing–I wasn’t about to pay for a Blackberry-equivalent.) Send me email–waltcrawford at gmail.com.

Actually, I think the fastest way to “follow” me involves “waltcrawford1″ as a user ID. Again, I’m not entirely sure…

Update: I believe that if you have a Twitter account, sending the message follow WALTCRAWFORD1 (case may or may not matter) will add you to my list. I will send at least one message in the next few days, if only to make sure that my phone really does send them properly.

Update 2, a day later: This is mysterious stuff, and I’m beginning to think that’s par for free web services. Yesterday afternoon (Tuesday), I decided that I really should send one Twitter from my cell phone to make sure that the setup work had all gone properly–even though I had gotten a text reply (well, two of them) that suggested all was well.

Sent the message. Checked Twitter 5 minutes, then half an hour later. No message. Retried the setup confirmation again. Tried a message. No message… Did this a couple of times.

Finally clicked on the “Delete and start over” button. Entered my cell # in slightly different form–even though the responses had been, apparently, correct with the other form. (Prepended”+1″ this time; it’s just not clear whether U.S. users need that.) Texted the (new) authentication string again.

Two things happened differently: The reply from Twitter did not ask me for a nickname/username, and the (new) authentication string disappeared from the setup screen.

Well, that looks promising, sez I. So I text one more Twitter from the cell phone. Ten seconds later, there it is on my home page (and presumably on the pages of seven followers and that person who is apparently a Follower for every Twitter account).

Great! I’m set. Wasted a buck or so worth of messages, but that’s OK. (Actually, I went ahead and signed up for the $10/1000 message “per month” plan for ALA, and will drop back to the nickel-a-piece messaging in July. I can’t imagine getting and receiving anywhere close to 1,000 messages during the conference, but can conceivably imagine hitting 200+. Or 10, as the case may be.)

Here’s where it gets a little bizarre: A few minutes later, checked my archive–and there were all the other messages, including the repeated verification string. And a while later, the “friends” screen showed all those other messages as well.

Conclusions? None, really. My apologies to the seven people getting six or eight odd messages. For now, I’m “add”ing anyone who follows me–but I’ll turn off some of them (temporarily) before I switch from Web-only to Phone for notifications, based on whether I think it likely that they’ll be at ALA.

Enough blather about twitter.