Special thanks to UCI Libraries’ Carole Ann
intro 2 Hughes, Associate University Librarian for
Public Services, and Cynthia A. Johnson, Head
of Reference, for encouraging the development
frequency of our Text a Librarian project @ UCI.
[Administration has to be supportive or this
kind of thing wont work]

Thanks to those early adaptor university
libraries that grabbed onto short message
service (SMS) public services! While I’m quite
certain the following is an incomplete list,
these are the four university libraries I found
to be actively providing text message reference
at the time the UCI Libraries Text Team was
putting together our text a librarian proposal
in Summer 2007:
Runyon Canyon, Los Angeles CA
•Curtin University of Technology
Brian Williams, JD | MSLS
Research Librarian •Southbank Institute of Technology
Criminology, Law & Society
U.S. Government Information •Southeastern Louisiana University (SELU)
University of California, Irvine
Brian.williams@gmail.com •University of California, Merced
http://justcrim.typepad.com
http://twitter.com/briancrime
http://delicious.com/briancrime
http://www.facebook.com/briancrime


http://delicious.com/briancrime/early_adaptors http://delicious.com/briancrime/sms


& X-tra special thanks to the Text a Librarian Team @ UCI


WHAT ABOUT YOU?


The Funhouse (Mural & Basketball Court. Punk
Rock Nightclub, Seattle WA. Taken during ACRL
2009)

Question: True or False

My library WAS doing text message
reference service along with these
four identified “early adaptors” way
back in the dark ages … 2007 or
earlier.


[and you missed it]


Question: YES NO Button | Multiple Choice

My library IS doing text message reference
service [YES/NO. INTERACTIVE BUTTON HERE].

We are using [MULTIPLE CHOICE. SELECT ONE]

A: Mosio’s Text a Librarian

B: Some other converter program (IM, Email, Etc. – flipping user text to computer)

C: Cell phone, Smart phone, Blackberry (anything handheld other than an iPhone)

D: iPhone

 [Our choice is not to choose – deal with it]


WHY BUILD A TEXT REFERENCE SERVICE ?


4 8 15 16 23 42
numbers | etc.


Uci & sms frequency: Justifying text message reference by the numbers
[sometimes numbers work 4 u; other times, not so much]

A Winter 2007 UCI Academic Computing survey
finds … “… 34% of our students use cell phone
text messaging daily and 58% use it at least a
few times a week…” Almost 60% of our students
use cell phone text messaging several times a
week.

Today, these numbers seem very low [DEFINITELY
UNSEXY], but they are one part of the numbers
justification for why libraries need to jump
into the text frequency.

UCI Student Information Technology Experience Survey. Email. From: NACS:
Network and Academic Computing Services (UCI OIT) Date: Tue, March 18,
2008 6:02 pm.

Spreading the word: Messaging and communications in higher education. ECAR
key findings. Pirani, J. A., & Sheehan, M. C. (2009). EDUCAUSE. Web site:
http://www.educause.edu. Retrieved from
http://www.educause.edu/Resources/SpreadingtheWordMessagingandCo/168955

ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2009
(Research Study, Vol. 6). Smith, Shannon, Gail Salaway, and Judith Borreson
Caruso, with an Introduction by Richard N. Katz. EDUCAUSE Center for Applied
Research, 2009, available from
http://www.educause.edu/Resources/TheECARStudyofUndergraduateStu/187215


CELL PHONE ACTIVATIONS SURGE
TEXT MESSAGING SURGES

Text.it “the UK’s official guide to messaging” [http://www.text.it/ ]
4.2 Billion Cell Phones Activated. 3g Americas [ http://www.3gamericas.org ]
6.8 Billion : U.S. and World Population Clock. Census.gov [ http://www.census.gov/main/www/popclock.html ]


WHY BUILD A TEXT REFERENCE SERVICE? This “new” frequency [of communication] has blown
up, exploded!!! Texting is not just popular with university students, though it is
especially so among that population - it’s popular globally and it’s popularity is
expanding every day.

We feel and we argue …

Implementing a text
reference service
capitalizes on this
popularity and
compliments and extends
our existing public
services.

It clearly signals the
UCI Libraries’ continued
commitment to delivering
innovative public
services

And, most importantly, it
enables the UCI Libraries
to better serve the
educational and research
needs of our primary
users with an instantly
responsive communication
channel.


IN THE BEGINNING (before Mosio debuted “Text a Librarian”), the UCI pilot text team had
to decide how to build a text program. In Summer 2007, we looked at the few text message
to computer converter programs available. We looked at smart phones … (the iPhone was
introduced in the United States on June 29, 2007)

While we loved the converter
programs’ ability to “flip” a
text message from a library
patron into a familiar
computer workstation
environment, we were hesitant
to pay a third party to
translate or mediate text
message questions [And the
converter options were few, at
that time].

So, we decided to go with an
inexpensive Verizon text/data
plan, using two Samsung
smartphones.

We liked the idea of the
phones’ mobility and we liked
the simplicity of using phones
to send and receive text
messages to and from our
users’ phones.


THE SMART PHONE CHOICE … We wanted a good deal
and we needed flexibility to change our plan as we
learned more about texting in the library
environment. The iPhone was not in play.

Verizon presented an inexpensive, flexible startup
option. We were able to enter an agreement with no
penalties for subsequent contract alteration or even
cancellation.

This proved helpful as we recognized over time that
(A) demand for texting services, unfortunately,
would not require two active phones and phone lines,
and (B), that given our regular text a librarian
hours, 9 to 5, Monday through Friday, we could
afford to drop the smart phone’s web access. This
step came much later during the second year of our
text program as a direct result of California’s
significant (not to say apocalyptic) budget
exigencies.

We have continued with one phone and unlimited
texting to the present (UCI text project now in its
3rd year).

Samsung SCH-i760 (Verizon Wireless) – CNET Review
http://tinyurl.com/36av34


A word about
Scheduling -

The UCI libraries
live and die with
Oracle calendar
software.

Here’s a screen shot
of my Oracle next
week Tues., Feb. 16,
2010.

I’m responsible for
monitoring the smart
phone 9 to 5.

Text Team Members
typically cover
three day or two day
sms phone shifts.

The shifts are
evenly divided among
the 7 Inglourious
Basterds on the Text
Team.


FUTURE NOW
STAY FLEXIBLE | THINGS CHANGE


As it turned out … text to computer converters were getting better
… and a massive roll out was coming …

“No future for you?”
Sex Pistols



I have worked as a special agent with
KGB and received compensation for “Compensation is “per piece”
that work. and is based on response type:
 * $0.10 (USD) for each full
response – query is
investigated and answered by
the Special Agent; * $0.05
(USD) for each validation
response – answer
automatically populates from
[and, yes, I am starving] our Knowledge Database and is
forwarded on by the Special
Agent” http://542542.com/current_positions


OMG !!! OCLC’s QuestionPoint and Mosio’s Text a Librarian
announce virtual reference collaboration – 15 January 2010

The landscape of text in
libraries has totally morphed in
two short years …

And while I recognize the power
of mobile computing and know that
handheld devices will continue to
be useful to libraries and, of
course, wildly popular with our
users ...

It’s obvious that some form of
“converter” like collaborative
text messaging service in
libraries is coming soon to a
QuestionPoint type consortial
environment near you …

That’s very exciting and likely a good
thing.



OCLC’s QuestionPoint and Mosio’s Text a
Librarian virtual reference collaboration
will enable libraries to better provide
text message based reference services to
our users.


[a cell phone is cheaper]



My library would be very interested in
participating in a consortial Text
Messaging Reference Service deployed by
QuestionPoint.


[what are we going to do with all those handheld
devices]


COUNTING
TRACKING WHAT’S UP @ UCI


We count because we can

13 Oct 2009 to 26 Jan 2010: 1,149 visits to justcrim.typepad.com shown above


“Librarians have perceived that there should be
relevant relationships between the numerical
measurements of certain aspects of library
activity and the managerial decisions that we
have to make and so have embarked upon the basic
arithmetic process of counting, perhaps to the
point of obsession…”
Available @ http://ifl.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/11/3/211.pdf

Flickr. Numbers. Uploaded on December 5, 2007. By Koen Vereeken. Available @
http://www.flickr.com/photos/koenvereeken/2088902012/ [Creative Commons: Some rights
reserved]


frequency (of text messages received) | frequency (sms - Vesuvius of communication frequencies)

Text A Librarian @ UCI Start
Date 01.31.2008

WEB: We use the web capability of
our Samsung i760 to answer
approximately 25 % of all text
message questions received during
the pilot’s first 1/2 year. http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view_rec
.php?id=1555

TYPE: 6 of the first 35 txt
questions are classed as research
questions.

HOURS: 40% of all Text messages
are received after hours -
Evenings, Weekends, Holidays.

Long Beach sunset : how we imagined
user response


½ EMPTY: The UCI community’s
initial response to text a
librarian has been modest. We The Text Team had originally
are concerned about the large % imagined we might be able to
of texts coming in after (9 to 5) extend our hours to nights and
hours, on nights and weekends, weekends – That idea led us to
sort of kills the immediacy of
opt for the smart phone with
the sms text frequency. data package and tied into our
broad vision of text a
librarian as an entirely
mobile, handheld reference
½ FULL: Two plus platform.
years down the road … We
learn that our user Libraries with text a
community generally ask librarian programs, ESPECIALLY
appropriate, short answer THOSE USING HANDHELD DEVICES
type questions when they (as opposed to text converter
text a librarian. We software), must figure out how
learn that answering text to most efficiently monitor
based questions is fun.
Text ref while commuting is text message queues beyond
unsafe and against the law
the traditional 9 to 5 Monday
thru Friday gig.
We learn how to share key information with our users
We love using the mobile
in a compressed 160 character sms framework. We
device but it arguably
learn that we can answer all sorts of questions in a
presents unique training and
text environment. We learn how to cut costs and to
scheduling challenges for
keep the text sms frequency open and viable, even
libraries, challenges perhaps
during difficult financial times.
dissipated by converter
programs and consortial
enterprise.


… if you build a text a librarian service, they will trickle in …


February 2010 | keeping score


January 2010 | Select
Transcripts


January 2010 | Select Transcripts


The Cloud Tag Transcript (Wordle.net view of our sms
transcripts from january 2010)

(The 824-6842 tag is our loan desk #)


Question: Multiple Choice

My library IS doing text message reference
service in some form today and on average we
receive …
A: 10 or fewer text messages a month

B: 10 to 25 text messages a month

C: 25 to 50 text messages a month

D: 50 plus text messages a month

[please call me if you’re doing better than 50 per]



Support for the texting communication
frequency should be maintained in
library public services, even if
counting texts reveals a tepid response
from our users.


[the big picture is all around us]


Not so guerilla advertising
marketing text messaging @ uci libraries


ADVERTISING THE PILOT!


THE NEW UNIVERSITY IS
UCI’S STUDENT
NEWSPAPER
Our eye catching New University TXT
advertisement ran right next to a beach
wear advertisement! Sometimes luck is
all that matters.


FUTURE NOW
CODA @ UCI


Voice to text conversion Voice to text conversion is imperfect, as this slide of a Google Voice
beta tool demos. Google voice flips voice mail into sms text messages synchronously, breaking voice mail
into 160 character bytes [the sender never knows]. I much prefer deciphering Google's cryptic voice to
text translations than to listening to the actual voice mail.


Res ipsa loquitur – the thing speaks for itself – and I couldn’t bring
myself to mention “Cha Cha” during this presentation … I like Mosio (liked
it before Text a Librarian) and I give KGB credit for coming in with such a
killer name.


Are we going to continue to go go forward?

The frequency with which our users text us is not what we
imagined but … Our pilot was made a “permanent” fixture in
the UCI Libraries Ask a Librarian service menu …

Things change (the budget, for example) but texting is @
UCI for the foreseeable future. Obviously, some core
segment of our user population has embraced the Libraries’
text a librarian frequency.

In the future, we’ll all be dead [or so the economists
tell us]. And in the future, in my opinion, most
libraries will open up this sms messaging frequency and
fit text messaging into their expanding menu of public
service choices.

We are learning every day about text messaging. So please
do email me if you would like to share your experiences to
date. I’m @ brianrw@uci.edu & brian.williams@gmail.com
See you on Facebook! & Twitter!

Or, better yet, text me at 6192473889 [cell]. Thank you
so much for the opportunity to talk texting with you all.

And thanks to the wonderful people @ Handheld Librarian!



Texting is not now and likely never will be
an essential channel of communication for
library public services.


[like a crow picking up anything shiny, you collect new
technologies]



Text messaging is becoming an essential
channel of communication for library public
services today.


[the u.k. alone sent 11 million texts in one hour, duh]


Photo Copyright held by
Edward Colver
http://edwardcolver.com/


delicious.com/briancrime/sms


Frequency | A Channel Of Communication

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