AskAway Blog

Public Library AskAway Virtual Reference Service Will Close June 30th, 2010

The following press release went out yesterday to the BC library community. We are very saddened by this news from our public library colleagues.

Post-secondary AskAway remains in place, and we are in the process of developing strategies to manage the impact of the public library service closure.

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Reminder to Check Your Settings

A few of you have reported experiencing trouble with QP this past week. The issues seem to mostly be related to logging in and out, and suddenly being timed out of QP. These could be related to your browser settings or your MyQP timeout settings. Please let me know if you experience any issues with QP during your shifts so that I can gain an accurate picture of the issue before reporting to QP.

As a precaution, please do the following 2 things before your next AskAway shift:

1. Check your browser settings:

Welcome to the new AskAway Blog!

After a short hiatus, the AskAway Blog is back. We're working on migrating content from the old blog, but in the meantime, use this blog to share your thoughts, updates, assignment alerts and tips with other AskAwayers. To minimise spam posts, a login is required to post to the blog - login available on the Guest Logins page.

Reference Renaissance Conference Announced

AURORA, Colo., January 20, 2010
*A Reference Renaissance 2010: Inventing the Future*, co-chaired by Marie Radford and Rivkah Sass, will be held August 8-10, 2010, in Denver, Colorado. This exciting event will feature numerous presentations showcasing the latest reference trends and techniques that will give you new ideas and tools to better serve your customers. Also included are vendor exhibits, presentations specifically focused on products and services of interest to reference and information staff and plenty of opportunities for networking and sharing with colleagues.

Good Tip

A student wrote "what are your hours?" I immediately gave the AA hours. But, after the call, as always, I thought, "Suppose the student thought I was a Camosun librarian on the line and meant the physical library hours."
I have had students on AA complain about the heat in the library (in Kamploops) and ask if I can turn it down, so this cognitive confusion is probably pretty common.
So, note to self: Ask what is the meaning of "your".
- Richard Baer
Camosun College

Article of Interest

Richard Baer recommended this article:
The Good, the Bad, but Mostly the Ugly: Adherence to RUSA Guidelines during Encounters with Inappropriate Behavior Online.
Authors:
Maness, Jack M.1
Naper, Sarah2
Chaudhuri, Jayati3
Source:
Reference & User Services Quarterly; Winter2009, Vol. 49 Issue 2, p151-162, 12p, 3 charts

Kwantlen Alerts

I want to alert AskAway librarians to 2 things that may come up when dealing with Kwantlen students. We hope to have both incidents resolved soon but just in case you come across it in the next few weeks:
1. Security Certificate Alert

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