Blogged Down (4): Yours, Mine, and Hours

Since the hook for blogs is content, what makes up blog fodder?

A seasonal list of library hours, for one. This is very reliable in popularity and uncontroversial. Just the facts, m'am.

Yet there is a problem. A blog consists of timely (a coincidental pun) entries, and a person who wants to know library hours may have ado to journey through a blog to locate this. For the deliberate searcher, it is better for hours to live on the library's homepage.*

*A favorite novel with a gratuitous quote: "From a corner the morning hours run out."--James Joyce, Ulysses

Blogged Down (3)

What prompts a reader to seek a blog? I can think of four categories, none cut-and-dried, nor exhaustive, nor bullet-proof.

(1) To be entertained*
(2) To learn something about the world, if it is only to re-assure your own view**
(3) To listen to a blogger, particularly a friend or personality***
(4) To be usefully informed--this appeals to self-interest****

*A library blog that entertains is an oxymoron.
**The library blog may touch upon the world-beyond-the-library on occasion, but not enough to attract that kind of reader.
***Since library blogs are typically corporate or impersonal, the hook of a friend or personality is missing.
****So a library blog must exploit its niche as being relevant to students and other library users.

Blogged Down (1)

Librarians spill lotsa ink about the advisability of having library blogs--institutional blogs written by library workers designed to capture the eyeballs of unsuspecting users. Yet at least in academia the real audience is minute, I imagine. Likely constant readers are libraryophiles, highly motivated students (notably in library science), some professors, and the library staff (eating their own dog food).