 Good morning, and welcome to this week's edition of Encompass Live. I am your host, Krista Porter, here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Encompass Live is the Commission's weekly webinar series where we cover a variety of topics that may be of interest to libraries. We broadcast the show live every Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. Central Time, but if you're unable to join us on Wednesdays, that's fine. We do record the show as we are doing today, and is then posted to our website in our archives for you to watch at your convenience. Both the live show and the recordings are free and open to anyone to watch, so please do share with your friends, family, neighbors, colleagues, anyone you think might be interested in any of the topics we have on the show. For those of you not from Nebraska, the Nebraska Library Commission is the state agency for libraries. Some of this is the state library in other states, so we provide services to all types of libraries, so we have shows on Encompass Live for all types of libraries. Public, academic, schools, K-12 schools, colleges, universities, archives, museums, corrections, pretty much it just runs the gamut. If anything you think of, really our only criteria is something to do with libraries, something that libraries are doing. We bring in guest speakers from across Nebraska and across the country to do presentations, book reviews, interviews, mini-training sessions, demos of various services and products. We also have a Nebraska Library Commission staff that come in and sometimes talk about things that we are offering here through the Library Commission to libraries in our state. And today we have one of our Library Commission staff who's going to be talking about something that's not something we offer here, but Amanda Sweet is our Technology Innovation Library in here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Actually I misspoke there. We do offer discounts on attending this conference to libraries in Nebraska. That's true. Oh, that's right. Yeah. And she's gonna talk to us about all the things she learned at this year's Computers in Libraries conference. And I'll let you take it away, Amanda, to tell us all about all the cool things you found out. So I discovered that robots are shiny. I didn't see that cool looking one right there. So these were some of the themes that were kind of that I started tracking through the library conference. Some of them are similar to what you may have seen in other conferences and some of them are specific only to computers and libraries. So the overarching one was leadership in libraries post COVID, how things are changing, how structures and innovation chains are changing, and how you can improve your digital experience so that you can, because honestly, once we've gone digital, some of it's not going to go back, some of it is, some of it won't. So that was kind of a big topic on there is what's changing, what's not changing, how is it going to and how can we get the most out of that. And the next one was, if we're going to be switching over to a more tech centric world, we have to kind of know what's possible and how to navigate those changes that are going to be going on. And once we're doing all that, it just kind of helps to have fun. So there was like, there were quite a few sessions about just silly websites you can go to and just had to relax and de-stress during COVID, and after COVID, life's a thing. And then it wraps up with none of this is possible without partnerships and collaboration. So you pretty much have to work together, otherwise it is going to go to put. So that was pretty much. That's it in a nutshell. But let me dig into some of these topics a little bit more. Before you get into that, do we want to, I mean, some people may know, but do you want to explain a little about what computers and libraries is the conference? Probably not attended or not heard of it before. So computers and libraries is one of the largest, if not the largest conference about, well, computers and libraries, it's all about how tech is being implemented, tracking different tech trends. And it kind of runs the gamut from the tools that will help librarians behind the scenes. So like the different services, cataloging tools, tips, tricks, and how to deal with metadata and things like that. And it ranges over into the services that you can offer to patrons so that they can learn how to use technology. So libraries using technology and patrons using technology and how to bridge that gap. And so a lot of this is, it's both of them, it's getting really hard to differentiate between the two sides. Because it's and I would, I just did the basic skills class for I didn't take it. I was one of the facilitators, I guess, yeah. And so I learned, so I was reading through a lot of those forums and boards. And it was really hard to split the line between choosing the tools that are available only to library staff, and that will help libraries do their job better. And the tools that are necessary to help patrons do their lives better, like get better jobs, build skills, deal with parenting. Not really a clear line. No, yeah. The computers and libraries conference it's produced done done by information today. And it's been an in person conference in the past, usually held in the Virginia Washington DC area in the spring. But this year, and last year, it went online, went virtual only due to the COVID-19 pandemic. They also do a complimentary version of this conference called Internet Librarian, which is held in the fall, usually in person in Monterey, California. This year, the virtual one was actually a merge of both computers and libraries and Internet Librarian. Right. They did something even more different this year with that. Yeah. But this year, Internet Librarian is supposed to be in person again in California. Nice. All right. Let's hope. Look forward to that in the fall. If you're going to spend some time, usually it's in the fall, so it's nice to head there when it's getting cool here in the Midwest or somewhere. But as I said, we do here, and I know other states do as well, we get deals to offer a discount on the registration costs to attend both of these conferences. So for Nebraska, look at our site for that as it comes up. And if you're in different states, look there, look to your state library to offer those kind of discounts to attend. Definitely highly recommended. Either one, East Coast, West Coast, online, depending what they're doing. It's true. Yeah. Yeah. So go ahead and tell us everything you learned there. Everything. We only have an hour. It's like I was kind of say, how long do we have? So I guess the major topic that's been on everybody's mind is what's going to happen after COVID. Some libraries are still closed. Some are in the process of reopening. And some patrons are probably not going to want to walk through the doors even when you are open just because it skates them out. And I know like the I just went into Bennett Martin Library and they still have the sticker system. So you have to put the sticker on the back of your hand or wherever to show that you're in the library for an hour at a time. I've been to Bennett Martin and Gear recently and Gear, they both did a similar system. So to our LaVar Lincoln City Libraries branches, yeah. And until we have reached herd immunity, majority of people are vaccinated. That's way that's long, long time down the road. Yeah. Yeah. So how long do we have to use technology as a stop gap to replace the in person systems? And how can we make that more interesting? So a lot of these sessions like libraries leading the new normal, and we didn't waste a good crisis, and the pivoting resetting and extending the digital experience was all about really quick pivots to implementing digital systems. And so they started using like a rapid iteration method to test out different ideas and just start doing idea after idea after idea. But then they found out that while they were doing that, they couldn't go through the normal chain of command. Like they couldn't go through and get like the right approval from the right person, they didn't always know where their approval was to get. So they just had to do it. And then like the leadership started shifting over and saying, well, yeah, this works. Okay, cool. So then this question started being, should we just do this normally? Like, should we just change our structure so that we have this rapid cycle of changing and testing ideas? So then these turned into some of the questions that were considered during the conference, which was, what is your leadership decision making process? And if someone within your organization wants to implement a new project or a system, how do they do it? And do you communicate how that would actually work? Like, does anyone understand the system of how to implement that change? And they found out during these sessions that it is really murky. I mean, honestly, maybe you had to think about much before many places to think about in such drastic quick detail, you know, you need to like turn on a dime tomorrow and figure out what to do. Usually you have more of a warning. Yeah. Yeah. And instead, it's you are doing this tomorrow. And then it's like, well, okay. So then it turned into, okay, so how do we have to restructure our decision making process and restructure this so that it's easier to do, and so that we're not blocking innovation, and we can just let it flow. And then it started turning into a few of the sessions on here talked about identifying toxic behaviors within the organization. Because some of the organizations that were talking in there, they didn't even realize and recognize that they had toxic behaviors. And they started talking about like, are we actually blocking ideas? Like, are we letting them grow? Like, are we actually like, is our system working? And it was just so that actually came up and about, I think every one of these sessions, like it was at least briefly touched on. And some of them was actually a main topic, which was just running through the basically the user experience of how employees run through the system at all different levels and how ideas share and get implemented. Are they blocked? Do they grow? Is there a clear path toward change? Is there a clear path toward innovation? Do you know how technology actually changes and gets implemented within your organization? Because if you want everyone at every level of your organization to be able to come up with these ideas and make these changes, that's a path that needs to happen. And then it's a path that needs to be communicated to people so that they understand that. And I'm pretty sure the top down bottom up question has been like a perpetual question against organizations everywhere. Which is, do you do like the planning with the small leadership group in the top and then implement it and trickle it down? Or do you do the bottom up approach where you share ideas among everyone? And then leadership and everyone on the floor is part of that discussion. And there were groups that use both different styles and there were kind of pros and cons to each one. And a lot of them were shifting more to a bottom up approach, it seemed like. So it's kind of starting to think about, and I've read a lot about the bottom up approach. It's used in MIT, it's used in lean startup practices and entrepreneurship programs. So if you want entrepreneurship within the organization, it might be something to look at for at least some systems. And I don't have a million hours and one to talk about what I've read about bottom up. But it could be maybe it could be another encompass live later on, who knows. And I'm actually looking at my second monitor, like I'm actually going to see Krista over here. And technically I do. So this was kind of it in a nutshell, which was start asking those hard questions and don't shy away from them. And recognize that change is necessary. And it's the only it's evolution is there for a reason. So the next major theme was how do we actually fix our tech? How do we make sure that people are using it and that it is a good system. So this was actually why that rapid iteration system was a thing. So I'm sure some of you have probably heard about design thinking. It's kind of I actually have a design thinking poster stuck to my wall. So if you see me looking up, I'm actually looking at that right now. They so basically you have to start by empathizing and understanding what people are going through. And try to design, like define and articulate the actual problems that people are facing, and then start imagining and ideating different solutions to that problem. So just using that's the first three steps out of five. So if we take that as an example, and say that you have a group of people of library patrons that are no longer able to go into the library, and they still need to be able to access services to get computer access and be able to live their lives. A lot of people were losing their jobs and needed to be able to access job search and online services. And they may not have been able to keep paying for internet bills while they were going through that process. So then the library starts saying, okay, so what are the actual skills that people need? What are the existing living situations that people are going through? And how can the library develop a service that will meet those needs without making life more difficult? So then some of the solutions that came out, a lot of you have probably heard about the curbside pickup. People were able to check out or take a laptop into the library parking lot to be able to use it. Some libraries opened up only the computer lab but spaced out the computers about six feet apart so that people will be able to use them. Some of them put partitions between the computer stations so people could still come in and apply for jobs. And a lot of them switched over to a virtual service because they found out that while people weren't able to go in and they still needed the hands on assistance, they started doing a Zoom session for job applications or doing it over the phone session for job applications or started building partnerships with the American Job Center or Goodwill or different organizations so that the American Job Center could be the expert level resource for creating resumes and job applications. But the library might be able to step in to help with building a video for an interview because a lot of the jobs started switching over to saying send over a three to five minute interview style video. But then people were like, okay, but how? So then the library can step in and say, well, you can use Canva as a free tool or we can provide you free software access to the Adobe Creative Suite or you can get free software access to Wondershare Filmora. So that was how that partnership started to branch out and started to iterate quickly to be able to meet those needs and be able to prove that value of the library. Because while the same system is happening, there was another, I also went on to another system through American Library Association and they had this huge shared Google Doc about basically libraries that were both terrified and excited about the future of COVID. And this was early on probably in like March, April of last year where all these libraries were sharing these ideas of what to do. And this is kind of how it started. So improving the digital experience was also about sharing like where is the place where ideas are happening? And do you know where to navigate those resources and go to where that idea sharing and kind of like collision of options is happening? And then it turned into so once you've understood what people are going through, you need to be able to understand the technology tools that are available that are and that you can actually start using. So this is just like a massive research base. And it's just like searching keywords, talking to people that you know reaching out to different organizations and finding out where in the library in the library world we have this information. But I didn't always go to the library world. I went to the entrepreneurs. I went to business groups and I went to instructional design groups. So most of what I learned wasn't from the library. So that's where that collaboration and partnership started going through. Because if what you're doing isn't working and the library is stuck or they don't have the resources, branch out. So that's also part of what the improving the digital experience. But look to the tech people for it. If you're going to be doing a user experience study, it doesn't have to be only from ALA or from another library organization. User experience research and startups have been doing it for a while. So the methods are pretty similar and there's overlapping. The old cliche, think outside the box. Right? I should have put like a little box opening in the corner. So that's kind of like the digital community that started coming up, which was how do you build a digital community to start sharing ideas and start sharing what's going on and what people are facing. And so let's go on to the next one, which is... So this one I actually have a couple different sections on here. And I think this is actually because my slide is slightly out of order. But I'll take it. Did I skip the slide? No. So when you're thinking about kind of the digital experience, you want to start also asking questions to evaluate what you've already got and find out how people are navigating your information because libraries are all about information. We love putting all the stuff out there and kind of giving people the stuff they need so they can pick and choose what they've got. But there's a point where... So this is where the instructional design part of it came in. So some of this is a recent discovery from even just in the field itself and some of it is still growing. But so a lot of it is information overload. If you give people more than three choices at one time, they tend to not make any choice at all. Because one, they don't want to invest the time and energy into researching each of the different tab choices to find out which option is available to them. Then they just like make a mental bookmark in their head, say I'll call them later and find out. But then about life happens and then they forget to call and then they just never get the resources that they need and eventually they stop going to your site. So the information overload part is from behavioral psychology and they talk about a decision point. So if you want to learn more about behavioral psychology, it was talked about in a lot of these sessions but there's also a free class that you can audit that is it's either on edX or Coursera. I bounce back and forth between the two but it's on one of them if you search for behavioral psychology. But they talk about how people make decisions and how that relates to websites and technology. So I would look into how to present information to prevent information overload and how to limit choices to about three to five and give a simple blurb underneath the choice describing what it is in one sentence or less. So if you have multiple departments in an organization just give a little tab about it and then a little blurb and then people can click on it and then get the information related to that tab because that's also how people think. They think in buckets. And so there was a bunch about that but that I can just touch on that to move on to the next bit. So in the case of information overload they also talked about micro learning. So if you think about how you actually learn stuff you usually don't learn it in big giant chunks. You usually learn it in many concepts and try to access it whenever you actually need it. So micro learning uses about a one to usually a maximum of 10 minute long video. The sweet spot is usually about three to five minutes long to just do mini concepts. So if you have one large concept you would actually break it down into mini chunks and then push it out into a smaller video that has maybe a bit of text next to it or you can also instead of video and text you can do a colorful infographic or just start mixing in images with your text. Because they also started looking at people trying to process a block of text and your eyes start to cross and it just doesn't process at all. So they started playing around with formatting and that's why I kind of heart Canva because Canva is also is kind of awesome for infographics and kind of displaying information so that it's spaced out more. And instead of trying to cram as much information as you possibly can into one short spot you spread it out. The brain can process it better and the colors that are used can also activate different parts of the brain so that you process information and actually hang on to it instead of just skim past. So much to know about colors and things. Can you tell I have some final words? Canva is if you're like overwhelmed by what how do I so easy to use and I started using it for lots of things just to throw together a graphic or something fun or informational useful yeah. Canva yes check it out. Oh and premade color palettes so you don't actually have to think about it. They'll suggest what works together yeah so you don't have to be a graphic designer. I know these things. And okay so they also explored kind of different ways of teaching. So there was the I mentioned reaching out over zoom that was probably it's one of the quickest fastest ways you can do it but you can also gamify it and you can use things like padlet or flip grid or Miro to share different ideas and you can google each one of those to find out what they are. They're kind of awesome. If you are wondering Miro is Miro. It's basically a giant brainstorming pad so it's basically like building virtual post-its so that you can build a shared brainstorming board or a shared planning board and get your team all on one page or you can use it for instruction to kind of brainstorm ideas and kind of build out a topic list that people actually want to touch on. And that could probably be a whole session all in itself but the super searchers was about packaging information so that you can present information to people and they can't just say well I could have just googled that. So instead of just sending a list of links um honestly I still sometimes do that sometimes that actually is just the best way to do it but so they so the super searchers were talking about instead of sending the list of links do a more detailed reference interview and start giving recommendations of how these specific links can actually tie back into people's goals instead of asking instead of making people sift through that massive list of links to make that association themselves because that is what Google already does you use a keyword it pulls up the related searches and you make the connections yourself so in this case the library would be able to help contextualize that and package that information differently and kind of just try new ways of presenting stuff and doing a I also talked about the user friendliness been a little bit earlier so if you want to learn more about user friendliness um they did talk about it in web redesign our journey and they talked about it in bringing instructional design to the library then they talked about it again in digital first and if you want to research it on your own you can also search for um user experience which is there's a whole organization that does it for user experience design and the website is interaction-design.org and i will put that into the chat here it is i'm on that website a lot i like it so the last bit that i can that i'll mention on here is considering where people are when they learn versus where people are when they actually use the information so if you are developing different resources and you are putting something together to help people figure out how to do an interview in person then you think about where people are going to be when they are doing that interview and then give them resources so that they can just pull out a quick cheat sheet right before they go into the interview read through the recommended tips and tricks straighten out their tie or their skirt wherever they happen to be wearing and then go into the office so if you generate that resource and then give them the recommendation to check it right before they walk into the office or I guess walk into their zoom room then it can be kind of an awesome resource and that's just something about that as part of user experience design is thinking about what are you teaching where are people when they learn it and where where are people when they're going to be using it and how can we help them best by developing resources that will help where they are all right so I will pause for a second and ask if there are any questions before I go into the next segment plus I want to drink my coffee sure you need to get a drink of course um yes anybody has any questions anything you want to know more about manage explain more dig more into anything um type into the questions section of your go-to-webinar interface I'm monitoring that here and I can um share that with her um just looking here getting married doesn't there wasn't anything that was asked while you were talking so while you think about it while you think about that I will mosey on to the next topic in line here which is so we just talked about how to improve the digital experience and I did mention that when you are trying to improve your digital experience you have to kind of know which tech is available for you to use as a tool and which tech is available for patrons to use as a tool and start contextualizing that so when you understand kind of what people are facing then you can start navigating the technology and so I started doing this for both the digital skills and for high tech so it's kind of the combination of the two because the weird thing that's been going on and this was actually mentioned in the AI and I oats for Africa's daughters is that now that tech has gotten so fast there are entire groups of people and sometimes entire countries of people that are skipping straight from not having a computer or smartphone at all to going directly to any of the things or to artificial intelligence so it's like do not pass go directly to angle and it's just it was weird to think about because in America we have a tendency to start at like the lowest level skill and build up on those skills and you have to know certain skills before you can get up to using something like Internet of Things and instead since they never had access to any of those computers or tools they never had access to any of the information they actually learned about Internet of Things and machine learning before they learned about some of the basic computer stuff so they saw the use in Internet of Things and said well can I just use that so they started using it so they will use they use drones they use IOT they use I mean machine learning is just built it's baked into all that so it just kind of walks hand in hand it's a huge leap though yeah but to them it's not to them it's just a tool and so we look at it and say seriously you're already using and Internet of Things and they're like yeah you're not just kind of it was kind of interesting to think about that because we're just blown away and think that we can never do it they'd never heard about it and said yeah that's our thing now so it just it was interesting to think about and I really actually loved that session because they gave different ways to introduce the technology and kind of contextualize it so that it actually matters and then so the tech trends they started talking about the gadgets and gizmos that are available Brian Pikmin pitchman Pikmin Brian Brian he's good people he always does the games and gadgets show and so he brought in a bunch of the he likes to work with startups and different groups that are just kind of getting into the game but it's always the he always picks the really good ones so it's the ones that are like the Finch robot that's made by Braeburn technology bird brain technology and this Finch robot works on a microbit system so during the session they were actually able to network the robots together and then they sent all of us a link so that when we click open the link we can start coding this robot using a drag and drop coding system and then we saw the robot move on the screen so we hit the little green flag on our screen and then the robot like went forward and lit up and I was like I want that nice yeah and so that was kind of like my one of my favorite ones and then later on in that session there was a group that went into spatial and virtual reality so I put on my VR headset and then we met in this virtual meeting room and I found out that that was actually how a lot of them business leaders are meeting right now and they were experimenting with setting up virtual meeting rooms so that you can actually just pick up you can there's virtual post-its that you can put like put on to a shared board and it's really trippy at first but then once you get used to it it's kind of awesome and you can also pick up little 3D objects and place them around the room so which is I started imagining how this could be used in different contexts and I thought about it in construction and architecture and for people that are trying to figure out what a design would look like and having an entire design team go into a virtual reality spatial room and start actually looking at their design from different angles and honestly the system has a little way to go before it'll actually reach that point but there are also other tools that they talked about during that session that already do it so the Microsoft HoloLens 2 is an augmented reality headset that you can just kind of put on and it acts as like a set of smart glasses and it augments different designs and different 3D objects onto the physical world so basically you would put it on and then through those glasses you would see those 3D objects but once you take the glasses off it would just be a normal world so in that way they're actually able to augment reality they're able to add in a digital layer so that you can have an added layer of meaning and you can actually have a group of people wearing a HoloLens standing around just a spot on the floor and they'll all be seeing their shared design and they can walk around it but then anyone else who walks into the room will probably think they're insane because it looks like there's just 5 people staring at a spot on the floor good times so it's kind of and I started exploring different ways that the library can start getting into that because there are actually tech tools that help you get into the beginning stages of learning this 3D design and virtual design and virtual reality virtual reality headsets are everywhere now and if you start going into Unity you can start doing this 3D design yourself or start playing around in Tinkercad for like an easy entry point and you can also start going into AutoCAD if you want to get into the more advanced mobile stuff so as a librarian you can start looking at the if you start looking at construction groups and looking at architecture groups and looking at just different industries and finding out is there a reason that people would need to be able to design and collaborate on some sort of idea can we connect them with the beginner level tools that will show them that this is possible and then help them chart a course toward making it a reality and so that's what I'm looking at right now because that is just good times in a cup I don't know why a cup but I'll take it so that was the a lot of those tools I learned about in XR and libraries and then in the tech trends and they also do a American Library Association also has like a future of tech kind of thing that they talk about all those different tech like tech groupings and then I put together a group of high tech pages which I guess I could probably share out from high tech and I will copy this into the chat so this is just a collection of resources that shows about what the stuff is has some basic videos about it and it'll give you a mess of information about it click around have some fun good times and so the digital navigators is a group of people that are so I'm actually one of the digital navigators I was part of that group that pilot group that went through I think digital navigators have actually been around long before I ever knew they existed so I don't know exactly when they first started but what a digital navigator is is someone who is embedded into the community or into an organization and they're able to identify what people are facing and find out and kind of like get at the goals of what people are trying to accomplish and connect them with the tools and resources to be able to access the technology tools and learning resources to get them to their goal and in some cases they'll do hands-on training to be able to help people learn the tools they'll be able to help people get started on the internet itself they'll be able to navigate local resources to find cheap internet access they'll be able to do basic to intermediate training for things like Google Docs Microsoft Word like the Office Creative Suite sometimes the Adobe Suite and they'll also be able to kind of navigate any makerspace tech that may be applicable to the organization or the community and when that gets to a point where it is a higher technology level than that navigator would have or would be able to achieve then that navigator would be able to branch it out to different partner organizations so that they can learn more or get more expert or specialized attention so that is kind of how you'd be able to start navigating that system of technology So I have a question how would someone I mean you said you've been how does someone become one of these digital navigators is there I'm glad you asked so the the group that I was in was actually making the training system that would help these digital navigators become digital navigators so when I started in the group they had kind of a baseline training and that training was supposed to be kind of the generic understanding of what that position would be the goal of this group was of the group that I was part of was to contextualize that core training to different environments so there were some digital navigators that were being put into community colleges there were some that were going in universities there were some that were going in statewide organizations some were regional some were single libraries and so mine would actually mine was the contextualizing it to a state library system and that's still actually in progress I mean that's one of those rapid iteration it takes a while to test it out and figure out what works kinds of things yeah and so let me go into so this was kind of like my wrap up of what that segment was all about which is basically just try new stuff that's kind of it in a nutshell be brave so after we've just gone through all of that kind of ask hard questions figure out what the tech people need and how to navigate it sometimes you just need to have fun so there were a lot of sessions that were about just relaxing and just figuring out cool and quirky things to do online one of my favorites is that there is now an AI tool where you can just click open a website and you can try to draw a cat using your mouse and it will try to generate an image of the what the AI thinks your cat would look like so to mess with the system instead of drawing a cat I drew a turtle so I did like a little oval the flippers and then it like the AI generated like this y'all at you say where did you see a cat like this now it's like I can't unsee that now drawing with a mouse is difficult too I would think yeah it is like we're not talking like with a stylus on a tablet we're talking like you're moving your mouse around yeah yeah and so it actually took me a few minutes just to like get my mouse control down and figure that out and then once I made my furry cat turtle I just kind of like blocked away and so there were a bunch of these that just have like a mess of URLs and just kind of fun things that you can try and so this last session down here was about how people started gamifying things and connecting people with gaming and networking events while the doors were closed because a lot of gaming can be done virtually and most people were not looking for the game specifically some like some of them were looking for specific platforms but a lot of them just wanted a place to go and a place to connect with people and something to do so there were things like I'm not the biggest gamer on the planet so I don't remember a lot of these but Xbox live was one of the big ones and then PlayStation is another one PlayStation Plus yeah yeah where you can do things online interact with other people so this went over a bunch of different resources for being able to game virtually a friend of mine used a steam a lot and steam was mentioned in here yes and so that one's a pretty good option and I think there were a lot of libraries that were talking in the chat about steam too and there were some that were talking about you look like you know something about steam yes I have we have well in my house we have an Xbox one a PlayStation switch two switches Nintendo switch and I have a steam account another one called epic games which is another similar to steam online games steam is good it has they both have a lot of discounts on games oftentimes or free games available for a limited amount of time if you pay attention to what was offered free this week or this month you can download that and then you have it so that's good to keep an eye on for things that's where a lot of people are playing that what was very popular over the last year among us game um one where you are trying to uh who is the trader type thing and on a spaceship or it's a multi-user game a lot of people were um got into that because it's something you could do everyone could do it from home people use down the tablets or on their PCs however they want to go into it and it could play together oh good that's a little overwhelming with so many games available it and so many it's also a place where game developers and designers can you don't have it you're not a major company putting out games like Microsoft or something you're an independent designer these are the places where you would go to get your game out there so if you are a game designer it's a good place to start or if you're interested in looking at those kind of indie type games good places to look and so that was what they covered in a lot of that and it sounds like you know pay more about that than my husband and I are big gamers have always been online and board games and tabletop d&d you know all of it oh actually my friend of mine does the tabletop d&d and he just showed me um I think it was beyond d&d it was the software and I was a changeling there you know it starts out tabletop you go the other way which is like we've been talking about in libraries you start as one thing and you're there's going to be more of an audience or a new audience if you go digital or if you go online and it's doing that as well yeah and there's like there are a surprising number of avid d&d years like Dungeon and Dragoners that I like I didn't I had never actually looked at the culture that much and then when I started getting into it and I started doing like a session or two online I was like yeah this is actually kind of cool but I was a pirate changeling awesome okay and so but also something to try on the library virtually you're in person oh yeah lots of libraries are doing things like that gaming nights and you know and so the last one on here was partnerships and collaboration so none of any of the anything that we just talked about none of it is possible if you don't have partnerships and if you aren't communicating collaborating working together and sharing ideas so the first one was probably people trying to figure out how to optimize communication within the organization because there would be different departments that are working on these awesome different things and then other departments didn't know it existed because there's only so many things that you can look at but then it's kind of like how can you build an internet that's basically just a website or a system of resources that is organized by topic or category or department that just shows what people are doing and so instead of talking to about like 20 different people you can start at the internet website look at the current projects and who's working on them and then use that as a starting point to actually talk to the person because that's just kind of understanding what exists and being able to kind of navigate that system and that also kind of tied back into that flow of innovation and that processing of how can someone within an organization recommend an innovation or recommend a change if they don't have access to what else is going on like who they could actually work with or partner with or collaborate with so how can you start kind of sharing those lines of communication so that was what the better learning through collaboration optimizing workflow was and that was also part of the it was a little bit in building community but the building community was more about how libraries can actually partner with different organizations within the community and how you can start kind of looking at problems from different angles and start being a kind connected human and there was also so the last one on this list is the partner plan pitch and this was actually getting into the nitty gritty nitty gritty details about how to approach a partner and how to kind of find that shared common ground and then be able to build out that relationship enough to be able to actually do a project together and they talked about how to start going over to different groups and start just getting your name out there so that people know that you're in the space and that you're able to start getting out into the community to start kind of mixing and matching and doing different things and so if nothing else this was actually like a really good one to go to there's also different resources for this on oh I think it was ALA that had that too um I've been actually trying to find a good partnership training a partnership guide I've done a few sessions where I've not asked about that so if anyone happens to know of an existing partnership training for libraries or networking I'd love to hear about it so but the one that I found was partnership and collaboration and it was through the American Association of School Libraries but a lot of it is kind of able to be tweaked or adjusted to fit different areas but I will link over to what I'm looking at now and I also started partnership mapping too which is basically looking at the problems that you're facing and finding out which other organizations are working in that space to be able to brainstorm and find new ways that you can collaborate with people and start kind of sharing out the different problems that people are facing so because the only way that you're going to be able to find a partnership or find some sort of way to like common ground of something you're working on is if you actually know the problems that other organizations are facing and knowing where they're putting their priorities and putting their time energy and efforts and if you are all putting your time energy and efforts into the same or similar things that is where you would identify where a partnership is and instead of just walking up and saying hey can you partner they'll probably look at you and say who are you and then you just want to start getting into that space and kind of understanding it and going to some different organizations and groups that are talking about different topics and then start integrating yourself into that system and basically just show up like be there and then just run through and start making that list of common ground and then find that best place for to pitch a partnership. Some organizations have a form that you can fill out some organizations have like a virtual coffee meeting or like a at one point in time it was actually a coffee meeting but and some of them actually have you can just cold email and they'll be able to some response some don't depends how busy they are and if they ever actually check their email so it's another experimentation thing. Well you can do is try reach out to who you think might work and see if you get a response yeah. And this session here just kind of gave recommendations for how to phrase that initial outreach email how to find that common ground how to navigate. So you know like when you partner with a different organization you're working with a different hierarchy structure and you might be working with a like a different decision-making process so with you first have to understand the decision-making process within your organization but then you have the added layer of understanding the decision-making process within your partner organization. Are you actually talking to the right person who's able to make that decision and are you expecting someone to be able to make a decision but they're not actually in that spot? And so are you layering some brand of expectation that you shouldn't be? And that was kind of a lot of what this partner plan pitch and some of the building community was about. So some of the biggies that came out of this one is communication is key if everyone's not on the same page and kind of accessing the same information to be able to make informed decisions probably not gonna get very far. And if you do try an internet that has that shared resource make sure that it actually fits into what you already do. So if you are asking everyone to log into Slack but it's Slack is not something that you've ever used before. It's not it's something that people have to go out of their way to log in it's not integrated into anything else that you do it probably won't get used but if you are already using something like Outlook then using something like if you were to integrate Slack into Outlook or integrate another system so that you can send out an email and it'll just click a direct link over into the resources and people don't have to work that hard to be able to access the internet then it'll get used a lot. And if you have like a main point of contact within the organization that is maintaining and updating that internet you'll have a lot more luck. And just kind of circling back to where we started to say does innovation actually have a process within your organization? How do ideas flow and how do you communicate that process to the people who might want to recommend something? And lastly just try it you're going to break some stuff but eventually. So we are at 11.02 and that is pretty much all I've got for you so if you have any questions or want to get the replay pass. Yes going to mention that yeah. So the link I will actually copy it into the chat here. I'll also mention while you're doing that for people who are wondering the slides will be available afterwards with the archive. Amanda will send the link to them and I'll have them on the archive page when it is posted. And we had the link to this the replay in the session description for what you signed up for so if you go there you already have that in there as well. And I think if you're interested in actually watching any of these sessions the ones now and I'm not sure if it is the entire conference was recorded or just selected ones do you know? So the entire conference was recorded but the sessions are only available until June first. Okay if you access these um access them quick and then download the a lot of the sessions I talked about if not all of them they have a downloadable slideshow. Sure the slides or the presentations are going to be always available right right but grab them from there yeah. So let me this is what the actual platform looks like. So if this is once you've logged into the system and click on to sessions you click one open and you can go into oh I'm in one of the workshops um those are different for an access. So you click into one of the sessions it'll have the video and then you go clear down to the bottom to the files and download. Nice there then you can save it. So I have a folder of these that I can look at anytime. To refer to awesome. And were there any questions that popped in because otherwise let's see anybody have any questions before we wrap up we got we don't we won't cut off if you have anything you want to ask Amanda about any of the sessions any of the things she attended any of them you've seen you can even before getting if you don't haven't paid for the replay pass yet um you can see what the session um the schedule was to see what the other you know everything that was mentioned if they to decide if you did want to pay for the access afterwards. We do thank you thank you very so very much for this informative session. Yes that's the idea. But you know do look into it um but like Amanda said June 1st right that's what you said. You know let me double check the back on here I'm pretty sure it was June 1st. Yeah June 1st. Yep okay so if you do want them do it now um they'll be able to through June 1st download any of the slides you want watching the sessions you want. And then start gearing up for internet librarian in in the fall and I did also see I if you go to the main page they've already done save the date for next year's computers and libraries looking like uh it's usually in March um yeah that's what yeah 2022 from the March 28 to the 31st. Right yep uh yes Arlington Virginia yeah this is where it usually is in Arlington well Arlington Virginia and the Hyatt Regency Crystal City um so they already have that scheduled to be an in-person in March 2022. An internet librarian is an acrober. Right and I'm not sure if they have that as they well you said they're doing in person they must have the dates already. I just I filled out a speaker proposal so that was the only reason I was looking at it and I wonder if they they probably updated their website but the speaker proposal said October but I forget what day. 2021 ah October 26th to the 28th cool if you do internet librarian 2021 as a search you'll get the actual page oh and they're the first one there yeah that's what I just saw there we go. So I always think of computers and libraries internet librarian as east coast west coast versions of the similar conference um sometimes you'll see the same presentations the same sessions on each schedule um because the same people will do the one on the east coast for I always think of it as people from the middle of the country east middle of the country west can go to california because east easier and quicker to get to virginia so they kind of duplicate sometimes on both sides which I think is great um to give everybody a chance to watch all once you have to you know if you live in new york you don't have to go all the way to california you can always just pop down to virginia if you want this is true um and we have a question and this is for me actually are the links in the chat going to be available in the archive yes what I'll do is I'll pull all those links out as well and um when I do the archive I'll have a link to everything that um Amanda shared the one for the replay is in the slides but the other ones that she mentioned um I'll make sure that I pull them out and have the actual hot links right to those as well and um you're welcome yeah I'm going to pull presenter control back to my screen now if you have any other questions go ahead and keep asking I'm just going to switch to my screen so we can see here there we go okay oh this is just for today's show and like I said here's the link to that replay pass page which brings you to the main um their computers and libraries page uh with a link to get the replay if you want to um there's actually various versions of it depending on how many sessions you want to watch and then just to save the date for next year and like I said internet librarian 2021 coming up in the fall uh keep an eye on that registration there we are so as I said today's show is is recorded and I'll pop over here to our main encompass live page we've got our upcoming shows here but right underneath here is where the archives are if you click on that the most recent ones are the top of the page every every week so today's will be there should be there by the end of the day tomorrow at the latest um as long as go to webinar and youtube cooperate with me as I said we'll have links to um let's see I'll show you this is the previous um pretty sweet tech uh the last wednesday of every month is our pretty sweet tech so that's why amanda was with us today we had a link to recording and presentation that time but I can also add links here to all the different um other things you mentioned in the chat as well for you so if you didn't grab that today don't worry about it you'll have it when you um have the archive available um well when that is ready I will email everyone who attended today and everyone who registered for today's show to let you know that it's up and ready for you to watch um while we're here I'll also show you you can search our show archives for um any topic you might be interested in to see if we've done a show on it or speakers presenters um you can search the full archives or just most recent 12 months you want something very current um that is because this is um the full archives for all of Encompass live I'm not going to scroll all the way down but you can see here um 2018 2017 uh so just pay attention if you are um searching the full archives to the original broadcast date uh some sessions will stand the test of time book reviews things like that um but some things may become outdated some resources or services may have changed um may have um disappeared uh links may no longer work may be different um so just pay attention um whatever the original broadcast date is for anything if you are watching any of our old older shows our main page here um but we do also have a facebook page if you see up here there's a link to it and there's a link on each of our session pages um so if you'd like to use facebook give us like over there here's a reminder to log into today's show information about our speakers is posted when our recordings are available there I announce them on here so if you do like to use facebook give us a like over there um we also post on other social media uh twitter um instagram using the hashtag encomp live that's a little abbreviation for us so if you want to look anywhere else for that um the hashtag you can find where we've posted anything else so any other less minute desperate questions for anybody no this i've just got some okay thank yous great info info thanks for all the resources um anything else to wrap up Amanda it's about all i've got for now and you said you put in a a proposal for internet librarian in california right um yeah that one was for um choosing better makerspace equipment that'll actually almost maybe we'll see you there presenting fingers crossed yeah awesome all right so i hope you'll join us um next week when our topic is adult book clubs during the pandemic something else you know we're talking a lot today about how things change um we have many libraries in iraq that do book clubs um what we hear through the library commission offer book book club kits to libraries a set of books um discussion questions for them to hold book um group readings and discussions and um we have some libraries who um did some online versions and how they kept things going over the past year um lisa kelly who's our um head of our reference department here is going to talk to some of our our libraries across the state about how they kept things going throughout the pandemic so do um sign up for that one or any of our other upcoming shows we have here we got our May dates starting to get June dates in there so um keep it on our schedule here as as i get more dates confirmed with new shows that this is where they will appear and that thank you so much for being with us this morning uh thank you so much for joining us again Amanda um and do you have any ideas about what you're doing for your May session hmm it's okay you got a month oh probably that teaching tech thing okay teaching not sure look for description from her um for that one like i said um pretty sweet tech with amanda is the last wednesday of every month with us here so if you are a techie type person this is the time to the ones to sign up for um i might break that down into mini sections so that it's not quite so much oh absolutely you need to spread out the info i mean i can't give recommendations on micro learning without doing it so um yeah look to see what she comes up with for description for next month oh micro learning yeah all right other than that thank you so much for being with us this morning hopefully we'll see you on a future episode of encompass live bye