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VIRTUAL WORLDS & VIRTUAL COLLABORATION

VIRTUAL WORLDS & VIRTUAL COLLABORATION. MARTIN KESSELMAN RUTGERS UNIVERSITY martyk@rci.rutgers.edu USAIN CONFERENCE, WOOSTER OH, April 2008. Who Moved the Cheese?.

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VIRTUAL WORLDS & VIRTUAL COLLABORATION

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  1. VIRTUAL WORLDS &VIRTUAL COLLABORATION MARTIN KESSELMAN RUTGERS UNIVERSITY martyk@rci.rutgers.edu USAIN CONFERENCE, WOOSTER OH, April 2008

  2. Who Moved the Cheese? • New approaches are needed – Most students & faculty no longer come to the library to do research. Either the information is online or we make it available online. • More group work / team work. Libraries are rethinking or creating new physical library spaces. Similarly there is the need to create new virtual library spaces. • Moving beyond the library building – office hours in departments, spaces in student centers, librarians at disciplinary conferences (for some academic librarians this can be a difficult transition to make). • Public librarians have the culture to go to where the users are (e.g. mobile libraries, senior centers, prisons, Bibliometro). They have been the leaders with virtual reference/virtual collaboration.

  3. Librarian/Researcher Disconnect “The consultative role of the librarian in helping faculty in their research and teaching is viewed as an important function by most librarians, but most faculty members do not put the same emphasis on this role of the library. In the future faculty expect to be less dependent on the library and increasingly dependent on electronic materials. By contrast, librarians generally think their role will remain unchanged and their responsibilities will only grow in the future. Indeed, over four fifths of the librarians believe that the role of the library as the starting point or gateway for locating scholarly information will be very or extremely important in five years, a decided mismatch with faculty views.” Ithaka 2006,N=4100,350 http://www.ithaka.org/research/Ithaka.Surveys.2006.Overview.pdf

  4. Creating Opportunities: Embedded Librarianship • Information Literacy Initiatives • Research Team Members (“clinical librarians”) • Multidisciplinary Studies Opportunities • Virtual Worlds / Global Opportunities

  5. Course Integrated CollaborationFood and Nutrition Business Info & Communication Course • USDA grant funded experimental team-taught class • Librarians as partners with teaching faculty • Multidisciplinary teams collaborate with industry partners. • Focus: teamwork, information literacy, communication • Active learning by simulating real life experiences • Appreciation of different communication styles, vocabularies, perspectives, methodology. • Examples of team projects: sorghum for diabetic foods, extracting pentose sugars from melon rinds, increasing shelf life for baked goods.

  6. Class Collaboration Challenges • Issues related to team size, team mix, and working collaboratively • Students had trouble scheduling F2F or virtual meetings • Chat conferencing is difficult for more than 2 -3 persons. • Skype was clunky for conferencing – need better tools for virtual conferencing that are freely available. • Too many tools available – decided to focus just on Sakai.

  7. Virtual Worlds – the Next Frontier • According to the 2007 Horizon Report (New Media Consortium & Educause), virtual worlds will soon mature. • “Opportunities to collaborate, explore, role-play, and experience other situations in a safe but compelling way… offer opportunities for education that are almost limitless, bound only by our ability to imagine and create them.” • Second Life is the best known. Examples of other MUVES (multi-user virtual environments) are: Metaplace, Croquet, Activeworlds, Multiverse.

  8. Second Life • Virtual world developed by Linden Labs, free to join. • Global community where REAL people meet, collaborate, and communicate via avatars, more than 6 million participants. • Teaching faculty are developing courses in SL • Librarians are teaching and answering reference questions in SL (e.g. InfoIsland – Alliance Library System) • Marketing tool for libraries and institutions.

  9. Second Life and Rutgers: Goals • Library and Office of Instructional Technology co-purchase an island via the New Media Consortium. • Explore new ways of presenting information and building information literacy enhanced by virtual environments • Build expertise of library faculty and staff in making information and resources available in virtual environments. • Promotion for libraries’ evolving digital capabilities and for Rutgers generally (recruitment, capital campaign, etc.)

  10. Virtual Science Library Ideas • A bridge to services offered by the physical library – such as reference and instruction. • Spaces for discussions with faculty about their research and topics of interest such as scholarly communication, intellectual property. • Spaces for science conferences, poster sessions, exhibits, virtual science information fairs • Collaboratories for group study/work where science faculty can work with students and each other. • Will not re-create physical library buildings in a virtual space!

  11. Using Second Life to Develop Student Science Research Identity • Simulate real-life experiences, through context of Selma Waksman (Rutgers Nobel laureate) & Waksman Lab. • ACRL Information Literacy Standard 4: “Information literate student, individually or as a member of a group, uses information effectively to accomplish a specific purpose.” • Teachable Moments: What led to discovery of Streptomycin & was it inevitable? Waksman as an undergrad, Relevance to today e.g. bioterrorism, new medicinal plants, MRSA • First step, focus on peer-review, a difficult concept. “You have to live it to learn it.”

  12. Second Thoughts on Second Life • High computing / graphics requirements for Second Life. • Interacting with objects in SL gets tiresome after awhile. Interaction between students difficult. • For what we want to accomplish, is second life the most appropriate technology? Video podcasts might be better, also learned that an online game, Peer Factor, exists. • Undergrads are not a major group in SL (compared to social networks). According to Linden Labs, those under the age of 25 comprise less than 28% of SL users. Median age is 36. • But there are some scientists using Second Life.

  13. Science in Second Life • Second Nature (Nature Publishing) – spaces for lectures, exhibits, M4 (Magical Molecular Model Maker) • American Chemical Society • Genome Island • Second Life Virtual State Fair (E-Xtension) • Nutrition Game (VITAL Lab, Ohio University) • NOAA and NASA on Second Life • Landing Lights Park (on Democracy Island, NYU Law) • Journal of Virtual Worlds, http://jvwr.org/

  14. Science Collaboration • Most science is collaborative and often takes place beyond institutional or geographic boundaries. • More and more, science is multidisciplinary (different approaches) or interdisciplinary (combined approaches) • And in some cases, transdisciplinary studies -- addressing present-day issues & problems without disciplinary boundaries while respecting disciplinary expertise. • Global issues require worldwide collaboration, e.g. global warming, AIDS, food/hunger.

  15. Beyond Google Docs: Science Collaboration Webs • aka “micro social networks” dealing with niche areas. • Find and connect with potential collaborators • Share information within a team or publicly • Discuss research via blogs, forums, wikis. • Article repositories – comment on work of others • Share science workflows and methodologies • Link up to global e-science projects • Analysis of networks & collaborations of scientists • Create your own groups

  16. Some Science Collaboration Webs • 2Collab (Elsevier), http://www.2collab.com • Nature Network, http://network.nature.com/ • Chemistry.org Exchange (ACS), http://exchange.chemistry.org/ • Professor’s Network, http://www.pronetos.com • Within3 (Health Sciences), https://www.within3.com/ • My Experiment http://www.myexperiment.org/ • BioMed Experts, http://www.biomedexperts.com/ • PLOSONE (PLOS interactive journal), http://www.plosone.org • MUSE (Educators and Librarians), http://k20.internet2.edu/ • NING (create social networks, includes one for science librarians), http://www.ning.com

  17. Emerging Technologies: Collective Intelligence / Social Operating Systems Collective Intelligence – from the collaboration of many individuals. • Examples: Wikipedia, Freebase (open shared database of the world’s knowledge), http://www.freebase.com • MIT Center for Collective Intelligence, http://cci.mit.edu/index.html Social Operating Systems -- focus on people & connections rather than content. • Examples: Xobni (for Outlook email), http://www.xobni.com and Socialistics for Facebook, http://www.socialistics.com • TEAM ORCA (Carnegie Mellon/Univ. of Pitt) -- “create a system that enhances scientists’ awareness for the purposes of helping them discover and make connections with potential collaborators,” http://www.hcii.cmu.edu/MHCI/2007/PittDental/ • /

  18. How to Transition from Tradition • Embrace Change and be an agent for change • Change mindsets, e.g. getting rid of the reference desk does not mean getting rid of reference. • Initiate opportunities. Leave your comfort zone and network outside the library • Be a risk taker, even if you fail, you will be noticed. • Think of yourself as a connector – not just with information but bringing people together.

  19. Opportunities and Challenges for Librarians and Virtual Scientists • As collaborations take place beyond institutional and geographic boundaries, whose users are they? And does it really matter? • More than one skill-set is needed. Global collaborations of scientists need access to information, capabilities to access, organize, disseminate, and preserve data, tools for research productivity, help with global intellectual property issues. • Virtual collaborations of scientists need virtual collaborations of librarians and information professionals • AgNIC is uniquely poised to provide this. Although AgNIC began with a focus on content, it’s ultimate strength is as a network of global partner institutions and professionals.

  20. Resources For More Information • Second Life Learning Opportunities in Science, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfsSGBraUhc • 2008 Horizon Report, http://www.nmc.org/pdf/2008HorizoReport.pdf • Film, Food & Nutrition Business Information & Communication Class, email to aruggier@rci.rutgers.edu • Agenda for Developing E-Science in Research Libraries (ARL) http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/ARL_EScience_final.pdf • Sci-Tech Social Networking, http://scitechnet.blogspot.com/ • UIUC Team Engineering Collaboratory, http://sonic.ncsa.uiuc.edu/

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