MySpace certainly has a great capacity for increasing client interaction. The Childrens and youth Services librarian at our library has introduced a MySpace site onto our library homepage to "promote the wonderful resources and activities that our library provides to young people in our area". Kids can blog onto the web site and our librarians have introduced themselves as "friends".The site is used as well to promote reading, as some of the kids have written book reviews.
Denver Public Library in the US has a great MySpace site for teens on its web page: http://www.myspace.com/denver_evolver
This site could act as a model to any library wishing to market its services to teens by using a site which they are comfortable and familiiar with. The site offers links to online activities such as blogs and chat sites, "Find a good book", "Ask a librarian", "Homework help" as well as abundant resources on many types of teen entertainment etc.
A good journal article to read on MySpace for teens:
http://www.oclc.org/nextspace/007/advocacy.htm
I could also see this working in the same way for other library groups which want to promote their activities and network with others, for example Book Clubs, Family History groups, the Bubba Time and Storytime parents etc., in fact anyone who wants to network.
Of course a whole library can have a MySpace site as well. I guess the advantage of MySpace over the usual library web site is it is less formal, and can include a lot of eclectic material, such as podcasts and videos, and is very intractive, giving the library and its clients opportunities to network and communicate in an informal and sociable way. This gives libraries th opportunity to "turn customers into a resource for innovation".
PS According to our those in the know, Bebo is more popular with the teens in our library area. It looks like fun!
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