Opening Keynote: Access 2007

Jessamyn West
Librarian about Vermont and the world

As per usual with Ms. West, taking notes is a bit of a reach. Lovely talk, but short on structure and points to record. It is worth mentioning that much of what she spoke about was taking advantage of OS and simple tools to solve the IT problem at hand. Lack of scalability in this approach concerns her.

Riffing on a t-shirt slogan she likes--"I will replace you with a small script"--she spoke for a bit about making technologies a little friendlier to appeal to users. Examples she gave are the 18 pt font WordPress uses for its login box (great for the older set) and the little AJAX lookup Yahoo does when you're picking a username for an account (tells you if your choice is taken and suggests alternatives). It's a neat notion: one need not fix everything, just enough to make it a little nicer and more approachable, gaining the good will of the user.

Comments

[jessamyn]

This was a real departure for me, doing a "big picture" type keynote instead of discussing specific topics and strategies. Glad at least some of it came across okay.

[dsa]

You did well, I thought, given that I could tell you sensed you were out of your comfort zone. An insightful colleague pointed out last night that there is a large, silent block of local public librarians at any given Access conference (offset by the large, insular, and technically-adept academic frequent fliers), and that your message likely went over very well with them.

[jessamyn]

Also I have to say, your comments about Endeca and the dimensions were laugh-out-loud funny. I was only sad I couldn't stay for more of Access, but hopefully I'll be able to attend as a regular old public library type next year.