Instant Messaging Instant Messaging Trends & PracticeTrends & Practice
January 16, 2008
Susan KniselyOnline Services Librarian
Nebraska Library Commission
What is Instant Messaging?
“Instant messaging (IM) is a form of real-time communication between two or more people based on typed text. The text is conveyed via computers connected over a network such as the Internet.”
-- from Wikipedia
A Live Example!
http://webmessenger.yahoo.com
Trends in IM Usage
Pew Report: How Americans use instant messaging (2004)
Who uses IM? How often?
42% of Internet users reported using IM.
36% of IM users said they IM every day.
63% said they used IM at least several times a week.
* American Adults, 18 and over
Pew Internet & American Life Project Tracking Survey (2004)
IM usage by age group
Gen Y (ages 18-27, born 1977 or later) 62%
Gen X (ages 28-39, born 1965-1976) 37%
Trailing Boomers (ages 40-49, born 1955-1964) 33%
Leading Boomers (ages 50-58, born 1946-1954) 29%
Matures (ages 59-68, born 1936-1945) 25%
After Work (ages 69+, born 1935 or earlier) 29%
Based on Internet users:
AOL’s Third Annual Instant Messaging Survey (2005)
IM vs. Email Thirty-eight percent (38%) of IM
users said they send more IMs than emails.
Two-thirds (66%) of teens and young adults (ages 13-21) said they send more IMs than emails.
AOL’s Third Annual Instant Messaging Survey (2005)
IM at work 26% of employed instant messaging
(IM) users said they use IM in the workplace.
77% of these at-work IM users feel that IM has had a positive impact on their work lives.
AOL’s Third Annual Instant Messaging Survey (2005)
How do people use IM at work? Communicate with colleagues: 58%
Get a quick answer on a business matter: 49%
Communicate with clients or customers: 28%
Exchange files: 25%
Send and receive information while on a conference call: 24%
Say things they wouldn’t document in email: 23%
Check in with kids after school: 22%
Pew Report: Teens and Technology (2005)
Teens & IM 75% of online teens – or about two-thirds of all
teenagers – use instant messaging.
29% of teens who use IM or text messaging will use it to communicate with their parents.
78% of teens who use IM said they used it to talk about homework, tests, or school work.
“Email is something you use to talk to old people.”
Recommendation:
“…social networking is increasingly used as a communications and collaboration tool of choice in businesses and higher education. As such, it would be wise for schools, whose responsibility it is to prepare students to transition to adult life with the skills they need to succeed in both arenas, to reckon with it.”
National School Boards Association Report: Creating & Connecting (2007)
Social Networking in Schools
Recommendation:
“It’s important for policymakers to see and try out the kinds of creative communications and collaboration tools that students are using – so that their perceptions and decisions about these tools are based on real experiences.”
National School Boards Association Report: Creating & Connecting (2007)
Social Networking in Schools
IM Trends in Libraries
How do libraries & librarians use IM? To communicate with coworkers in their
own library
To network & collaborate with colleagues in other libraries See Librarians who IM (http://libsuccess.org/index.php?
title=Librarians_who_IM)
To offer IM reference service See Libraries Using IM Reference
(http://libsuccess.org/index.php?title=Libraries_Using_IM_Reference)
Reasons to use IM IM is free (minus staff time)
Millions of our patrons use IM every day
For some, not being available via IM is like not having a telephone number
Staff can communicate in-house using IM
IM is user-centered and builds relationships with library users
From Aaron Schmidt’s “10 points on IM in libraries” www.walkingpaper.org/212
Chicago Tribune Article (9/13/07)Channick, Robert. “Libraries using IMs to attract young
clients” Chicago Tribune, September 13, 2007.
"I think we're getting people who wouldn't be using the library if they didn't use this method.“
--Bill Pardue, Virtual Services Librarian Arlington Heights Memorial Library
IM @ NLC Network Services
“NebraskAccess” on AIM, Google, MSN, & Yahoo! Promoted on NebraskAccess Comments form
Information Services (Reference) “AskNELibCom” on AIM, Google, MSN, & Yahoo! Promoted on Ask A Librarian page Meebo Me Widget*
“AskNELibCom” Experience IM reference service debuted in December 2006.
Service has not been actively promoted. Users find it via “Ask A Librarian” links on NLC and Nebraska.gov websites.
Averages 13.5 IMs per month.
Most users are looking for state government information. Very few have self-identified as librarians.
No inappropriate IMs; some “Are you real?”
Meeting Users at their Point of Need
http://nebraska.gov
http://www.nlc.state.ne.us/docs/needhelp.html
Meeting Users at their Point of Need
- “If the library is on [a patron’s] buddy list, it just takes a single click to contact the library. This puts the library into the patron’s world rather than requiring the patron to go to the library’s Web site and use an unfamiliar service” (158-59)
- Meredith Farkas- Social Software in Libraries
Practice, Practice, Practice!
Steps to get you started Step 1: Create a free IM account
Step 2: Find some IM buddies and practice: Friends or family who already IM Other librarians in your library or system NLC librarians
Step 3: Once you’re comfortable with IM, start brainstorming its place in your library!
Popular + Free IM Services AOL Instant Messenger (AIM)
http://www.aim.com/ (client)http://aimexpress.aim.com/ (web-based)
Windows Live Messenger (MSN)http://messenger.msn.com/Download/ (client)http://webmessenger.msn.com/ (web-based)
Yahoo! Messenger http://messenger.yahoo.com/ (client)http://webmessenger.yahoo.com/ (web-based)
Google (Gmail)http://mail.google.com (web-based)
Buddy List Most IM programs let you add
the screen names of people you IM regularly to a Buddy List.
Your Buddy List usually shows which of your buddies are online and logged into the instant messaging program at any given time.
Away Messages Use “Away Messages” to let people know when
you may be temporarily unavailable to respond to IMs.
Most services include several standard messages and also let you create your own.
Examples: Busy Stepped Out Be Right Back On Phone
IM culture Use frequent, shorter messages
Don’t worry about typos or misspelling
Capitalization and punctuation are optional
Learn some of the abbreviations: LOL – laugh out loud BRB – be right back AFK – away from keyboard BTW – by the way http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_slang_phrases
Compatibility Issues Problem: IM services that don’t “talk” to
each other.
Solution: Create accounts on multiple IM services.
Login to all accounts at once. Downside = multiple windows.
Use IM aggregator software to monitor multiple IM accounts through one interface.
IM Aggregator Software
Trillian: http://www.ceruleanstudios.com/
Pidgin: http://www.pidgin.im
Meebo: http://www.meebo.com
Web-based! Nothing to install!
Works even if IM is blocked
Used by NLC staff
Lets you login to and monitor multiple IM accounts through one client. Examples include:
Meebo
http://www.meebo.com
My Meebo Account
Meebo Me Widget Easy-to-create chat window
you can add to your web site.
Visitors can see at a glance if you are available to chat.
Visitors can chat with you in real time without logging in to an IM account.
http://www.meebome.com
Three Steps to MeeboMe
1. Go to www.meebome.com and customize your widget.
Three Steps to MeeboMe
2. Create a new Meebo ID if you don’t already have one or sign in with existing Meebo ID.
Three Steps to MeeboMe
3. Copy and paste the widget code into your web site html where you’d like the widget to appear
Ta Da!
Where can you embed MeeboMe?
Questions?
Susan [email protected]
800-307-2665 (in-state) / 402-471-3849AIM/Google: nlcsusank MSN/Yahoo!: nlcsusan
Bibliography AOL’s Third Annual Instant Messaging Survey
www.aim.com/survey/ Creating & Connecting: Research and Guidelines on Online
Social – and Educational – Networking, NSBA, July 2007www.nsba.org/site/docs/41400/41340.pdf
How Americans use instant messaging. Pew Internet & American Life Project, September 1, 2004www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/133/report_display.asp
Library Success: A Best Practices Wikiwww.libsuccess.org
Pew Internet & American Life Project Tracking Survey, February 2004.www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/43/dataset_display.asp
Teens and Technology. Pew Internet & American Life Project, July 27, 2005www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/162/report_display.asp