Greetings!

Hello SMARTies. I’ve just come on board as an author for our blog here and thought I’d give you a little blurb about me.

I’m a Library Computer Geek. I work at the Goshen Public Library in Goshen, NY, where I’ve worked on and off since 1993 when I started at a page. I bounced around a few libraries within the [RCLS] system, but this has always been my library of choice. Currently I’m the Network Administrator and the Web Designer. And the trend-spotter.

I’m also the Web Wizard for the YSS section of the NYLA website, a job I landed while working at RCLS Headquarters, beacuse someone there new I was geeky, and passed my name along to a YSS Board person. It’s a fun little gig, but as someone who has learned web design, it’s also taught me to dislike the downsides of CMS.

I read a lot of RSS feeds–well, I’m subscried to a lot of RSS feeds…I read as many as I have time for. I love Web 2.0 goodies, and have actually now participated in enough closed betas that I’ve lost count. I also like gadgets. On the flip side, I like all things crafty. And of course, books.

I joined SMART because it seemed to be the only place in NYLA where I sort of belonged, but I still don’t feel like I fit in. While I’ve done collection management (I was a YA Librarian once), and Cataloging (was also a Tech Services person once), and Circ duties, none of them really apply to what I do now. After attending last year’s NYLA conference, I grew even stronger feelings on the subject. While there were program offerings that I did enjoy and which I did feel applied to me, a lot of them were at conflicting times. And there could have been more of them. If there were, say, a “geek” section of NYLA, we could have our own track of programs, outside of the ones that also need to cater to people like Tech Services. I can tell you, our Tech services person and I would never end up in the same programs. We’re worlds apart. Which isn’t a bad thing. It just is.

And maybe an entire other section of NYLA isn’t feasible. In which case I feel that SMART needs to maybe expand a little. A lot of what I read about daily are all the great things libraries are doing with their websites, libraries blogging, libraries on MySpace (yes, ours is), Libraries and Wikis. None of these quite seem to fit into SMART as it is and yet I think they’re things we should be paying close attention to.

I also think that at this point I’m probably not the only Library Computer Geek who feels slightly lost in the organization and the section.