[WEB4LIB] RE: Communication between Librarian & Webmaster?

[Edward Wigg]

At 08:58 AM 9/16/98 -0700, Shaken Angel <jbfink at ogre.lib.muohio.edu> wrote:
>
>
>On Wed, 16 Sep 1998, Wilfred Drew wrote:
>
>> I would almost bet that most webmasters for libraries are also librarians.
>> If not, they should be.
>> My 2/100ths of a dollar.
>
>They certainly are here at Miami U, although the actual Library Systems
>department (including me) are not -- we handle the actual machines and the
>software, but do very little/none of the interface design.  
>
>I think it's important that the people who are designing and implementing
>the actual interface to a library's web site be librarians, but as for us
>fix-it grunts, it's probably immaterial.
>
>Maybe the talk should be more along the lines of how to teach librarians
>to talk to folks like me. :)
>
>-- john f.

What librarians do best is organize knowledge; interface design is a
specialty of its own that most librarians are not especially knowledgeable
about or skilled at. 

Librarians may or may not be the best people to be library webmasters
depending on how you define webmaster. If the function of webmaster is to
design the way the structure of the site works, then the right person is
most probably a librarian. If, on the other hand, the job of webmaster is
to implement that structure in valid html (or whatever), using the various
available technologies (servers, databases etc.), then the need for a
librarian is not so clear. In the best of all possible worlds the
structure, interface, technology, and graphics would each be handled by
specialists (librarians, interface designers, programers/systems analysts,
and graphic artists respectively) with one person in charge whose skill is
project management. In the real world we may not have all those skills
available to us and the best person for a job that can encompass all those
disparate skills may or may not have an MLS.

If a library web site is merely a brief listing of services, locations,
events etc., as many are, then the need for a librarian is even more
unclear. If a library web site is a portal to wide array of information
from many sources that need organization, explanation and categorization,
then creating such a site without large quantities of input from a
librarian or librarians would be foolhardy at best.

Librarians should be proud of their special skills, but they should not
claim expertise in other areas, like interface design, unless they have
actually earned it.

Just my $2 * 10^-2

Edward