[WEB4LIB] Re: Re: Google Answers questions

[Andrew K. Pace]

Does anyone else see an inherent contradiction in this thread?  People will
use Google because a VRD is not fast enough, and librarians (supposedly
manning VRDs) are moonlighting to answer questions for money at
Answers.Google?  Is this the way our profession wants to seek revenge on
dot-com equivalents of library services?  If you can't beat them, join
them?  That would be fine with me, I guess, if we were actually trying to
beat them.

If people don't know about answers.google, then they most certainly don't
know about VRDs...who do you think will ultimately win this marketing
race...hmmmm, I wonder, cuz, you know, "Virtual Reference" is almost as
great a branding as "Google."  Why do we call it "virtual" anyway?  Aren't
the questions, the answers and the people on both ends real?  What's more,
"ask a librarian" puts the emphasis on the question, not the answer, where
it should be.  I propose that we change "Virtual Reference" and "Ask a
Librarian" to simply "Real Answers."  That's what we're good at, isn't it?

As for the sentiment of "why not" to the librarians feeding this
bastardized reference service?  Well, gee, why shouldn't I spend my day
making webpages for money using the tools provided by my employer?  Why
shouldn't I be doing paid consulting on the clock?  Because its unethical,
if not illegal.  Why not devote that energy to making library services
better, and marketing them to wider audiences?  There's no good reason that
reference librarians should not be rising up to crush this service like the
tangential annoyance that it is.  Answers.google deserves to go down the
path of Questia's Answer Marquis, and Questia itself (1 librarian left on
their staff, and I'll bet her resume is current).  Google--and all their
dot-com brethren--oughta stick to algorithms and get out of the answer
business.

-Andrew
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Andrew K. Pace, M.S.L.S.
Head, Systems ~ NCSU Libraries
North Carolina State University ~ Raleigh, NC
andrew_pace at ncsu.edu ~ 919-515-3087
http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/staff/pace/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Richard Wiggins wrote:
And by the way, I bet a bunch of the Google Answerers ARE reference
librarians, earning money on the side...

Dan Lester wrote:
We've already established that some of them are done by moonlighting
librarians.

gprice wrote:
Q. I Asked Google about the use of Virtual Reference Desks (VRD) to answer
questions. For example could a researcher submit an answer where a
portion/all of the research was done by a VRD?
A: They responded by saying, "Researchers can use any publicly available
resource to find an answer to a user's question. However, these virtual
reference services are not likely the best resource for a Researcher
because a Researcher has a limited amount of time to spend answering each
question.

Robert Tiess wrote:
Even "moonlighting librarians" can only go so far, unless they are earning
extra income
answering questions while on the job (i.e. "double dipping"), which would
raise
ethical questions and provide potential grounds for dismissal.