This session opened with the announcement that James Crawford will be speaking between 12:30 and 1:15. The lunch break is 12:15 to 1:30. So I need to decide between lunch and Google. Hmm....
Curt, who had an article published in the Fall in Computers in Libraries, discussed how Fremont has been using Facebook to reach out to its users. Their website, which is managed using Joomla, has been made mobile using a Joomla plugin. This created some headaches with Facebook. No one used the site while the Facebook page continued to get feedback. Curt mentioned that places where a mobile site has worked seem to have a larger budget and staff to put into the development of the site. Their site has turned into a static informational site.
He feels that their use of Facebook has been successful since they have built a unique presence there and it is practical, innovative and fun. He also said that it is important for the the Facebook page to be different from the Library's main website. He suggested the book Facebook Marketing for Dummies, which has this advice as well.
Interesting tip, you can embed one (and only one) RSS feed into a Facebook page. It's also possible to create customized links at the side of a Facebook page using Facebook Markup Language (which apparently is a superset of HTML). Also interesting is that you can now, as an administrator, post to the Facebook page as the page, not as yourself, which makes it clearer that the manager of the page is responding or posted. It might be a good idea to put the semi-buried BookBlog feed here.
There are apps that can be added as links to a Facebook page. He recommends the GoodReads and YouTube apps.
An interesting thing that Fremont has been doing is using iLike to highlight music that they have recently purchased. Not useful for Winnetka-Northfield as we have no popular music collection to speak of, but interesting nonetheless. Another interesting thing they do with iLike is using it (after establishing an artist profile) to publish podcasts.
He's looking at Dapper (http://dapper.net) which can be used to extract information from a website.
Using Facebook Markup Language they've managed to embed Meebo into their Facebook page, which is not a bad idea. They've also added a Bibliocommons widget to their Facebook page, which I think we'll definitely need to investigate.
An new observation I've not seen before: Facebook walls are the new discussion board, even to the extent of running book discussions there.
Curt provided a nice definition for the difference between Facebook & Twitter. Twitter is active communication versus Facebook's passive communication. An interesting analogy is Twitter to a large wedding reception where you know 1 or 2 people, so people introduce you to other new people and you hear some new stuff you've never heard before. Facebook is more like a dinner party where you've invited only people you know.
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