Archive for the ‘Reports’ Category

The folks at the Pew Internet and American Life Project have announced a new report titled Millennials will benefit and suffer due to their hyperconnected lives. Janna Quitney Anderson, Elon University and Lee Rainie, Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project have issued this report based on an online survey of 1,021 technology stakeholders and critics.

“In a survey about the future of the internet, technology experts and stakeholders were fairly evenly split as to whether the younger generation’s always-on connection to people and information will turn out to be a net positive or a net negative by 2020. They said many of the young people growing up hyperconnected to each other and the mobile Web and counting on the internet as their external brain will be nimble, quick-acting multitaskers who will do well in key respects.

At the same time, these experts predicted that the impact of networked living on today’s young will drive them to thirst for instant gratification, settle for quick choices, and lack patience.”

The annual Horizon Report has been published by the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) and the New Media Consortium (NMC). It profiles six new and emerging technologies which will impact education over the coming years. Here’s a brief recap of their findings:

Time to adoption: One Year or Less

• Mobile Apps
• Tablet Computing

Time to adoption: Two to Three Years

• Game-based Learning
• Learning Analytics

Time to adoption: Four to Five Years

• Gesture-based Computing
• Internet of Things

Sarah Kessler at Mashable identifies 7 Ways Universities Are Using Facebook as a Marketing Tool. This interesting article looks at the study done earlier this year at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth which asked a representative sample of U.S. schools whether they use some social media, 100% of them said they did. These are the ways that those universities are leveraging Facebook:

1. Virtual Tours
2. School Pride
3. School Swag
4. Alumni Groups
5. Sharing Department Content
6. Reaching Out to Prospective Students
7. Facebook Places Advertising

Aaron Tay at Musings About Librarianship presents a detailed report and analysis of What Are Mobile Friendly Library Databases Offering? A Survey. This in-depth coverage includes mobile screenshots and a features matrix.

comScore has issued a new report stating that 14 Million U.S. Adults Used QR Codes in June. The study was based on a sample of 14,452 adults and also revealed that:

• Magazines and newspapers are the preferred vehicle for scanning QR codes (49.4%), followed by product packaging, (34.3%).
• The preferred place to scan was at home (58%) and then retail stores (39.4%).
• QR code users are more likely to be male (60.5%), between the ages of 18 to 34 (53.4%) and have a household income in excess of $100,000 (36.1%)

via Mashable

Web usability expert Jakob Nielsen has written a report on The State of iPad Usability. At 129 pages, this detailed report is available for free download from the Nielsen Norman Group and offers in-depth analysis about how people are using iPads. Well-worth a look for anyone interested in designing for these popular mobile devices.

Colorado Library Research Service has issued a report on U.S. Public Libraries and the Use of Web Technologies. The report is based on their study of 689 U.S. public libraries’ websites which analyzed their Web presences. One of the more interesting findings of the study discovered that 1 in 3 public libraries across the country (32%) now have a Facebook account. Be sure and view the full report for more.

The American Library Association has published The State of America’s Libraries Report 2011, a study based on a survey of 1,000-plus adults in the U.S. The report reflects trends in today’s libraries. Some key findings include:

• U.S. libraries of all types continue to make increasing use of social media and Web 2.0 applications and tools to connect with library users and to market programs and services. Facebook, Twitter and blogging tools are the favorites.
• Almost all academic libraries offer e-books, as do more than two-thirds of public libraries.
• The availability of wireless Internet in public libraries is approaching 85 percent.
• Students and faculty are using academic libraries more than ever. During a typical week, academic libraries had more than 31 million searches in electronic databases, answered 469,000 reference questions and made 12,000 group presentations.

Sue Polanka at No Shelf Required discusses the results of a recent Cengage Learning survey entitled “Instructors and Students: Technology Use, Engagement and Learning Outcomes”. The survey looked at how educational technology impacts overall student engagement and learning outcomes. Some of the findings included:

• 87% of students believe online libraries and databases have had the most significant impact on their overall learning.
• 62% identify blogs, wikis, and other online authoring tools while 59% identify YouTube and recorded lectures.
• E-books and e-textbooks impact overall learning among 50% of students surveyed, while 42% of students identify online portals.

Be sure and check out the full post for more!

Sarah Perez at ReadWriteMobile discusses the Forrester Research annual mobile technology report which outlines 10 Mobile Trends for 2011. Here are the top five trends, be sure and check out the post for the rest:

1. Mobile/Social/Local Combinations will Explode but will Generate Little Revenue
2. 2011 is the Year of the “Dumb” Smartphone User
3. The Mobile Fragmentation Problem will Continue
4. The “Apps vs. Internet” Debate Will Continue…to be Irrelevant
5. Mobile Marketing Spend will Surpass $1 Billion

Ben Wieder at The Chronicle of Higher Education’s Wired Campus blog reports on the 6 Top Tech Trends on the Horizon for Higher Education. The post discusses the 2011 Horizon Report, an annual look at technology trends affecting higher education produced by the New Media Consortium and Educause. Here are the top tech trends to watch:

1. Mobile Devices
2. Game-Based Learning
3. Learning Analytics
4. Augmented Reality
5. e-Books
6. Gesture-Based Computing

Slideshare, the presentation-sharing website has published it’s SlideShare Zeitgeist for 2010. This brief presentation reports on their findings. Heading into conference (and also Bibliographic Instruction) season, it’s good to know what the popular presentation trends were for the past year.

The Association of Research Libraries has published a report summarizing their research into Fair Use Challenges in Academic and Research Libraries. Sixty-five librarians were interviewed for this study in which they were asked about their employment of fair use in five key areas of practice: support for teaching and learning, support for scholarship, preservation, exhibition and public outreach, and serving disabled communities.

The latest issue of Library Technology Reports looks fantastic! It’s titled Privacy and Freedom of Information in 21st-Century Libraries and it’s authored by an all-star cast of talented, forward-thinking librarians such as Sarah Houghton-Jan, Jason Griffey, Eli Neiburger, Deborah Caldwell-Stone, Angela Maycock, and Barbara M. Jones.

“As libraries increasingly move beyond provision of print material and into their expanding roles as providers of digital resources and services, intellectual freedom concerns have been magnified as they apply to a range of complex new issues.”

Keith Webster, University Librarian and Director of Learning Services at the University of Queensland, Australia, writes for Educause Review about The Library Space as Learning Space. In this article he discusses a series of studies done at the University of Queensland Library investigating the use of their library space. As a result of these studies they report twelve key findings:

1. Most respondents visited the library to undertake individual study-related activities, and they accomplished this.
2. Respondents also visited the library to undertake social or group learning activities.
3. In all but a few instances, respondents did less of what they had intended to do.
4. In all but a few instances, respondents did more “other” things than they had intended to do.
5. Most respondents chose to work in the library because it is conveniently located and provides good study spaces.
6. All respondents put location, atmosphere, study space, and finding what they need above social reasons (e.g., group meetings for visiting the library.
7. Most respondents visited the library after they had been at home or at a class.
8. Most respondents planned to stay in the library for between thirty minutes and two hours.
9. Respondents were regular library visitors.
10. Students spent most of their time in the library using computers and quiet study spaces.
11. Students also used e-mail, the Internet, and Facebook, met and chatted with friends, ate, and borrowed books.
12. Students wanted the library to provide more computers and more quiet areas.