So, you are reading this on the OLD 8bitlibrary.com. 8bitlibrary.com no longer redirects here (to blog.8bitlibrary.com). Here’s JP’s “farewell” post to the blog…but first, some nostalgia…

In 2009, JP Porcaro and Justin Hoenke met for drinks and found out they were both ALA Emerging Leaders for the upcoming year. Our bromance continued with daily IM chats until Justin one day said:

Let’s start a librarygarden of gaming.

So, we did. We really started taking off and getting hits when Justin made a joke on twitter:

Let’s all get library tattoos.

And I was like, YEA LET’S DO IT. And that’s how this whole thing happened…Justin & I would brainstorm crazy ideas, and if they were just crazy enough to work, i’d #makeithappen. So we started Project Brand Yourself a Librarian, librarians shared it like crazy, and a bunch of librarians got tattoos.

So from the very start, within weeks, we strayed from the original “library garden of gaming” idea.

We came up with other crazy ideas and made them happen:

• ALA DANCE PARTY (and other parties like the NJLA ones and the ACRL Social)
• #TeamRock8
• The Adventures of Flat Justin
• Think Tank (which grew into ALA Think Tank, facebook’s largest active group of international ideas-sharing for librarians)
• Cranky Kong, librarianship’s oldest blogger.

We also had lots of fabulous contributors, almost all the top names in the field of “gaming in libraries” either wrote for us or were considered part of the team.

And then we shifted from crazy ideas to more traditional ones:

• We ran the petition to start a the ALA Comic Book & Graphic Novel Member Interest Group, and with the help of everyone who sent in an online signature, we made it happen at ALA Mid Winter 2011.
• We ran National Unconference Day ’11, a hybrid online & in-person conference. We had fabulous lightning talks at it by Michael Stephens, Jaime Hammond, and Eli Neiberger.
• We became the largest active source for game reviews for librarians, and eventually lead the charge to make GameRT a reality.
• We hosted Retro Gaming Days all over New Jersey.
• Got involved in Buy India a Library.
• Launched #makeithappen and inspired MIH.
• Launched #libgaming (which has since died, sad sad…)
• We ran webinars.

In our heyday, we were getting about 4000 clicks a day (which is BIG for library blogs), and alexa.com had us listed as one of the highest trafficked library blogs. The only blogs that were getting higher traffic at the time were the ‘official’ ones; the LJ, SLJ and some of ALA ones…

Lots of success here in a short period of time, maybe moreso than any other library blog. So why did we let blog.8bitlibrary.com “die”?

• All of our contributors are doing other things.

We all got busy. 8bitlibrary lead us to publication deals, speaking gigs, new jobs, and new leadership opportunities. Now that GameRT exists, we have a more formal place to do our gaming-in-libraries work.

• Blogging is boring.

We should have figured out from day 1 that blogging was not what we were about. We were a successful BRAND, but never a good BLOG. All of the successes I listed had more to do with 8bitlibrary as a brand, and less to do with blog.8bitlibrary.com.

• WordPress sucks.

The blog was constantly marred by slow load times, login problems for contributors, and errors on the user and contributor end. Anyone who was a frequent contributor knows what I mean when i say “500 Internal Server Error”

• We have better places to “publish”

Blogging is NOT publishing. We’ll get some game reviews actually published via GameRT hopefully soon!

SO WHERE DOES THAT LEAVE 8BITLIBRARY?!

When Justin posted this on the new 8bitlibrary.com, people FREAKED out (they though we were killing everything, the facebook page, the twitter, the tumblr (which is now the main site) and the blog) and I had to write this.

Where we’re left without the blog is where we always belonged: as the party people of librarianship. So we’re still gonna do all the stuff we used to do, like ALA DANCE PARTY, Project Brand Yourself a Librarian, and all the Think Tanks and subsequent parties…but we won’t have to worry about keeping up this illusion that we’re a “professional” library blog.

We’re still here.

#partyhard and #makeithappen,

JP

The Emerging Leaders poster sessions. Justin & I mentored a fabulous team this year and they are presenting a poster session on Video Game Collection Development. [rsvp on facebook] [add to your conference schedule]

ALAplay 2011 will be a fun event cosponsored by LITA, the Games and Gaming Member Interest Group, and the Comic Book and Graphic Novel Member Interest Group. [rsvp on facebook] [add to your conference schedule]

8bitlibrary.com‘s ALA DANCE PARTY 2011. Get down, make love. #partyhard. [rsvp on facebook] [add to your conference schedule]

ALA Facebook After Hours Social. Good times in the French Quarter. [rsvp on facebook]

Emerging Leaders Summit. A few 8bitlibrary.com contributors are speaking. [rsvp on facebook] [add to your conference schedule]

YALSA’s Pecha Kecha: Teens and Technology. JP aka me is speaking and I need people to cheer me on so I can present it again at the ALA Virtual Conference. [add to your conference schedule]

OK

every library blogger insists on giving you advice on what to pack and what not to forget for #ala11. these posts all say the general same things:

• don’t forget comfortable shoes
• be sure to pack enough business cards
• don’t forget to eat

We feel these are usually short-sighted and/or boring suggestions. here’s some more important ones:

1. MAKE IT HAPPEN. aka #makeithappen
2. AVOID INCEPTION BY SLEEPING BEFORE YOU GET ON YOUR FLIGHTS!! This will also help protect you from extractors. Don’t drink anything on the plane in order to avoid extractors from sedating you en route.
3. PARTY REALLY HARD EVERY NIGHT. Rest during the conference sessions. Sleep when you get home from the conference.
4. GET AS MANY CONFERENCE RIBBONS AS POSSIBLE AND MAKE A CONFERENCE SASH OUT OF THEM. It’ll be a fabulous accessory for your many Supermarket Sweep-style exhibit hall runs.
5. BUY A ROUND OF DRINKS FOR 8BITLIBRARY.COM CONTRIBUTORS. Toast to the Nyan Cat.
6. START YOUR MORNING WITH A RED BULL AND A BUMPING JAM BY LUDACRIS. Because access to books should be Ludaversal.

Emerging Leaders present best practices for video game collection development

Are you thinking about starting a video game collection for your library? Are you wondering how to take your video game collection to the next level? Join the 2011 ALA Emerging Leaders Team G for a poster presentation on video game collection development at the ALA Annual Conference on Friday, June 24, 2011 from 3:00pm – 4:00pm in Conference Center Room 271-273.

Team G, comprised of Erik Bobilin, Abby Johnson, Kate Kosturski, Jonathan Lu, and Nicole Pagowsky, will present information on issues and best practices when developing a video game collection, including Circulation & Access, Selection & Purchasing, Weeding, and an ideal MARC record. The team surveyed public, academic, and school libraries across the United States and Canada and spoke with experts in the field to find out what innovative ideas might change what we know about video game collections in libraries.

ALA’s Emerging Leaders program allows new professionals to gain experience and create personal networks within the American Library Association by working with a group on an assigned project.

For more information, check out the team’s website: http://bit.ly/libvideogames

JP and I had the opportunity to work with the awesome Team G over the past six months on this program.  They’ve done some amazing work with this project that I hope you all will check out if you’re going to be at ALA 2011.

Are we looking at the past?

Well, don’t worry.

The Wii has a strong library of 968 games (as of December 2010) with more to be released in the near future.  The total number of systems that have been shipped is 84 million, making it Nintendo’s biggest home video game system to date.  Chances are that the people using your library will continue to use their Wii systems for their gaming entertainment for years to come, so providing them with games to enjoy is still a solid strategy for library video game collections.

When it comes to video game programming, I myself believe that you can’t go wrong with a Wii system and a library full of patrons.  Most, if not all, of the 4 player games for the system have an insanely high replay value which will keep players having fun.  The biggest complaint that will most likely come when the next generation Nintendo system is released is that the Wii is “old and that we want to play something new”.  What do I say to that?  I say give them options.  When the next generation of video games come around, libraries will have to invest the time and money into obtaining these systems and learning about them and what they offer our patrons.  But that doesn’t mean that we should just give up on the Wii.  Use it as you have always been using it for programs.  The games speak for themselves…they are enjoyable and full of entertainment, so let them do the talking.

6 months ago i would have said “it’s the gaming-in-libraries blog”! And I’m not, 6 months later, saying that statement is wrong. But we’re about a bigger issue, and that is: “we’re the #makeithappen blog“.

In libraries, #makeithappen is a taking new exciting ideas and seeing them through to the end. It’s the blog about all the really cool new stuff people are actually doing in libraries.

I had the opportunity to watch the Joaquim Phoenix movie I’m Still Here thanks to the Netflix instant queue. It was a great documentary about Joachim trying to become a Hip-Hop star. I won’t give spoilers, but the end, to say the least, “leaves you wondering”.

Tonight, again because of the Netflix Instant Queue on Xbox, I got to see the 1998 documentary Wrestling with Shadows, which ultimately chronicles the end of Bret Hitman Hart’s WWF career, with the Montreal Screwjob being the crux of the story. Everyone KNOWS wrestling is scripted, and the movie takes you through the process of how wrestling IS scripted. However, the end of the movie is the story of a script gone wrong, where the person who was supposed to win was “screwed”. In the 90s wrestling era, this was a defining moment of “OMG, wrestling can be REAL sometimes!!!”.

When the movie started, I felt that the fact that a documentary was being recorded at the convenient moment when the ultimate wrestling “real” outcome (vs the usual fake wrestling) was proof that even at the time wrestling was “real”, it was also an elaborate hoax.

I suggested to my wife that this would be a great program for a library (like a book discussion, but with movies instead of books). Show both movies and have people discuss the fictional and the factual elements of both, and maybe try to decide which told a better fictional but factual story.

My wife said “this doesn’t belong in libraries“. There’s lots of dicks, boobs, balls, sex, and drug use in the Joachim movie after all, and the wrestling movie was full of violence: everything we love to censor.

I thought back to all the books I have read since becoming a librarian. Lots worse violence. Way more sex and drug use. Much more graphic violence. They are making a MOVIE out of The Perks of Being a Wallflower, after all! As an aside, that book was set right in the same historical period as the Montreal Screwjob.

I said to myself: WHY is it ok to have certain forms of “inappropriate” expression in books but not movies? Why do we treat some forms of media as sacred, and other forms as dirty?

This, of course, is also what 8bitlibrary.com is about. We believe that storytelling media shouldn’t be judged just because it is presented in a certain media format and not another.

And so, I ask, how have libraries dealt with “controversial” content in one form of media that is less-controversial in other forms? We already know that some library board in the middle of nowhere decided to ban their library from showing the Michael Moore movie Sicko just because they didn’t agree with the argument the movie made. I’m sure they already own books that make similar arguments, and no one cares. Cranky Kong, Donkey Kong’s grandfather, would probably applaud their ban.

So, should libraries ban content in some formats and not others? And, do you feel like 8bitlibrary.com is just a “gaming blog”, or do you feel like we talk about gaming so much because we are touching on an issue that is really relevant to current libraries?

I wrote an article in January 2011′s School Library Journal along with 8bitlibrary.com contributor Beth Gallaway on the USA Supreme Court Case on First Amendment Rights and how they apply to video game content (vs, say, the same content in a Bugs Bunny cartoon). Same issue, different media format.

I would really love to get a convo going, either here, on twitter, or on facebook, about what you think!!!

Thanks for reading, true believers.

#makeithappen!

All of the petition signatures for the creation of a Comic Book and Graphic Novel Member Interest Group in the American Library Association need to be in by 4pm EST today, Tuesday January 4th. If you haven’t added your email signature yet, it’s easy!

1. Go here.
2. Follow instructions/ fill out your info.
3. Click submit!

EDIT: We’ve got more than enough signatures, but if you want to sign as a show of solidarity, look for JP at ALA Mid Winter! He’s got long hair and wears flashy kicks.

Thanks everyone for your help and support. We’ll keep you informed as the process moves forward.

- J 2 the P

Guess what? We’re starting a Comic Book and Graphic Novel Member Interest Group in the American Library Association! Robin Brenner, Creator and Editor-in-Chief of www.noflyingnotights.com & I will be co-conveners, with the fab Tina Coleman serving as our ALA Staff Liaison.

BUT WAIT! Before we can make it happen, a

“Petition to Establish a Comic Book and Graphic Novel Member Initiative Group
in the American Library Association”

must go before the ALA’s Committee On Organization (COO) to be voted on and approved. We need 100 signatures on that petition. Would you kindly help us get them?

Enclosed in this post is the petition and the statement of purpose for the newly proposed group. If you are an ALA member-in-good-standing (i.e., you’ve paid your membership dues) and you’d like to sign your name to the petition, please fill out this info. An automated email will be sent to my email box and will serve as your digital signature.
Thanks so much, and please help us spread the word by posting / tweeting this link: 8bitlibrary.com/?p=2101

And here’s what you are agreeing to when you email me:

Petition to Establish a Comic Book and Graphic Novel Member Initiative Group
in the American Library Association

To the Committee On Organization (COO)

We, the undersigned members in good standing of the American Library Association, ask that the Committee On Organization approve the establishment of a Member Initiative Group (MIG) concerned with comic books and graphic novels in libraries, pursuant to ALA policy and refer to Council the following “statement of purpose” for the MIG,

“To provide a method for engagement and networking among ALA members interested in comic books and graphic novels. To collaborate with ALA units to support the inclusion of comic books and graphic novels in library initiatives and programs across the Association. To advocate for wider incorporation and acceptance by the profession and the Association for comic books and graphic novels in library services, programming, and collections. This group is open to all members, and encourages participation from members from all library types and members who serve various library user demographics.”

IF YOU AGREE to this, please click here to email me!

Thanks errbody. – J2theP

http://blog.8bitlibrary.com/sign-the-petition/

When getting ready for a local high school class to come in for a session on the resources the library could offer them, I panicked as I searched the shelves and found little information on the topic of grant writing, non profit organizations, and United Nations Millennium Development Goals. Combine that with the problem that most of the titles were a bit out of date (out of date books=a common occurance in our quickly changing world).  I didn’t want to bring 70 teens into the library just to tell them to check our website and the databases we offer to our community.  It didn’t seem like a good idea.  The teens that I have been interacting with on a day to day basis at my library use us to access things online.  Does it matter that we have the entire run of Naruto in print?  Nah, they’d much rather just go to One Manga and read it online (even if we have it on the shelf.  Checked out?  That’s another thing.  Who wants to wait for something when they can have it now?)

Blurry, but you get the point. Lots of teens.

It made me realize a simple idea that’s been going over in my head the past few months: that the world of physical stuff is almost over.  You may not agree with me but a big part of me feels that libraries collecting physical information and materials are throwing away their money on something that is going to become so quickly outdated.  I’d much rather take that money and invest it in either developing sustainable digital solutions or by spending it on creating experiences.

What do I mean?

CREATING DIGITAL SOLUTIONS: The more and more I dive into learning about the open source community, the more and more I love the idea behind it.  Basically, open source provides us with the tools to create something that we can use for our libraries.  I can’t offer solid examples because my knowledge of open source is still developing (I understand 0.0000001% of what is out there about it) but I can say this…the leg work has already been done.  Encourage your staff to learn about open source and the culture behind it.  Hopefully from there we can build sustainable digital solutions for libraries in the future.  I just think about the awesome shit John Blyberg has done for libraries and wish we could each have our own version of him at our libraries.

CREATING EXPERIENCES: 90% of what I bring to the table as Justin The Librarian is an experience for teens in the library.  My biggest focus as a teen librarian has been to bring the teens in my community experiences that they can’t get just anywhere else.  Be it game nights, discussions about faith and identity, or local bands in the library,  I feel like these experiences can make a bigger/better/harder/faster/stronger experience for teens and a greater incentive for them to become more committed to their library and involved in their community.

I’m not saying get rid of your physical materials budget.  Like I said above, there’s just as strong of an argument for keeping physical collections up to date.  I’m not interested in debating that.  What I want to think about is how we can move ahead and accommodate a generation that is less reliant on physical stuff.  Let this thought seep into your head:

What libs need to fear is what happens when the kids today are the adults tomorrow? Will they need us? Why?   -Lori Reed http://twitter.com/#!/lorireed/status/4553065776553984

Quote: Where do you stop? What about violent books, violent movies?