It’s not filter failureIt’s a discovery deficit

RLUK 11 November 2010, Edinburgh

orThankyou Clay Shirkey.

Now where’s my **** filter?

Some of the people who contributed to this presentation...

Helen BermanLorie LeJeune

Iain Emsley

Neil Saunders

Brian Kelly

Harry Collins

Michael Nielsen

Jen Dodd

Greg Wilson

Timo Hannay

Maxine Clarke

Jenny RohnRicardo Vidal Paulo Nuin

Jenny HalePeter Murray-Rust

Deepak Singh

Jon Udell

Tim O’Reilly

David Crotty

Rafael Sidi

Richard Akerman

Jean-Claude Bradley

Mike Ellis

Liz Lyons

Andy Powell

Gavin Baker Peter Suber

Victor Henning

Sabine HossenfelderFlickr

Google

Steve Wilson

Andrew Milsted

Frank Norman

Dave de RoureJeremy Frey

John Cumbers

Bill Flanagan

ISIS LSS Group

Lakshmi Shastry

Catherine Jones

ISIS Computing GroupSTFC

Plausible AccuracyJohn

Dupuis

Chad Orzel

Ken Shankland

Martyn Bull

Jonathan Gray

Rufus Pollock

Clay Shirky

Kevin Kelly

Gavin Bell

Shirley Wu

Euan Adie

Richard Curry Ian Mulvany

Jamie McQuay

Atilla Csordas

Pawel Szcsesny Gabriel Cavalli

Matt Wood

TIM HUBBARD

DUNCAN HULL

Richard Grant Branwen Hide

PLoS

Friendfeed

Bora Zivkovic

Peter Binfield

John Wilbanks

Kaitlin ThaneyThe BioGang

Tony WilliamsEgon  Willighagen

Martin FennerYaroslav Nikolaev

Jon EisenMichael Eisen

Richard Akerman

Jeremiah FaithMichael Barton

Lee Smolin

Garret Lisi

Victoria  Stodden

Simon ColesTony Hey

Noel Gorelick

Jon Tansley

Benjamin Good Dorothea Salo

Paul Walk

Mitch Waldrop

Björn Brembs

Rich Apodaca

Bill Hooker

Pedro Beltrao

Mat Todd

SciFoo 2008/9

campers

Stephen Brenner

Brian Matthews

Allyson Lister

Phil Lord

Steve Koch

Koch Lab

Carole Goble

Stephen FriendEva Amsen

JOHN WILLINSKY

TIM HUBBARDTIM HUBBARDTIM HUBBARD

Steph Hannon

Rebecca Goulding

Leigh Dodds

Paul Miller

Mark BorkumDan Hagon

Jim Downing

Nico Adams

@gnatFabiana Kubke

Hope LemanLisa Green

Ariel Waldmann

@tGrace Baynes

Simon Philips

Matt Johnson

Lee Dirks

Microsoft

NPG Ben Goldacre

Arfon Smith

Nicholas Cole

Chris Leonard

PIERRE LINDENBAUM

ALAN CANN

Jo Badge

Mummi Thorissson

Andrew Kasarskis

Glyn Moody

@communicating

PT Sefton

Andrew Farke

Back to them later...

Me: A brief history

Finished highschool 1990...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/elsie/105716382 CC-BY

Undergrad 1991-94

First email addresss -1991

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bike/3046589822 CC-BY-SA

“You need to spend half a day a week in the library reading the new journals”

My project supervisor, 1994

http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevecadman/486261295 CC-BY-SA

PhD 1995-99

http://web.archive.org/web/19990421174831/www.sciencemag.org/

http://web.archive.org/web/19990208214440/http://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/

Over the course of my PhD...

...day to day search went from...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevecadman/486261295 CC-BY-SA

...to...

http://web.archive.org/web/19990208214440/http://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/

The last generation to remember “the library”

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jhoweaa/436923541 CC-BY

Who are you?

“RLUK's vision is that the UK should have the best research library support in the world”

...the people who have to deliver

US Defence Department: 090807-N-5749W-394.jpg

...with limited resources

http://www.flickr.com/photos/picsbycam/3564466980 CC-BY

So where is the most value?

We share a problem

http://www.flickr.com/photos/schnurrbart/43568532 CC-BY-SA

Too much stuff...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/miczanin/4726970804 CC-BY-SA

Too little resource

For me the resource is...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/robbie73/3387189144 CC-BY-SA

...for you it is...http://www.flickr.com/photos/mukumbura/4052671706 CC-BY-SA

Information overload...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dylanroscover/3450505729 CC-BY-SA

Filter failure?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/daveyll/332723930

http://www.flickr.com/photos/biscuitsmlp/2247299538 CC-BY

A discovery deficit.

Filters block.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/emperley3/4705354106 CC-BY-SA

The right filter for you? Right filter for now?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lotzman/3595748169 CC-BY

Filters makes sense in a broadcast world

http://www.flickr.com/photos/m0dlx/506786451 CC-BY-SA

http://www.flickr.com/photos/baccharus/4473818003 CC-BY

Someone had to choose...

...you had to choosehttp://www.flickr.com/photos/notramstolimestreet/4089688772 CC-BY

Centralised filters were required.

But today looks more like this...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fraz5356/4754482759 CC-BY

Floods of information...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikebaird/4289349768 CC-BY

...content from all directionshttp://www.flickr.com/photos/ocarchives/4418399902 CC-BY

This is a good thing...http://www.flickr.com/photos/62337512@N00/3958637561 CC-BY

http://www.flickr.com/photos/flavinsky/3410980137 CC-BY

Every reader their book....

...for every moment, and every problem

http://www.flickr.com/photos/valeriebb/290711738 CC-BY-SA

Every book its reader...

Every book its reader...

All we need to do is connect them...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/adrian_s/8271860 CC-BY

Save the time of the reader.

0

25,000,000,000

50,000,000,000

75,000,000,000

100,000,000,000

1982 1986 1990 1994 1998 2002 2006

Submissions to Genbank

0

1.25

2.50

3.75

5.00

1982 1986 1990 1994 1998 2002 2006

Average Capacity of Human Researcher

0

1.25

2.50

3.75

5.00

1982 1986 1990 1994 1998 2002 2006

Average Capacity of Human Librarian

http://www.flickr.com/photos/atomicjeep/2065043917 CC-BY

One person is not enough...

...but neither is a gated community

http://www.flickr.com/photos/andypowe11/3759152528

“Skulls don’t scale”http://www.flickr.com/photos/carolune/5117452872 CC-BY-SA

David Weinberger

Networks scale

Discovery deficit

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationallibrarynz_commons/4078337883 Public Domain

Is search the answer?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ezioman/2095747903 CC-BY

A blunt instrument...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kylemay/1430449350 CC-BY

...not every problem is a nail

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bb_matt/207102083 CC-BY

Social networks scale

Social aggregation...

...but still too much content

Social annotation

Each interaction adds value...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/qnr/1263648697 CC-BY-SA

...and each interaction measures value...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pinksherbet/3209939998 CC-BY

...adding to my collection...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/klmircea/3210506796 CC-BY-SA

...indexing and curatinghttp://www.flickr.com/photos/koalazymonkey/3650487959 CC-BY

My collection.

My collection. Not your collection.

My professional mission as a librarian is this:

Help people build their own libraries.

That's it. That's all I care about.

Daniel Chudnov, Library of Congresshttp://onebiglibrary.net/story/because-this-is-the-business-weve-chosen

http://www.flickr.com/photos/blackplastic/1433817953 CC-BY-SA

Democratization?

You need us...

...alll of us

http://www.flickr.com/photos/richardmoross/3947406286 CC-BY

But we also need you.

Whither “the library”?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jhoweaa/436923541 CC-BY

Books are for use.Every reader their book.Every book its reader.

Save the time of the reader.The library is a growing organism.

Simply connect.

People with content...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pedrosimoes7/2382514343 CC-BY

...content with content...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nufkin/243437309 CC-BY

...but above all...

Connect people with people

http://www.flickr.com/photos/yourdon/3088582622

The library as the engine of discovery.

Through open frameworks. Open data.

Open communities.

You provide the framework...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/gadl/300325809 CC-BY-SA

We’ll provide the people

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mararie/3313582639/ CC-BY-SA

Don’t think about filtering.Don’t think about control.

Enable discovery.

cn@cameronneylon.nethttp://cameronneylon.nethttp://slideshare.net/cameronneylonTwitter: @cameronneylonFriendfeed: cameronneylon

Thanks to:Sciencetwists, Friendfeeders, and the wider online community for ideas, criticism, and conversations.

Deepak Singh, Larry Lessig, Andy Powell, and John Wilbanks for presentation inspiration.

Flickr for images