Social networking and facebook

Students as well as adults visit libraries to use facebook. Facebook is a popular social networking Web site. Librarians use Facebook as a way of providing outreach to campus communities, while also promoting and marketing library services (Ganster, 2009). This allows a place for patrons to interact with librarians by becoming a part of an online community. Because of Facebook, libraries are now able to develop an outreach presence and information center within this online community. An example of how one library is using Facebook to enhance its efficiency is that in December 2007, librarians at the State University of New York at Buffalo began exploring ways to use Facebook Pages as a virtual tool to reach out to patrons and market library services. The library conducted a survey and based on users’ responses found that the use of Facebook Pages provided a welcome extension of services and a different form of outreach that not only reached out to campus community but reached beyond the campus community. Ganster and Schumacher (2009) list some of the third-party applications that Facebook developers have created to enhance their pages. One example includes a JSTOR application that allows users to search the JSTOR database through facebook. Another example is that the University at Buffalo Libraries Page uses the photo upload capability to create albums of the various libraries and key units, including circulation, reference, interlibrary loans, etc. Library patrons can view the library environment virtually. The library has included video tutorials where patrons have the capabilities to collaborate with the libraries by adding their own photos and videos. Another Facebook application that is useful to libraries is the Facebook Static Facebook Markup Language application. The University at Buffalo used this application to provide links to their library hours and also provided links to their subject guides, Instant Librarian-which is a chat reference, library exhibits, students frequently asked questions, and subject librarian Web pages.