Information literacy expert Sheila Webber takes time out from the blogosphere and her Second
Life incarnation to extol the delights of blogging

Q Who are you?
A Sheila Webber, 54, senior lecturer in the Department of Information Studies, University of Sheffield.

Q Where can we find your blog?
A My Information Literacy blog is at http://information-literacy.blogspot.com and my Second Life blog is at http://adventuresofyoshikawa.blogspot.com

Q Describe your blog?
A The Information Literacy (IL) blog highlights IL resources (such as tutorials, articles and portals), IL related developments and upcoming events worldwide, and carries conference reports. It’s primarily an information blog. The personal touch comes from the photographs of flowers and landscapes I put it – I mention them because some people have said that they look at the blog for those rather than the IL!
The Second Life (SL) blog is a diary of my avatar in SL, Sheila Yoshikawa. It started as a Bridget Jones-type blog, with a learning diary angle.

Q How long have you been blogging?
A I started in April 2003, with Stuart Boon as co-blogger, using Moveable Type software that was already available on a server in my department. Unfortunately, after we’d been blogging regularly for two years this server got hacked, an event that coincided with the only person who knew the setup moving elsewhere. We made a new start on Blogger in 2005.

Q What started you blogging?
A Initially, it was to publicise an IL project but I soon realised I was a natural blogger. I like writing short pieces and people seemed to find them useful. If anyone is interested, I wrote a piece about why I blog at http://inquiry-in-im.group.shef.ac.uk/team2007/02/20/learning-about-myperspectives-on-blogging

Q Do you comment on other blogs and what is the value of it?
A I don’t do much commenting, probably because the IL blog is not really a social networking blog. When people want to comment on my blog, or tell me about an IL item, they also tend to email me rather than comment on the blog. I think that I, and the blog readers, want to keep the signal-to-noise ratio high. It’s a bit different on the SL blog, where I mention more social and personal things (perhaps strangely, considering it is about SL rather than my first life!), so there tend to be more social chitchat-type comments from SL friends.

Q How does your organisation benefit from your presence in the blogosphere?
A I hope that the blog helps show that we in the department are participating actively in the information world. Since I have readers worldwide it helps bring the department to their attention. I also like to think that it may attract potential students who are interested in information literacy.

Q What good things have happened to you that could only have happened because of your blogging?
A Apart from the trips abroad,getting in contact with people via the blog. Also it’s nice when a stranger comes up to me at a conference and says they like the blog or my photos.

Q Which blogs do you read for fun?
A I don’t look at that many blogs outside work interests. There are blogs about fashion in Second Life (aggregated at http://fashionplanet.worldofsl.com) that are useful because the search function within SL itself is rubbish.

Which bloggers do you watch and link to?
Moira Bent
http://blogs.ncl.ac.uk/moira.bent
Michael Lorenzen
www.information-literacy.net
ALFIN blog in Spain
http://alfin.blogspirit.com
Jill Walker Rettberg
http://jilltxt.net
Brian Kelly
http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com