Is Oprah doing this to save money by not having to fly guests to the show? Or is she possibly making some money through this endorsement? Maybe a little of both, but it appears this is yet another example of Oprah hyping up a new technology. Perhaps it will work. When Oprah exclaimed her love for Amazon’s Kindle, interest and sales spiked, and when Oprah joined Twitter last month, she had one million followers in 28 days with a jump in Twitter traffic by 43% in the period following that episode. Could the same happen for Skype?

I was only able to catch the last 10 minutes of the show, but watching Oprah taste wine with the owner of the Bonny Doon Winery proved less than exciting. When Oprah asked shoppers at Harrod’s if they had previously heard of Skype, all of them had. Will this show make them want to try it out? I also heard a lot of Skype hype before I ever used the service. After using it for the first time, I was very impressed with the clarity (at least with one on one conversations) and ease of the service. What was most interesting to me in watching Oprah on Skype was that none of the participants were using headsets, but the audio was still amazingly clear and free of feedback or echo. Is Oprah really using some sort of SuperSkype? Oprah also started a Skype webcast based around the book, “A New Earth: Get Ready to Be Awakened” by Eckhart Tolle. While there was extreme interest in the webcast, technical difficulties prevented it from getting very far on its first go-round. While any “Oprah effect” Skype serge may only be temporary, perhaps this is the beginning of a stronger interest in VOIP?

This semester I have been an Elluminate assistant, teaching students and some professors how to use the synchronous communication devices found in Elluminate. Elluminate is a phenomenal tool, allowing for interaction via text, voice, and visuals. I assisted an Elluminate class Saturday morning for LIBR-210 Reference where the professor was able to demonstrate how to use various web pages and databases to aid students in their reference service. However, similar to the drawbacks described by Meredith Farkas with Virtual Reference service, there can be some technological hurdles to overcome with Elluminate. There is a reason we hold training sessions at the beginning of each semester—interactions in Elluminate are not completely intuitive and most users new to Elluminate could use a bit of guidance in the beginning. Still, I believe that the introduction of Elluminate in the SLIS program has helped bring all of us closer together in our classes and in this program. This is also one of the benefits synchronous communication provides between libraries and their patrons.

Another benefit is the instantaneous (or semi-instantaneous) nature of the interactions. IM seems to be the most popular of the synchronous tools with many libraries setting up AIM, MSN, Yahoo, or gTalk accounts. Meebo widgets make it extremely convenient for users to communicate with their library—particularly for patrons who do not have accounts with any of the major IM players. Whenever I have communicated with a library via IM, I have used their Meebo widget.

Skype is a relatively new tool for me, but I enjoyed it so much this week that I have been using it to call all of my relatives, whether they have Skype or not. Skype seems like it could be a fabulous tool for reference with its phone, video, and chat capabilities. But most of the population is not ready for it yet. There were only 3 libraries listed on the Library Success wiki as using Skype for reference. I contacted the Ohio University Libraries via Meebo on a Saturday night (when Skype service was not available) to ask how patrons used Skype to communicate with the library and approximately how many Skype reference requests they received on a given week. It seems that the Skype service has yet to catch on, with most users communicating through the chat capability instead of a phone or video call. Perhaps we will see Skype use go up in the future as more people spend increased time at a computer and feel more comfortable making calls from it (or if Skype is allowed to function on cellphones—such as their iphone).

I have already given my thoughts on library reference service and SMS. I was happy to see evidence of creative thinking this week with the use of text messaging in the OPAC at the Bryn Mawr library. While some people might be hesitant to text themselves the call number and book information from the catalog because of the cost, this sort of innovative thinking is where I see the use of SMS evolving in libraries.

Out of everything that we have talked about thus far in the semester, synchronous communication may be undergoing the quickest change. In five years, the playing field might be completely rewritten. I look forward to the innovations to come.