Maybe ‘leveraging’ is the problem. My experience with social networks is that they are about sharing and showing and when they are used for leveraging and marketing it feels like a incursion. If you’re trying to get something out of the deal it will show and feel out of place to most users.

How does the rss feed work so I can get updated on your blog?…

I hope all is well and you are enjoying your new job. everything is great at dpl. i am enjoying working with mary. i thought this artilce from the nyt very good. i like the idea of having a video war day for teens.

best

bruce miller

The New York Times
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March 22, 2008
Taking Play Seriously at the Public Library With Young Video Gamers
By SETH SCHIESEL

And you thought libraries were supposed to be quiet. Not on Friday.

Under the Beaux-Arts arches of Astor Hall at the New York Public Library’s flagship building on Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street, thumping hard-rock beats mixed with tennis-ball thwacks and the screech of burning tires late Friday afternoon, as the library showed off the latest addition to its collections of books, films, music and maps: video games.

Beneath the engraved names of august benefactors like John Jacob Astor and Simon Guggenheim, several hundred children, young adults and the people who love them virtually jumped, drove, battled and rocked out as the library celebrated its burgeoning “Game On @ the Library!” initiative.

The library first offered games at a single Midtown branch in 2006. Now the library system offers both organized play sessions and games for circulation at 18 branches across the Bronx, Manhattan and Staten Island. (Brooklyn and Queens operate their own separate, library systems.) The library now owns about 2,500 copies of 92 different games available for circulation in one-week intervals. Overdue fine: $1 a day.

Standing a few yards from boisterous teenagers playing Super Smash Bros. Brawl on Nintendo’s Wii and driving through Burnout 2 on Microsoft’s Xbox 360, David Ferriero, the Andrew W. Mellon director of the New York Public Libraries, referred to the system’s planned $1 billion expansion — to be kick-started by a $100 million gift from the financier Stephen A. Schwarzman — as he explained what video games were doing in such unfamiliar surroundings.

“Especially at this pivotal moment in our history, it is so great to have so many people of this age group here in the library, because it foreshadows what life is going to be like around here when we have transformed this building,” he said. “We want to do a better job of integrating the circulation and research collections, and part of that is becoming more relevant for a younger audience.”

Jack Martin, the library’s assistant coordinator for young adult services and the mastermind of the “Game On” project, said the library was in some ways only catching up with libraries in Ann Arbor, Mich., Los Angeles and parts of New England in making video games part of its programs and collections.

“What we’re seeing is that in addition to simply helping bring kids into the library in the first place, games are having a broader effect on players, and they have the potential to be a great teaching tool,” Mr. Martin said. “If a kid takes a test and fails, that’s it. But in a game, if you fail you get to take what you’ve learned and try again.

“In a lot of these games you have to understand the rules, you have to understand the game’s world, its story. For some games you have to understand its history and the characters in order to play effectively.”

The program now includes games for the Wii, Xbox 360 and Sony PlayStation families of game systems. Mr. Martin said he hoped to expand soon to include online PC games like World of Warcraft. He said the library system had spent about $61,000 to provide hands-on game spaces in the 18 branches. The 2,500 circulating games appear to have cost at least $100,000.

In Astor Hall (also known as the lobby), a procession of tourists stopped in their tracks as they passed through security, alternately stunned and thrilled by the juxtaposition of the venerable hall with the three big screens and throngs of exuberant players.

“This is pretty cool, and it definitely expands the audience of the library,” said Garrett Lynn, 15, a ninth grader at Rockhurst High School in Kansas City, Mo. “It’s good because you don’t see too many kids my age in a place like this to check out a book.”

Donna Roth, 50, a makeup artist from nearby Prairie Village, Kan., and a chaperon for Mr. Lynn’s visit to New York with her son Donald, answered, “But you should!”

Across the hall, Radhames Saldivar, 16, a 10th grader from upper Manhattan, ripped through a blistering rendition of Heart’s “Barracuda” on Guitar Hero III. Afterward he said: “I never thought I’d see this happen. I might have to check out the library some more.”

A few feet away, Carlos Rivera, 16, said he helped organize the regular Friday afternoon game sessions at the Jefferson Market library branch in Greenwich Village.

“I thought a library was just for books, just for studying, just for a lot of things I don’t normally do,” he said. “But when I found out the library was starting to have games it was great, because it’s really good to hear that the library is paying more attention to the youth and what we’re into.”

He paused. “And it’s also good because I can just say to my parents, ‘I’m going to the library.’”