Top Technology Trends: New Experts!

While this might be old news for some, I’m thrilled to welcome the following new experts to the Top Technology Trends’ panel:

• John Blyberg
• Karen Coombs
• Meredith Farkas
• Jeremy Frumkin

They join continuing panelists:

• Marshall Breeding
• Sarah Houghton-Jan
• Clifford Lynch
• Eric Lease Morgan
• Andrew Pace
• Karen G. Schneider
• Roy Tennant

This information will be updated on the LITA web site soon.

John Blyberg:

John Blyberg is the Head of Technology and Digital Initiatives at the Darien Public Library in Darien, CT. Previously, John worked as the Systems Administrator and Lead Developer at the Ann Arbor District Library. During his time there, he was instrumental in the design, development and deployment of their popular Drupal-based web site. He was also responsible for the complete overhaul of their network infrastructure and the addition of many vital patron services. Because of his work there, John was named by Library Journal as a 2006 Mover & Shaker. John holds a BA in English from the University of Maine and attended three semesters of graduate work in creative writing from the University of Michigan before he left to pursue life as a geek. He is the author of http://www.blyberg.net/

Karen Coombs:

Karen A. Coombs serves as the Head of Web Services at the University of Houston Libraries. Her duties there include development and maintenance of the libraries’ web site and electronic presence. She has an MLS and an MS in Information Management from Syracuse University. Karen has presented at many national conferences including ALA Annual and Internet Librarian; she has written articles for Computers in Libraries, Library Hi Tech, Library Journal, and Journal of Academic Librarianship. She is co-chair of the LITA Special Interest Group for Blogs, Wikis and interactive media and the author of the Library Web Chic weblog.

Meredith Farkas:

Meredith G. Farkas is the Distance Learning Librarian at Norwich University in Northfield, VT. In this position she has had the opportunity to implement many social technologies for use with her patrons and her colleagues. Meredith is the author of the book Social Software in Libraries: Building Collaboration, Communication and Community Online (Information Today, 2007) and writes the monthly column “Technology in Practice” for *American Libraries*. She also is the author of the blog Information Wants to Be Free and contributes to the collaborative blog TechEssence. She is the creator of Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki as well as a number of national conference wikis. Meredith is a passionate advocate for affordable online continuing education for librarians and developed a free online course, Five Weeks to a Social Library, to teach librarians about social software. In March 2006, she was named a Mover and Shaker by Library Journal for her innovative use of technology to benefit the profession.

Jeremy Frumkin:

Jeremy Frumkin is the Gray Family Chair for Innovative Library Services at Oregon State University Libraries, where he leads the Libraries digital library research and development efforts. Frumkin is a principle investigator on the Ockham initiative, and is one of the founding organizers of the code4lib conference. Frumkin writes a regular column for OCLC Systems and Services: International Digital Library Perspectives, and also blogs at digitallibrarian.org. His latest effort is leading OSUs LibraryFind project, where he gets to collaborate with an extremely talented team of developers and librarians in the creation of tools to support the scholarly workflow.