Twitter and Academic Libraries

1) Darcy, Del Bosque, Sam A. Leif, and Susie Skarl. "Libraries Atwitter: Trends in Academic Library Tweeting." Reference Services Review 40.2 (2012): 199-213. ProQuest. Web. 29 Mar. 2014.

“Libraries Atwitter” is an observational study of over 200 academic libraries to see how they are using Twitter. Surprisingly, the study uncovered that still only about a third of  the academic libraries selected had twitter accounts. Those that did have accounts were not using them to their fullest potential; many of the libraries did not use hashtags or reblogging to communicate with followers. At the end of the study, the authors recommended that academic libraries push their boundaries with Twitter and find new ways to use the social media site.

2) Aharony, Noa. "Twitter Use in Libraries: An Exploratory Analysis." Journal of Web Librarianship 4.4 (2010): 333-50. Print.

“Twitter Use in Libraries” studies the difference between the twitter usage of public and academic libraries. The researchers looked at the frequency, subject, and language of the tweets. They found that both public and academic libraries take advantage of using the social platform, but they tend to to tweet about different topics. Academic libraries tend to send formal language tweets that focus on promoting the library collection and services.

3) Mathews, Brian S. "Twitter and the Library: Thoughts on the Syndicated Lifestyle."Journal of   Web Librarianship 2.4 (2008): 589-93. Print.

In this article, Mathews gives an overview of what Twitter is and the reasons people use it, while applying these observations to an academic library context. He finds that the student body uses to twitter to assess and ask questions about the library. Twitter, Mathews argues, can be used as a platform to become more syndicated with the student body, providing libraries with the opportunity to learn about their patrons and student opinion of the library.