Friday: E1 - Virtual communities - Changing information services

Anne Collins, Isla Kuhn[Speaker], Peter Morgan (UK): Making a virtue out of virtual communities: working electronically with an advisory panel of library users.

Problems with existing user groups and library committees at the Medical Library at Cambridge University:

- poorly attended
- reverse volunteerism
- overcrowded agenda

Promises (to get participants):
- no meetings!
- opinion gathering function
- not to be a formal representative ("What did you think?")
- eager to have a two-way dialogue
- they didn't have to answer the question, no pressure
- fairly informal

They've got 46 faces "behind the voices". Mostly NHS Hospital and Univ Cambridge, less NHS regional and MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology.

First questions were:
- journal consultation
- library closure on public holiday
- closure for stock check
- social networking