?Facebook has become as natural as having a phone? The use of social media in three libraries in the Umeå region ? an evaluationSocial media has come to be an integral part of people?s everyday life, as well as the business world in terms of communication and marketing. More and more libraries also embark in the use of social media, and the purpose of this study is to evaluate the use of social media in three libraries in the Umeå region. The libraries all use Facebook as their current, primary social media. Thus this study focuses partly on the analysis of the content on each library?s Facebook page, and partly on the experiences of the responsible librarians. The evaluation is based on a mix of existing tools in evaluating social media that are relevant in a library context.

This bachelor thesis is about communication problems and treatment during the reference interview. The purpose was to investigate the reasons of why users? information needs are not always understood by the librarian and what to do about it. I have also investigated what kind of skills that can be useful for librarians to have and how a librarian can act in a way that makes the user feel welcome during the reference interview. The method I used was a literature study and an own study through interviews of library users.

The purpose of this study is to analyse the offer from the ministry of education and cultural affairs to Swedish public libraries concerning a computerised connection to SUNET (the Swedish University Network). The study is based on analyses of the main texts from the campaign and interviews in order to identify arguments that caused the libraries to accept or decline the offer. My conclusions are that the marketing of the SUNET-offer was to a large extent filled with technicalities, and that the campaign failed to identify and focus on the true recipients the decision-makers. The wordings used in the written material were too negative and discouraging. In order to succeed with future concentrations concerning public libraries, it is vitally important to overcome the boundaries between the decision-makers in the local government, the people responsible for information technology and the library staff..

This paper aims to examine whether there are any substantial differences between a generation of users born during the 1960?s and younger generation born during the 1990?s regarding the use of digital technologies connected to the Internet. Based on Marc Prensky?s theories on people born before and after 1980 saying those born before are not as natural when it comes to using digital technologies. We used diaries as a qualitative method to gather data from 16 respondents.

This report describes the development of an application in collaboration with Designingenjörerna AB. The company has worked for a long time with a community platform and they required an application where users can create their own unique profile representations, called Avatar Creator. An Avatar Creator is computer based application, which makes it possible to create a virtual character. The problem area behind this is that, large websites require a lot of administrative work when people upload profile pictures on different community pages. They can contain abusive material or pictures of other people rather than those who created the profile.The questions in this report are, how can an Avatar Creator help user to get a unique profile of himself? What are the advantages and disadvantages of an Avatar Creator? How to create a user-friendly application?To understand how an Avatar Creator works and get ideas to create an application, exiting Avatar Creators were reviewed on the Web.Collaborative work with Designingenjörerna AB was done to pin down the requirements for the Avatar creator application.

This thesis is a study of Futurum.kom´s campaign "Lyssna dig rik". Futurum.kom is a regional marketing project between Länsbibliotek Sydost, Regionbibliotek Kalmar and 25 public libraries in the county of Blekinge, Kalmar and Kronoberg. The aim of the Futurum.kom project is to strengthen the role of the public library in society. "Lyssna dig rik" was a cluster group campaign with the aim of making people know about the possibilities of loaning audiobooks in libraries. The target group was lorry drivers in the age of 30-65 with the possibilities to listen to audiobooks at work.

The transition from paper to electronic journals in induces a major change in academic libraries. The library must focus on customising the service to meet user needs in order to compete with other actors on the market. This situation entails the need for a marketing and management approach in library organisations. Linda Ashcroft has in previous research focused on marketing of electronic journals. She has stated the importance of simplifying the user environment of electronic journals and the importance of regaining control over electronic journals from publishers and vendors.

The purpose of this Master?s thesis is to present a survey of how Swedish libraries provide information services for children. In this thesis ?information? means non-fiction material and ?children? do not include preschool children. The method used is knowledge overview and the material (mostly Master theses in LIS published January 2001-June 2006) is related to user studies of children as information seekers.

The purpose of this Master?s thesis is to investigate the library needs of fourteen-to-fifteen-year-olds. We have limited the investigation to the significance of libraries for the teenagers in their leisure time. Our focus is the public library with a particular reference to the plans for a new local public library with a youth profile in Malmö. With a departure point in the idea that young people?s use and view of libraries is to a large extent depending on factors such as social and cultural background and lifestyle, we chose to do a qualitative interview study with eight teenagers.

The purpose of this study is to examine if digital public libraries are serendipitous environments. Serendipity in this instance is defined as finding something unexpected and valuable, while searching for something else.A survey was conducted at two Swedish digital public libraries, where the patrons were asked to fill in a questionnaire online. The questions were based on the work on serendipitous digital environments by Lori McCay-Peet, as well as considerations of human factors that could possibly influence serendipity.The result indicate that a majority of patrons experience serendipity at the digital library, although it?s still more common to do so at the physical library or on other web sites. The result also confirms the importance of taking human factors into account when studying serendipity.

SNA Europe?s handsaw concept is called ?Bahco Handsaw System? and is constituted by a saw handle with the possibility to switch between different saw blades. The sales of ?Bahco Handsaw System? products have not achieved the desired results probably due to the high price. Developing a more cost efficient handle, enabling a lower consumer price of the product, is assumed to increase the sales volume.

This thesis is about Fristadstorget in the city of Eskilstuna and how the square flow together with the user orientation could be improved. This work focuses on how public spaces best satisfy users through architecture, cognition and information interpretation. I've looked at people's movement patterns in Fristadstorget, with the help of observation from strategic locations. While I also integrated the city?s surrounding and taking in information from already existing buildings around the square.

The purpose of this master thesis is to describe and analyse the development of the library history in the municipality of Karlsborg. This is done with a comparison to the library development in Sweden as a whole and in particular to the cities of Lidköping and Halmstad. I have worked according to the following questions: 1. How did the libraries develop before the municipality took over? 2.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to study what place public libraries have in local politics, particularly from the point of view of the politicians. To answer this, I have interviewed politicians, participated as a silent observer of a public debate, and studied articles on library politics in newspapers and other press. The results show that politicians in general have a positive view of libraries and good co-operation with library professionals, and that they have a fairly up-to-date view of libraries. They are, however, less interested in library issues in general, and are often complacent with the way things are already running. The newspaper studies show that library issues are usually only discussed when a specific library is somehow in danger.

Little attention has been paid in the literature to libraryassistants in Swedish public libraries. In this bachelor thesis,the professional role, work duties, career prospects and statusof library assistants are examined at two public libraries.Because of a scarcity of published information on thedevelopment of this profession in Swedish public libraries,retired library assistants, as well as currently employedlibrary assistants, librarians and a library head wereinterviewed.Since the ?80s, work duties of library assistants havechanged, with a reduction in some of the more manualaspects of library work, the development of new duties and,overall, an increasing similarity in the duties performed bylibrary assistants and librarians.Additionally, the public perception of library assistants as acategory distinct from librarians was investigated bydistributing questionnaires to library patrons. Contrary toexpectations prompted by statements in the literature, asubstantial portion of visitors was found to be aware of thetwo separate categories.Library assistants at Swedish libraries have no careerprospects, unless they undertake studies in their own freetime and at their own cost, and obtain a librarian degree. Adifference between the situation of library assistants inSweden and corresponding professional categories in a fewother countries is that, at present and for several years, noformal education for library assistants has been available inSweden.