So after reading the articles about chat ref and its rather abysmal numbers and success it has got me wondering a couple of things. What other libraries out there also notice the same results as these two articles discussed?

Could it be that chat is just not an effective medium for the reference encounter?

If the chat is not an effective medium, what about other types of communication? One that comes to mind is a bulletin board. Would a bulletin board be more effective or would it have the same usage as chat ref?

I can see in some instances where a bulletin board would seem to work better. First, there isn't an implicit idea that you expect "real time" responses. You post something and then wait for somebody to post back. This would allow the librarian to answer the question without having to worry about time constraints (to a certain extent). Second, other patrons are free to browse the bulletin board for answers to their questions. We often answer the same question many times, this would be an excellent place that people could find the answer to a popular question. Finally, I see this working really well with book discussion groups or reader's advisory. The librarian could post a book and others could give their opinions and thoughts on the book.

I do see some drawbacks to online bulletin boards. First would patrons want their question to be seen by the public? Sure there are ways to mask ones' identity by using non descriptive user names. Even with that, are patrons going to want to post personal questions? We tend to think of a reference encounter as a one on one kind of relationship. What is to stop the other bulletin board useer from entering in the encounter?

These are just some random ideas I have bouncing through my head today. It is hard to get up and running after having a 3 day weekend. I hope everyone enjoyed their weekend and are ready to face the work world.