this is an interesting case study of how blogging has documented the evolution of my thinking, and perhaps our collective thinking as practitioners.

since i wrote this post, over two years ago, my thinking has certainly evolved. although, having said that, i wouldn’t have disagreed with your comment at the time of writing this post – you are absolutely right that libraries need a website to which they can tether their online presence (and you’re also write in suggesting that my commentary in this post doesn’t do that idea any service). i just had a slightly different focus at that point in time: my thinking was focussed externally, because i was in a new role in an organisation that really needed to look outward.

in the last two and a bit years, i’ve clarified my thinking. this semester, when i teach about web content management for libraries, i’ll be talking to students about how a library’s web presence should be a portfolio, consisting of its ‘destination web presence’ (its website, blog, whatever), its fit-for-repurposing content, its outposts…

a couple of years ago, i think libraries collectively lost sight of the import of our destination websites in our online presence portfolios: we got focussed (perhaps overly) on outposting and harnessing the cool and sexy tools that were suddenly at our disposable. since i wrote this post, i think we’ve seen a shift in focus, or perhaps a broadening in focus, where we’re thinking more and more about our home turf – our websites – but still looking at outposting and making our content accessible via third party services.

i agree with you 100%: a library needs a destination web presence – a well designed, flexible and dynamic site – just as much as it needs its physical libraries. i still feel strongly that a library’s destination web presence should definitely be supplemented with relevant and appropriate outposting, and also that we should absolutely be making sure our content can be found in other places. but you’re right: a library’s destination web presence – be that a website or a blog or whatever – is incredibly important.