What is Participatory Context

The Library 2.0 is a continuation of the development of digital libraries and user oriented digital information services such as MyLibrary. The 2.0 is used to distinguish the present initiatives from the traditional library and information services denoted as Library 1.0 (Maness, 2006). Because of the technological development of electronic resources, the means of collecting, storing, managing, and using widely distributed knowledge resources stored in a variety of electronic forms has changed (Griffin, 1998). Digital libraries have been seen as libraries without walls being logical extensions to libraries (Fox & Urs, 2002) and they have shortened the distance between author and reader by giving a more direct involvement in the dissemination of information. The fundamental mission to facilitate and provide access to information and knowledge has remained, but the processes, tools, and techniques have undergone major development. The initiatives describing personalized Web services like MyLibrary (Cohen, Fereira, et al., 2000) are a further development of digital libraries, which define personalized library services to users who are Web users. This group of users expects customization and interactivity. After the initial MyLibrary initiative there have been several dozen implementations of similar projects worldwide. However, during the initial years, the adoption rates of these services reached only about 10% of the potential user community (Gibbons, 2003). It is important to look at the barriers to personalized service because this seems to be the future of the digital world and the next big challenge at hand; what challenge will the Web 2.0 services pose to the libraries where libraries share the technological and social space with the Web? New trends like personalization, self service, mobility, and technology have created a Web environment that is transforming how users are interacting with information (Bearman, 2007; Benson & Favini, 2006; Coombs, 2007).