A trial with academic social referencing software – also called social bookmarking software – has been carried out with members of the Research Group Systems- and Network Engineering (SNE) of the University of Amsterdam.
The idea for a user trial started after Marten Hoekstra of the SNE group contacted the University Library of the University of Amsterdam for advice and recommendation on using one of the academic social referencing tools. The University Library recognized the value of the social bookmarking site Del.icio.us, but concluded that this was not optimal for academic work1. Three other academic social referencing software tools were identified and analysed. Possible advantages of these academic social referencing tools for academics are listed in the textbox below.
In order to assess the potential value of Web 2.0 applications for library services, and specifically academic social referencing tools, a user trial was set up by the University library with the members of the SNE group. Pleiade Management and Consultancy was asked to document and report the feedback from the users during the trial. The user trial was supervised by Driek van Heesakkers of the University library and Marten Hoekstra of the SNE group.
