Week 4

The Belk Library and Information Commons in Boone, NC is using Instagram as a way to promote their library by having a contest for patrons called “The Belk Library Through My Eyes”.  The instructions are easy:  1. Take an awesome Belk Library photo, 2. Upload it to Instagram, 3. Tag it #BelkLibraryContest.  The winning shot will receive a $50 University Bookstore Gift Card. 

The website lists several ideas and also has a way for patrons to vote for their favorite photo by “liking” the photo.  There are links to Instagram and quick instructions for use.  Not only are they marketing their library with this event, but they are teaching others how to use Instagram as well.  To see some of the strange, awesome, wonderful, unique, and sometimes weird photos that sometimes have nothing to do whatsoever with the library, visit http://www.library.appstate.edu/news/2013/04/enter-our-instagram-contest-and-win-50

Although you might think of instagram in a library as being a wave of the future, the Carlson Library at the University of Toledo has found a way to incorporate it with the past as well.  Visit http://mulford.utoledo.edu/carlsonblog/?p=1461 to see how they used Instagram to not only find local pictures of the past and present, but to also help bring the two together.  They call it “Local History Through the Public Eye”. 

I am especially fond on the photos that take their inspiration from the book and website by Taylor Jones called “Dear Photograph".  The pictures here come from the Toledo site, but check out the great photos also found at http://dearphotograph.com/ .