HowTo: Blog for PLA

Many of the emails of interest I’ve received about our Call for Bloggers for the ALA Annual conference have asked, “What does blogging for PLA entail?” Here’s the basics on how PLA blogs conferences, and how you can be involved.

Who can be a PLA conference blogger?
As you might expect, our preference is for public librarians. However, if you are a Friend, trustee, paraprofessional, a library school student, or even a library volunteer who is attending the conference, we’d like to add your diverse perspectives to the mix.

Do conference bloggers need to have a blog, or previous blogging experience?
No, and no. Not only are we into diversification of perspectives, we also like to offer conference blogging as an entry-level experience to the uninitiated. Our blog is powered by WordPress, which is easy to use, and we try to get people set up far enough in advance to answer questions or concerns. I’m even working on setting up a private, practice blog for newbies to help them ramp up on their posting skills before the conference, if they need it.

What do you want bloggers to cover?
Our focus is on the entire conference experience with public librarians in mind, so we encourage our conference bloggers to cover preconference workshops, sessions, meetings, lunches, dinners, receptions, interviews, with pictures, text, and audio recordings (we often podcast interviews and recordings of PLA-sponsored sessions). You can even cover sessions and events sponsored by other divisions, if you can make them relevant to public librarians somehow. We do have a few limitations, which are outlined in the guidelines each conference blogger should read before getting started, but otherwise, it’s pretty open.

How many posts are required of each conference blogger?
This is really up to each conference blogger, since we have no official minimum or cap. We like to see at least one post per day from each blogger, to encourage timely conference reporting, but if a blogger decides to save up their content and post them all on the same day at the end, that’s OK, too.

Is there a required length for posts?
No. The key to good blog posts is content that is easy to read on the screen, which usually comes down to clearly written short prose and a wise use of bullet points (taking a nod from Jakob Nielsen). A post can be as simple as a picture with a caption, or as involved as a 6 paragraph mini-essay. For examples, check out our archives.

When do conference bloggers start writing?
Conference bloggers can begin with their introductory post as soon as they start traveling to the conference, if they want, since part of the conference flavor is documenting the journey to and from the meeting. Conference bloggers also have 1 week from the end of the conference to post any wrap-up content, since we know that the conference is fast and furious, and some content just waits until bloggers arrive home.

This totally sounds doable. How do I sign up?
Use the Contact Us link on the PLA Blog site to send us your name, your title, your library/organization, your email address, and your blog URL (if you have one). You’ll receive information on how to proceed from there.

Hope this enlightens the mystery that is conference blogging for PLA, and encourages you to take the plunge and give it a try!