Method 9

I had difficulty finding someone I could do live chat with, but a few years ago, Bell Library participated in a pilot collaborative virtual reference project through the Texas A&M System.  I was the point person in our library for that project.  So I know what live chat is like.  College Station decided not to continue with the collaborative VR, though I believe they are offering that service locally.  Much to my surprise, during the pilot, participants frequently did not show up for their alloted time slots.  I was so careful about always being there when it was my turn to cover.  When you are trying to initiate a service, I think it's particularly important to make that service run as smoothly as possible.  We did not have lots of traffic through our VR offering!  From my conversations with other academic libraries (public libraries are a different story), they typically did not have a large amount of traffic, either.  Offering a chat service was seen as more of a PR move than anything else.  Libraries want to show they can be reached in different ways, particularly through communication channels that this generation uses constantly.  We studied the possibility of adding chat to our services.  But we decided that, until we get closer to full staffing, the degree to which the service would be used did not, as of now, justify the effort that would go into offering the service.  One of our main concerns is that we think the person staffing the chat reference should be located in an office away from the Reference Desk.  For the service to be "instant," we would want for someone to be readily available.  We have only one person at the Ref Desk on evenings, weekends, and select hours during the week.  Our first obligation is to the users who are physically present in the library.  In taking care of these folks first, the staff member at the Ref Desk would not always be able to monitor the chat reference.  We don't want people to have to wait, though.  Until we have more staff available to handle reference questions away from the desk as well as at the service point, we don't think we should try to sustain the service.  We don't think we would be able to deliver optimal service.  Some staff members may be a little reluctant to work a live reference service.  Personally, I don't think staffers should be forced to participate in VR or chat reference.  Training, also, and practice are important factors to consider.  Additionally, we also question whether we want a third party, such as Meebo, to have control of the information in these messages.  Privacy and protecting information that could be linked to specific persons are key concerns.  We also keep pretty detailed records (aggregated, not personal information) about our e-mail reference service.  Similar records would have to be kept on any chat service we offer.  The distance learning librarian already has a pretty full platter. 
Having real-time reference assistance through chat, though, is yet another way libraries can demonstrate their support of patrons!