QuestionPoint Members
1,936 Active SUPs (service unit profiles)
1,274 SUPs in the 24/7 Reference Cooperative
29 Languages can be handled by QuestionPoint libraries
6,882,337 Transactions have been received by QP libraries since 2002 (as of July 31)
3,138,658 Patrons have asked questions via libraries with QP since 2002*
30,295 New patrons asked for help via QP libraries' websites in July*
24,721 Active records in the Global Knowledge Base
524 Libraries have contributed active, searchable records to the GKB
*These numbers are lower than actual, as they do not include texting patrons or chat patrons who have not provided email addresses.
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QuestionPoint libraries are in the 33 countries listed below by region.
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Australia New Zealand --------------- China French Polynesia Japan India Thailand -------------- United Arab Emirates ---------------- Botswana South Africa -------------- France Greece Germany Italy The Netherlands Spain -------------- Republic of Ireland |
United Kingdom England Scotland Wales --------------------- Croatia Serbia Slovenia --------------- Russia ------------- Canada Mexico United States ----------------- Costa Rica Jamaica Martinique Puerto Rico Trinidad & Tabago -------------------- Chile Colombia Peru |
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QuestionPoint Statistics for July 2011
38,956 Questions received via E-mail and Text Messages
28,533 Chat sessions requested
8,154 Chat sessions requested via Qwidget
27,433 Chat sessions accepted
6,252 Chat sessions requested at non-24/7 Reference Cooperative libraries
579 Sessions requested after hours at non-24/7 Reference Cooperative libraries
50 Most concurrent chat sessions (just up 1 from last month)
15 Average concurrent chat sessions (down 2 from last month)
24/7 Reference Cooperative Statistics
67% Overall “Answering Percentage”! Cooperative libraries picked up 67% of all chat sessions, and Back Up staff picked up 31%, for a total of 98% pick-up. See Sessions Abandoned, below.
7,628 Academic sessions requested; Academic members answered 5,305 (69.5%)
14,653 Public sessions requested; Public members answered 9,593 (65.47%)
631 Sessions Abandoned (Patron disconnected before librarian picked up, may include some practice sessions)
July Questions of Note
Did you ever try searching the Global Knowledge Base when you thought you'd exhausted resources to answer a question at hand? It may still be rare that the GKB has the directanswer to the question you're researching--after all, there are numerous aspects to all areas of inquiry and except for ready-reference facts, it's unlikely that most Q&A databases will have exactly the question you're asked. But previous research in a subject area may well note a book or newspaper or journal or web site that you had not encountered before.
Browsing through the GKB recently, we decided to focus on answers contributed by the Library of Congress's Science and Technical Reports reading room. Not only are they thrown some real curiosities (Is the pinky finger fractured more than any other finger? QID 209616), but they are also often called on to answer very practical questions (What speed should one drive to obtain the best mileage? QID 209594) and to provide resources for graduate-level research (What were the contributions of the Jeep to the Allied defenses in World War II, with particular reference to Normany? QID 91706).
Over the almost 10 years since QuestionPoint's introduction, the Science and Technical Reports reading room has contributed 327 records to the Global Knowledge Base. In fact, in June 2002, the month QP was introduced, this reading room submitted a question about Bulldog vehicles. It's 327th contributed record to date is about telling the temperature by the sounds made by insects (QID 210185).
In July, 28 French-language records were made active in the GKB, 23 English-language, and 5 Spanish-language. Don't forget to submit your own answered questions, via the QuestionPoint Ask module, if you think they could be useful to others. Even if they are about local matters, they may provide just the information someone else is looking for. Editors will correct spelling and standardize the formatting for the GKB.
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