Striving for a balance between economic development and environmental protection is an ambitious goal requiring sufficient information on the part of all actors. Public libraries can play an important role in acting as promoters of knowledge on environmental sustainability. The researchers analysed the status of German public libraries and their efforts towards a sustainable society. We considered the libraries’ collections and created a questionnaire, asking librarians to evaluate the current situation in their library. The results show that many libraries promote environmental sustainability by highlighting books and other media on several subtopics through special conventions or shelves. Energy meters were the most frequently mentioned tools provided to sensitize to the topic. Furthermore, libraries organize several information events. Therefore, partnerships with other organizations and schools are of utmost importance. Beside these efforts, there is still more potential to promote environmental sustainability. Often, the lack of budget and personnel poses a challenge.

In this paper we present a preliminary altmetric study of scientific bloggers and how they use different social media (i.e. blogs, social bookmarking systems, and Twitter) for scholarly communication, information dissemination, and creation of visibility. We analyzed linking behavior in blog posts and tweets, number of comments assigned to blog posts and share of publications found in social bookmarking systems. Results show that heavy tweeting and blogging do not result in large numbers of followers and comments, tweets and blog posts contain lots of URLs and self-citations, and share of publications found in social bookmarking systems varies between different platforms.

Das effektive Suchen, Finden und Nutzen sowie das Erstellen und Indexieren von Informationen wird mit der zunehmenden Masse an Publikationen und Medien zu einer notwendigen Fähigkeit im 21. Jahrhundert. Diese Informationskompetenz wird nicht mehr nur von Information Professionals wie Bibliothekaren, sondern von allen Teilnehmern der Wissensgesellschaft erwartet. In dieser Arbeit werden die Fähigkeiten, die eine informationskompetente Person besitzen sollte, in einem Kriterienkatalog zusammen getragen. Um den Stand der Informationskompetenz unter Schülern, Studierenden, Lehrern und Wissenschaftler testen zu können, wurden zielgruppenspezifische Multiple-Choice-Fragebogen entwickelt, die das Wissen der jeweiligen Probanden im Gebiet der Informationskompetenz erfassen. Deskriptoren: Informationskompetenz, Kennwert, Ermittlung, FragebogenAssessing information literacy using multiple-choice questionnaires Due to the increasing amount of publications and media, searching, finding, using, generating and indexing information have become necessary skills in the 21 st century. This information literacy is no longer expected only of information professionals like librarians but of every participant of the knowledge society. This work presents skills, an information literate person should possess. To assess the level of information literacy among pupils, students, teachers and scientists, target-group specific questionnaire have been designed to test their knowledge in terms of information literacy.Descriptors: information literacy, questionnaires, indicators, assessing information literacy Mesurer la maîtrise de l'information au moyen de questionnaires à choix multiples En regard de l'augmentation de la masse des publications et des médias, rechercher d'une façon efficace, trouver, utiliser et indexer l'information correctement deviennent des compétences nécessaires au 21e siècle. Cette maîtrise de l'information est attendue, non seulement des professionnels de l'information tels que les bibliothé-caires, mais de tous les participants de la société de la connaissance. Dans cette étude, l'ensemble des compé-tences qu'une personne maîtrisant l'information devrait posséder, sont rassemblées dans un catalogue de critè-res. Pour tester le niveau de maîtrise de l'information entre élèves, étudiants, enseignants et chercheurs, des questionnaires ciblés à choix multiples ont été dévelop-pés afin de recenser les connaissances des participants respectifs dans le domaine de la maîtrise de l'information.Descripteurs: maîtrise de l'information, indicateur caractéristique, enquête, questionnaire

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Participatory smartphone apps empower citizens to interact with the city's administration. The purpose of this case study is to investigate the current state of participatory apps in Germany. Within this study, we examined 248 applications aimed at strengthening citizen participation. These apps were found in Google Playstore and Apple Appstore using search terms extracted from the relevant literature. Many of the apps give users the opportunity to report problems within their cities, such as broken street lamps or potholes. The information created and disseminated by the citizens through the app mainly includes the topics “mobility” and “environment.” Information provided by the city itself is much more diverse. Topics such as “Points of Interest,” “News and Events,” “Government” or “City Services” can be identified here. In the southern part of Germany, there is a significantly larger number of municipalities which have a citizen participation app. None of the apps examined uses gamification, although the use of game elements is very promising to foster the engagement and motivation of citizens.