Cover image from “Legends of the DC Universe” #10 ™ and © DC Comics (www.dccomics.com). Used with Permission.
What do superheroes and information professionals have in common? One famous example is Barbara Gordon, librarian and all around information wiz by day, crime fighting Batgirl by night. You’re probably a superhero with superpowers too. Don’t believe it? Take the ‘Superhero Quiz’ and find out now!
Superhero Quiz
1. When someone in the staff lunchroom mentions ‘metadata’ do you
A. Lose concentration and drop your mashed potatoes
B. Look confused, you thought it was called ‘meta-data’
C. Think you’ve found a kindred spirit and Yay! someone who’ll understand your geeky jargon
2. When your CIO says ‘storage is cheap, why don’t we keep everything – FOREVER!’ do you say:
A. ‘Whatever’ – you’ve kept all your emails for ten years in your .PST file anyway
B. ‘Sure’ – the price is dropping constantly and it keeps you in work backing it all up
C. ‘And have the Earth (and probably Mars too) covered in data centres gobbling up power just to keep all the useless information that just might come in handy one day? – and don’t even mention the .PST files that everyone is keeping that will land us in it if we get a subject access request and then there’s the interminable backup routines that take all night to run and one day might just take longer and jeopardise our operations….Aaargh!’
3. When you think about the Cloud do you:
A. Think of silver linings
B. Think you’ll lose your job
C. Get an intense headache; you thought email was tough to manage but WowieKazowie!! the Cloud will be a rollercoaster ride to hell if not handled properly
4. When you talk about ‘disposition’ you mean:
A. You’ve just changed your mood on Facebook to ‘happy’
B. You’ve just changed your mood on Facebook to ‘tired’
C. Getting rid of useless information so the organisation is compliant, mitigating its risk, becoming more cost effective and, of course, saving the Earth (or Mars) from being covered in power gobbling data centres. Klonnkk!
5. On Twitter you’re following:
A. Grumpy Cat
B. Grumpy Cat and The Register
C. Grumpy Cat, The Register and KaBoom!! Mark Merifield
6. When you hear yet another bad news story about information breaches, lost data, and hidden files do you:
A. Quickly move on to something much more entertaining like…the latest Grumpy Cat tweet!
B. Get cold sweats because everyone thinks it’s your sole responsibility to make sure this doesn’t happen at your place of work
C. Resolve to convince your IT colleagues that working together will reduce the risk of this happening at your place of work. KerPOW!!
7. When you hear that during a debate in the Lords, Lord Prescott spoke about the importance of labelling files do you:
A. Lose concentration and drop your mashed potatoes
B. Look confused – surely files label themselves?!
C. Feel proud – you are the frontline of transparency and preserving our nation’s collective memory. BAM!!
Now find out how you’ve scored. If you’ve answered mainly
A. You are lucky because although you might be expected to manage your own information at work, you’re not responsible for making sure everyone else can and does the same with theirs (see B and C below).
B. You are an IT professional. Get in touch with your IM colleagues (see C below) because they will make your life easier.
C. Congratulations – you are a superhero! Give yourself a pat on the back, take off that bat costume and get back to work – it’s not getting any easier being an information professional but – Holy search engine Batman!! – it’s definitely worth it. Just like that.
…you don’t have a wikipage but you do have this!!