Barbara Fister recently posted an article on the ACRLog that was called Creepy Treehouse. It discusses an interesting concept that’s being used in the technological realms to describe a certain type of technology use/setting.

A creepy treehouse is a place built by scheming adults to lure in kids. Kids tend to sense there’s something creepy about that treehouse and avoid it. Hence, a new definition: “Any institutionally-created, operated, or controlled environment in which participants are lured in either by mimicking pre-existing open or naturally formed environments, or by force, through a system of punishments or rewards.”

It’s an interesting take on that vaguely unsettled response we sometimes get from students when we try to be too cool, try too hard to seem fun and playful, when we make familiar toys unpalatably “educational.” Setting up an outpost in an attractive playspace with an ulterior motive is just . . . creepy.

Please visit the ACRLog and read her full article. It’s quite insightful and applicable in today’s “Library 2.0″ environment.