Unfortunately, it did rather scupper my plans for this weblog over the period of completing my dissertation: I started out making occasional public posts on relevant topics I thought others might find interesting, with private posts covering to-do lists and reminding myself what I'd done for the purposes of writing-up. However, once my online time was limited these activites were dropped as I used the time to carry out the research instead and keep in touch with friends and family, which I do almost entirely online nowadays.

Now there's just over three weeks left until my deadline: I'll make an effort to revive this weblog, but of course my top priority has to be writing the dissertation itself, so posts may end up being delayed somewhat!

As you may know, I'm currently studying for a Masters (postgraduate) degree in Library and Information Studies at City University in London, UK. As part of this course I am carrying out research examining people's perceptions of pop music, particularly the moods and emotions music evokes, in order to write a dissertation on the subject.

As part of this research I am carrying out an online survey, in which participants are asked to listen to samples of five songs and enter the words they feel best describe each song, both emotionally and more generally. I will also ask for some basic information about each participant (including age, gender and nationality) to allow me to see if these characteristics alter people's descriptions of pop music. Information will be presented anonymously in the submitted research results, which means no-one other than me will be able to see individual responses linked to email addresses.

The survey is estimated to take between five and twenty minutes to complete, and is likely to be online between 24th July and 14th August. If you are interested in taking part in this survey, please email me at e.a.speller @ city.ac.uk (removing spaces from the address) using the email address you would prefer to be contacted with, and I will send you an invitation to take part as soon as the survey is online. If I am in the fortunate position of having more volunteers than are needed to carry out the research, I will pick respondents at random. Volunteers completing the survey will be given the option of receiving summary results of the research after its completion in mid to late September.

Thanks in advance!

Edited 23/7/2007: I no longer need volunteers as I completed my research last September - thank you to those who responded! The email address in this post is no longer valid as City Uni helpfully cut off students six months after they finish courses (with no email forwarding to soften the blow) - if you need to contact me, please either leave a comment on the blog or e-mail blogATedithspellerDOTcoDOTuk.

How about "CILIP: showing librarians aren't mean, sad, peculiar or petty-minded"? (see yesterday's Notes and Queries in the Guardian's G2, which unfortunately aren't online yet.)