Creative Librarian » Library Links

Library Links

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Where they stand: Obama, McCain on the issues: FYIPolitics | Where they stand: Obama, McCain on the issues | Seattle Times Newspaper
A look at where Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain stand on a selection of issues as they go head-to-head for the presidency

Saturday, April 14, 2007

OPAC Survey results: OPAC Survey results - part 1 » “Self-plagiarism is style”
OPAC Survey results - part 2 » “Self-plagiarism is style”

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

LibrarianInBlack: LibraryThing for Libraries (w00t!)

Tim Spalding, the creator of LibraryThing, has given a sneak preview of a version of LibraryThing just for libraries. I can’t wait to see this puppy in action, real-time. From the explanation of how it works:
LibraryThing for Libraries is composed of a series of widgets, designed to enhance library [...]

Saturday, March 31, 2007

NYT changes, back-dates article after Wikipedia fact-checkers find error

Boing Boing: NYT changes, back-dates article after Wikipedia fact-checkers find error

Sometime yesterday, the entire last section of the NYT article, which (according to the NYT website) was NYT’s most emailed article for the last two days, was changed …
No letter or correction has been issued, however, calling attention to this error.
It [...]

Friday, March 23, 2007

I’ve been meme’d

I can’t help myself. It’s the 5 sites not related to libraries meme.

I think someone got the Daily Puppy but I don’t remember anyone doing Cute Overload. Because mornings suck less when they start with a smile.
There has been a lot said about the “mommy-bloggers” but I consider them contemporary diarists whose autobiographies I don’t [...]

Thursday, March 15, 2007

It’s about our jobs too: It’s about trust, reliability, accuracy …
Stacy on Web4Lib found one of her vendors giving her bad usage stats. When she called them on it, she was told it was a “known problem” and they would “hide” the bad data from her. It’s not even the only vendor that’s given her bad stats this year!
As an [...]

Sunday, March 11, 2007

If you build it, will they come?: If you build it, will they come? (part 2) » “Self-plagiarism is style”
Even with the least used tweaks, there’s more than enough usage to justify the development time, so I’m extremely happy with the graphs.
Usability tweaks are worth implementing.

Thursday, March 8, 2007

And another thing…: T. Scott: Librarians Unbound
…Librarians need to free themselves from the tyranny of the library. This is hard, I know. All of us in the field, to one degree or another, love libraries and feel emotionally bound to them. But they are only a means. Libraries don’t do anything — librarians do.
heehee

You must read Dear Library of Congress…: ALA TechSource | Dear Library of Congress…
It is both ironic and poignant that librarians are still worrying about “bibliographic control,” after ceding so much of the same to the companies that now rent them journal access per annum at usurious rates, digitize their book collections into DRM obscurity, or sell them ponderous, antiquated “management” systems [...]

Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Ten Tech Trends for Librarians 2007: Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology: Ten Tech Trends for Librarians 2007
So here’s this year’s list, with a new name: “Trends” instead of “Things.” Sure it puts a finer point on it but it also recognizes the changes in my thinking about the essential duties of librarians:
Learn to Learn
Adapt to Change
Scan the Horizon
As we carry [...]

Monday, February 19, 2007

Can we have it both ways?: It’s an issue that keeps coming up peripherally but never seems to be addressed head on. There was something at Christmas I think but I got distracted by other worries then and now it’s come up again in The Decimal Divide by Joshua and even in Christopher’s “addition of beauty products to a porcine companion” [...]

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Does distance learning have to be like this?: Basically, anyone who is thinking of getting a graduate degree online needs to read this post with the comments.
It describes my own experience much better than I ever have. Online learning really does change from teacher to teacher.
There was one class that was wonderful because the professor could somehow read the text chat while he [...]

Thursday, February 1, 2007

ILS Data Series: ILS Data Series
I’m not trying to cover many details, provide spec sheets or serve as comparison shopping. I’m just documenting some ILS users’ experiences using their data to see what the landscape looks like.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

SOPAC

Just linking to the original post and some of the responses for my own memory.

blyberg.net » AADL.org Goes Social
the goblin in the library » Sucking the Suck out of OPACs
LibrarianInBlack: AADL goes social
Superpatron - Friends of the Library, for the net: Ann Arbor District Library adds patron tagging, rating of items
SOPAC, 4 days later

Now [...]

Tuesday, December 5, 2006

How to Build a User Community: Creating Passionate Users: How to Build a User Community, Part 1 [online]
Much more difficult than it sounds.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Library Juice » The real reason students like Google better than our databases: Library Juice » The real reason students like Google better than our databases
The real reason undergrads like Google is that it gives them more reading material that they are actually able to understand. And this is not a reflection on our students’ intelligence or general preparedness - it goes for the brightest of our undergrads. [...]

Friday, August 25, 2006

Tooting MPOW’s horn: The library where I work has been doing our best to move into the future. This summer with a redesigned website and not one, not two, but three new blogs! (The third one is internal.) We’ll also be trying IM reference shortly.
What prompted this post is the latest way we’ve drawn attention to [...]

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Librarians at the Gates

Librarians at the Gates

Courage, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. And in an era of increasing controls on the gathering and dissemination of information, many Americans are unaware of the courageous stands librarians take every day.
The day-to-day challenges librarians face are inherent in the job description: defending access to controversial or banned [...]

Monday, August 21, 2006

OPAC Blog Posts - A List: Life as I Know It » Blog Archive » OPAC Blog Posts - A List is very comprehensive for anyone needing an overview or a more in-depth look at the discussion.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

The Final Chorus: The Days & Nights of the Lipstick Librarian!: It’s A Man’s World-The Final Chorus
For whatever reason I still cannot quite articulate, men seem to be able to set aside (or sidestep entirely) mundane issues and do some serious navel-gazing. Add to it the fact that technology has always been a male bastion and what do [...]

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Why Libraries are Important: 2 Cents Worth » Why Libraries are Important
When the child graduates, the teacher will be gone. The classroom will be gone. The textbooks will be gone. But for the first time in history, continual learning will be the ONLY road to prosperity. Teacher and classroom as the model for continual learning will be meaningless. [...]

Ten Rules for New Librarians: Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology: Ten Rules for the New Librarians

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Yes, OPACs suck. Now what?

blyberg.net » OPACs in the frying pan, Vendors in the fire
A Wandering Eyre » OPACs (everyone together now) SUCK
Rethink the role of the library catalog | TechEssence.Info

The topic of catalogs has come up again (Does it ever really leave?). And they’re thinking about redesigning it according to what it’s actually used for. Personally, I [...]

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Casey Bisson on Web Services: Information Wants To Be Free » Blog Archive » Casey Bisson speaks! We all should listen.
And while I was not particularly sad to see my stunningly inadequate description of Web services go by the wayside, I was very sad that people would not have the opportunity to read Casey’s insights into why our systems [...]

Tuesday, May 9, 2006

“Unshelved Interview”: LISNews.org | No snickering in the library, unless you’re hooked on “Unshelved”
The guys behind “Unshelved” are interviewed by the Seattle Times. It’s great.

Thursday, May 4, 2006

Book Quote

Treasures, those old ones,murmured Hal in Erde’s ear. Keepers of the knowledge, scholars, librarians.

The Book of Earth, Marjorie B. Kellogg. Daw 1995.

Thursday, April 27, 2006

On getting staff members to buy into a new technology: On getting staff members to buy into a new technology | TechEssence.Info
I broke every one of these rules in the same project. Needless to say, it failed miserably.

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Story time for Grown-Ups: LISNews.org | Story time for Grown-Ups
As an adult with no children, I don’t find much at the public libraries to interest me. Adult-oriented programs may be increasingly important as life-spans lengthen and others also put off starting families. Children are the voters of the future but we’re missing out on a broad spectrum of [...]

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Save the Internet

Save the Internet

Congress is pushing a law that would abandon the Internet’s First Amendment — a principle called “Network neutrality” that prevents companies like AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from deciding which Web sites work best for you — based on what site pays them the most. Your local library shouldn’t have to outbid Barnes [...]

Payitforward: WebHome < Payitforward < TWiki
So what I am proposing is that if you want to try this experiment put your name in the ring with the area you would like to cover. I really like the philosphy that there is always someone that knows more than you. I am hoping that the reverse is true [...]

Blogging Libraries Wiki

Welcome to the Blogging Libraries Wiki - Blogging Libraries
Some of you may remember the links page I maintained for libraries with blogs. Well, that page was becoming a bit difficult to maintain and I thought it would be nice if people could simply add their own links to library blogs, so this wiki was born!

Soon [...]

Thursday, April 20, 2006

Making a Sandbox: Sandboxes are invaluable for trying out new technology. I miss mine *sigh*.

Wednesday, March 29, 2006

manybooks.net: manybooks.net - Free eBooks for your PDA
All of the 13,313 eBooks available here are free!

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

New journal: Evidence Based Library and Information Practice is OA and looks really interesting but having the articles in PDF only is going to cut into their readership. Who has time (or patience) to wait for a download of an article you’re not sure you really want?

How to lose a techie

Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology: Make a New Plan, Stan: More Ways to lose Your Techie Folks
You must read all of these. Many of them are going to be familiar to everyone, techie or not. And if I might add my own …

Support your techies’ ideas for bringing the library forward, but not [...]

Wednesday, March 1, 2006

Google replaces Thomson

The citation rankings from Science Citation Index are practically a requirement for university tenure these days. But the datqabase is so expensive that most libraries have to search on a for-fee basis. I did one recently that was $30 for 6 citations to one article.
Google Scholar service matches Thomson ISI citation index

The free [...]

Let us help

metaProjects » Blog Archive » Don’t need no stinkin’ proposal

My profession in general (hereinafter MPIG) hasn’t quite figured out what to do with its young professionals. It wants to harness our creativity, expertise, and energy, but isn’t quite ready to entrust us with actual decisions. Thus, lower-middle managers in MPIG who would like [...]

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Brain Exercise: Creating Passionate Users: Brain death by dull cubicle
Experiencing and learning new things is literally exercise for the brain!
… dull and/or stressful work environments with low stimulation suppress neurogenesis, which means less or no new brain cells.

Friday, February 17, 2006

Aquabrowser: Christina’s LIS Rant: Everyone wowed about NCSU, how about HCPL’s Aquabrowser implementation?
She’s right that I haven’t seen it anywhere else. She’s also right that it rocks. I was browsing through the alternate terms like I was a tag person ;-). I’d love to sit behind a regular patron and see how it worked for them.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

Ways to Improve the Sex Life of Your OPAC: Library Web Chic » Blog Archive » Lipstick on a Pig: & Ways to Improve the Sex Life of Your OPAC
More great opac ideas.

Playlist: Libraries turning to iPods and iTunes: Playlist: Libraries turning to iPods and iTunes
A nice piece about the troubles libraries are having with digital media.

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Social Opacs?: blyberg.net » If you build it…
Our users are smart, clever, interesting, positive, intuitive, and social. They may not know it yet, but they’re waiting for their public libraries to be a catalyst for the community. There is something wonderfully special and intimate about shared experience–that is why Web 2.0 is so successful. When those [...]

Friday, February 10, 2006

KISS or not to KISS: K.I.S.S.
But is simplicity what librarianship is all about? Is our job to present the complex world of information searching as something so simple a baby can do it? And, is doing so ultimately a good marketing strategy? I don’t think so.In fact, marketing in this way could harm the profession. After all, if we strive [...]

Thursday, February 9, 2006

The Good in Library 2.0: Steve Lawson on Library 2.0
Steve and Michael do a great job of getting to the real point of the Library 2.0 ideal. It has nothing to do with the technology (That isn’t going to stop changing for a while.). It’s all about revising our attitudes towards ourselves, our patrons and our jobs.

Monday, February 6, 2006

The Laughing Librarian: Carnival time! Go check out the great links.

Thursday, February 2, 2006

The Value of Middle Men: Earlier this week, I was contacted seperately by a faculty member and an IT guy about the same issue. The teacher’s department had bought access to a database. Thus far registration had been complicated for the students and the teacher was anxious to streamline the process. He apparently contacted the IT guy directly and IT [...]

Thursday, January 26, 2006

5 Factors for User Centered Services: Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology: 5 Factors for User Centered Services
Words to live by.

Monday, January 23, 2006

Hippocrates: Open Access News
Hippocrates is a new, free medical search engine specializing in deep-web content intelligible to lay readers. For more details, see this story about it from today’s issue of The Hindu.
I tried it and was impressed by the results.

In-house tech: LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Library services and in-house software development
Ah, you say, I don’t need to know about these things because I have vendors supply this for me. Yes, that might be true, but such an approach to the situation is expensive in terms of time. It is not possible for third party [...]

Friday, January 13, 2006

Open Access News: Open Access News
Infotrieve, Inc., today announced that it had converted ArticleFinder, its online scientific, technical, and medical (STM) database with more than 26 million citations and eight million abstracts from over 54,000 journals, to a free access model. The move provides scientists and researchers, who work for corporations and are subject to different copyright regulations [...]

Sunday, January 8, 2006

information overload?: LISNews.org | Are we set for information overload?
As books get digitized and TV shows get downloadable, will it be too much? Maybe! Will all this instantly accessible information make us much smarter, or simply more stressed? When can we break to think, absorb and ponder all this data? It may take better technology to cope [...]

Thursday, December 22, 2005

Clam Chowder: Carnival of the Infosciences #18: Clam Chowder: Carnival of the Infosciences #18
I made it into the carnival again!

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

ILS Customer Bill-of-Rights: ILS Customer Bill-of-Rights
Let me use RSS as an example. RSS 1.0 was born December 2000. RSS 2.0 in September 2002. It’s almost 2006 and ILS vendors are just now starting to unveil some RSS feeds. We shouldn’t be treating those announcements like watershed moments. They’re tidbits of “too-little-too-late” packaged in shiny wrappers, served with a [...]

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

V VRD Conference

Thanks to the VRD Conference Blog and Librarian in Black, there is plenty of information for those of us who weren’t able to attend the Virtual Reference Desk Conference.

IPL’s Model for Kids Questions
Training & Education Track session
Federal Library Collaborative VR Project

Evaluation of a Chat Reference Service from the User’s Perspective
IM Working with Trillian
r u there? [...]

Tuesday, November 8, 2005

Alluring lattes (and more!): Library Marketing-Thinking Outside the Book: Alluring lattes (and more!)
Our coffee shop opened Monday and it’s already very popular. We already have the most popular computer lab on campus (with the oldest computers…) and wifi. Now we just need the new website. (I’m working on it).

Monday, October 31, 2005

Stantunes

Stanford launches iTunes service
Stanford has launched an iTunes-based service for downloading news, lectures, and related material.

Now that’s shifted!

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Internet Librarian: List of Notes

Thanks to the dedicated (obsessed?) bloggers at IL there is a plethera of information out for those of use stuck at home. Below is a list of some I expect to need in the near future.

Expert Panel—Tips for Keeping Up (Limit your information intake and make it more efficient)
::schwagbag::: Internet Librarian :: Day 1 [...]

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

30 search tips in 40 minutes: internet librarian 05: 30 search tips in 40 minutes. List of all 30.
I’m so jealous of those who got to go. Maybe next year.

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

Tips For Keeping Up: As busy as we all are and as many great sources of library information as there are it can get overwhelming. If you keep up with the Carnival of the InfoSciences and This Week in LibraryBlogland (now with feeds!) , you’ll get a good overview.

Thursday, October 13, 2005

What we are

I have seen the enemy, and she is me.
That’s just how librarians are - beneath our buns, or our mohawks, or our seven veils, we are all fierce-hearted fighters for intellectual freedom. And we always have been.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen it expressed this well.

Tuesday, October 4, 2005

digitalwatch.org

digitalwatch.org contains articles and other items related to Digital Libraries written/produced by members of the LIS2901 Digital Libraries Seminar within the School of Information Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh.

Interesting information. Here is the same site without the annoying ad frame.

Monday, September 26, 2005

My First Librarian Story: I’m lying on a table in the ER, both in pain and drugged to the gills and the tech drawing my blood wants to know if we a have a particular book in the library.

Friday, September 16, 2005

I did it again: Carnival Time.
The carnival has been good for me. It gives me a reason to write more essay type posts even though I’m really busy at work.

Thursday, September 15, 2005

ColLib

I [Magnus Enger] have created colLib - a prototype of a system for organizing and finding documents that are available in Open Access repositories:

Harvesting and tagging of open access library and information science articles, complete with a meta-search function!

Friday, September 9, 2005

National ID cards don’t fight crime: Boing Boing: UK Criminologist: National ID cards don’t fight crime
The more we try to fix ID on one person, the more information we demand from each person to identify them. But the more personal information that is available, the more vulnerable it is to being appropriated by fraudsters, she says.

Wednesday, August 31, 2005

The Tagomatic: The Tagomatic - Have You Tagged It?
It’s like Amazon reccomendations on a wider scale. Valuable for those classic reference questions.

Thursday, August 25, 2005

A Change in Attitude?: MPOW has guests fill out a short form when they use one of the computers (students, faculty and staff have their own accounts). I just signed in a new freshman and on my way back to the desk I saw him actually reading the form. It just struck me as strange because at his age [...]

Monday, August 15, 2005

Carnival Time: I ran off and joined the Carnival!

Thursday, August 4, 2005

PDAs

The Library in the Palm of Your Hand: PDAs - LJ Tech Blog - Blog on LibraryJournal.com - 670000067

The Library in the Palm of Your Hand(PDAs) compiled by Sue Searing is now available on the web as a UI Current Awareness Clip. She has selected and annotated articles on a variety of topics related [...]

Friday, July 29, 2005

Provide assistance to lawyers working for freedom

Boing Boing: Geeks: provide technical assistance to lawyers working for freedom
EFF is starting a mailing-list pool for geeks willing to render technical assistance to lawyers working on worthy cases

Although it’s for Geeks, this would be a good place for librarians to contribute.

Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Sharing Bad: Cutting Through - helping you to cut through the information and technology clutter » Five Reasons People Don’t Tell What They Know
Been there, done that. The article has the distinct ring of Truth.

Monday, July 18, 2005

The Librarian Effect: ★ The Joy of Tech! ★
Just because it’s amusing.

Monday, June 27, 2005

LITA posts

Lots of great posts from conferences to read.

LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Top Tech Trends - Sunday
LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Leo Klein’s Top Technology Trends

LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Karen’s Uber-Trend

Thursday, June 23, 2005

Good LITA articles

LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Sarah Houghton’s Top Technology Trends
LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Marshall Breeding’s Top Technology Trends
LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Thomas Dowling’s Non-Trends From The Trailing Edge

Definately thought provoking.

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Welcome to the LITA Blog: LITA Blog » Blog Archive » Welcome to the LITA Blog
ALA Annual is coming up and we’re planning to blog LITA programs and other events of interest to the library technology community. We also have handy links here to ALA, LITA, and the ALA Annual official site and unofficial conference wiki.
Cool.

Thursday, June 2, 2005

So much to do

In an attempt to get my unread list in mt aggregator down to something managable, I present the inevitable link list (annotated because some librarians are born, not made).

ALA | Patriot Act Extension Debated at Closed Congressional Meeting

In a closed-door meeting May 26, the Senate Intelligence Committee failed to agree on a proposal that would [...]

AL Online News Feed: AL Online News Feed

Wednesday, May 4, 2005

Free Biomedical Literature Resources: Free Biomedical Literature Resources lists places that you can get free access to medical literature. PubMed is the National Library of Medicine’s online database that includes Medline. PubMed Central is an open access repository, also hosted by NLM. These resources contain information written for medical professionals and can be difficult to understand. Information written [...]

Monday, May 2, 2005

Tallahassee library promotes new sense of community

PLA Blog - The Official Blog of the Public Library Association:Tallahassee library promotes new sense of community

Today’s library has changed, and the one-year-old Fort Braden branch is no exception. The branch sports a new gray and white exterior and the interior is designed for comfort, making it the place to stop by even if you’re [...]

Monday, April 11, 2005

library digital resources 101: PLA Blog - The Official Blog of the Public Library Association
This article is an excellent library digital resources 101 short piece, describing how patrons can access these resources through their local library, as well as an overview of a few select sources.

Tuesday, March 29, 2005

Library Journal: Library Journal - Everything I Need To Know I Learned Online
Online communities can help librarians save time, establish professional links, and reconnect with the roots of the profession

Tuesday, March 22, 2005

Edward Vielmetti

Edward Vielmetti Hears From His Library…and he Blogs It

I’m sure Edward was a big library user before he got this e-mail, but now he will probably be a bigger one now. Plus, he’ll tell his friends about what his library is doing with RSS. Can you say free PR?

Friday, March 18, 2005

Building Communities in the Palm of your Hand: Building Communities in the Palm of your Hand discusses the ways libraries can become more pda/smartphone friendly, and therefore more user friendly.
This is particularly an important subject for health sciences libraries. PDA’s are very popular with doctors and when they need information they want it immediately with as little trouble as possible. My library [...]

Sunday, March 6, 2005

ITI-InfoCentral.com: Peter Scott’s Library Blog
ITI-InfoCentral.com is the new digital archive of Information Today, Inc. Search, browse, preview and purchase from over 25,000 full-text news reports, articles, interviews, and critical reviews about the companies, products and people in the library, electronic information services, and digital content industries. ITI-InfoCentral.com links to ITI’s archives, from September 1987 to the [...]

Sunday, February 27, 2005

ongoing · Real Information Retrieval: ongoing · Real Information Retrieval
Summary: find a Real Librarian
Good publicity.

iPods for Libraries

Library Stuff
Free Range Librarian: iPods are imPure, Too

Is it good, is it bad?
It’s a tool that will let libraries circulate digital materials more easily. Yes the drm sucks but it’s also why the copyright owners will allow the circulation.

Tuesday, February 22, 2005

Upgrade your users: Creating Passionate Users: Upgrade your users, not just your product

Tuesday, January 25, 2005

You’ve got to be kidding: LibraryTechtonics: Libraries in Philly managed by library assistants *instead of* librarians
My SO’s response, “It’s like trying to operate a hospital with nothing but nurses.”
Forgive me for forgetting who originated the idea, but it looks like the ALA does indeed need to start certifying libraries for standards of service.

Friday, January 7, 2005

Maslow: In Information Wants To Be Free » Maslow and library technology, Meredith gives her view of the tech needs pyramid

Wednesday, January 5, 2005

tech needs pyramid

walking paper: tech needs pyramid
Below is a diagram illustrating the levels of technology needs for libraries. Just as in Maslow’s scale, those at the base are core, essential needs that must be met for survival. As we look up the pyramid, we see technologies that can be considered higher functions.

It’s an interesting method of sifting [...]

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

knowledge management and librarianship

knowledge management and librarianship is both a blog and a series of articles contained therein. It’s an interesting set of essays complete with references.

knowledge management and librarianship: Part 1
KM and LIS: part2
KM and LIS: part3
KM and LIS: part4
KM and LIS: part5

Thursday, October 21, 2004

J Med Libr Assoc: The October issue of The Journal of the American Library Association has several articles of interest to electronic medical librarians. And it is provided open-access through Pubmed Central

Friday, October 15, 2004

OA Library Journals

Via an email list, a list of open-access, peer-reviewed and indexed library journals.

Information Research
Library Philosophy and Practice
LIBRES Library and Information Science Research Electronic Journal

Tuesday, October 5, 2004

The American Institute for Health Education: The American Institute for Health Education (AIHE) is a non-profit corporation whose mission is to put “medical research articles into the hands of patients and their families.” AIHE will provide citations by email or full-text photocopies by snail mail. Clients with access to a good research library –or a lode of OA literature– might only [...]

Wednesday, September 29, 2004

Digital Libraries: September’s JoDI: Journal of Digital Information is all about digital libraries with several interesting articles.

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Identity

…realize about the librarian stereotype. Every human trait has a valuable and a less-functional face to it. We tend to talk about the librarian stereotype strictly in terms of its undesirable aspects. But it is related to our strengths as librarians also - to our thoughtfulness, our focus, our desire to help.
Library Juice 7:18

Very thought-provoking.

Friday, September 3, 2004

OPAC (Non)Evolution: First, read Users Trump Library Vendors Again! >The Shifted Librarian
It’s true libraries have limited resources, but they already have a vendor for their catalog, and that vendor should be the one leading the way.� Libraries must begin demanding these types of services from the vendors. It’s crazy to see users writing code to compensate for [...]

Thursday, September 2, 2004

OCLC Repository: OCLC Research Publications Repository contains works produced, sponsored, or submitted by OCLC Research. In general, the works are research-oriented and are in the subject area of library and information science. Many items describe OCLC Research projects, activities, and programs and were originally published by OCLC, while others are from peer-reviewed scholarly journals
Peter Scott’s Library Blog

Thursday, August 26, 2004

Mybrarians: I saved TechnoBiblio: More mybrarian thoughts…. until I had the time to really read it . And I’m glad I did. The concept of a “mybrarian” as well as the real life Radical Reference team are exactly the kinds of things creative librarians should be doing. Libraries were created when all information was in [...]

Sunday, August 15, 2004

Topic Maps: Dorothea presents tech and information topics in an understandable way. Now that she’s started library school, the combination is particularly suitable for this site’s readers.
Caveat Lector Topic maps and libraries is the latest offering.

Wednesday, July 14, 2004

Measuring Value: TechnoBiblio: Grappling with changes in measuring our value makes a good point about the fact that the way libraries have traditionally measured the value of their services didn’t work too well before and are almost completely worthless now.
What the patrons at my (research/academic) library want most is to be able to search for sources and [...]

Tuesday, June 22, 2004

Guilty!: Some good points. We can’t get so wrapped up in what we’re doing wrong that we forget what we’re doing right.
Often I hear the mantra that libraries should be more like businesses. While it is true that we can learn things from the public sector, they have much to learn from us. I wish my [...]

Monday, May 10, 2004

Cheap Tech Solutions: Tame the Web: Technology and Libraries: 10 Things A Library Can Do to Boost their Techie Stuff*
(*without breaking the bank)
Well worth a quick look for some great pointers. My library ranked surprisingly high.

Thursday, May 6, 2004

LJ

A couple of interesting articles from the May Library Journal

Born with the Chip

Given that the average librarian is a Boomer and over 50, there is a gap of one to two generations between most of the profession and a growing group of our primary users, whom we all need to understand in order to serve [...]

Wednesday, April 28, 2004

PAC Funding: TechnoBiblio: Funding model for public access computing (and library operations in general)
Funding for technology (or books or staff or training) is obviously hard to come by these days. When I think about skills that I picked up in library school around marketing services and budgeting for them, I am generally left with a pretty [...]

Friday, April 16, 2004

Don’t forget the older online users: TechnoBiblio: Don’t forget the older online users
While we often talk about the younger generation and how their expectations will/are changing how libraries provide services, remember that there is also a large base of users who, once they get online, are just as enthusiastic about technology as the younger generation. And as technology matures, it [...]

Sunday, April 4, 2004

MP3 Books

The Shifted Librarian has a couple of encouraging posts up about the circulation of audiobooks in MP3 format in Illinois libraries.

They Like Them - They Really, Really Like Them
ListenIllinois Successful at Wheaton Public Library, Too!

Saturday, April 3, 2004

The high cost of not finding information: KMWorld Magazine - The high cost of not finding information
In an increasingly information-based world, we turn out complex products that are less tangible than they are knowledge-based.
In 2001, IDC began to gather data on what not finding information might cost an organization. We looked at knowledge worker productivity, as well as at lost e-commerce [...]

Friday, March 5, 2004

Library Article: New Seattle Central Library is on the cutting edge of technological advances
Libraries have always been in the information business, but technology has expanded the definition of what “information” means — and exploded the list of what people expected from their libraries even just 18 years ago, when Central got its first computer. (It was a [...]

Tuesday, February 17, 2004

Me Third: The Shifted Librarian:I Second that Emotion
The idea is for a library conference devoted to …planning a library services architecture that can support next-generation library services, and bring together the best hackers we have to bang together some prototypes over the course of a few days to a week?
I love the idea and I think it [...]

Monday, February 2, 2004

Best of the Web: PCWorld.com - Web Stars: Best of the Web
rustrated by the growing number of pay-per-view Web archives? Your local library’s Web site might be able to help, though you may need a library card to enjoy full access. For example, New York Public Library cardholders can read issues of The New York Times online for the [...]

Friday, January 16, 2004

Collaboration Imperative: Library Journal - The Collaboration Imperative
If librarians want to lead in creating the digital future, they need to learn how to work with their colleagues in museums and archives
So far, most institutions have been working on developing and maintaining a web presence for their services. This is something I don’t think has been really explored [...]

Library IT survey: Summary of Library IT Support Survey
In July 2003 I conducted a survey about Library IT departments’ work loads and how they are shared with other IT units on campus. The data was collected through a web form and participation was solicited on PACS-L, SYSLIB-L and other library listserve lists The purpose of the survey was [...]

Portal Power: Library portals could lead to increase in resource usage
A recent case study on the implementation of the MetaLib library portal at the University of Loughborough has revealed a significant increase in network database usage once the portal was launched to users.

Tuesday, January 13, 2004

Digital Preservation Tutorial: The Digital Preservation Tutorial from the Cornell library is extremely well done.

Friday, December 19, 2003

libraries and standards: There’s a very interesting discussion about the nature of librarianship at mamamusings: libraries and standards. Be sure to read the beginning first. If you read the comments at mamamusings, you’ll see my response. I do disagree with Dorothea but she makes some good points. Moreover, she writes well so even her rants are a pleasure [...]

Monday, December 15, 2003

WEBMASTRY: Price, Gary WEBMASTRY SEARCHER Vol. 11 No. 10 Nov/Dec 2003

EMTEL Results: EMTEL European Media, Technology and Everyday Life
All sorts of fun(?) papers using the EMTEL research.
EMTEL is a research and training network of European social scientists investigating the social dimensions of the Information Society in Europe. It includes 7 partners in 6 different countries (Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Norway, the UK). It involves more than [...]

Monday, December 8, 2003

Webpages Ephemeral: On the Web, Research Work Proves Ephemeral (washingtonpost.com)
Essentially, web URLs are becoming often used as references in scholarly works. However, the rate at which these resources as a whole move around, change and disappear, defeats the purpose of references in the first place.
At first it seems like an obvious observation but when you think [...]

Sir Arthur C Clarke: OneWorld South Asia - Humanity will survive information deluge %u2013 Sir Arthur C Clarke
An interesting interview about the progression of communications media.

Friday, December 5, 2003

Better Old Services: The Digital Librarian: Better Old Services for Digital Libraries

Saturday, November 29, 2003

New Services: The Digital Librarian: New Services for Digital Libraries
Great ideas!!

Monday, November 17, 2003

Pro-Active Librarianship

Library Journal has a slew of articles worth reading this month.

Library Journal - The SUV Idea
The Public’s Lobby

11 Keys to Your Statehouse
The Expert User Is Dead

No more resting on our laurels, librarians in all sectors need to become more active in shaping our own world and the outside one as well.

Friday, September 26, 2003

We’re Next?: The Shifted Librarian: Thursday, September 25, 2003- Library Associations Take on the Entertainment Industry
…it won’t be long before the entertainment industry actively turns on libraries. You can feel it coming, can’t you? 12-year olds honors students, 66-year old retired teachers, and librarians.

Google Reference: Google Meets eBay: What Academic Librarians Can Learn from Alternative Information Providers
An interesting article from D-Lib, well worth reading.

Monday, September 22, 2003

The Researching Librarian: The Researching Librarian: Home
This site was created for librarians–new or experienced–who find themselves needing to perform research for purposes of publication, promotion, tenure, or other reasons. I hope that it also might be useful for other [...]

Wednesday, September 17, 2003

Library Stats: The Shifted Librarian: Tuesday, September 16, 2003- And Yet You’re Eliminating Libraries??
Make sure you have copies of this document to hand out to all of your patrons. Put these numbers on your web site. Include them in your newsletter. Autograph a copy and send it to your legislators.

Wednesday, August 20, 2003

The Shifted Librarian

The Shifted Librarian

Learning about NetGens in their Natural Habitats- These are the future tax-payers libraries will be relying on for support. Now is the time to catch their interest, before they get caught up in the cycles of schedule and habit.
Better *Public* Libraries- Better Public Libraries illustrates through a number of case studies current best [...]

Saturday, August 9, 2003

Library To Raise Emergency Funding: Library To Raise Emergency Funding- The NYC public library is starting a funding drive to make up for the money that’s been cut from it’s budget.
Not a new story, and unfortunately not the last.

Friday, August 1, 2003

Creating Your Niche on the Net: Ex Libris–an E-Zine for Librarians and Information Junkies — issue 185 : CREATING YOUR NICHE ON THE NET
…let’s take this a step farther and think about what internet niches our libraries could fill, what unique services we could render that would make librarians the go-to people for our bosses and for our local community.
Marylaine Block [...]

Monday, July 14, 2003

NLG Project Planning: A Tutorial: NLG Project Planning: A Tutorial “is provided to assist you in developing a project plan for a National Leadership Grant application. While we hope you find it helpful in preparing your application, your use of the tutorial is not a requirement of applying for a National Leadership Grant.”

Tuesday, June 24, 2003

Internet Censorship in Libraries

I thought about doing a piece on the Supreme Courts decision but it had already been done better.

Supreme Court Decision Analysis
Supreme Court Forces Libraries To Censor
More on the Supreme Court Forcing Libraries to Censor
Round-up of Links About SCOTUS Decision to Censor Library Internet Access
A New Filtering Proposal
FAQ on E-rate Compliance with [...]

Sunday, June 15, 2003

Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography: Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography
“This bibliography presents selected English-language articles, books, and other printed and electronic sources that are useful in understanding scholarly electronic publishing efforts on the Internet.”
An authoritative resource going back to 1990, complete with blog, search engine and links.

Live Digital Reference Bibliography: Live Digital Reference Case Studies: A Bibliographyis a good place to start research.

Thursday, May 29, 2003

eBooks

I mentioned the Baen Free Library before discussing its support of fair-use. Further investigations of reading books on using PDAs has proven to be highly addictive. There is a fee-based system, Webscription.net where electronic copies of many of Baen’s holding can be bought and downloaded for $4 or $5 (US) each.
Other options include:

OmniRead which hosts [...]

Friday, May 23, 2003

The Library Web Manager’s Reference Center: The Library Web Manager’s Reference Center is a great collection of resources contributed by the members of the Web4Lib list. It makes an impressive reference source.

Coffee Service in Libraries: “As a group, we selected coffee services in libraries as the issue of our final presentation for the Hypatia Conference. We investigated the general history of coffee and coffeehouses, the history of the coffee service trend, implementation of the coffee concept, surveyed listservs regarding coffee shops [...]

Monday, May 19, 2003

Flow in Online Learning: Instructional Design for Flow in Online Learning
“This tutorial describes how the instructional design of an online course can facilitate an optimal learning experience for the student.”

Friday, May 16, 2003

Conducting a Dialogue: Conducting a Dialogue talks about software used to monitor a website visitors actions and automatically sends them emails afterwards based on those actions to encourage them to come back. I can see this being good for libraries to learn about usability problems and to direct patrons to less obvious services.

Friday, May 9, 2003

Roving Librarian: Reference on the Road: A Roving Librarian in Loker Commons Brings Library Services to Students describes a rather interesting outreach program. The undergraduate libraries at Harvard are sending reference librarians with wireless inabled laptops to the public areas where students actually gather to offer research help.
Gives new meaning to “telecommuting,” doesn’t it? It’s a [...]

Saturday, April 26, 2003

Library Organizations: The Medical Library Association
SLA - Special Libraries Association
American Library Association
Libraries for the Future

Internet References for Librarians: LibrarySpot -A directory of reference sites in many areas targeted at librarians.
ODLIS: Online Dictionary of Library and Information Science
UsefulBookmarks- A librarian’s directory of links.

Library Fun: The Laughing Librarian-Library humor
The Lipstick Librarian!- Must be read to understand.
Overdue Media, home of Unshelved- A comic for librarians set in a public library.
Why You Should Fall to Your Knees and Worship a Librarian. Just read it. And buy th t-shirt.
Biblia’s Warrior Librarian Weekly: Original Library Humor by Biblia, the Warrior Librarian

Libraries and Technology: LISHost.com- “LISHost, non-profit, low cost Web hosting and design for the entire library world.” Librarians sharing the work and cost of maintaining a server to keep it lower for all.
oss4lib — Open Source Systems for Libraries A community to encourage the use of open-source software by libraries. Open source means that it can be legally [...]

Library News Sites: LISFeeds.com is a website that displays the RSS feeds of several library weblogs. One stop shopping for industry news.
LISNews is a newspaper type website targeted to information workers. Comments are allowed to encourage discussion.
Weblogs are good places to find the latest and the most concentrated stories about their subject. Library Weblogs is site that [...]