LibrarianInBlack

Chinese censorship and journalist prisoner

Today is an Amnesty International rallying day for human rights.  I found out about it through a Facebook promotion: Bloggers Unite for Human Rights.  The topic that I, as a blogger, would like to highlight is the continued censorship in China, particularly internet censorship.  The filtering, blocking, and state monitoring of ideas is offensive to me as a librarian, and if you feel the same way then you may want to read about the imprisonment of Shi Tao, a Chinese journalist. 

I invite you to sign an Amnesty International action asking Yahoo lobby the Chinese government for the release Shi Tao, who was imprisoned for sending an email (through Yahoo) about his beliefs about the Communist Party to the a recipient in the U.S.  Yahoo provided the Chinese government with information (his confidential emails) that lead to his arrest and imprisonment, and Amnesty International has classified the Shi Tao as a Prisoner of Conscience.  You can read more about the issue of Chinese censorship on the AI website.

Amnesty International provides an online action center where you can express your opinion on human rights issues to government officials and other people in positions of power.

Evaluating a Web Design

Jacob Gube, at Six Revisions, has put out a list of Six Incredibly Useful Tools for Evaluating a Web Design.  As our library is getting ready for a redesign ourselves, this is a handy list of tools to check out.  Measuring what the current site is doing wrong is important to making the next site do it right.

via Darlene Fichter

Reference desk blog success story

Stephen Francoeur writes about his library's successful long-term reference staff blog with content like technical support alerts and resolutions, resource suggestions, training tips, reference question Q&A, and more.  The blog, Reference at the Newman Library (at Baruch College), has been around since 2004 (hard core!) and averages a dozen posts a week.  A great example of how blogs can be used as internal communication tools quite successfully.

Libraries engaging with local bloggers

David Lee King writes about some thoughts he has after reading a blog post and listening to a PLA presentation that touched on engaging with local blogs in your own community.  He lists some ways that library staff can be proactively interactive with these users (or potential users, as the case may be). 

I have long promoted engagement with local blogs as an excellent online outreach technique.  It can be as time consuming as you want it to be - monitor one or monitor fifty.  It's up to you.  And don't limit yourself to just blogs--monitor local Google groups and continuing education discussion boards.  There are lots of ways for your local users to interact. 

Building on what David wrote, some of the tips I typically give are:

• Observe for a while: see what people say, what they do, what the tone of the site is like.
• Be authentic: don't write as an institution, write as a real live human being.
• Don't intrude: you don't want to come off as an infiltrating or heavy-handed pain in the rear.
• Identify yourself: make sure people know you're from the library.
• Show what you know: talk about library and non-library resources and services when it's appropriate.

There are also many tools you can use to find these local blogs:

• Blogs by City
• Frappr
• FeedMap
• Blogdigger local
• Metroblogging
• feedmap

Library Use of E-books study

The Primary Research Group has published the 2008/2009 edition of Library Use of E-books. You can read some of the key findings on their website, but the full study costs $75.  From their description of the study:

Data in the report is based on a survey of 75 academic, public and special libraries. Librarians detail their plans on how they plan to develop their e-book collections, what they think of e-book readers and software, and which e-book aggregators and publishers appeal to them most and why. Other issues covered include: library production of e-books and collection digitization, e-book collection information literacy efforts, use of e-books in course reserves and inter-library loan, e-book pricing and inflation issues, acquisition sources and strategies for e-books and other issues of concern to libraries and book publishers.

found via Peter Scott's Library Blog

Call for all libraries to stop supporting digital rights management

DefectiveByDesign.org, a campaign from the Free Software Foundation, protested outside of the Boston Public Library for offering digital content with digital rights management attached to it.  They then expanded that complaint to all libraries, asking library users to sign letters and send them to their local libraries.  You can view a copy of the letter here.

I applaud their efforts, but the sad reality is that any subscription eContent that any library offers, except for a few select DRM-free Overdrive titles, will have DRM attached to it.   I agree with the DBD tagline that "books should not expire," but until there is much more of a push by all end-users, not just those of libraries, I don't see that changing.  And libraries will be left with the choice of offering DRM-laden eContent or offering no eContent at all.

video of Clay Shirky @ Web 2.0 Expo

Check out this inspiring video of Clay Shirky at the San Francisco Web 2.0 Expo.  I felt better about what I do for a living instantly :)

What would make your work easier?

Michael Stephens Lee LeBlanc recently wrote a thought-provoking post on Tame the Web, asking us all a question with its title: What would make the work you do easier?  As he admits in his introduction, "This is a whole can of worms."  He posts anonymous responses from several people who talk about some of the common time-wasters and work-impediments to library work: inefficient procedures, silo-ed information, unexpected IT upgrades, and endless meetings.  They also talk about what would help: creative coworkers, competent leadership, more training, etc. 

I second Michael's encouragement to take a moment, stop, and think about those things that are barriers and then follow up with some hard thinking about what could remove them. 

I always keep a "stuff I'd like to change" list, and go back to it when I have the needed go-gettery attitude and want to feel like I'm making a difference.  Most of these things are changeable to a point, but just require some thoughtful planning as to procedure and a people-centered political approach.  Gah...politics.  My least favorite part of the job.  But when you want to change something, knowing how to walk over those hot coals is necessary, as is knowing how to get other people to follow you.

So stop, think about three things that would make your own work easier (usually starting with something that's wrong and what the "right way" would be), and write them down.  Come back to them another day, one at a time, and think about how you can get from where you are to where you want to be.  That, my friends, is how the world gets better.

Pixelated Posey Necklace

Here's a good gift for the necklace-wearing tech-lover in your life: the Pixelated Posey.  Doesn't it just make you smile?   The necklace was available at ModCloth, but they are all sold out.  I hate to taunt you with something you can't have right away, but this was just too cool.  Keep an eye out though--I have a feeling it will be returning.

found via Popgadget

Ergo: information literacy website

The State Library of Victoria (Australia) has a new information literacy site for students and teachers at the high school level: Ergo.   The site offers some great resources that anyone could use:

• research, essay, and study skills guides
• history pathfinders with numerous State Library digitized resources
• video author, artist, and historian interviews
• teacher and student resources and learning guides

I encourage anyone engaged in info lit teaching to take a look and see what kind of information you can gather.  And, if nothing else, it's a good pointer to the Library's impressive digitized collections.

found via Stephen's Lighthouse

Turning the Paige: young readers' book reviews

Check out Turning the Paige, a new young readers' book review blog.  This site is written by Paige Turner (teen?  adult?), who reads and reviews the books.  Each entry has information about individual books, including a cover image, synopsis, age level, discussion of the book, and a rating (given a grade like a B-).  You can view lists of books by age level, series, grade, or genre.  The genres include items like Adventure, Fantasy, Realistic Fiction, and even "Books for Boys."  You can also search for a specific book or author.  The site is still in its infancy (only 4 months old) and there are not a load of reviews there yet.  But what is there seemed great to me, and definitely worth bookmarking.  Plus, you can suggest a new book to Paige for reading.

A small disclaimer: there are ads on the site, but most young people (like us older ones) have learned to tune those out to a degree.

found via eHub

e-learning webcast from Frank Cervone

There is an upcoming SirsiDynix Institute that many of you readers may be interested in:

Trends in e-learning: What does it mean for libraries?
May 21, 2008, 11am-noon EST
presented by Frank Cervone, Professor of Education and Director of the Library, Information, and Media Studies program at Chicago State University

Read more on the SirsiDynix Institute website where you can also register.

Virtual Library Legislative Day: May 14th

I am not a good lobbyist.  I always placed last in my Girl Scout Troop trying to sell cookies (emphasis on "trying"), I don't do a good job fundraising for anything, and I hate begging people for anything--even something I really believe in.  I don't do it well and don't get good results because of it.  As a result, I have learned over time to avoid "Library Leg Days" like the plague.  Until this year.

This year there is a virtual version of Library Leg Day.  Along with the hundreds of people in D.C. to support libraries, there will be thousands more participating virtually through a Virtual Library Legislative Day on May 14th.  It's nothing fancy, actually, and very simple.  Just phone, fax, and/or email members of Congress to tell them about the issues facing libraries and why supporting libraries is crucial.  You can read more and find links to email or fax legislators on the ALA webpage about Virtual Library Legislative Day.  There's even a nifty flier, though it would have been cool to create supporting web graphics as well, what with the emphasis on "virtual" (I had to screenshot this image).

Super Cheap Flash Drives as Giveaways

I would like to see more libraries paying attention to the wonderful site Free After Rebate.  Amidst all of the somewhat useless "free Norton upgrades" there are a lot of great hardware deals.  Usually you only have to pay shipping, and sometimes even that is free.  I have gotten nearly-free or free flash drives, MP3 players, keyboards, mice, USB extension cables, and more. 

A lot of these things would make great giveaways in raffles, summer reading prizes, and anything else you can think of. 

Right now there are two nearly-free flash drives available:

• Crucial Gizmo 1GB Flash Drive: $2.40+ shipping (requires rebate form, expires May 18th)
• Lexar 512MB Flash Drive: $4.97 + shipping (no rebate to redeem, expiration unknown)

There are also frequently great deals at the brick-and-mortar stores.  If your library has a credit card (and most do) or if you can get reimbursed from petty cash, just nip on over to a store and grab up as many items as you need.  I've seen 10GB flash drives going for $2 in the circulars for stores near me...there are probably similar deals near you! 

My Online Marketing Webcast Available

Today I gave a 90-minute webcast for OPAL: Online Marketing for Libraries.  Tom Peters, OPAL's coordinator, has already archived the presentation on OPAL's archive site.  You have three choices: you can listen to the audio while viewing the slides and text chat, or just listen to the audio file, or simply view the slides. 

While you're there, you might want to check out some of the other recently archived presentations, like "Discover Your LibraryThing" with Tim Spalding and Cindy Hart or "Virtual Worlds for Kids, Tweens and Teens," a panel discussion with Cliff Zintgraff, Kelly Czarnecki, and Tom Peters.  There's a lot more too! 

I have another presentation for OPAL coming up about technology training and competencies on Thursday, May 15th at 1pm PST.

Live Mesh - bring your data with you

If you haven't read about Live Mesh from Microsoft yet, it's an idea to bring together various computing experiences and make them uniform based on user, not on location.  In other words, you bring your preferences and your files with you wherever you go.  Lorcan Dempsey does a fabulous job of describing Live Mesh on his blog. 

Live Mesh is now available in "Tech Preview" mode if you want to try it out.  Early reviews have been mediocre at best.  But hey...try it out yourself and see what you think!  I have written about this concept before, and really believe that this is the next big breakthrough in personal computing.  This is something you absolutely need to watch!

IPL collection on web apps

The Internet Public Library has a special collection of links dedicated to Web Applications.  It's a couple of years old, so a lot of the "hot new stuff" isn't there, but the solid stand-bys are here, and I was able to use this site a few times to answer user questions in the last year.  I recommend bookmarking it as a potential research tool.  You never know!  Note to IPL: please update this!  We'd love you to pieces if you did.

New Children's Books Podcast

I just heard about a children's books-themed podcast, entitled Just One More Book.  The podcast comes out three times a week, is between 5 and 25 minutes in length, and discusses favorite books and literacy issues.  There are over 300 archived episodes, so there is a lot of information to draw upon already, not to mention the future episodes.  As a speaker and presenter I often get questions about why there aren't more youth services-themed technology initiatives out there.  I am happy to add this site to my knowledge base!

found via Stephen's Lighthouse

New BIGWIG site

The LITA BIGWIG Group (Blogs, Interactive Groupware, and Wikis Interest Group) has a new website.  The new site includes a My Account feature, an activities calendar, and forums.  If you have an interest in blogs, wikis, and other groupware please join up!  You don't have to be a LITA Member or a BIGWIG participant.  It's all about sharing and group knowledge, so the more the merrier!

videos make the world go round

Here are two wonderful videos that can make you feel great about working in a library:

1. the St. Joseph County Public Library's commercial (via skagirlie)
2. Allen County Public Library's Why I Love Being a Librarian (via Tame the Web)

Enjoy!

Internet Archive staves off the FBI

Back in February, Brewster Kahle (proprieter of the Internet Archive) received a National Security Letter from the FBI.  He fought it with the help of legal counsel, and the FBI recently withdrew the letter and lifted the gag order.  This is only the second National Security Letter that has been challenged and as Kahle said, ""you can push back on these."  Read more in the San Francisco Chronicle's lengthy article.  And all I have to say is "You go Brewster!"

Memory Card Cases

Check out Pelican Memory Card Cases ($18.99 for an 8-slotted case).  Perhaps I just haven't had my eyes open, but this is the first time I've seen a memory card case to carry multiple cards.  I like this one especially for its small size and water-resistance.

found via Cool Tools

Small Libraries Can Tackle Tech Too!

Jessamyn West has kindly posted her talk notes from a session at the Central Massachusetts Regional Library System entitled "Tiny Tech/High Tech - How Small Libraries Can Use Technology Sensibly."  It's a great presentation and highlights some very real, and easy, things that smaller libraries with no funding or staff can do to make themselves more technologically relevant in their communities.  Thanks Jessamyn!

Libraries Unleashed: the Guardian Tackles Library Technology Issues

The U.K.’s Guardian published a special supplement recently: Libraries Unleashed.  There were 18 articles on library technology on topics like Library 2.0, digitization, "the new user," and more.  While some of the statements in the articles made me cringe in dismay, in general I think they did a great job of getting the word out about what libraries do today.  Now, if only here in the U.S. we could convince Time or Newsweek to do the same :)

Clearspace: online collaboration software

Looking for an alternative to SharePoint (Microsoft's enterprise collaboration tool)?  Check out Clearspace, an enterprise collaboration solution much like SharePoint.  It is not free, but offers a 30-day free trial, an instant "test-drive," and a free live demo for interested parties.  From what I could see, it's a lot more "Web 2.0"-ish looking than SharePoint, offers some additional functionality, and .  I can't speak to the issues of pricing or support, but their customer list sure is impressive: Dell, Intel, Electronic Arts, Netflix, Oracle, GE, etc. 

found via eHub

Free posters for libraries to use

Tasha Saecker on Sites and Soundbytes (one of my favorite sites for finding new and interesting tools and websites) points us to this excellent (and I do mean excellent) library posters from the Iowa State Library.   The posters are in PDF and for anyone to use and  have nice library-neutral promotional themes that any library could print out and post.  There are over a dozen (including some in Spanish), but my favorite is this poster encouraging tech training at the library.

How del.icio.us is your site?

Phil Bradley recommends an interesting article by Ann Smarty in Search Engine Journal that describes the usefulness of examining your website's presence in del.icio.us as one way of measuring your digital presence's success.  Using the del.icio.us URL search, you can look for for different key pages on your site to see how many people have saved them, and you may find that sub-pages are more popular than your homepage (as in Phil's site's case). 

Maine State Library goes mobile

The Maine State Library announced a mobile-accessible library accessible at the following URL: mobile.maine.gov/msl.  You can get contact info, hours, directions, access to the ask-a-librarian service, borrowing FAQs, new audio book information, and a list of Maine public libraries with wifi. 

Much of the web world, including libraries, is behind in addressing the needs of our mobile web users.  Glad to see some progress being made!

via ResearchBuzz

Learning, Web Apps, and Not Innovating

Here are three useful "Top 100 lists" that are sure to give you several resources to use and check out:

1. Top 100 Tools for Learning from the Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies.  They interviewed 155 learning prrofessionals to compile the list.
2. Top 100 Web Apps for 2008 from the annual Webware survey.  1.9 million votes resulted in the list.  Various Amazon and Google products appear often.
3. Top 100 Lamest Excuses for Not Innovating from Mitch Ditkoff's "The Heart of Innovation" blog .  Some of these are faecetious, but others could stimulate some excellent staff discussions about why you should innovate.  (via Stephen's Lighthouse)
   

Mortality Schedules

MortalitySchedules.com is another good site for your local genealogy buffs.  It is a directory of the census mortality schedules (information as to all persons dying within the 12 months preceding the census taking) from 1850-1880, and can be viewed at the state or county level.

via Peter Scott's Library Blog

Sarah's Online Reference Warehouse: Vegan Resources

This is the second installment in the Sarah's Online Reference Warehouse.  The first installment was about recommended Real Estate sites.  This one is about vegan resources.  As a new vegan, I had a hard time finding what I needed, and maybe this list will help somebody else.

Vegan/Vegetarian Recipe Sites

• The Vegetarian Lunchbox: veggie lunch recipes including a good deal of kid-friendly resources and recipes, and focusing on recipes for salads, soups, and sandwiches
• The Post Punk Kitchen: written by the author of some of my favorite vegan  cookbooks, this site is one I often visit
• The Vegan Chef: written by a well-known vegan chef, hundreds of great recipes
  
• Compassionate Cooks Recipes: recipes organized by function or cuisine
• VegWeb Recipes: huge number of vegetarian and vegan recipes
• International Vegetarian Union Recipes: hundreds of world cuisine recipes, great stuff for experimenting with something new
• Veg Cooking: vegetarian and vegan cooking, also includes information on becoming veggie, shopping, and dining out

Vegan Shopping Online (where you can find Sarah "virtually" on the weekends)

• Food
  
  • Allison's Gourmet: excellent vegan cookies, fudge, cocoa, brownies, chocolates, gift baskets
  • Good Baker: vegan baking mixes for things like cakes, brownies, muffins, etc.
  • Sticky Fingers Bakery: cakes and other confections to make your head spin
  • Food Fight Vegan Grocery: based in Portland at their brick-and-mortar store, we're fortunate that these guys sell online too...great selection.
  • Sweet & Sara: vegan marshmallows--heck yes!
• Not Food
  
  • Alternative Outfitters: vegan apparel and beauty products
  • MooShoes: vegan shoes and other goods
  • Shop Humanitaire: animal-friendly shopping of all kinds...belts, wallets, clothing, shoes, books, etc.
• Both
  
  • Vegan Essentials: includes vegan apparel, beauty products, home accessories, and an amazing food assortment

Other Vegan Resources

• International Vegetarian Union: anything and everything you want to know about going and being veggie
• The Vegetarian Resource Group: information about going veggie, newsletter, vegetarian nutrition info, and other support information
• I Can't Believe It's Vegan: a site listing common store-bought foods that you wouldn't think were vegan (like Pillsbury "Butter Flake" flavor crescent rolls).  The foods aren't necessarily good for you, but they are vegan so in a pinch when you're visiting the folks you can play nice with their traditional food values.
• Happy Cow's Vegetarian Guide: guide to veg-friendly restaurants and health food stores (excellent for traveling information)
• VegGuide: international guide to veg-friendly food and dining
• Vegan Beers: beer that does not use animal products in its ingredients or brewing process
• Vegan Wines: wine that does not use animal products (namely isinglass, made from fish)

Internet Connectivity in U.S. Public Libraries

The ALA Office for Research & Statistics has released a new report: "Internet Connectivity in U.S. Public Libraries."    More reports are coming, at least two per year related to technology and libraries.  This 8-page study shows a number of interesting findings, based on the data from the Public Library Funding & Technology Access Study. 

What caught my attention was the clear and significant difference in the technological offerings of public libraries based on whether they are urban, suburban, or rural.  For example, 67.2% of urban libraries offer eBooks, while only 48.6% of suburban libraries and 30.0% or rural libraries do.  That is a huge difference.  Connection speed is another area with huge differences.  Our libraries, especially in rural areas, due to a lack of funding (which means a lack of resources, training, dollars for projects, staff time) results in inequitable service for the country's public library users.  Web 2.0 digital services have offered one way to level the playing field, offering quick and low-tech ways to provide cutting-edge digital services, but we clearly need more.  If basic services are still lacking, we need to work on that too.