[LISNews] The LISNews For February 3rd 2010

[The LISNews Librarian News By Email]

It's Wednesday and time to highlight the most popular LISNews user blog posts from the past week. 
Everyone gets a blog @LISNews.org!

-[1] - Dismantling the Echo Chamber
   http://lisnews.org/node/35786/
-[2] - Emerging Trends and Technologies in Libraries and Information Services Blog
   http://lisnews.org/node/35794/
-[3] - MLIS v1.0
   http://lisnews.org/node/35800/
-[4] - Free Super Saver Shipping
   http://lisnews.org/node/35798/


And here's the latest from LISNews:


--Open Societies need open systems
- http://lisnews.org/node/35833/
-Front Page Story by AndyW Posted Wednesday February 3rd at 10:09 AM
-Read 85 times - 0 Comments
>From BBC News (via Library Link of the Day) Notable quote:  "At the heart of this and many other fights lies an attempt to
limit the ways in which the network and the computers connected to it can be used, and to do so in ways that serve the
interests of corporations.  These interests may sometimes be aligned with those of the wider public, but that alignment is
conditional and contingent and cannot be relied upon, which is why it must always be challenged."   Full commentary


--Re: Nothing is the Future, ctd.
- http://lisnews.org/node/35832/
-Blog Entry by AndyW Posted Wednesday February 3rd at 12:54 AM
-Read 217 times - 0 Comments
Some of the commenters to Wayne Bivens-Tatum’s post “Nothing is the Future” seem to be under the odd impression that his
post is an response to Library 2.0/101. It could be one till you get to the last paragraph of his post.      I've used
"mobile" just as one example. The same could be said of various service or organization models. You can plug in
any term you want, and know that when anyone tells you that thing is "the future," they're wrong. And to be clear,
my criticism isn't of any particular services or trends. If there's a new, popular way for librarians to communicate with or
reach out to library users, by all means librarians should adopt it, or at least experiment with it. My criticism is the
hype and the reductionism, and the implied claim that some librarians really know what the future holds, and that it just
happens to be centered around whatever they happen to like at the moment. Maybe they're convincing themselves, but they're
not convincing me.    (Emphasis mine.)   From the bolded text, Mr. Bivens-Tatum is addressing all forms of library future
hyperbole. While Library 2.0/101 make an excellent target for such criticism, the logic presented also makes an excellent
case for the librarians who are overly cautious and/or completely rejecting minor changes to the practice and profession
(e.g. the people who make the overzealous argument that rejects any new service, program, event, material, web tool, or
website based on their own biases without patron consideration or input). It’s a dangerous, dismissive, and ultimately
untenable position to maintain in this information-communication revolution. It’s antithetical of the evolution of knowledge
and ultimately critical of anyone working on better content delivery, regardless of their means and methods. If the zealotry
of the web 2.0 techno-narcissists with their grand prophetic-like innovation announcements is bad, then their counterpart in
the sneering cynical criticisms of pompous ludbrarians[1] rejecting deviance from the status quo is equally harmful for
rational forward looking discourse.  (To provide a visualization of how I am seeing this, I made up a simple chart.)    I
count myself in the middle of this chart, perhaps with a leaning towards the right end. The middle sentence between the two
bolded ones in the quotation holds more of the essence of the “change in the library” conversation that I’m interested in.
It is about watching and listening to what patrons are doing and saying and then providing materials and services that work
towards or meet their expressed needs. If I can provide both a low tech or a high tech solution, who gives a damn which is
used so long as there is a solution? I am beholden to the end result (patron with need satisfied), not the process that
achieved it.  Tim Spalding in the Thingology blog makes an excellent concluding point in his reply to the Academic Librarian
post, stating:     It says something that hasn't been said before as well. But if it prompts librarians to dismiss
technology's impact on the future of libraries, it will do great harm. Instead, I hope people use your essay as a way to
"kick it up a notch" intellectually, get past the small stuff and confront the very real changes ahead.   
(Emphasis mine.)   I couldn’t agree more. It’s really time to get past the crap, get over our hang-ups, and talk like
adults. This divisiveness that has been generated is really beneath a profession who values the free exchange of ideas.
Let’s start acting like it.    [1] Luddite + Librarian = Ludbrarians.  AndyW


--Frontline: digital nation
- http://lisnews.org/node/35831/
-Front Page Story by Bibliofuture Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 8:23 PM
-Read 211 times - 0 Comments
Frontline has a program called digital_nation life on the virtual frontier - You can see the full program by following the
link  Interview highlights  Defender of the Books  Do Books Have a Future


--Macmillan Books Still Mostly Absent From Amazon.com
- http://lisnews.org/node/35829/
-Front Page Story by Bibliofuture Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 5:33 PM
-Read 225 times - 0 Comments
On Sunday, Amazon.com appeared to wave the white flag of surrender in its war with book publishers over e-book prices. But
as it turns out, the battle is still raging.  As of Tuesday afternoon, both the physical and e-book editions of such
Macmillan books as “Wolf Hall” by Hilary Mantel, “The Checklist Manifesto” by Atul Gawande and “The Politician” by Andrew
Young were still not available on Amazon’s site.  More at the NYT Bits Blog


--An Occasional Column: Defining Value
- http://lisnews.org/node/35828/
-Blog Entry by StephenK Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 4:18 PM
-Read 235 times - 0 Comments
As promised in LISTen 105, this is one of the columns being released this week.  Click on the "Read More" link to see the
web-based view of the column or check your podcatcher for the PDF version.Defining ValueBy Stephen Michael KellatThat
special groundhog saw his shadow in the central Pennsylvania community of Punxsatawney.  Six more weeks of winter supposedly
loom ahead.  Unfortunately groundhogs do not predict economic cycles.Even the economy has caught up with libraries today. 
Those on the front-lines must avoid the temptation to blame funding problems on “the government”.  Libraries are one of
those sorts of governmental agencies that the average adult citizen potentially interacts with far more frequently than
perhaps a mayor's office or the upper echelons of the various public safety commands.The big problem throughout the economy
that is now trickling down to libraries is the lack of definition of what value may be and how it is assessed.  This was
seen in late 2008 with the addition of the delightful piece of jargon known as “toxic assets” to the public's lexicon. 
Toxic assets were termed such as they were financial instruments that nobody in the financial services industry could figure
out a fair market value for.  If no value can be assigned, red ink appeared in bookkeeping due to the now-modified
accounting rules.  Multiple financial institutions cratered and due to the complexity of some insurance items known as
Credit Default Swaps the damage was somewhat prevented from spreading to the rest of the planet due to payouts made by
insurer AIG.  The list of counter-party payouts made by AIG is not fully released yet but is expected to include prominent
financial institutions in European countries at a bare minimum.That on-going financial crisis shows in large scale a problem
which permeates other parts of life.  What is value?  How do we assign value to things?  In a world where the intangible
tries to gain equal footing with the tangible in the marketplace this gets very confused.  From the perspective of
librarians, we already have one place where we can observe this tension without having to resort to the macroeconomic level
of Wall Street cratering.  The prime example is the ebook marketplace on Amazon.Thanks to the efforts of LISNews user
bibliofuture, posts have been seen over and over about tensions relative to pricing.  A large movement on Amazon purportedly
wishes to cap ebook costs at USD$9.99 or less while publishers wish to charge more.  At risk between those groups are those
intangible blobs of bits called ebooks that previously would have been tangible codices made of paper and other ingredients
which we otherwise would call books.  Unlike physical books, Amazon will not run out of copies of the intangible blob of
bits that is an ebook.  That lack of scarcity helps contribute to a perception that that same intangible blob of bits is
less costly to produce than a paper-based codex might have been instead.The production of an intangible like an ebook is not
without cost.  Just as there are materials costs in producing widgets, there are also labor costs in producing widgets.  As
for the production of intangibles such as those that fuel today's supposed knowledge economy, the irreducible production is
labor hours.  The work an author undertakes is roughly the same whether the end-product work is a paper-based codex or an
ebook.  There is still a cost involved in creating a media manifestation of one sort or another.  This is easily evidenced
by the difference in the amount of time that textual blog posts, audio podcasts, and video podcasts require for
creation.With the opaqueness and lack of public understanding as to the costs involved in producing intangibles in today's
knowledge economy, is it any wonder that there is a lack of any reference point to judge worth and value?  When visiting a
deli a customer has reference points to determine the worth and value of a piece of meat compared to what else is on offer. 
Intangibles do not provide those hooks which then leads to difficult discussions of public goods served and benefits
derived.  Outside bread and butter issues like device compatibility,  how can one assign value to a single song for download
let alone choose between retailers offering that song?  With the ease of manipulating online reviewing and commenting
systems, usable community-based reference points cannot be separated from the chaff otherwise called propaganda.The root
problem with this is the lack of community and by extension the degradation of society.  Commerce is based upon the notion
of some consistency and predictability in interaction.  While many in the First World are more connected than ever with
online tools and gadgetry, attention is taken away from the real world around you.  When you functionally cease to be part
of a community, value and cost make little sense to you.  When you functionally cease to be part of a community, you become
little more than alien without a grasp of the native language let alone culture.  When you check out on society through
electronic means, culture and knowledge wither as social stratification is increased through the reality of those who have
electronic access and those who do not.This is not something libraries can fix by themselves.  While libraries have a role
to play in this, they are not the ones to lead this dance so to say.  That initiative can only come from other political
elites or the religious orders.  When voters chose in late 2008 change they could believe in it becomes more readily
apparent that nobody is quite sure what the end result will yet be.  The strengthening of communities and interpersonal ties
is going to be essential for society to lift itself out of its current economic psychosis.###Kellat serves as the Head
Writer of Erie Looking Productions and is working on raising capital to support production operations.


--Redbox for books
- http://lisnews.org/node/35826/
-Front Page Story by Bibliofuture Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 2:36 PM
-Read 330 times - 0 Comments



--Arthur C. Clarke's 2001 Newspad
- http://lisnews.org/node/35825/
-Blog Entry by Pete Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 1:07 PM
-Read 214 times - 0 Comments
Once again, Arthur C. Clarke's imagination becomes reality as reported in The Unofficial Apple Weblog;  "At several points
during the film, we see ill-fated astronauts David Bowman and Frank Poole using a flat, iPad-like device.  Those who read
Arthur C. Clarke's novelization of the movie will remember that he described this device as the "Newspad," something that
was used by people of the future (as envisioned in 1968) to watch TV and read newspapers. You can read the full description
of the device after the break -- it's described as a newsreader, with two-digit codes for each article online, and a
constant stream of information from the hourly updates on "electronic papers.""


--Deer checks in, checks out of school library
- http://lisnews.org/node/35824/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 11:49 AM
-Read 280 times - 0 Comments
Deer checks in, checks out of school library Whether it was to do research or check out the latest Dr. Seuss book, a deer
broke through a back-door window and into the library at Graham A. Barden Elementary School Tuesday morning. “He said he
didn’t see the deer’s head,” Covert said of Becton. “He saw the back of it, and he was a small.”  


--The only perfect reference work Nelsons Perpetual Loose-Leaf Encyclopaedia
- http://lisnews.org/node/35823/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 10:55 AM
-Read 527 times - 0 Comments
"The only perfect reference work" Nelson's Perpetual Loose-Leaf Encyclopaedia From Popular Mechanics from 1910 comes this
advertisement for Nelson's Perpetual Loose-Leaf Encyclopaedia. Nelson's was still going strong in 1930 where a set cost
$99.50 plus $6/year for updates -- buy a set, get a free bookcase -- Nelson's stopped publishing updates sometime in the
1930s. Thomas Nelson & Sons is still around today, the world's largest Christian publisher, but their company history
curiously makes no mention of their innovative encyclopaedia.  


--You won't believe what people leave in Erie library books
- http://lisnews.org/node/35822/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 10:53 AM
-Read 320 times - 1 Comments
You won't believe what people leave in Erie library books They've drawn cards for birthdays and Valentine's Day. They've
saved baby portraits and grade school snapshots, including one of a curly-haired lass named Kitty Senger. They've collected
a ticket stub from a 1992 Michael Bolton concert and an autographed picture of Bobby Rydell. They've tried recipes for
meatloaf, streusel coffeecake and "sky high biscuits" and experimented with six flavors of Jell-O desserts from a 1934
pamphlet.   


--LOC Explores Ways to Release Open Source Software
- http://lisnews.org/node/35821/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 10:33 AM
-Read 281 times - 0 Comments
Library Explores Ways to Release Open Source Software In the spirit of transparency and community, the Library of Congress
has established an internal process to create open source software. This will make it easier for software developers and
sponsors within the Library to produce software that can be freely redistributed to users worldwide.


--Wall Of iPads Could Be Used In Libraries To Display iBooks  
- http://lisnews.org/node/35820/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 10:31 AM
-Read 477 times - 3 Comments
Wall Of iPads Could Be Used In Libraries To Display iBooks ClarkeHopkinsClarke, the Aussie architects who mocked up the
above concept wall, believe it'd be the perfect installation for a library, with hundreds of different ebooks displayed. But
that's not the end of this story—due to the size and weight of the iPad, Gizmodod could be seeing a lot of innovative uses
for them, as interactive wallpaper in clubs, teaching aides in schools, and so on. There's the small hurdle of cost, of
course.  


--Five lessons from my e-book experiment 
- http://lisnews.org/node/35819/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 8:56 AM
-Read 402 times - 0 Comments
Five lessons from my e-book experiment  1. The weight is a nice advantage 2. Page turning is less irritating than you’d
think 3. Being able to search a book is very useful 4. Text formatting can be annoyingly sloppy 5. Availability of titles is
the biggest problem "The result of the experiment? I’m back to reading books on paper. I’ll explain why in a moment but here
are five things I learned from my e-reading experiment."


--Tauranga NZ mulls user-pays libraries 
- http://lisnews.org/node/35818/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 12:57 PM
-Read 196 times - 0 Comments
Tauranga mulls user-pays libraries  Council revenue gathering is reaching new heights in Tauranga with plans to start
charging for library book loans.  The charges are proposals at this stage, but the idea is attracting the interest of bigger
city councils.  A great proportion of the cost of a public library service is supported from rates.  But Tauranga City
Council wants to head the user-pays way.  "(The) council has asked us to reduce the total cost of the libraries to the
ratepayer and we're trying to do that by a mixture of charges and making savings," says Jill Best from Tauranga City Council
Libraries.  LISTen 105 has more on this story


--Henderson NV libraries become Redbox locations
- http://lisnews.org/node/35817/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 8:54 AM
-Read 513 times - 4 Comments
Henderson libraries become Redbox locations Two Henderson libraries now house Redbox movie kiosks as part of a nationwide
trial by the company.  Gayle Hornaday, assistant director for Henderson District Public Libraries, said waiting lists for
movies is a chronic problem for Henderson libraries. The Redboxes are expected to alleviate the problem by providing more
copies of popular films.  “We can’t really up our expenditures, but by teaming up with this vendor we can provide access to
more current movies,” she said. 


--No silence at the library suits me just fine
- http://lisnews.org/node/35816/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 8:51 AM
-Read 291 times - 0 Comments
No silence at the library suits me just fine Books are being pushed to the sidefiguratively and literally. Children's
space, teen areas and computers have filled that space. With the diminished role of actual books, libraries have been
reinvented as community hubs. I have no problem with this change. Libraries need to be vibrant, welcoming places...


--New Site and Book From Peter Morville Search Patterns Design for Discovery
- http://lisnews.org/node/35815/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 7:53 AM
-Read 252 times - 0 Comments
You may know Peter Morville from such books as Information Architecture for the World Wide Web or Ambient Findability, or
from any number of library conferences, or his sites semanticstudios.com and findability.org. Well, he's back with a new
book and site, http://searchpatterns.org/ , and Search Patterns: Design for Discovery. "Search is among the most disruptive
innovations of our time. It influences what we buy and where we go. It shapes how we learn and what we believe. This
provocative and inspiring book explores design patterns that apply across the categories of web, e-commerce, enterprise,
desktop, mobile, social, and real time search and discovery. Using colorful illustrations and examples, the authors bring
modern information retrieval to life, covering such diverse topics as relevance ranking, faceted navigation, multi-touch,
and mixed reality. Search Patterns challenges us to invent the future of discovery while serving as a practical guide to
help us make search applications better today."


--Re: Nothing is the Future
- http://lisnews.org/node/35814/
-Blog Entry by AndyW Posted Tuesday February 2nd at 1:46 AM
-Read 326 times - 0 Comments
This is a reaction post of “Nothing is the Future” by Wayne Bivens-Tatum (Academic Librarian).  While my astute
professional peer makes excellent points concerning the hyperbole in library technology trends, I feel that there is an
excellent lesson to his post: while librarians can and should act as leaders for their patrons, they should also be
followers and listeners. I see librarians as bridging the gap between the past and future, interacting on a medium of the
patron’s choosing. While we should have an eye to emerging technologies to gauge their development and adoption by society
as a whole, it behooves us to remain mindful of the established and accepted communication mediums. Yes, there are marvels
of the digital age and certainly things that librarians should be aware of[1], but it is folly to set sights constantly on
the horizon to the detriment of what currently exists and works.   In following, it is not for our patrons to take us to a
brand new technologies, but to remind us of the merits of existing ones. As Mr. Bivens-Tatum simply states, people still
interact with the library using letters, telephone, and other last established technologies. There should be no rush to
usher to declare these mediums dead in the favor of what holds the current fancy of the technological vanguard. In listening
to what patrons want and use, we are performing the most basic function of the library: giving people what they actually
asking for. Simply put, it is the act of matching the demand that the patrons have articulated to us as a wanted and desired
material or service.   To this end, my take on Mr. Bivens-Tatum’s blog title would change it to “People are the Future”. In
the greater picture, our existence is constantly in their hands. At the local level, they will always (hopefully) tell us
what can be done to meet their needs. Whether this is a mobile app or extended weekend hours, only the community that we
serve can answer that question. People are the future for libraries, for they are the ones who dictate our services,
programs, collections, and, ultimately, our fates.     [1] Personally, I don’t take all of the Library 101 RTK list
literally. I don’t think that librarians need to know how Hulu works (to use the most infamous example), but the important
takeaway is that this presents a trend of television on demand via the internet (something very worthy of notice as all
forms of television and movie content make their way to online). Same goes for a lot of the named products, sites, and items
on that list. The 101 RTK list gives an excellent heads-up to some of the emerging trends in information and communication. 
 AndyW




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