[LISNews] The LISNews For February 19th 2010
The LISNews Librarian News By Email
lisnews at lishost.net
Fri Feb 19 10:31:31 CST 2010
Happy Friday! It's the LISNews for February 19th, 2010...
Let's look at the top headlines from the past week:
-[1] - Wi-Fi Turns Rowdy Bus Into Rolling Study Hall
http://lisnews.org/node/35937/
-[2] - NYPL Librarians Take Questions 24/7
http://lisnews.org/node/35958/
-[3] - LISNews Librarian Essay Contest
http://lisnews.org/node/35927/
-[4] - Bullet Point: Dear Google, you too need to talk to librarians
http://lisnews.org/node/35944/
-[5] - Do School Libraries Need Books?
http://lisnews.org/node/35929/
And here's the latest from LISNews:
--Fifth Grade Girl Donates Books to Library
- http://lisnews.org/node/36000/
-Blog Entry by dlnieman Posted Friday February 19th at 11:00 AM
-Read 8 times - 0 Comments
Kylee Rolofson of Greenwood, Nebraska had a special birthday party this week. The girl asked her parents to buy books for
the Greenwood Library. During her birthday party friends brought books and DVDs to be donated to the Greenwood Public
Library. All-in-all she was able to donate 50 items to the library. Read article With people like Kylee Rolofson growing
up today, I believe the library has a positive future.
http://theantiquarianlibrarian.blogspot.com/2010/02/fifth-grade-girl-donates-books-to.html
--Kindle Arrives Free on BlackBerry
- http://lisnews.org/node/35999/
-Blog Entry by Bibliofuture Posted Friday February 19th at 10:41 AM
-Read 54 times - 0 Comments
Story at PCWorld.com Amazon.com has released its new, free Kindle for BlackBerry application, giving Research In Motion
(RIM) smartphone users access to the online retailer's catalogue or more than 400,000 digital books for its Kindle e-reader
and associated mobile applications. Click here for full article.
--Pew Report: The Future of the Internet IV
- http://lisnews.org/node/35997/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Friday February 19th at 10:27 AM
-Read 86 times - 0 Comments
The Future of the Internet IV In all, 895 people responded to our online survey and 371 of them were experts who have
participated in our past surveys about the future of the internet. In this survey, we asked the experts to react to two
opposing statements about the direction and impact of the internet 10 years from now – that is, the year 2020. In this
report, we cover there answers to these issues: Will Google make us stupid? Will the internet enhance or detract from
reading, writing, and rendering of knowledge? Is the next wave of innovation in technology, gadgets, and applications pretty
clear now, or will the most interesting developments between now and 2020 come “out of the blue”? Will the end-to-end
principle of the internet still prevail in 10 years or will there be more control of access to information? Will it be
possible to be anonymous online or not by the end of the decade?
--Do E-Readers Cause Eye Strain?
- http://lisnews.org/node/35996/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Friday February 19th at 8:36 AM
-Read 156 times - 1 Comments
Bruce sent over a link to Do E-Readers Cause Eye Strain? The act of reading is going through a number of radical
transitions, but perhaps none is more fundamental than the shift from reading on paper to reading on screens. As consumers
decide whether to make this jump and which technology to use, one key question is how reading on a screen affects the eyes.
--Has This Library Solved "The Mystery Of The Mummy Paper?"
- http://lisnews.org/node/35995/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Friday February 19th at 7:27 AM
-Read 147 times - 1 Comments
Has This Library Solved "The Mystery Of The Mummy Paper?" Reality or urban legend: were the wrappings of ancient Egyptian
corpses recycled and pulped to create so-called "mummy paper?" Archaeologists and other scholars have long debated the
veracity of claims that mummies were imported into the U.S. in the mid-nineteenth century, stripped of their burial shrouds,
and their bindings (largely composed of linen and other fibers such as papyrus and something akin to canvas) repurposed into
printing paper. But, did this really happen? Are we being fleeced? Is this a fabricated tale? Can this yarn be unwound to
get to the meat of the matter?
--CA Library Officials recommend cuts not privatization
- http://lisnews.org/node/35994/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Friday February 19th at 7:26 AM
-Read 117 times - 0 Comments
Officials recommend cuts, not privatization Responding to a loud community protest against outsourcing library management,
Nevada County officials Thursday recommended in-house staffing and operating hours cuts to solve the system's financial
woes. “It still preserves our professional librarians, and we knew we'd have to cut hours,” said County Librarian Mary Ann
Trygg.
--Deconstructing Library 2.0
- http://lisnews.org/node/35992/
-Blog Entry by AndyW Posted Friday February 19th at 12:41 AM
-Read 309 times - 1 Comments
I realize I’m relatively new to the library scene as a second career librarian, so some of what I’m asking may have been
covered somewhere already. I’m fine with being corrected in the comments (since there is no better way to learn than to
question), but I’m still going to ask. In trying to get an idea of it, I plugged the term into some search engines and then
just followed the trail. I found the Library 2.0 listing in Wikipedia which also provides an antiquated round up of writings
on the subject (the most recent article mentioned is 2007). It lists the principles as the following: Browser + Web 2.0
Applications + Connectivity = Full-featured OPAC Harness the library user in both design and implementation of services
Library users should be able to craft and modify library provided services Harvest and integrate ideas and products
from peripheral fields into library service models Continue to examine and improve services and be willing to replace
them at any time with newer and better services. The first principle seems very specific and certainly obtainable. I
don’t know of any examples of such an interface, but it has my vote for how an OPAC should function. The second and third
principles look like the application of market research. Ask users what they want, design around it, and customize where
desired.  Maybe it's because I have a science background, but when I look at fourth and fifth principle, I see the
basics of evolution. The concept of an organization changing due to external pressures (read: patron requested services and
materials) over time does not strike me as being radical or controversial at all. It is basically a call for librarians to
use some (pun intended) intelligent design in approaching . So, this concept is an intersection of a
still-yet-to-be-realized vendor request, knowing and engaging your audience market research, and an evolving service model?
Perhaps I do not understand. Were libraries not doing any of these things before? Maybe the definition is antiquated. It
was written before the rise of the current social media and Web 2.0 tools and websites. Does it need a revision? First, a
few observations and questions off the top of my head. All too often, especially when it comes to technology, people will
cite a recent survey or fact about the sale of technology or usage statistic and use that to make broad pronouncements of
something that the library should be doing. But the causal connection logic doesn't follow. For example, if the total number
of smart phones sold in the United States went up last year, this does not necessitate that libraries need mobile
applications or sites. How many of those phones sold are replacing current phones? How many of those mobile users are
library users? If I said that there are 1,000 people in a town, and that there were 600 people who have smart phones, this
is not an immediate call to develop mobile resources. The question that this scenario begs (and that never seems to be
asked) is how many of the library users have smart phones and would want or use a library mobile resource. While it could be
argued that the creation of mobile resources might entice the non-library smart phone user to become a patron of the
library, the counterpoint I would offer is simply, “Prove it.” Where is the correlation between the broader trends and the
library user? On that note, I rarely (if ever) see a posting, press release, or story about something new the library is
offering that references a user survey or focus group or even an anecdote. It's as if the notion for these new offerings
appear on circumstantial evidence or hunches or a variation of (the term I liked the moment I saw it) Ideas Worth Stealing.
There appears, to me, to be an endless loop of libraries adopting practices (either service or technology) which do not
catch on. These failures are then chalked up to a failure to publicize, staff training or awareness, or lack of interest
when there was little or no user feedback indicating such a tool or service was desired in the first place. How much of a
stranger are we to our patrons? If I stopped ten random people in your library tomorrow, had them write down what they
wanted on a piece of paper, would you be able to guess what it was with any accuracy? Now, beyond those statements, a few
more questions. What is beyond Library 2.0? How are these principles different than how things were done in the past
(pre-2006)? How does Library 2.0 address the digital divide? How much is Library 2.0 really driven by the user
experience? I imagine the library-patron relationship less like a 'horse and cart' and more like a planet-moon relationship.
(If information was the sun, patrons are the Earth and libraries are the Moon. We are roughly in sync with our patrons,
sometimes ahead or behind, and sometimes in the way.) When will the OPAC meet the our demands and (more importantly) the
search engine expectations of our users? Do we have to go open source to get what we want? Why aren't we yelling at vendors
to do this? Why are we putting up with this? Has Library 2.0 been hijacked by technophiles? In looking over the Library
2.0 Ning, the majority of posts in the forums and blog revolve around technology. Or is it because online librarians tend to
talk about online tools and sites? And finally: Is the term Library 2.0 dead? Is it more of a quibbling point for
people who are looking to argue about the present and future of libraries? Does it really mean anything anymore? Has it
become more of a “Blind men and an elephant”? What does it matter anyway? I may get some heat on this last question, but
if it takes some bumps to learn a few things here, I’m willing to take the knocks. I don’t mind being set straight, but in
reading up on Library 2.0, I’m wondering what the big deal is about it. AndyW
--You Can Help Judge Our Essay Contest
- http://lisnews.org/node/35991/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Thursday February 18th at 9:27 PM
-Read 176 times - 0 Comments
You probably already saw the big announcement for this months essay contest: The first ever LISNews Librarian Essay Contest
invites librarians to write an original essay about issues that impact librarianship. The contest will run for the entire
month of February, 2010, with the fabulous prizes awarded sometime in March. Winning essayists will receive one of several
prizes including Amazon or Borders gift cards, and a year of hosting from LISHost.org. You can browse the current essays at
http://lisnews.org/essays What you might not know is you can help pick a winner. Each essay has a set of Stars that allow
you to register your vote. The average score for each essay will help pick our winners.
--The Library Rules
- http://lisnews.org/node/35990/
-Blog Entry by jessica hearts libraries Posted Thursday February 18th at 5:39 PM
-Read 188 times - 1 Comments
By Jessica Horvath One thing I've learned during my time in the library world is that libraries treat their policies and
procedures manuals like security blankets. Rules make the introverted librarian feel safe and sometimes rules even make the
library safe. While rules can be dandy, I think there's a line that libraries cross all the time. A point in which the rules
stop making sense, and the limitations for the patron are terribly unwelcoming. If libraries will ever be universally known
as the "third place," we better make the visitors feel, at the very least, welcome. Let me illustrate my point: Imagine
going to a friend's house to play your favorite game, let's pretend it's Yahtzee. You walk up to her front door, which has
a laminated sign, in that dreadful comic sans, asking, "*PLEASE* Turn your cell phones OFF or put on VIBRATE before you
enter." "Well," you shrug, "guess she doesn't like noise." You ring the door bell and enter, politely overlooking the
tangerine vinyl furniture. "How's it going?" you ask. "You need to keep your voice down," she says. You whisper, "Where
are we playing Yahtzee?" "Over by that table, under the sign that says 'Yahtzee Table.'" Guess this friend likes signage
too. When you sit down at the designated Yahtzee table, you notice that a dull golf pencil is tethered down with twine and
an old piece of scotch tape. "Why did you tether this pencil?" "So someone doesn't steal it," she asserts. "By the way,"
this "friend" warns, "you only have 15 minutes left to play Yahtzee, and then the next person needs to come over and take a
turn." Disappointed, you say, "But, I just got here!" "Not my fault," she says, "that's the policy." Does this resemble
the typical user experience at your library? When evaluating your library's policies, do more than put yourself in the
patrons' shoes. Determine which policies are suffering from a mental illness (obsessive, germaphobic, schizophrenic, etc.)
and kill them off before you sound like that "regular" who draws his mustache on with a sharpie and wears stiletto heels.
You've lost touch with reality when you think over-signage will stop the bathroom questions, and you've completely lost your
mind once you insist the precious number two pencils be kept in the locked drawer. And really, will the library go bankrupt
if the last stapler disappears off the reference desk? Remember, these aren't just your patrons or "customers"; these are
your neighbors, your fellow man. The library, for better or for worse, is your home. We should live up to our notorious
reputation for sharing, and welcome our twisted and sometimes smelly world into our home.
--No Ruling At Google Books Hearing: Judge
- http://lisnews.org/node/35989/
-Front Page Story by Blake Posted Thursday February 18th at 2:02 PM
-Read 253 times - 0 Comments
NY Times: No Ruling At Google Books Hearing Lawyers for authors, publishers, corporations and governments came to a New
York court to challenge or hail a proposed deal over Google Inc's plans to digitize millions of books, but the judge said he
would not rule on Thursday. And from Publishers Weekly: At today's Google settlement fairness hearing, U.S. attorney
William Cavanaugh slammed the Google settlement, telling Judge Denny Chin that the class action vehicle was inappropriate,
and that the settlement "turned copyright on its head." Though the settlement may or may not offer tangible benefits, the
U.S. attorney stressed, "procedural rules cannot be used to modify rights." He also told the judge that the Department of
Justice has an active, "ongoing antitrust investigation" open on the settlement, suggesting that if the judge does approve
the deal, DoJ intervention still could be a factor.
--Parent Has a Problem with "Pants" Books for Teens
- http://lisnews.org/node/35988/
-Front Page Story by birdie Posted Thursday February 18th at 1:41 PM
-Read 375 times - 1 Comments
A citizen of the Fond du Lac School District has added more books to a list she wants banned from the schools. The school
district has scheduled a reconsideration hearing for 6:30 p.m. today at Fond du Lac High School to hear public comment on
Ann Wentworth's request to have the book "One of Those Hideous Books Where the Mother Dies" by Sonya Sones taken off the
shelves of Fond du Lac school libraries. The popular young adult book is being challenged by Wentworth as inappropriate for
students of middle school age. In addition, Wentworth is asking the district to review the following six library books at
Theisen Middle School: # "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" by Ann Brashares. # "The Second Summer of the Sisterhood" by
Ann Brashares. # "Girls in Pants "The Third Summer of the Sisterhood" by Ann Brashares. # "Forever in Blue: The Fourth
Summer of the Sisterhood" by Ann Brashares. # "Get Well Soon" by Julie Halpern. # "What My Mother Doesn't Know" by Sonya
Sones. Several interested persons have signed up to speak at Thursday's hearing. The district reconsideration committee
will be asked to begin scheduling dates to review the other six books in question. Each book will be considered
individually, according to the Fond du Lac School District. Fond du Lac Reporter has the story.
--The Unspeakable Truth
- http://lisnews.org/node/35987/
-Blog Entry by Anonymous Patron Posted Thursday February 18th at 12:31 PM
-Read 944 times - 11 Comments
By Ned Potter (LIFE-SHARE Project Officer, University of Leeds Library) How close is the library to death? Reports vary.
Some people think the reaper is hovering over the life-support machine, eager to pull the plug; others think that kind of
image is a lot of melodramatic fuss about nothing. Two things I know for sure. One is, public-funding for libraries is being
cut on both sides of the Atlantic - and as we sleep-walk towards a Conservative government in the UK we’ll soon realise just
how much worse things can be, particularly with regards to the arts, culture, and public spending. The other is, people who
would otherwise require the services of a library have never had so many means and opportunities to bypass us entirely in
reaching their information goals. So, we have issues! Is it as simple as Change or Die? Thingology, the blog from
LibraryThing, recently indicated in an article entitled ‘Why are you for killing libraries?’ that there might be a third
way: impede technological progress to ensure that libraries remain relevant and needed. The e-book, it suggested, could kill
us off for good – so how come we’re so keen to embrace it? It is a provocative and thought-provoking point, and my two
sentence summary above is in no way adequate – I’d wholly recommend reading the whole thing. It is a counter-intuitive but
ultimately fairly logical suggestion that perhaps we should be trying to slow down the uptake of any technology which could
ultimately render the library empty and obsolete. I’ve read differing explanations of the origins of the word “library”.
>From the Latin word ‘Liber’ meaning ‘to peel’ referring to the inner bark of a tree, on which manuscripts were written, or
more simply to just mean ‘book’. Or, also from the Latin, perhaps it originates from ‘Libero’ meaning to free or liberate? I
like that one more (although I fear it is less likely to be correct) as what we do is liberate information. We facilitate
access to, pay for access to, point people towards access to, and generally ‘free’ information that they want. (Because,
contrary to popular reports, information is not free. It is sometimes monetarily expensive, it is often locked behind
complicated authentication procedures, and it is almost always buried deep within a massive heap of other information – too
much data is just as prohibitive as too little.) The 'freer of the information' is a definition which stands the test of
time a lot better than ‘the keeper of the books’ – we’ve been keepers of books for millennia, but we may not be for that
much longer; we’ve been liberating information for ever too, and that will never change as long as our role survives. It is
as agents of Libero that we may be able to endure. What we cannot do is obstruct progress to information liberation! We
cannot try to slow down the impact of the e-book, or any other format which may have a negative impact on the library’s
usefulness. It’s just not right to try and divert or derail progress for our own ends – indeed, we have no hope of doing so
anyway - and even to try is to betray the Information Professional’s equivalent of the Hippocratic Oath… We must embrace the
e-book and everything it represents, even if doing so makes us complicit in our own demise. Here is the unspeakable truth:
if there comes a point when we are no longer required in our present form, we shouldn’t fight that, we should just leave. We
cannot deflect emerging trends to suit our own industry. It would be terrible for me and you and all our peers to lose our
jobs (although whatever happens there will always be some cause for a good number of libraries to remain open, I’m sure) but
that isn’t a good enough reason to try and keep something alive if it effectively enters a vegetative state. I used to like
the idea that we are ‘the gatekeepers of information’ but that has an obstructive ring to it now; we really do need to be
more akin to willing Sherpas. It is better to fade away than to betray our roles as the liberators of information by
becoming jailers instead. That’s a stark pronouncement, but actually it isn’t as bleak as all that. I don’t think we are
anywhere near the point where libraries are no longer needed yet, and that there’s plenty we can do in the meantime to
ensure we never get there. The first thing is to ensure everyone knows what we can already do for them, and the second thing
is to adapt to what they need us to do for them. Let’s look at spreading the word first of all. We need to make sure
everyone is making an informed decision as to whether or not to engage with libraries. This comes back to a whole host of
related hobby-horses I’ve ridden elsewhere… The Library Day in the Life Project, marketing the profession in general, the
Echolib debate – they all relate in some way to the idea of preaching to the potentially converted, and telling them what we
actually do so they know whether or not they need us. We’ll never ‘convert’ those who are actively hostile (or if we do, it
won’t necessarily be a good use of our resources when there are better targets to work on) so we must concentrate our
efforts on the currently indifferent. We have to reach people who don’t fall into our current marketing catchment area. If
someone came up to me and asked me why libraries were so important these days, I could regale him or her with anything from
the 30 second ‘elevator sell’ to a one-hour lecture on the value of what we do today – but sadly people don’t come up and
ask, so we have to go and find them, on their terms, and via the media they engage with already. In fact, I feel as though
we need some kind of professional PR. Not individually, but collectively. Imagine a news item on the radio, perhaps about
libraries closing due to lack of borrowing / footfall or some such – I’ve heard items just like that. But never have I heard
the announcer say, “Here is a spokesman from the Coalition for the Promotion of Libraries [or whatever] who said: [insert
‘passionate defence of the profession which might possibly encourage the radio listeners to think anew about whether we can
offer them something’, here]” – yet I can think of a hundred other industries that wouldn’t dream of letting a negative news
story go by without some official representation in the media, to rebuff or mitigate the stories effects. Or, indeed, to
place more positive stories in the media in the first place. Lots of libraries do brilliant marketing on an individual or
regional level (and learning from those success stories is important) but I’m not sure the profession per se, and the
library per se, is so well represented; that needs to change. How do we go about doing this? I don’t have the answers – I’m
better at formulating questions, sadly. But I’d like to simulate debate and get the input of greater thinkers than me… The
second thing we can do to ensure we never get to the stage where we have to do the decent thing and fall on our collective
sword is adapt, modify, revise and reinvent. There is plenty of historical precedent for organisations to find circumstances
have overtaken them and they are no longer relevant in their current form. Some are able to adapt and become relevant in a
new form; some are simply unable to continue existing at all due to a comprehensive shift in the technology / market-place /
paradigm. My main point in this essay is to say we that we need to engage with the former idea, because it’s not worth
trying to force it if the latter happens. To take a very basic example of adapting, there is a company in the UK and Europe
called The Carphone Warehouse. You can guess what it used to do, when it first started out – it sold phones for people to
have in their cars. Mobile phones (and good taste) rendered car-phones obsolete pretty swiftly, but The Carphone Warehouse
survives to this day and continues to thrive, by shifting their focus to mobile phones and all the associated paraphernalia.
The lesson we can learn here is, they were not so tied to their previous identity that they couldn’t adapt to the changes in
the needs of their customers, and even though they stopped selling their eponymous product entirely they still had value in
the marketplace. A rather weightier example might be the oil industry. Here’s a quote from BP’s website: “Since ‘BP’ petrol
first went on sale in Britain in the 1920s, the brand has grown to become recognised worldwide for quality gasoline,
transport fuels, chemicals and alternative sources of energy such as wind, solar and biofuels.” I’m not sure I’d agree with
that entirely… (I’m trying to avoid libel here.) But what is striking about that sentence is the fact that the second half
of it may be all BP is known for in a hundred year’s time. When the oil runs out, BP and all the other companies will have
to focus their efforts entirely on things like wind-farms and solar energy. Say what you like about the irony (or perhaps
carefully crafted and sinister strategy) that the destroyers of the environment are to become, with all their incalculable
resources, its protector; the fact is the brand endures despite an almost total about-turn in their focus. They are
adapting, they are fully accepting that their original purpose has a limited legacy (in certain senses of the word, anyway)
and they are repositioning themselves accordingly. Major oil companies have a history of buying up patents of potentially
rival technologies (steam-powered cars, for example) in order to suppress them – do we really want to go down a similar
route in libraries by disrupting technological progress? Of course not, let’s skip straight to the part where we
re-appropriate our resources to better engage with the current market-place. Can libraries change? They can, in fact they
are already doing it and have been for ages – the environments we work in are often unrecognisable from, say, twenty years
ago. But can we cope with a Carphone Warehouse / BP style paradigm shift, where ‘the book’ as we’ve always known it is no
longer our primary offering? It’ll be a damn sight harder, but possibly necessary in the long term. And, like the phone
company and the energy company, we’ll be moving into a closely related area in which we already have expertise –
essentially, in our case, marshalling and providing access to information online. The unspeakable truth is that we should
not try and outlive our usefulness. We certainly shouldn’t try and prolong that usefulness by effectively sabotaging our
users’ ability to empower themselves. But the more palatable truth is that if we work hard on reinvention and increased
public understanding, we’ll never have to be put on the life-support machine in the first place. It is never too late to
adapt.
--It's Just Not a Good Time
- http://lisnews.org/node/35986/
-Blog Entry by Anonymous Patron Posted Thursday February 18th at 11:32 AM
-Read 298 times - 1 Comments
Really, as far at the job situation these days goes, it's not a good time for a lot of people. But that's not much comfort
when it's YOU that's facing a possible layoff. Never would I have thought that this would happen. I went to college, then
grad school for my Master's in Library Science. After two years of looking (I admit I was place-bound) I landed a
$13-an-hour support staff position at an academic library. I wasn't particularly interested in the work, or even academic
libraries for that matter, but hey, it was a job, and a job with good benefits at that. Fast forward another two years and
I am looking at the likelihood of getting laid off in May. "Laid off" is just a nice way of them saying to you that your
work isn't valued enough to keep you. With the support of my spouse and a good friend, I am dealing with it okay. I still
come to work (and actually do work) and make an effort to be nice to everyone. But last week I had a moment where I didn't
know whether to laugh or cry... I was sitting at my desk quietly working when in walked four student workers with a bunch
of Mylar balloons. They gave one to my co-worker, thanking her for her donation. Then one of them looked at the nameplate on
my cubicle and said, "it's says that you are supposed to get one too." I cringed. Like I said, I work at an academic
library; the university I work for was doing a campaign to raise money for the university. I of course, knowing layoffs were
coming, gave nothing. The student brushed off my attempts to deny that I donated anything and proceeded to try to hand me
the balloon. I did not want that balloon; it had the logo of the university foundation on it. The same university that
decided that I did not have a job there anymore. I did not want that happy, cheerful balloon in my workspace. I told the
student again I did not want the balloon. She still tried to hand it to me. Something in me just snapped. In a steady, tense
voice I just told her, "I don't want the balloon, I am getting laid off." She apologized and left quickly. Unless you have
a job lead for me, I just want to be left alone during my time left at my job. For anything else, like stupid chain emails,
meetings about things I won't be here for when they are implemented, or cheery work anniversary/birthday celebrations, IT'S
JUST NOT A GOOD TIME.
--It's J.K. Rowling's Turn to Get Sued
- http://lisnews.org/node/35985/
-Front Page Story by birdie Posted Thursday February 18th at 10:44 AM
-Read 380 times - 1 Comments
J.K. Rowling has been named in a lawsuit alleging she stole ideas for her wildly popular and lucrative "Harry Potter" books
from another British author reports The Huffington Post. The estate of the late Adrian Jacobs on Wednesday added Rowling as
a defendant in a lawsuit it filed in June against Bloomsbury Publishing PLC for alleged copyright infringement, according to
a statement released by the estate's representatives, who are based in Australia. The lawsuit, filed in a London court,
claims Rowling's book "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" copied substantial parts of Jacobs' 1987 book, "The Adventures
of Willy the Wizard – No. 1 Livid Land." Jacobs' estate also claims that many other ideas from "Willy the Wizard" were
copied into the "Harry Potter" books. Jacobs died in London in 1997. "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" is the fourth
book in Rowling's series and was published in July 2000.
--The Fight over the Google of All Libraries
- http://lisnews.org/node/35984/
-Blog Entry by Pete Posted Thursday February 18th at 10:18 AM
-Read 297 times - 0 Comments
An (Updated) Wired.com FAQ on the Google Books Project and the fight over a settlement. Federal judge Denny Chin will have
the difficult job of sorting that out Thursday, as he gives the second version of the Google settlement a “fairness
hearing.”
--A Self-Publishers Tale: The Disadvantages of Amazon's Advantage Program
- http://lisnews.org/node/35983/
-Front Page Story by birdie Posted Thursday February 18th at 8:42 AM
-Read 540 times - 7 Comments
Dennis Danziger writes: "I am the world's worst Jewish businessman. I don't understand why I'm so bad with money. It can't
be genetic. My brother is a professor of economics. My cousin Leilah, a college dropout, created a company that trades on
the NY Stock Exchange. And I am very good at three-point shots. Not only am I inept at everything money-oriented, but I am
unorganized and have no patience for details. So self-publishing my novel, A Short History of a Tall Jew, a dark, romantic
comedy set in Los Angeles, was something most of my friends and family warned me against. I could have hired an on-line
self-publishing company to do the work. They're fast and inexpensive, but I got all snobby and didn't want a name on my
book's spine that would instantly identify my work as a vanity production. So I farmed out the cover art, the page lay-out
and the web design to a place where skilled craftsman earn a fraction of what they're actually worth - Cleveland - my wife's
hometown. And before my website was up, I astonishingly received an order from the Amazon Advantage Program. More from
The Huffington Post.
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