Note from Michael – I’m deep in two projects today and tomorrow and haven’t had much time to catch up on the hubub with Harper Collins and ebooks. I can say that I agree with Justin’s take on the potential and promise of promoting content creation, access to technology and building the community memory (whatever community it might be – civic, academic, education) as a big part of our future in libraries. I appreciate Justin’s hard work and insights. The news about HarperCollins placing loaning caps on ebooks in the Overdrive catalog—known as #hcod on Twitter—gobbled up my Twitter […]
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Via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette… Gov. Tom Corbett’s no-new-tax pledge means he has to figure a way to slash billions of dollars across the board from Pennsylvania’s budget, and it’s unlikely libraries will emerge unscathed. Into this breach steps janet jai of Highland Park. (She had her name legally changed to lower-case letters a long time ago, but that’s another story.) Ms. jai (pronounced like the letter J), 65, has rushed out 500 copies of a self-published, 165-page paperback book, “Saving Our Public Libraries: Why We Should. How We Can.” We met Monday to discuss her fundraising suggestions. I had coffee […]
DOK, the Library Concept Center in the Netherlands and home of the Shanachies has been working on digital storytelling tools for libraries and museums for a number of years now and have come up with new applications for Multi Touch that allow the users to bring their own content to the library. There have been a number of articles on the earlier apps DOK has developed such as the Heritage Browser. The Heritage Browser displays archival material from the City Archive in the library’s public space via a Microsoft Surface table. DOK has linked the material of the City Archive […]
A Nintendo DS game for my wife Haley, some Captain Beefheart for our Saturday family night music, and a book about firemen to read to my son Finn before we go to bed tonight. I can’t think of a better way to spend our weekend. -Post by Justin Hoenke, Tame the Web Contributor
Transliteracy: 21st century literacy It is clear that technology is creating a large change in the ways we communicate and get information within our culture. This great change affects not only individuals, but also the institutions that make information available, such as libraries and universities. For a very long time, the essential modes of human communication remained unchanged. Having the ability to read, write, and speak more or less ensured that one possessed the necessary tools to communicate effectively within our culture. With the explosion of new technologies that affect the way in which we accomplish so many of our […]
As much of a fan of putting together elaborate and unique programs at my library, at the same time I feel it’s good to balance things out with some laid back stuff as well. This lead to my desire to seek out a movie license so that we could show some films. It was a program that could easily happen and at the same time give our teen patrons something to do. I tried a Random Movie Night program at first. It was probably the least amount of work I put into a program and I had hoped for high […]
First up, the Buy India a Library team wishes to thank everyone that has donated to the project. Right now, our total amount raised stands at £665, which is more than half of what we need to accomplish our goal of purchasing a village library! Awesome! If you have any questions about how the money we raise is being spent, please read our post here: Who spends the money we’re raising, and how? And finally, Andromeda did this really great interview at ALA Midwinter that explains the project and how it came to be. Thanks for everything, and if you […]
For new librarians entering the field of academic librarianship, there is an expectation to continue and evolve the Participatory Service methodology. Luckily, it is not a forced expectation, but rather one of excitement and, dare I say, glee. The ability of academic libraries to effectively reach and engage students in the research process is palpable and librarians are responsible. Librarians entering the profession are happily challenged with continuing this new era of constant change, experimentation, innovation, and evaluation. This group of new and future librarians is so inspired and focused on this new culture of libraries and librarians. And I […]
From the minds of Jan Holmquist (representing Denmark), Andromeda Yelton (representing the USA), and Ned Potter (representing the UK)… …comes Buy India a Library, a project started by librarians to fund a library in India via Twitter. Head on over to their blog for more information on the project and learn about how you can help them accomplish their awesome goal! What an awesome project and a wonderful team. I’ve been lucky to meet in person with Andromeda a few times and have many great discussions with Jan and Ned online. Kudos to them for making it happen! -Post by […]
Portland Public Teen Library: 2010 Year In Review on Prezi I’ve been thinking a lot about transparency this year. It might have to do with the term becoming a buzz word of some sorts, or maybe because the ongoing discussion concerning Wikileaks in news media. A huge part of me, however, thinks that I came to the conclusion that as a public employee I have an obligation to inform my community about what I’m doing. Nonetheless, I approached creating a 2010 year in review for the Portland Public Teen Library with this idea in mind. Here’s the full annual report […]