September 2011
84 posts
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“We asked Amazon a few questions about the privacy implications of the split...”
– Amazon’s Silk Web browser adds new twist to old idea (via infoneer-pulse)
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Naked Security: Amazon Kindle Fire's Silk browser... →
All web connections from your tablet will connect directly to Amazon, rather than the destination web page. Amazon will keep this connection between your Kindle Fire and EC2 open indefinitely while you are actively surfing, reducing the latency and connection times to retrieve web pages.
Hopefully you can start to see the problem here. All of your web surfing habits will transit...
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“The irony of copyright law as it stands is that historic orchestral broadcasts...”
– Readers’ reviews: the festival bubble and the music copyright extension | Culture | The Guardian (via infoneer-pulse)
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ALA Techsource: Ready, Aim....Fire! →
Great summary of the Kindle announcements yesterday, concluding with some thoughts about how the new and cheaper devices will affect libraries.
For libraries, however, with the exception of cheaper cost-per-device you want to provide…well, nothing really changes. Amazon is still providing books at the publisher’s set cost that are licensed in such a way that limits the ability of...
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Read Write Web: Do E-Readers Make it Harder to Ban... →
As e-books continue to grow in popularity, there’s a seemingly unwinnable debate over which is better: digital books or their paper-based counterparts. Both have their advantages and it’ll likely be quite awhile before paper books come close to disappearing. In addition all of the benefits that e-books bring, is it possible that they may also make it more difficult for books to...
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Library Limbo →
infoneer-pulse:
The layoffs of eight library staff members — some with decades of experience and only a couple of years away from retirement — have faculty members at the University of San Diego up in arms. Critics call the administration’s actions an affront to the Roman Catholic teachings of the university.
Administrators said a reorganization of the university’s Copley Library was necessary...
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This Is My Next: Amazon Kindle Fire vs. iPad 2 vs.... →
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The Digital Reader: Kindle Library Ebooks & the... →
I suspect that as time goes on that we will see Kindle availability having an effect on library ebook sales. That might not be important now, but imagine what will happen when ebooks grow to be a larger part of the overall market. A title that is not available on the Kindle won’t get the same exposure in a library as one that is available. Readers won’t find it, so they won’t read it. That...
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Brian Solis: Whoops, I didn’t mean for you to read... →
As the line between social media and privacy continues to erode, I often think about these words by Gabriel García Márquez, “Everyone has three lives: a public life, a private life, and a secret life.” Sometimes in social media, we intentionally or often, unintentionally, blur the lines between who we are (outward facing), who we are (introspectively), and who we want to be.
A recent...
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Library Renewal: Library eBooks Coming Soon to... →
Unfortunately, some new concerns have started to creep in as I think through the long term implications for this deal. Amazon is getting access to a LOT of information about libraries, even if it is anonymized, and it is making me wonder if we should have done a better job negotiating our deal. I applaud OverDrive for working with Amazon to get ebooks on the Kindle (and Kindle apps);...
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“A library is not a laboratory, a schoolroom, or a lecture platform—it is a...”
– Jesse H. Shera, “The Compleat Librarian” (1964)
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Library Babel Fish: Not Sold (Yet) on Ebooks →
It’s partly a function of the kind of library I work at—undergraduate, residential, small—and partly my skeptical nature, but I still am not convinced we should invest in vast collections of books we don’t choose and don’t really own. So before I market something, I need to be persuaded my community needs it. And so far, there’s no demand.
This is a common technology paradox. Until people...
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FB stalk your homework.
thelifeguardlibrarian:
Upcoming lesson: I know you can stalk that girl down you saw that one time. If you’re good at Facebook, you’re good at research. It’s all a matter of stalking the right way.
Haha, so true!
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Attempting Elegance: Counting books is boring →
At SUNYLA this year, someone asked me about collection measures, and I think that’s when I said “I don’t care” and made several people very happy. Even if that’s not when I said it, I still don’t care.
I said it again today, when a friend innocently asked a bunch of us what our staff FTE and collection size are. I answered the FTE question (22), but … I still don’t care about the size of...
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Critics at Large: Far More Than Shushing and... →
To put this plainly, librarians are surgeons with the Internet. They are specially trained to know how to find anything you need in cyberspace, how to locate the best answer and get it fast. They’re ready and waiting. They are the emergency-response personnel to all your information needs. Your public librarian is a wizard. Ask them anything – seriously, I dare you – they will find it. ...
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The Guardian: The death of books has been greatly... →
For one thing, people are buying more and more books in Amazonia, and more and more of them are on Amazon’s ebook platform the Kindle. In May this year, Amazon announced that, for the first time, it was selling more Kindle versions of books than paperback and hardbacks combined, and (here’s the thing that doesn’t get quoted so often) sales of print books were still...
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University of Venus: Hymn to the Libraries →
Lovely post.
There will never be enough words to write about libraries and my very personal encounters with their books. Beyond the family influence, the happy accidental encounters, and various events from my life; libraries are and will always be the main constant in my professional and human achievements (because I don’t see how one could develop in the absence of the other).
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“Different languages are spoken at varying speeds but thanks to correlated...”
– The speed and density of language (via wildcat2030)
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The Happiness Project: Want To Boost Your... →
“‘Control your exit?’” I asked blankly. “What exactly does that mean?”
“It means, always be able to leave when you want. Drive yourself to a party instead of getting a ride, so you can leave when you’re ready. Try to go to someone else’s house, or a public place, instead of having people over to your house, because there’s nothing worse than seeing someone lean back and cross...
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CIO Insight: Want Good IT Customer Service? Visit... →
The blog post that linked to this put it well:
As a former IT person and a current librarian, I’ve got to say that this article,Want Good IT Customer Service? Visit Your Library, has a lot of truth in it — I definitely see the differences between my former profession and my current one. And as the article points out, many of those differences are on the plus side for librarians. ...
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seanan_mcguire: Across the digital divide. →
Wonderful, wonderful post from an author about the importance of books to those in poverty. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
It is sometimes difficult for me to truly articulate my reaction to people saying that print is dead. I don’t want to be labeled a luddite, or anti-ebook; I love my computer, I love my smartphone, and I love the fact that I have the internet in my pocket. ...
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Jameco.com: The Fountain of Knowledge →
A nice ode to libraries from the marketing VP of an electronics company.
The repository for our knowledge has historically been entrusted to libraries. But in this Internet age… is the library still relevant today? I think libraries are still relevant and, in fact, they’ve frequently embraced new technology at a faster rate than many of their users. I’m far from a book...
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Wired Campus: Major Publishers Join Indiana U.... →
Interesting project. It’ll be worthwhile to keep tabs on how this goes, especially in regards to student satisfaction and whether there’s any effect on grades.
Each professor at Indiana can decide whether to participate in the e-textbook project. So far 22 courses have done so, and last month the university released a report outlining how those professors and their students (1,700...
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Censored Genius: Amazon's Big Ass Library →
But what these librarians are saying is that the book lending model for libraries is dead. Much like how the VHS and DVD lending model perished years ago when Blockbuster and then Netflix and then Redbox appeared. What? That part of library lending is stronger than ever? In fact, Redbox is only $1 and Blockbuster has repeatedly lowered prices AND Netflix users are quitting the service...
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“In the course of digitizing for ten years, we’ve had two requests to take down...”
– Ed Van Gemert, deputy director of libraries at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, speaking to The Cornell Daily Sun. (via arlpolicynotes)
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Library Journal: Both Sides Now | Peer to Peer... →
What is more troubling to me is the way that copyright is being read as a one-sided right: for authors to control the circulation of their work. It’s treated as a moral right, not as a balance of interests recognized by law. In fact, the Constitution spells out that the only right authors have been granted by copyright is a limited monopoly that exists because it is assumed to provide...
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Not All Bits: Cyberpunk Librarian: Dealing With... →
The thing that I do differently is this. I’ll declare RSS bankruptcy once a day, sometimes more often than that. I have a simple strategy of dealing with information overload that I don’t see discussed all that often and that simple strategy is this:
It’s just news. Don’t worry if you miss some of it because there will certainly be more later.
Look, I want to be on top of my profession and...
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shhh! no running in the library!: The Authors... →
thelifeguardlibrarian:
I’m trying to catch up. For those of you playing at home, Galleycat’s conveniently put together a very helpful brief reports on the goings on.
-Authors Guild Locates Orphaned Work Author in Less Than Three Minutes
Using Google and a telephone, the Authors Guild uncovered the author of a…
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Kim Komando Show: Kim's Essential Guide to... →
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American Libraries Magazine: Avoiding the Path to... →
It would behoove libraries to adopt a similar focus. A very simple formula is at work in determining satisfaction for most library users. If a patron comes to the library or logs in and finds what she wants, or a close approximation to it, she is happy. To the extent that she does not, she isn’t. Period. Impressive buildings, glitzy web pages, fat acquisitions budgets, high volume counts...
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LIS News: 15 tips for social media security in... →
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Rules for Anchorites: The Year of the Unlimited... →
Great post about the Amazon ebook thing from the perspective of an author.
Now, I get that ebooks are happening whether anyone likes it or not. And I get that subscriptions have worked for other media–I use my Netflix like anyone. But there’s a reason Netflix has a quite limited streaming selection, and it’s losing, not gaining, content. This is not because Netflix hates you and wants you to...
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GigaOm: Why the idea of a Netflix for e-books... →
When the news of Amazon’s plan hit the web on Monday, a number of observers quickly noted that paying a monthly fee for access to a collection of books sounds a lot like something we already have — namely, a public library. So why wouldn’t people just go to the library instead of signing up with Amazon? The most obvious answer is: For the same reason millions of people have signed up for...
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Boston Globe: Social media might not be worth the... →
This is absolutely good advice. Anyone considering having a social media presence for business/publicity purposes needs to weigh all the pros and cons before starting up an account.
…But it’s not just about time - social media work also takes diligence. One negative comment or potentially offensive post can make a business look unprofessional or disconnected from its customer base.
So ...
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LIS News: Social Media Security in Libraries →
Libraries and librarians are fully embracing social media sites like Twitter, LinkedIN and Facebook. Our libraries use them to connect with and engage our patrons, increase library visibility and communicate information. We each use them to connect with old friends, sell ourselves, stay up to date with the world around us, and keep in touch with family. There are serious security risks...
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Express Times: Ever met the stern librarian? →
How sad for this person that they’ve only ever dealt with unfriendly librarians! :(
Step into a library, and you are greeted with a “why have you come here?” look by a perpetually dour librarian. Instead of being drawn by a welcoming ambience and the attractive smell of books, you are made uncomfortable by the hostile vibes of the librarian.
