At my library we have been considering raising the limit on the number of DVDs/videos a patron may check out at once. Currently the limit is four. There is no book limit. One of the reasons we were concerned about raising the limit is that DVDs in particular have such a high resale value on the Internet. I saw this article about a library employee who has systematically been reselling DVDs, books and other library items over the Internet for six months and using his access to the library computer to mark them as “checked in” He was turned in because he sold a book to a college president in Illinois who was suspicious about some of the library markings. This sort of thing happens all over, even in sleepy little neighborhoods like mine. Slashdot discusses. What do we do about this? [thanks john]
Author: jessamyn
what quirky libraries have you been to lately?
Andrea visits the Fire Library
ALA Elections – some picks
I haven’t spoken much about who I’m voting for in the ALA Elections because I suspect only a very small subset of you care, and because I haven’t even gotten my ballot yet. That said, Library Juice has two lists of picks from people who I generally agree with politically. If you are a voter in the ALA elections, vote for people you know, don’t just use all your votes because you have them. Bullet voting makes each vote count every so slightly more. Leslie Burger is my pick for president, but then again I voted for Michael Gorman.
rory on blogs
Rory has an essay worth reading on the blog people thing. Of particular note are two points. His quote “Library Juice is not a blog, but I will wear a “blog person” button if you send me one.” points to a certain sort of solidarity that can be useful in library and blogging communities alike. Secondly, he mentions the “blogging craze” whereby every new group with a web site decides that site must be a blog. There are many ways to put information on the web and we shouldn’t forget the Right Tool for the Right Job maxim. Blogging has brought many reluctant technology users into the world of quickly and effortlesssly shared information, let’s not bludgeon them with the term and then confuse them and mutate it to shove it in places it doesn’t belong.
[blogs] have become the default format for any new website, regardless of the appropriateness of a centrally chronological organizing principle. These days, any time a group is organized they set up a blog, as though all they can imagine offering via the web is their latest news and links. I think a blog is a logical part of a larger website, but often small organizations miss the boat when they make it their primary presence, with a single scanty page, linked only from the blog, telling us “about the organization” when information concerning the rganization could easily make up a site of its own and deserves prominence and accessibility.
how is a library like Las Vegas?
Maine Today: “A visit to a public library should be like a trip to Las Vegas — what happens there should stay there.”