Guantanamo Bay Prison library reading preferences lean towards Harry Potter. The prison “librarian” and Air Force translator spent ten months in solitary confinement over spy charges including one charge of taking two souvenir photographs.
Author: jessamyn
big news – keynote speech in Australia
Big fun news this morning…. I’ll be giving a keynote speech at the Australia Library and Information Association’s New Librarian Symposium in Adelaide Australia in December. I had been invited last month but funding was going to keep me on this side of the pond and giving a talk via videoconferencing. I just got word that the Bob Hawke Prime Ministerial Library [part of the larger institute] will be sponsoring my travel so I can give the talk in person. I’ve never been to Australia. I’ve never given a keynote talk. I’ve never been in the Southern Hemisphere. I guess now is as good a time as any to see if I’m on a no-fly list, huh? More from me as the situation develops. Anyone with local knowledge or who is a member of ALIA, feel free to drop me a line.
let the NextGenners shine
I’m not a NextGen librarian though I am often in the market for jobs, the same as they are. I’ve been thinking a lot about library schools increasing their acceptance rates at the same time as available jobs are seriously dwindling. Andrea and I were chatting about this on the way back from the library tour.
“Do you think you should be able to go through library school nowadays without knowing how to use a computer?”
“No.”
I’m not even sure who said what. I feel that the profession has enough experienced and able librarians who may not be tech savvy. The shift in the profession is leading us towards more and more technological solutions to library problems. I don’t think everyone has to be a systems librarian, but everyone should be able to competently troubleshoot a public PC and/or use their own computer for basic office and reference tasks at a bare minimum. The next step is letting the NextGens — or anyone who wants to really — really apply these skills to the workplace environment.
libraries + weblogs, a great resource page from Iceland
If anyone asks you about the whole “libraries and weblogs thing” anytime soon, just send them straight to this page and then ask “any questions?” I bet there won’t be, except maybe “why don’t I know more about this woman?”
The Librarian – one for the history museum?
I read about the review of the new book The Librarian a few days back and paid it no mind. Then I got the following email and while I think that flaming the author would be in bad taste, a pleasant email from a modern-day librarian setting him straight might not be out of line.
There is a review in today’s NYT Review of Books of a book called “The Librarian.” I urge you to read the review if you haven’t already. I get the feeling that the author (of the review) is just begging to have the review posted to your site, so that we can flame the living shit out of him.