Want to keep your loved ones close to you [and your books] even in the afterlife? How about these book shaped urns? [thanks jude]
Author: jessamyn
hi – 13oct
Hi. I appear to be allergic to leaves, or something else about this wonderful weather. I’ve been home sick for a day or so — sick like no-typing sick — but I’m on the mend and have managed to toss up a few pictures from the Fall Tour of Libraries that Andrea and Corey and I went on this weekend.
nurture young librarians!
Marylaine has a short astute piece on the importance of younger librarians to the profession.
In the face of rapid demographic, technological and political change, we must do everything we can to make our entire organization smarter and nimbler, which includes hiring and listening to new young librarians. The fact is that “what everyone knows” is sometimes wrong, which explains the extended time-lag between when a revolutionary new theory is proposed and when it is generally accepted as true: it’s the time required for defenders of existing theories to die and get out of the way. [thanks celia]
ebook invasion in Cherry Hill NJ
This ebook/library press release [which was emailed to me in its entirely in my comment box] makes the “virtual library” that patrons get to use until the new library is built sound about as fun as watching the Macy’s Parade on a tiny black and white television. Residents of Cherry Hill do get to visit the Cherry Hill Digital Community Center [sponsored by Sirsi, makers of non-Netscape compliant OPACs] which the library web site says is “an online place” available for residents. I’ve got nothing against eBooks conceptually, but can we agree that, just like Google Answers, they’re supplemental to other library services, not replacements for them? Just like the profession’s reliance on major book distributors has narrowed our easily-purchased titles to a smaller subsection of available books, so does the eBook program’s interaction with big name publishers subtly, or not so subtly, shift the library’s collection focus from comprehensive to popular? Library/business/vendor partnerships can be a really good thing, but they have to be entered into thoughtfully and consciously. Do you think overdrive’s privacy policy is the same as your library’s?
itinerant librarians
The name Itinerant Librarians and the concept it embodies has always appealed to me, sort of like the MyBrarian idea. I’m not sure I agree with the Distributed Library Project assertion that traditional libraries don’t foster community [ours does, in at least some ways, I am sure of it] but the project concept is fascinating nonetheless. [thanks jude]