Tag: ala

hi – 28feb

Posted on by jessamyn

Hi. Sometimes getting people on board with a new idea is just as easy as plowing forward with a positive attitude and hoping that people will either sign on and share your excitement, or at least watch cautiously and be willing to be convinced. Two examples from today

  1. ALA Council is going to have an online “face book” to help people familiarize themselves with their appointed and elected Council reps. Big props to Leslie Burger for this one, but I helped a little.
  2. The Roxbury Free Library in Roxbury Vermont now has a URL and a mini web page. Big props to Susan D’Amico for being willing to learn about domain shopping and I helped with a little hosting while they plan their next step. What a nice little achievement to take to town meeting, don’t you think?

In both these cases, someone in a position of authority basically had to make a decision, flip a switch, say “yea” or “nay” to a new idea, decide to do something different. With some some help from people with good information (me in these cases, and others) whole new things spring up, new combinations of information, new methods of delivery. How neat is that?

leslie burger and what to do with ala

Posted on by jessamyn

Leslie Burger, incoming ALA President has a blog. I would love to know what Michael Gorman has to say about this, or as Caveat Lector calls him M-ch–l G-rm-n which always makes me smile. Leslie has already gotten going, meeting with some of the blogger types at Midwinter to solicit opinions about using and implementing “new” technology at ALA to help the organization. Her latest post The LIE, BQE and ALA talks about building on the idea of social networking to make ALA more relevant and useful to an incoming group of librarians, a group that may be wondering what ALA can do for them. Many people, myself included, chimed in with suggestions, and I’d encourage you to do the same.

copyright programming at ALA Annual in New Orleans

Posted on by jessamyn

ALA’s Office for Technology Policy has their programmming for ALA Annual in New Orleans scheduled already. If you have a particular love of copyright issues, you may want to go to some of these events.

Best Practices in Digital Reference: Copyright, Licensing, and Privacy Guidelines (Linda Arret)
Sunday, June 25 8-10am

The Long Tail: The Internet, Culture, and the Mega-Store (Nancy Kranich)
Monday, June 26 10:30-12noon

Copyright 101: Everything You Wanted to Know about Copyright But Were Afraid to Ask (CAC, CAN, COL-IP)
Monday, June 26 1:30-3:30

Ray Patterson Copyright Award and Reception (CAN, CAC, OITP)
Monday, June 26 4-5:30pm

ACRL’s Copyright Program: Copyrights and Licensing Wrongs (as an FYI)
Sunday, June 25 10:30-12noon

Dear ALA, how is that new website going?

Posted on by jessamyn

A colleague of mine works for one of the companies invited to go to Chicago to present their proposal to ALA for the content management system for new ALA website. Since travelling to Chicago on their own dime in June, they haven’t head a word from ALA. I’ve heard, informally, that the field has been narrowed to two, possibly one candidate. It’s too bad that formally the other candidates haven’t heard anything. Especially bad, since they have blogs and can express their displeasure online. From the school of “I don’t know what Library 2.0 is exactly, but I know it when I see it” this sort of quick widely-distributable feedback is part of it, and that’s the good news and the bad news for some libraries. Please read An Open Letter to ALA. update: apparently Openflows has now heard from ALA. This post had nothing to do with that.

National PATRIOT Act call-in Day

Posted on by jessamyn

It’s a bit of a stunt, but ALA Council is doing a National [USA] PATRIOT Act call-in day at 10 am CST today. All Councilors are going to turn on their cell phones and call their legislators to ask them to

  1. Include language in Section 215 to require a statement of fact linking the person whose records are sought to a terrorism investigation.
  2. Include language to allow a Section 215 recipient to post a meaningful challenge to the FISA court order.
  3. Include language allowing a section 505 recipieint to post a meaningful challenge to a National Security Letter.

Of course, when I’ve been calling my representative, I’ve been going beyond this and expressing grave reservations about Section 215 specifically and other parts of the USA APTRIOT Act generally (specifically concerning wiretaps and electronic communication generally), but this language appears designed to be something that everyone on Council can get behind. So, if you’re free in a few hours, go find your representative and pick up the phone.