Never had one of these done for a talk I’ve given before. I did more of a write-up on my experiences giving three talks in a week (every specific thing was great but the overall busyness was a little much for me) over at the place where I store my newsletter. Still unclear what I’ll be using the blog space for now except possible cross-posting or … something. But wanted to say hello and that I’m still doing my librarian thing.
Tag: tilt
Upcoming events and reflections on newsletters
I’ve spread myself a little thin. Which is not at all bad but it’s been an interesting few months to try to sort out what goes where. This blog has been going since April of 1999. Since that time I’ve gotten socially active in a number of other places, notably Twitter and Facebook. I usually use that for real-time keeping current, event notifications and back channel discussions with peers. This space has always been for longer-form link sharing and essays as well as a central repository of all of my talks, FAQ and other things. When I’m busy sometimes it’s just a linkdump and I had started a few tentative posts just titled TILT for Today in Librarian Tabs. Then I started thinking they might be better off as a newsletter and so TILT-Y Mail was born. Please feel free to subscribe if you like that sort of thing (by typing your email in the box). You can read past issues and see if it’s your cup of tea. Or if you’re the sort of person who uses the Medium platform, I have a version which is over there. I write one 500-750 word essay a week, on Fridays.
What this means, though, is that this blog space is unclear. It’s sort of for essays, sort of for personal announcements, sort of for events. I didn’t talk much about the Librarian of Congress swearing-in ceremony which was last week, even though that may be the biggest things that’s happened in librarianship in my professional career. Next week is Banned Books Week where I always write something up, our goofy flawed holiday.
And coming up there is some stuff going on in my professional life.
- I’m moderating a Meet the Authors panel at the Stowe Free Library next weekend
- We’re having our Passport to Vermont Libraries wrap-up celebration on October 1st in Northfield. For some reason I am concerned about this.
- I’m giving a talk at BU about disruption in the context of institutions like the library. For some reason I am not concerned about this.
- Keynoting the Southern Tier Library System conference on October 13th
- The Internet Archive’s October party where I’ll be repping for Open Library at the Library Leaders Forum. Say hi if you’re around.
I like having a newsletter. I like having a blog. I seem to have enough time to (mostly) maintain both but I do spend a lot more time cross-linking between my various streams than I used to. I think my next article for Computers in Libraries magazine will be about newsletters.
TILT: today in librarian tabs v. 2
I liked this so much I figured I’d do it again. Some of these are links emailed to me that I never did get around to writing a full post about.
- Every wanted something like Rotten Tomatoes that aggregated a bunch of reviews, only for books? The somewhat uninspiredly named Book Marks does that thing.
- We give people advice on how to find things, this meticulously detailed comparison between Apple Maps and Google maps can help us give people advice on how to find things.
- The Center for an Urban Future writes policy papers. This recent one about NYC libraries and their technology instruction is a very good read. NYC libraries provided tech training to more than 150,000 New Yorkers in 2015, up 81% from three years earlier.
- A story from the blogs: Sofya Onikienko and her rescuing of her books during the Patriotic War. Fascinating story at the Russian Landmarks blog. (thank you John)
- Wild Colorado is a library-created (and Kickstarter funded) app that helps people interact with and identify nature and is available to Coloradans statewide. (thanks Joseph)
TILT – today in librarian tabs
I need to close some tabs on my browser so they are here.
1. Are you someone from a “diverse” group who gets frequently asked for your opinions about how to help organizations “get diverse” enough so it seems like a part time job? Follow Diversity in Design’s lead and charge people for it. No shame in it. There is also Clarity.fm which doesn’t have a specific keyword for librarians but that didn’t stop me from signing up.
2. The Open Access Button “helps researchers, patients, students and the public get access to scholarly research and to report when they’re denied access.” Learn about it. Cool stuff.
3. Fair warning: the Department of Justice is starting to get serious about public entities having accessible websites and also “web content” What they mean about web content is not totally clear but libraries should pay attention. Good blog post by this law firm who has a good accessibility blog generally.
4. Live to Run Again is a not-for-profit public education campaign against drowsy driving for people who are traveling long distances to go to dog events. They sponsor ABLE an Audio Book and Library Exchange where volunteer librarians bring audiobook CDs to dog events so that people can listen to them and stay awake on the way home. Drop off the audiobook at the next library along the way. Great idea and they are always looking for donations if you are weeding CD audiobooks.
5. I don’t think I have mentioned this here but I am teaching a Tools for Community Advocacy class at the University of Hawaii, a short summer class with eleven really interesting students. I dislike course management software so I made my own website for the class from an available template. I am proud of it. You can view it here.
