Library Stuff

Students face new textbook picks: Rent vs. buy, print vs. e-book

Steven — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 22:05:43 +0000

USA Today – “With another summer ending, the time has come to ask the perennial question: Could this be the year higher education finally embraces the e-book?”

Internet may phase out printed Oxford Dictionary

Steven — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 16:16:13 +0000

AP – ” It weighs in at more than 130 pounds, but the authoritative guide to the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary, may eventually slim down to nothing. Oxford University Press, the publisher, said Sunday so many people prefer to look up words using its online product that it’s uncertain whether the 126-year-old dictionary’s next edition will be printed on paper at all.”

Harvard’s Library Lab Issues an Open Call for Proposals from Students, Faculty, and Staff

Steven — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 14:22:28 +0000

Harvard News – “In a move designed to inspire a new generation of library services, the University’s newly created Library Lab is inviting students, faculty, and staff to collaborate with the Harvard Libraries and serve as co-creators of the information society of the future. In announcing the Lab, Robert Darnton, Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor and Director of the University Library, states that the Lab “will develop a wide variety of digital innovations that will ensure Harvard’s leadership in the burgeoning and increasingly collaborative world of information technology. Thanks to support from the Arcadia Fund, Harvard’s Library Lab will enhance knowledge and library services through a striking balance of innovation, cooperation, and entrepreneurship.”

Overdue state funds put libraries in bind

Steven — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 02:24:48 +0000

Chicago Tribune – “A service through which libraries in Illinois can share books and other resources is at risk of disappearing due to lack of state funding. But nine library systems throughout the state are making a last-ditch effort to save the delivery service, which many patrons have come to rely on when they can’t find something at their hometown library. Five of the systems, primarily in the northern part of the state, may merge into one. Four downstate systems are discussing doing likewise.”

I’d Like to Thank My Agent, My Publisher and… Google

Steven — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 15:55:42 +0000

Matt Dellinger – “Writing the acknowledgements for my first book, “Interstate 69: The Unfinished History of the Last Great American Highway,” was a heady but nervous experience. Like delivering an Oscar acceptance speech, maybe, without the tux or the orchestra. I spent a long time on the book (eight years from the first interviews to publication), and I felt the need to be thorough. I thanked my editor, my agent, my family and friends, people who had guided me professionally, people who had pitched in, people on whose couches I’d slept, my college professors, the book’s subjects… And of course I thanked Google. How could I not?”

Are E-Books Worth the Money?

Steven — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 15:52:01 +0000

WSJ – “If you walk out of the cinema this week with a burning desire to read Elizabeth Gilbert’s “Eat, Pray, Love,” you can download it onto your Amazon Kindle electronic book reader–if you have one–for $12.99. Then again you could just walk into your local Borders bookstore with a coupon and get the paperback for $10.”

Retiree turned page on new career

Steven — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:33:41 +0000

Houston Chronicle – “Who in today’s world of ever-advancing electronic media gives a hoot for the lore of yore, the tired, worn and acid-chewed books that, in some cases, only a scholar could love? In the Houston Public Library’s historic special collections section, where some 40,000 volumes, some centuries old, wait in climate-controlled stacks for that special reader, the answer is clear: Charlie Arbore.”

National Archives to house infamous Nazi papers

Steven — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:31:47 +0000

AP – “During the final days of World War II, as American soldiers were returning from Germany with swastika-inscribed helmets, flags and other Nazi memorabilia, Gen. George Patton was packing up his own set of souvenirs. The legendary field commander took four pages of documents signed by Adolf Hitler that laid the legal framework for killing 6 million Jews – the so-called Nuremberg Laws. On Wednesday, The Huntington Library, a sprawling complex of libraries, museums and botanical gardens in this leafy Los Angeles suburb, plans to hand over the documents to the government-run National Archives, thus concluding a 65-year-old odyssey.”

The ABCs Of E-Reading

Steven — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 02:08:09 +0000

WSJ – “New Devices Are Changing Habits. People Are Reading More, Even While in a Kayak”

Library Days Get Reprieve

Steven — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 14:30:34 +0000

WSJ – “Despite previous plans to cut the city’s library system to five-day service, the system will remain open six days a week but reduce its hours of operation, library officials said Monday. In June, after the City Council approved a budget that reduced funding for the libraries by $10 million, officials considered scaling back service at New York Public Library, which operates branches in Manhattan, Staten Island and the Bronx.”

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