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LISNews Week In Review 5-12-2006

posted by Blake on 11:58 AM May 12th, 2006
from the Better-Late-Than-Never dept. I'm sure you've been unable to sleep at night because I haven't posted a Friday Update in several weeks. Truth is I just forgot. So I'll write a quickie today and plan on getting back into it for next week. There's just to much to cover, so I'll hit a few highlights from this week, and give you the most popular stories from the past month. Birdie is off this week traveling with her husband and I have no ideas for a new poll.

There was, sadly, little discussion on 10 Reasons Why the Internet Is No Substitute for a Library , but Brian G. had some interesting things to say.

It was good to see No snickering in the library, unless you're hooked on "Unshelved". I couldn't be happier for the Unshelved guys getting a good story like that in the Seattle Times.

In the journals, mdoniel submitted his Limerick of resignation, though sadly it really is impossible to rhyme librarian with Nantucket. Samantha provides some interesting insider info into the The Project Vote Smart Debacle. Shoe Gives Us her impressions of Horizon 8: "All in all, it looks like this crew has listened, and made improvements. Will it pass muster? I hope so. In theory it seems pretty sound." And last and least I've been going on and About FOSS In Libraries.
Here's the most popular stories from the past month ordered by hits, and comments.

Librarian Suggests Right-Wing Books, Hilarity Ensues 1724 11
Should I Become A Librarian? 1074 12
OSU librarian faced book banners before 925 19
Library Technicians make a top 10 list 766 12
Librarians to sever ties with scouts? 725 12
OSU Librarian cleared of harrassment charges 698 1
Iowa town bans sex offenders from local ibrary 658 7
Parent putting Harry to the test 608 3
The Debate in Tucson: Is the Library a Place for 587 8
The Saga Continues at OSU over Conservative Book 585 1

OSU librarian faced book banners before 925 19
Should I Become A Librarian? 1071 12
Library Technicians make a top 10 list 766 12
Librarians to sever ties with scouts?
Librarian Suggests Right-Wing Books Hilarity Ensues 1724 11
Censoreware Critics....rejoice 498 9
The Debate in Tucson: Is the Library a Place for 587 8
RLG to combine with OCLC 489 8
Iowa town bans sex offenders from local library 658 7
Library book downloads picking up 459 7
More On The OSU Librarian And American Libraries 330 7
America's Bookshelf-- Mail Away Library 568 6 Trackbacks:

RLG to combine with OCLC 8 comments OCLC Has Announced a merger!

Two of the world's largest membership-based information organizations have agreed to come together. The combined organization will offer an integrated product and service line, and will give libraries, archives and museums new leverage in developing services, standards and software that will help them support research and disseminate knowledge online.

The RLG Board of Directors and OCLC Board of Trustees have recommended that the two service and research organizations be combined effective July 1, 2006. If approved by RLG member institutions, RLG's online products and services will be integrated with OCLC products and services, and RLG's program initiatives will be brought forward as a new division of OCLC Programs and Research. Librarians to sever ties with scouts? 12 comments Story at World Net Daily by Walter Skold:

In 1998, the governing council of the ALA, the world's largest library organization, condemned the Boy Scouts over its policies, but a WorldNetDaily investigation reveals activists quietly are planning to take action at the association's annual convention in June.

OSU librarian faced book banners before 19 comments Walter Skold at WND:"The Ohio State University librarian formally accused of "sexual harassment" for recommending freshmen be required to read WND Managing Editor David Kupelian's controversial best seller "The Marketing of Evil," says his ordeal was not the first time he's been accused of discrimination by homosexual faculty members.

Scott Savage of OSU's Mansfield campus confirmed to WorldNetDaily that when he served at Lakeland Community College in Ohio the school's Diversity Committee accused him and other librarians in 2004 of creating a "hostile environment" because they allowed display of the book "A Parent's Guide to Preventing Homosexuality," by Joseph Nicolosi."

More On The OSU Librarian And American Libraries 7 comments An Anonymous Patron writes "Mr. Scott Savage has charged the editor of the American Libraries magazine with censorship, claiming that he went back on a promise to print his very critical essay in the pages of Am Libs.

Would be curious to see if either side has the emails to prove or disprove the charges? Savage also charges Judith Krug with failing to come to his aid."

Update: 05/10 17:48 GMT by B :Scott wrote in to tell me he did not accuse American Libraries of censorship and did not create the headline or the editor's note attached to his opinion essay on the WorldNetDaily website. The old headline here read "OSU's Savage says AmLibs censored his article" I've changed it to "More On The OSU Librarian And American Libraries"

College & Academic: OSU Librarian cleared of harrassment charges 1 comment Melchior Sternfels beat Karl Sandwell-Weiss with her submission on this one: "Eugene Volokh reports thatScott Savage, the OSU librarian who was charged with sexual orientation harrassment for suggesting a book by Rick Santorum for freshman reading, has been cleared of the charges by the OSU administration. Volokh also suggests that Savage is probably in a unique position to contribute to the diversity of the OSU campus." College & Academic: The Saga Continues at OSU over Conservative Book Recommendations 1 comment Further to our previous reports here and here, comes news from the Columbus Dispatch that OSU librarian Scott Savage has in turn filed a counter-complaint with the University again the two professors, J.F. Buckley and Norman Jones, who accused him of sexual harrassment based on his book recommendations for incoming freshman. politics: Iowa town bans sex offenders from local library 7 comments The Reader's Shop writes "WCFCourier.com reports that the City Council members of Oelwein, Iowa have voted to bar registered sex offenders with a history of attacking children from entering within 250 feet of kid friendly public places. The list of kid friendly places includes libraries, schools, parks, child care facilities, bike trails and recreation centers. Sex offenders can be fined $750 if they are found to be in a safe zone. Offenders with a "reason" to be in a safe zone are exempt.
Related Stories:
whotv.com, oelweingov.com." Books: America's Bookshelf-- Mail Away Library 6 comments shoe writes "This via Tree Hugger... There's a competitor to Netflix in town, with a twist. They're offering books for trade. America's Bookshelf is half library, half book store. Books are $3.50, delivered to you, and you can keep them as long as you'd like. ABS will send you a postage paid envelope to return the book from their office (run on entirely recycled materials!).

Probably not a bad service for people who can't get to their local library on a regular basis for whatever reason. Or those people who just can't seem to return a book on time.Direct link is here: America's Bookshelf." 10 Reasons Why the Internet Is No Substitute for a Library 2 comments Mark Y. Herring wrote 10 Reasons Why the Internet Is No Substitute for a Library 5 years ago. In an effort to save our culture, strike a blow for reading, and, above all, correct the well-intentioned but horribly misguided notions about what is fast becoming Intertopia among many nonlibrarian bean counters, he wrote 10 reasons why the Internet is no substitute for a library.

Not Everything Is on the Internet
The Needle (Your Search) in the Haystack (the Web)
Quality Control Doesn't Exist
What You Don't Know Really Does Hurt You
States Can Now Buy One Book and Distribute to Every Library on the Web - NOT!
Hey, Bud, You Forgot about E-book Readers
Aren't There Library-less Universities Now?
But a Virtual State Library Would Do It, Right?
The Internet: A Mile Wide, an Inch (or Less) Deep
The Internet Is Ubiquitous but Books Are Portable

Are these still valid reasons? Will they be in 5-10 years? The Debate in Tucson: Is the Library a Place for Porn? 8 comments MG75 writes "As we all know when it comes to computers in the library, there is the debate to filter or not to filter. Pima County government is about to take over the operation of the Tuscon-Pima Public Library from the city in a few months and will be installing filters on all of the computers in the library. Here is the story from the Arizona Daily Star." No snickering in the library, unless you're hooked on "Unshelved" The Seattle Times has an interview with Gene Ambaum and Bill Barnes, the guys behind Unshelved.

"It's kind of, like, 'Dilbert' for librarians," offers Deena Martinsen, vice chair of Longview Public Library's board of trustees.Echoes Chris Skaugset, director of Longview Public Library, whose wife bought him a framed "Unshelved" print for Christmas: "They're just so tuned to library work," he says. "You see it every day." Harry Potter News: Parent putting Harry to the test 3 comments Laura Mallory wants to put an Avada Kedavra curse on the Harry Potter book series.The working mother of four admits she's never read any of the six books published thus far in the seven-book series by J.K. Rowling. The books are "too long" (book five alone was 870 pages) and she works a part-time job, Mallory writes on her "appeal form for instructional materials." She hasn't read them, yet she wants them off the shelves of the Gwinnett County Public School system libraries. Gwinnett Daily Post - Griffin,GA has the rest of this one, it gets funnier. Library Technicians make a top 10 list 12 comments Elena writes "AOL Jobs has an article: "10 Legit Jobs That Don't Require Much Experience."

From the article:
Library technician
The job: Directing patrons to standard references, handling interlibrary loans, checking out books and other routine library tasks.
The requirements: High school diploma and strong computer skills.
Average pay: $26,720

It's the fifth one on the list, ranked (I think) by salary. I wish we paid our assistants/techs better. Hopefully none of them see this and quit for the more lucrative field of Traffic Technicianship." Censoreware Critics....rejoice 9 comments @ CNET
The irony ...the irony...." Should I Become A Librarian? 12 comments bolo writes "I am 35 years old with BA in English that hasn't taken me anywhere special. My wife and I are expecting a child in four weeks (yikes!), and I'm feeling a strong need for a stable, respectable, professional career that will help keep my family off food stamps.

A couple of months ago, while brainstorming career options, librarianship hit me like a sucker-punch, and the idea of becoming a librarian has been been buzzing around in my brain since then. I *love* books (I've worked mostly in bookstores since college) and libraries, I'm fascinated by the issues involved (media, media literacy, information access, community, archiving, copyright, etc.), and cataloging actually sounds fun to me! I think librarianship is noble, important, cool, and could expand wildly in the 21st century.

My problem is this. Library school would be a big investment of money for us--my wife and I are already working on a decent-sized debt. I don't feel like I'm in a position to spend money/get into further debt for a career that isn't at least reasonably secure and renumerative. In short, I make just under $30K a year now, and I need to make more fairly soon, with prospects for more in the future.

I'm willing to work hard in library school--get involved in organizations, volunteer, go to conferences, etc.--so I can become a more appealing job candidate, but I need to know that I'm not spending time, energy, money, and heart on a career that will disappoint me.

SO, my question is mostly to recent (5 years or less) library school grads: What has your experience been? What is the job market really like? (I'm beginning to get that the "librarian shortage" is a myth.) How many people are applying for the jobs I see on LISJobs.com? How many of these jobs go to recent MLS's? What about jobs outside of libraries? Is an MLS really applicable to any work outside libraries? Was library school worth it? Are you paying off your loans? Is Google slowly killing libraries? Is lack of funding helping?" Library book downloads picking up 7 comments Thanks to Mr. Backwage for ThisOne from the Chicago Tribune. They report that A month ago, theChicago Public Library quietly added a link to its Web site and waitedfor the tech savvy bibliophiles. "New! Download Audio Books," the linkpromised since March 15. That first day, 72 titles were downloaded tohome computers and MP3 players from chipublib.org. By the end of weektwo, 617 titles were checked out, and the numbers were promisingenough that library officials doubled their initial $25,000 investmentto buy more titles. The collection jumped to 1,300 downloadabletitles. College & Academic: Librarian Suggests Right-Wing Books, Hilarity Ensues 11 comments Karl Sandwell-Weiss writes "Officials at the Ohio State University are investigating a librarian for 'sexual harassment' after he recommended four conservative books for a freshman reading program. The university is pressing forward, claiming that it takes the charges 'seriously.'" A press release from the Alliance Defense Fund has more details, and there's also some comments over at Inside Higher Ed. Does suggesting a book by Rick Santorum constitute harassment based on sexual orientation? This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted. LISNews Week In Review 5-12-2006 | Log in/Create an Account | Top | Search Discussion Threshold: The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

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