LISNews: Librarian News

Rob Brian sent this in from The Sydney Morning Herald The library of the NSW Parliament is getting rid of more than half of its old and rare book collection. They need to sell some, to pay for cataloging what they keep. Sales so far have brought in $110,000, enough to employ staff to continue cataloguing the remaining finds. The ex-parliamentary librarian Mr Russell Cope, had wanted the collection kept intact.

\"The fact that parts of [library] holdings are not \'used\' is advanced, especially by uninformed parliamentarians, as an argument for getting rid of \'unused\' items. If they happen to be valuable as well, the monetary attraction becomes hard to resist.\" -- Read More

E-Book 2000: September 25-27, Washington DC
To learn about E-books -- how the technology is developing, the
applications that are emerging, and the impact of e-books on libraries --
plan to attend E-Book 2000 on September 25-27, at the Ronald Reagan Building
and International Trade Center in Washington, DC. -- Read More

Originally published in Library Juice, this article by Teri Weesner has found its way to the Progressive Librarian web site. The article is called \"The Mystery and the Act: Toward a YA Human Sexuality Collection\" and it discusses the needs that teens have for accurate, honest information about sex and sexuality, and how librarians can meet that need.

\"This editorial is based on the premise that there is a connection between young people accessing porn via the internet and their innate curiosity about human sexuality and their own bodies. Young people viewing internet porn have an information need that can be addressed by youth services librarians and library collections. To ignore this information need is just as inaccurate and inappropriate as young people gleaning their information from internet pornography and cybersex chat. Young people\'s information needs are legitimate and the response of shaming from librarians is an ineffective tool for teaching, learning or discipline.\" -- Read More

What can you say about a boy named Harry?

I have collected quite a few unused Harry Potter stories, so I thought I\'d just throw them all together in one big fun to read quickies collection. Read on for all sorts of exciting Harry Potter News. -- Read More

Someone sent in This Story at cantonrep.com. The strike we\'ve been reporting on for a week or two has begun at The Stark County District Library. This is the first time workers have struck in Stark County. Some branches are open still, and they are trying to keep services going. Not wanting to take a side, I\'ll just leave out the usual story quote. A member of the Stark County District Library board of trustees has resigned to protest the way he said the board is handling a looming strike by library employees [Other Story]

In case you haven\'t heard by now, Napster was not shut down on Friday. If you\'d like to learn more on this subject, O\'Reillynet.com has a Story that compare all the latest and greatest P2P software. This is technology that is changing how people share information, and is worth keeping up on.

\"In essence, Gnutella and Freenet represent a new step in distributed information systems. Each is a system for searching for information; each returns information without telling you where it came from. They are innovative in the areas of distributed information storage, information retrieval, and network architecture. But they differ significantly in both goals and implementation\" -- Read More

The new trend in libraries is to have the police issue warrants and arrests for overdue meterials. The Los Angeles Times has an article on a few libraries that do not (and will not) do that.\"One of the hallmarks of our library is it is free and open,\" said Susan Kent, the city\'s head librarian. \"Yes, there are really bad offenders, but we\'re not here to prosecute. We\'re here to provide a service.\" -- Read More

The New York Times has this article about Random House publishing books only in digital format.\"Beginning in January, the house will publish under the name AtRandom a list of about 20 purely digital books, by authors ranging from the editor of Harper\'s magazine to a downtown dominatrix.\" -- Read More

According to this article in the Star Tribune, a library which can only hold 40 people at a time may take over the hospitality loungue of an old brewery complex.\"Imagine showing up at your public library and being told you can\'t go in. That happens sometimes at the Pierre Bottineau branch library in northeast Minneapolis. It\'s the city\'s smallest library. -- Read More

When I first got my MLS and sent out tons of resumes, I only got a few interviews. I once was told I came across as shy, that I was not assertive, and I needed to be more agressive.So here is what I said at interviews...Perhaps all of the librarians out there could give me some interview pointers. The D is for the library director\'s questions...Director:
Why do you want to work here?I heard you have a nice book collection.D: Who is Harry Potter?The library\'s gardener. -- Read More

For all of you inspiring writers out there, here are some books that could get us on Oprah\'s recommended book list. Who moved the card catalog and gave me a PC?-an amazing look at changeThe case of the missing book cards-An unsolved mystery -- Read More

Following several inquiries from the for-profit sector, Lane Medical
Library has decided to make it\'s XMLMARC software available without charge
for commercial use. Availability will be governed by the the Free Software
Foundation\'s GNU General Public License, version 2 (June 1991) or later at
the user\'s option. The new agreement governing all new licensees is
effective today, July 28, 2000, and is posted on our web site:
xmlmarc.stanford.edu -- Read More

Law.com has A Story from the ALA Meeting on Law Librarian Salaries. As you may have guessed, it is not a glowing report on the state of librarian pay. It\'s not just the pay in law offices, but many firms simply don\'t think the libraries are important.

\"\"We need to get away from the attitude that we are lucky to make what we make,\" says Elizabeth Kenney, the law librarian at the Boston office of Philadelphia-based Dechert -- Read More

The NY Times has a neat Review of 2 interesting web sites, The Jew\'s Daughter and aspergillum gently. These are 2 new sites that really do some neat stuff using plugins and HTML. They provide a new way of reading and following the text you read. It\'s quite interesting and worth checking out. This might be a new direction for online reading, it\'s fun and easy to follow. -- Read More

At last summer\'s ALA conference, then President-elect (now President) Nancy Kranich gave a talk on the importance of seeking out the alternative press as essential in developing a balanced collection, a value expressed well in the Library Bill of Rights. That talk was published in the review journal Counterpoise and later electronically in Library Juice. It\'s called A Question of Balance: the Role of Libraries in Providing Alternatives to the Mainstream Media. -- Read More

Daniel Tsang, winner of the 2000 Eubanks Award, interviewed Sanford Berman on his KUCI (San Diego) radio show recently. He calls Mr. Berman \"librarian extraordinaire, and advocate of democratizing and making libraries more socially responsible.\" \"Hear about \'bibliocide\' and \'internal censorship\'. Are libraries turning into corporate entities with no soul?\"

Read the press release for the show and listen to it in Real Audio format.

Slashdot has a nice round up, that talks about all the alternatives and ideas. After reading the the Preliminary Injunction Brief (pdf file) it looks like Napster is in big trouble. Technically Napster was not shutdown, they are just not allowed to do anything that is even close to illegal (no major label music, no links to the music, etc...). Which is basically like saying, no one who will ever speed or run a stop sign is allowed to drive. It doesn\'t outlaw cars, but no one is driving.

On a realated note, check out DOCSTER a form of instant document delivery, that builds in copyright and organization for libraries.Read on for more stories from around the web. -- Read More

A school librarian has 37 overdue books from a local library totaling over $500 dollars. She should know better!! Read the article from the State\"What is bad is she is a librarian,\" library system executive director Dan MacNeill said as he explained the situation to the board.\" -- Read More

The library accused of hiring militia type security to protect library workers has reported that the allegations are untrue. The follow-up article is from the Canton Reporter\"We are totally unarmed,” said Ed Bean, a spokesman for Troy, Mich.-based Huffmaster Companies. “We don’t even carry nightsticks. In the public sector, you don’t want any offensive weapons whatsoever.” -- Read More

A follow up on This Story on the site Contentville from Tuesday. Wired is now Reporting Contentville has now agreed all independent articles are to be processed through the Publications Rights Clearing House, that should keep your dissertation safe, or atleast make you a couple bucks.

\"It doesn\'t surprise me that writers are upset,\" magazine publisher Steven Brill said in a phone interview. \"If my articles were up there and I didn\'t know it, I\'d be really pissed off, too.\" -- Read More