LISNews: Librarian News

When you see the word "Amazon", what's the first thing that springs to mind – the world's biggest forest, the longest river or the largest internet retailer – and which do you consider most important?

From Guardian UK:

These questions have risen to the fore in an arcane, but hugely important, debate about how to redraw the boundaries of the internet. Brazil and Peru have lodged objections to a bid made by the US e-commerce giant for a prime new piece of cyberspace: ".amazon".

The Seattle-based company has applied for its brand to be a top-level domain name (currently .com), but the South American governments argue this would prevent the use of this internet address for environmental protection, the promotion of indigenous rights and other public interest uses.

Google executives Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen — coauthors of a new book, The New Digital Age — recently returned from a highly publicized trip to North Korea. In the second part of their conversation with NPR's Audie Cornish, they discuss the role of the Internet in more repressive countries. "We fear that the natural action for, in particular, autocratic governments experiencing what we describe as 'virtual urbanization' will be to balkanize the Internet," says Cohen, "filtering out content so that way the Internet experience in that particular country looks as much like the physical society as possible."

Full piece

Mr. Blum is the editor of Amazon Kindle Singles, a Web service that is helping to promote a renaissance of novella-length journalism and fiction, known as e-shorts.

Amazon Kindle Singles is a hybrid. First, it is a store within the megastore of Amazon.com, offering a showcase of carefully selected original works of 5,000 to 30,000 words that come from an array of outside publishers as well as from in-house. Most sell for less than $2, and Mr. Blum is the final arbiter of what goes up for sale.

Full article in the NYT

From the New York Times:

DALLAS — President Obama has left little mystery about how he views his predecessor. “The failed policies of George W. Bush” wiped away a budget surplus and “squandered the legacy” of bipartisan foreign policy. Mr. Bush put two wars “on a credit card,” led the country away “from our values” and “crashed the economy."

But Mr. Obama will surely say none of that when he helps dedicate the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum on Thursday. Addressing a crowd of Bush supporters and administration veterans, the 44th president will no doubt extoll the virtues of the 43rd president and praise his years of service to the country.

It has become an awkward ritual of the modern presidency that the current occupier of the Oval Office is called upon to deliver a generous historical judgment of the previous tenant. With the opening of each new presidential library, the members of the world’s most exclusive fraternity put aside partisan differences to honor the shared experience of running the nation in difficult times.

E.L. Konigsburg, the author of the 1967 children's book From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, about two children who run away from home to live secretly in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, died Friday. She was 83.

Full article

From the New York Times:

More than four years after leaving office, former President George W. Bush has a question for America: So what would you have done?

In a new brick-and-limestone museum, visitors to an interactive theater will be presented with the stark choices that confronted the nation’s 43rd president: invade Iraq or leave Saddam Hussein in power? Deploy federal troops after Hurricane Katrina or rely on local forces? Bail out Wall Street or let the banks fail?

Slide show here.

OK, included "Laura Bush" as one of the topics, can we now please delete that one Blake?

Due to aggravated circumstances that have yet to abate, a truncated episode is presented with a news miscellany.

Related links:

• PCMag.com: The Windows 8 Revolt -- Microsoft still has the chance to ditch Windows 8 and return to its tried-and-true operating system. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like that will happen.
• ZDNet: First real-world usage figures suggest Chromebooks are struggling
• The Register: Manual override: Raspberry Pi beginners' books -- Do the 'getting started' guides make your first slice of Pi more tasty?
• Ars Technica: Anonymous raises $54,000 to start a news site
• Public Libraries News: Fifty shades of volunteer library

Download here (MP3) (Ogg Vorbis) (Free Lossless Audio Codec), or subscribe to the podcast (MP3) to have episodes delivered to your media player. We suggest subscribing by way of a service like gpodder.net. Matériel purchasing needs including subsistence support selections can be found via Amazon.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/. -- Read More

Story at Salon.com

The Boston bombing suspect wanted a Chechynan dictionary, "Snatch" and books on how to make fake IDs

Full article

The Digital Public Library of America, intended to provide free open access to materials from libraries, museums, universities and archives across the country, launches at noon ET on Thursday.

Full story

UPDATE: The launch was to happen in front of the Boston Public Library. Because of the events in Boston this week the launch is being delayed.
Source: http://dp.la/get-involved/events/launch/

Do you make experimental music? Will you be at (or near) ALA Annual in Chicago this year? Then be a part of "Librarians Like Noise", a night dedicated to... well... librarians who like noise. We're looking for performers! If you think you might be interested, email Steve Kemple, Music Reference Librarian from the Cincinnati Public Library, at steven.kemple@cincinnatilibrary.org.

The event will most likely be on the evening of Monday July 1 at a yet-to-be-determined Chicago-area venue.

Happy birthday to Blake Carver, our fearless leader!! Please join me in wishing him all the best.
smiling Blake
pensive Blake

Since Kickstarter launched in 2009, everyone from indie bands to technology developers to non-profit organizations has asked themselves, “Will crowdfunding work for me?” Libraries, which often turn to more civic-minded crowdfunding sites like Indiegogo and Fundly, are no exception. But the question remains: does it work?

Cassandra Elton got the idea to establish the Antelope Lending Library in a well-traversed mall on the Southeast side of Iowa City while she was working at an after-school program in a local elementary school. Elton found that her students—primarily from low-income and immigrant families—did not have access to the literary culture for which the city is known.

Full article

Duck Duck Go is a small search engine based in Pennsylvania that is, according to Google at least, a Google competitor. OTM producer Chris Neary talks with Duck Duck Go founder Gabriel Weinberg, SearchEngineLand's Danny Sullivan, and a dedicated Duck Duck Go user about the site. Also, each of the OTM producers try Duck Duck Go, and only Duck Duck Go, for a week.

Full piece:On The Media

In 2012, Martin Richard, the 8-year-old Dorchester boy who was killed in the marathon explosions, marched at Boston’s City Hall to call for peace.

Richard’s second-grade class was there to “express themselves in a positive manner and become more engaged in the politics of the city,” according to a Boston.com story about the march.

The school says it is grieving for Martin and his family. It released his statement and identified Martin’s mother, another victim of the bombing, as a school librarian:

The Neighborhood House Charter School is mourning today the loss of our beloved student Martin Richard, during the tragic events at the Boston Marathon yesterday. He was a bright, energetic young boy who had big dreams and high hopes for his future. We are heartbroken by this loss.

We are also praying for his mother, Denise, our school librarian and sister Jane, another Neighborhood House Charter student, who were seriously injured yesterday. Our thoughts are with his father, Bill Richard, and older brother, Henry. They are a wonderful family and represent the very best this city has to offer.

Book censorship is being contrasted to gun regulation.

Picture and additional post at Teleread

Explosion at the Boston Marathon
Story here

There was also an expolsion at JFK Library

A third event just after 3 this afternoon at John F. Kennedy library is now being called either a fire or “an incendiary” device and it is too soon to say if it is tied to the explosions at the finish of the Marathon.

Boston Police Commissioner Edward Davis said earlier today “a third incident — explosion — was at the JFK Library” on Columbia Point. But he said that information could be “premature.”

Full article

UPDATE: Fire at JFK library likely unrelated

In light of the Air Staff being shorthanded with someone in hospital ICU, this week's episode brings only a news miscellany.

Related links:

• CBC News: Libraries without librarians don't make sense, forum told
• PC World: Serious LibreOffice update fixes 54 bugs
• The Verge: Ebooks made up 22.55 percent of all US publishing revenue in 2012
• Michael Geist: Canada's Digital Divide Likely to Widen Due to Access and Adoption Failures
• Michael Geist: The Canadian Digital Divide -- The Experience Just North of Toronto
• AEIdeas: Obama White House -- US likely faces ‘permanently slower’ economic growth
• The Register: Library ebooks must SELF-DESTRUCT if scribes want dosh - review -- Shovel UK taxpayer cash this way please, say publishers
• The Hill: News bites -- Broadcast lobby chief unalarmed by Fox threat
• PCMag.com: CBS Also Threatens to Yank Broadcast Stations Over Aereo
• Ars Technica: News Corp. COO -- If we lose Aereo lawsuit, Fox may stop broadcasting - Fox probably won't go cable-only, but they'll fight for their retrans fees.
• PCMag.com: News Corp. Threatens to Yank Fox Broadcast Networks Over Aereo
• AllThingsD: News Corp. Threatens to Pull Fox off the Airwaves if Aereo Wins

Download here (MP3) (Ogg Vorbis) (Free Lossless Audio Codec), or subscribe to the podcast (MP3) to have episodes delivered to your media player. We suggest subscribing by way of a service like gpodder.net. Matériel purchasing needs including subsistence support selections can be found via Amazon.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/us/.

In book news, a recent report shows that book publishers received nearly 23% of their revenues from sales of ebooks (versus paper books) during 2012. That’s up from 17% the year before. That comes from full-year data by the Association of American Publishers (AAP). The AAP includes 350 publishers, including large ones such as Simon & Schuster, Hachette and Harper Collins, as well as independents like Sourcebooks.
http://smallbiztrends.com/2013/04/ebooks-growth-up.html

Is the beloved paper dictionary doomed to extinction? In this infectiously exuberant talk, leading lexicographer Erin McKean looks at the many ways today's print dictionary is poised for transformation.

Interesting line in talk: Paper is the enemy of words