LISNews Librarian And Information Science News

More than 100 drivers in Austin, Texas found their cars disabled or the horns honking out of control, after an intruder ran amok in a web-based vehicle-immobilization system normally used to get the attention of consumers delinquent in their auto payments.

Read More http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/03/hacker-bricks-cars/#ixzz0ifKWFE6H

Internet of Things Explained
IBM's Smarter Planet team has created a great 5 minute video explaining the emerging trend of Internet of Things, an exciting topic ReadWriteWeb has and will continue to cover frequently and in depth. Internet of Things is about, as the video explains, the coming future when there are more "things" on the Internet (sensors especially) than there are people.

The result of that will be "a kind of global data field" the video says. "If we can actually begin to see the patterns in the data, then we have a much better chance of getting our arms around this. That's where societies become more efficient, that's where more innovation is sparked." Check out this artistic, succinct, optimistic and inspiring video explaining what could well become a big factor in how the future unfolds.

Why do you need the library?

Why does anyone need the library?

Why do we need anything?

If we, librarians, could define the role of the library, then we, library users, could decide if we really need them. As it is, we are letting technology define the role of the library. Whereas I think that our service to people should define it.

I think it's a matter of ego. And Homo NOVUS, the superior iPhone-clutching human, can be a huge ahole. Whatever he needs, he gets, with a simple tap of his as-yet-to-be-determined-rightful-ownership-through-patent-litigation futuristic touch-screen. He (and She, the ladies can be aholes, too) is multi-tooled, unlike his club-wielding and single-minded predecessors.

It truly is ego. The new library is about who owns the authority. In the old library, the librarian was the authority. But things change.

(there should be a table here, but I don't think we can use tables)

ANTIQUUS (old library) --- NOVUS (new library)
Librarian-centric --- User-centric
Fixed Authority --- Dynamic Authority
Repeated shushing --- Constant bleeping

So clearly there's a power struggle. But it's not between librarians and library patrons, but between librarians and inanimate devices. NOVUS totes the device around, searching for signals, or wireless connectivity, and follows. So who is the master? the human or the device?

After False Start, PTFS Finally Acquires LibLime
After some delay, the acquisition of Koha ILS support vendor LibLime by Progressive Technology Federal Systems (PTFS) is now "signed and completed," according to John Yokley, PTFS co-founder and CEO.

In January, just before the American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Annual meeting, PTFS announced its plans to acquire LibLime, but was stymied in February by a dispute over financial terms. The deal was called off.

A Report From meetingnews.com on the ALA. The association's use of new technology is part of a closer integration between its membership services and meetings teams, designed to bring the most value of an event to both members and non-member attendees.

Libraries, community groups squeezed by cuts to Internet program
The Conservative government is quietly cutting funding to hundreds of community groups and even hospitals that provide free Internet access to Canadians who might not otherwise have a chance to get online.

Organizations that benefit from Industry Canada's 16-year-old Community Access Program began receiving letters last week informing them that sites located within 25 kilometres of a public library would no longer be eligible for cash.

Fending Off Digital Decay, Bit by Bit
Electronically produced drafts, correspondence and editorial comments, sweated over by contemporary poets, novelists and nonfiction authors, are ultimately just a series of digits — 0’s and 1’s — written on floppy disks, CDs and hard drives, all of which degrade much faster than old-fashioned acid-free paper. Even if those storage media do survive, the relentless march of technology can mean that the older equipment and software that can make sense of all those 0’s and 1’s simply don’t exist anymore.

Ranting about library technology
Laura Harris shares a bit of a rant about library technology, and things she thinks need to change in the future.
1.Multiple systems, or at the very least, the appearance of multiple systems, are enemies to usability.
2. As a corollary to my first statement, indexing databases are a bane to usability.
3. Vendor branding is at odds with the mission of most libraries.
4. Metadata needs a makeover.

The number of visitors to the Enoch Pratt Free Library increased by 20 percent in a six-month period, prompting library officials to suggest that the Internet is helping boost usage at an institution known for its printed word and paper collections.

"It's been a steady increase, across the boards," said Carla D. Hayden, the library's chief executive. "People are using our Web site to find the treasures we have in here. New digital technologies have opened up the collections to so many more people."