LISNews: Librarian News

Olinux.com has an Interview with Sergey Brin from google, who talk about how google works, and their very interesting mission:\"Google\'s mission is to organize the world\'s information, making it universally accessible and useful.

Sounds like a library? They have over 6,000 servers that run RedHat 6.2 linux, serve 50 million searches per day, and over 25,000 websites use their engine!

They [Olinux.com] have a google of interviews with other open source folks, if you\'re interested -- Read More

Wired has a nifty Story on E-Journals. With the big puch to E-Publish Journals some insist that simply publishing electronically is not enough --and that open, free access to the full content is needed. Critics insist that peer review is critical to ensure quality control and patient safety. Without peer review, researchers may exaggerate their findings. Some people say that faster publication time compromises quality, others insist that the benefits of electronic publication remain unparalleled by print. So far, few online-only journals have managed to survive.

\"These new online journals will give scientists an alternative,\" Cockerill said. \"They will finally be able to publish their research in high-quality journals, with full peer review, but without surrendering control to a publisher that will limit the subsequent distribution of that research.\" \"There\'s already a threat to paper journals,\" Kassirer agreed. \"Unless journals get on the Internet, their life is threatened.\"

The Pfeiffer Report has an interesting Report on online publishing. They say all is not well in the online world, no one is making and money, and that spells trouble. They say since there is no way of supporting the considerable cost of on-line publications, they will begin to fold up shop. Now in the fututre the online versions of magazines and newspapers will simply be an extension of the print versions. Could on-line content really be on the verge of going out of fashion? Is it all about profit?

\"Traditional publishers will be able to incorporate on-line activity as part of the overall publishing project; some major sites will be able to survive with ad-revenues and associated income streams. But for most publications (in other words, the on-line equivalent of the thousands of magazines which fill newsstands around the world) it is still not quite clear what a valid on-line business model could look like\"

I thought I would post this quote from George Bush, from the debate on October 11, 2000. The question was about the differences on gun control. Anyone have any comments?

But let me say something about Columbine. And listen, we\'ve got gun laws. He says we ought to have gun-free schools. Everybody believes that. I\'m sure every state in the union has got them. You can\'t carry a gun into a school, and there ought to be a consequence when you do carry a gun into a school.

But Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it\'s really a matter of culture. It\'s a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet and walk in and decide to take somebody else\'s life.

So gun laws are important, no question about it, but so is loving children and character education classes and faith-based programs being a part of after-school programs.\" -- Read More