May 2002

Charles Davis found This Nando Times Story
On the Library of Congress and the 111th and 112th
collections of materials on its \”American Memory\” Web site. The site now
includes more than 7.5 million items, which the library says is the world\’s
largest collection of online educational material.

Biologist and author Stephen Jay Gould died of cancer Monday. The NYT obit (registration required) says he passed away in a bed in his library, surrounded by books.

Gary Price sent over This One from The Dallas News on a new kind – or new kinds – of librarian.


They say there are tattooed librarians and belly-dancing librarians, glamorous librarians and librarians in Stetsons and Dan Post boots.

This is one of the longest versions of the same ol\’ story I\’ve seen.

Matt helped put together a new Eldred v. Ashcroft Site with Lawrence Lessig.


This site collects material related to the constitutional challenge of the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, which extended by 20 years both existing copyrights and future copyrights. It includes a Section on how you can help.

Julia Steger writes \”This Article from The Roanoke Times newspaper in Roanoke, Virginia 5/21/02 in the Technology section:

\”Bookhounds to Cybersleuths\” gives good press to the important role librarians and libraries fill in our lives including, in this time of budget and position cuts, heartening praise for school librarians and libraries. It also stresses our ability to change as technology demands while continuing to offer the human touch of helpfulness and accountability for the veracity of information. \”

The DVD for \”Harry Potter and the Sorcerer\’s Stone\” will be out on May the 28th. Below are three links to reviews of the DVD release. Everyone seems to agree that the transfer
from film to DVD is a bit sketchy at times, but the sound is great.

Also, the reviews concur that Disc 2, which contains the extras, will
not appeal to anyone over the age of 10. There are seven deleted
scenes, but accessing them is time consuming. Here are the
first steps:

Deleted Scene Access Instructions
So you\’re braving it, eh? Okay then. With Disc Two in your player,
from the main menu, select \”Diagon Alley\”. You\’ll be faced with a brick
wall from which you\’ll be asked to select the right bricks to let you
inside. Just click on a few – the third time you fail to get the right
combination, the disc will let you in anyway. Inside Diagon Alley,
select the key on the Gringots sign. Inside Gringots, select the coins
to get the money you\’ll need to buy a wand. Next go to Olivanders and
select a wand. Once you\’ve finally found one that works, leave Diagon
Alley and go back out to the main menu. Select \”classrooms\”. When you
get to that page, select \”down\” on your remote to highlight the
creatures on the statue and hit enter twice. You\’ll be taken into the
third floor corridor, where you\’ll see a three-headed dog. Select the
flute and hit enter. Next you\’ll be taken to a room with flying keys.[taken from The Digital Bits]

Beleive it or not there are more steps. This interactivity
is meant to appeal to kids, and might, but no alternative is provided for adults.

From The Digital Bits

From DVD File

From The Home Theater Forum

P.S. If you\’re really hardcore, you\’ll buy the Canadian DVD \”Harry Potter and the Philosopher\’s Stone.\”

The DVD for \”Harry Potter and the Sorcerer\’s Stone\” will be out on May the 28th. Below are three links to reviews of the DVD release. Everyone seems to agree that the transfer
from film to DVD is a bit sketchy at times, but the sound is great.

Also, the reviews concur that Disc 2, which contains the extras, will
not appeal to anyone over the age of 10. There are seven deleted
scenes, but accessing them is time consuming. Here are the
first steps:

Deleted Scene Access Instructions
So you\’re braving it, eh? Okay then. With Disc Two in your player,
from the main menu, select \”Diagon Alley\”. You\’ll be faced with a brick
wall from which you\’ll be asked to select the right bricks to let you
inside. Just click on a few – the third time you fail to get the right
combination, the disc will let you in anyway. Inside Diagon Alley,
select the key on the Gringots sign. Inside Gringots, select the coins
to get the money you\’ll need to buy a wand. Next go to Olivanders and
select a wand. Once you\’ve finally found one that works, leave Diagon
Alley and go back out to the main menu. Select \”classrooms\”. When you
get to that page, select \”down\” on your remote to highlight the
creatures on the statue and hit enter twice. You\’ll be taken into the
third floor corridor, where you\’ll see a three-headed dog. Select the
flute and hit enter. Next you\’ll be taken to a room with flying keys.[taken from The Digital Bits]

Beleive it or not there are more steps. This interactivity
is meant to appeal to kids, and might, but no alternative is provided for adults.

From The Digital Bits

From DVD File

From The Home Theater Forum

P.S. If you\’re really hardcore, you\’ll buy the Canadian DVD \”Harry Potter and the Philosopher\’s Stone.\”

steven bell writes \”The latest issue of Fortune (paper – May 27)features an article about Google. The good news – they report Google has grown and been profitable to the tune of $15 million annually – not bad results for the dot.com world. I\’d say this is a must read for Google fans, but others will be interested in some of the Google facts. For example, Google has over 10,000 servers situated in five data centers around the country. The story is currently online at Fortune.com \”

Also of interest might be Glossary, Sets, Voice Search, and Keyboard Shortcuts. All part of Google Labs.

This One from The NYTimes says Sylvia Ann Hewlett\’s book \”Creating a Life: Professional Women and the Quest for Children\” has generated the kind of publicity authors and publishers usually only dream of, but it\’s hardly selling at all.


Data from the research marketing firm Bookscan suggest \”Creating a Life\” has sold fewer than 8,000 copies. The book\’s publisher, Talk Miramax Books, puts the number closer to 10,000 but acknowledges that the book has sold far short of expectations.

This NYTimes story on a new thingy @ Amazon that lets users suggest that shoppers buy a different book than the one being perused.


Patricia Smith, a spokeswoman for Amazon.com, said the company\’s intent was to let customers share information. \”Obviously, it is not intended for shilling,\” she said. \”I think people will recognize that for what it is.\”

How does your OPAC look when compared to Amazon, or Google?

Clifton Evans has Exploring content filters over at Boxes and Arrows that suggests a new way of navigating an online information space.


He says content filtering is a much more natural way of sorting through categories, especially when the majority of your content is under more than one subject. This filtering technique is very similar to a Boolean query within a search engine, though it makes things more accessible to users.