April 2003

Jen Young noticed a CNN Story on the thorny issue of university patents, many of which stem from research paid for with public funds.

“It’s an embarrassment,” Cleveland State University intellectual law professor Michael Davis said of the law that allows universities to patent and profit from government-supported research. “The government paid for all of the research and development. Taxpayers are essentially paying twice.”

Cites & Insights: Crawford at Large 3:6 (May 2003) is now available!!



This 20-page PDF issue includes:



* Perspective: Northwest Passages: From Juneau to Yakima

* Bibs & Blather: ALA’s website and more

* The Library Stuff: nine items

* Scholarly Article Access (formerly The Access Puzzle): six items and a
set of quandaries

* Perspective: Grading the Home Pages: PC Magazine’s Best 100

“Undiscovered” Sites for 2002

* Cheap Shots: two items

* The Good Stuff: five items

Robin from over at InMyBook spotted This Little Blurb that says with its book-purchasing fund cut drastically, the Oakland Public Library is asking the public to help it through its budget crunch by donating a book.
System-wide wish lists are available on Amazon.com., and at several local bookstores. They include Cody’s Books, Marcus Books and Walden Pond Bookstore. Many individual branches have their own wish list, and Diesel Bookstore and Laurel Bookstore have wish lists for their nearby branches.

Don\’t pack those bags yet! The latest scoop from ALA is that the Executive Board needs more time to review the available data before making a final decision about the joint ALA/CLA conference. Further discussion is scheduled for FRIDAY.

Biblia, the Warrior Librarian writes “Just thought you’d like to know that the book “Biblia’s Guide to Warrior Librarianship” has soared up the Amazon rankings … last week it was rated at just 1,025,000 in their sales, and now has sky rocketed up to 97,000th position. For a few days there, it was sitting at around 94,000th. “

It was 948,641 when I just checked.

“The director of the Whitley County public library is now on administrative leave after he was arrested last week on child pornography charges.”

“Federal investigators say Jack Wasano tried to buy child pornography over the internet using a library computer.”

“They say they have e-mail of Wasano trying to buy video of girls between the ages of 11 and 14.” (from WKYT.com)

John Bayley, husband of author Iris Murdoch, has announced that he will be selling his late wife\’s personal library of over 1000 books, saying that he doesn\’t have room in his house. The books, many of which are covered in Murdoch\’s scribblings in Greek and Latin, will be sold in one lot at the Antiquarian Book Fair in London in June. The collection is valued at approximately 150,000 pounds. Murdoch, whose descent into Alzheimers was dramatized in an Oscar-winning film in 2001, died in 1999. More info here at the BBC.

Steve Fesenmaier writes “If you couldn’t make it to the West Virginia Library Association’s Spring Fling this year, you missed one of the best two-hours on libraries and movies. Filmmakers and librarians discussed how libraries can help make local history films; WV’s leading playwright Jean Battlo talked about making a new version of WV’s most famous “lost film,” about Smilin Sid Hatfield, famous from the “Matewan Massacre;” Mari-Lynn Evans showed clips from her $2 million PBS series on Appalachia that will be aired this January; and environmentalist filmmaker Robert Gates showed his just-completed film on the effects of mountaintop removal, “Mucked.” See picts and the poster at:
wvla.org “

“A Fort Lauderdale school librarian did not come to work Monday because parents were afraid she could transmit the virus for severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, to their children.”

“Gayle Grossman does not appear to be sick, but she did recently travel to China, which is where SARS is thought to have originated. Grossman works at Bayview Elementary, but she won’t be at work for the next 10 days, which is the recommended quarantine period.”

“Grossman made the decision to use her remaining sick and vacation days after several parents said they would keep their kids out of school if she returned.” (from Yahoo News)

Troy Johnson writes “At Wired.com there is a story titled “Shifting into Overdrive” that discusses the impact of digital mass storage. There is a line in the article that says “the overwhelming cheapness of storage will lead to the apotheosis of librarianship”. I had to look up “apotheosis” and it means “to make god like”. Any story that compares librarians to gods is probably worth reading. “