October 2003

I grabbed this item from the STS-L listserv this morning. The Institute of Museum and Library Services has awarded $10 million to 27 grant projects (listed here by state) aimed at recruiting and educating librarians to offset an expected shortage.

In May 2000, Library Journal magazine reported 40% of America’s library directors plan to retire in 9 years or less. And, according to the July 2000 Monthly Labor Review, in 1998 57% of professional librarians were age 45 or older. The March 2002 issue of American Libraries magazine showed that based on 1990 Census data almost 58% of professional librarians will reach the age of 65 between 2005 and 2019.

[On a personal note, my library school, The College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, MN, will be one of the recipients.]

Fang-Face writes “An Associated Press article at the First Amendment Center reports that people are lobbying the government for greater control over what private enterprise is allowed to market in video games. For my money, the article clearly demonstrates the slippery slope of fascism in action by showing how hypersensitive reactionary elements in society are not only opposed to real violence, but even violence by proxy. To quote from the article:

I find that this article also shows how, more and more, people are striving to abdicate their parental authority and their responsibility to give over to the tender mercies of Big Brother the raising of their children.”

The “Children’s Choices for 2003” annotated booklist, the latest in the annual series compiled jointly by International Reading Association (IRA) and Children’s Book Council (CBC), is now available. A single copy for personal use may be downloaded for free from IRA. See the site for information on purchasing multiple copies, as well as guidelines for using the list.

Over 700 books published in 2002 were evaluated by approximately 10,000 school children, ages 5-13, across the United States. Votes were tabulated earlier this year, resulting in this list of the 103 top books according to the kids who read them. Annotations were provided by the members of the regional review teams: children’s literature specialists, teachers, and librarians.

Lists from previous years are also available on the IRA site. Coming next month: the Young Adults’ Choices and the Teachers’ Choices lists for 2003.

Lori Bell writes: “Under the leadership of the Illinois State Library Talking Book and Braille Service, the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center and the Southern Illinois Talking Book Center are pleased to announce the opening of InfoEyes on November 3, an online information community and virtual reference service for the visually impaired.

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Lori Bell writes: “Under the leadership of the Illinois State Library Talking Book and Braille Service, the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center and the Southern Illinois Talking Book Center are pleased to announce the opening of InfoEyes on November 3, an online information community and virtual reference service for the visually impaired.

“Talking book readers, other visually impaired individuals, and librarians are invited to use the trial service. Through the service, library customers can get assistance using the Internet, finding information on the Internet and in periodical databases and reader advisory service. Librarians will be using OCLC Question Point Enhanced software to provide services which include voice over IP, co-browsing, and application sharing. The trial will run through July 30, 2004. It is hoped that more libraries in other states serving the visually impaired will join Illinois in providing these services. Customers will be asked to evaluate the service and resources to help librarians in developing the service. Hours of service are posted on the web page and it is hoped that as more libraries join the service that hours can be extended. If customers want service outside of those hours, they can schedule an appointment or a reference session.

As the project develops, more information will be posted on the website. Tom Peters of TAP Information Services is the project evaluator and will write an evaluation of the project which will be made available when the project ends. If you have questions on the service, please contact Lori Bell ([email protected]) of the Mid-Illinois Talking Book Center or Diana Brawley Sussman ([email protected]) of the Southern Illinois Talking Book Center.

Steffers writes: “Yahoo reports that an Israeli startup has developed a processor that uses optics instead of silicon to function faster than current processors. “The processor performs 8 trillion operations per second, […] 1,000 times faster than standard processors.””

Gary Deane writes “Here’s an interesting one – an “ask an expert” outfit, made up of a community of professionals and freelancers, that donates part of its fees to public libraries and also advocates for the use of public libraries in its mission statement. And not a librarian among them…

http://www.ourmailnet.com/“

Bibliofuture writes “David Rothman has a website Teleread that promotes a national digital text archive for public use. In a commentary at his blog he comments on why librarians have not already done what Amazon is doing. He points to an article he wrote that suggested some equivalent ideas to librarians. His comments are worth a look. Also the Teleread site is interesting from a librarians perspective.”

Anna writes “Is the Council Bluffs (Iowa) Public Library haunted?

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An accountant will do a full audit of the accounts of the Tonganoxie (Kansas) Public Library to deterimine just how much money the former director actually stole, er, “diverted for personal use.”

The board says it was $17K, but the crook, er, former director, says it was only $726.

In contrast to the earlier reports about pre-schoolers not reading enough, now here’s a report about the admittedly incredibly small phenomenon of “Hogwarts headaches.”

A pediatrician says he had three otherwise healthy children complain of headaches for two to three days last summer. It turns out all had been reading the 870-page “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” in marathon sessions.