June 2004

This is neat. She won’t be complaining about a low salary. maybe all of us should dust off ye olde rollin’ pin.

“A former librarian created a pie combining oats and walnuts with chocolate chips and crumbled granola bars to win $1 million in the Pillsbury Bake-Off on Tuesday. Suzanne Conrad, 35, said it took a week to perfect her Oats ‘n Honey Granola Pie. “I kept sending the pies to work with my husband,” said Conrad, of Findlay, Ohio, about 40 miles south of Toledo. “We just couldn’t eat another piece.” She said her prize money would go into a college fund for her 3-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter and pay off loans for her master’s degree in library science.”
Read More.

Here’s a classic…

“A Concord High School student has been kicked out school for putting laxatives in the coffee of a librarian and the principal. The two were told what was in their drinks before either of them sipped them.

School officials said the unidentified student can reapply to the district once he serves a two-month suspension. The process usually takes 30 days, which means the boy will miss the first semester of school.” Read More.

A few years ago, funding for libraries in PA seemed to be on the upswing, but it sure didn’t last long… Bad news for the Susquehanna County Library in Pennsylvania. “The state of Pennsylvania cut $110,000 from Susquehanna County’s library funding in 2004, leading to cutbacks in materials and services that could get worse as the Legislature works out the 2005 budget.” Read More.

One From The Houston Chronicle says once again, users of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser have been warned that digital evildoers have exploited a security problem with that software. The alert du jour issued last week was particularly alarming because, unlike past malicious programs that targeted Windows or Internet Explorer flaws, there’s no patch for this one. Try Mozilla or Firefox, you’ll be pleasantly suprised!

The Mysterious Search Engines Guy also shared Google feels spyware strains a somewhat related article on how Google is an attractive target for spyware makers out to hitch a ride to ad-related profits.

Here’s an article about a library director in Delaware who only makes $25K per year and receives no benefits. She’s working on her MLS, “yet even armed with a degree, she doesn’t expect any major bumps in salary, comprehensive benefits, or even a larger library. She’s not complaining, though. According to her, “This is just the way things are.” More proof that people don’t join the profession for the money, but for the love of it. Read More.

“Madison’s largest and most popular library is back up and running. The Sequoya branch was shut down after last week’s tornado hit the Midvale neighborhood. The library closed its doors for two full days after suffering major damage. But Sequoya and other the nearby businesses said they were lucky.” Read More.

Steffers writes “Yahoo! reports that Tuesday the Supreme Court upheld a lower courts ruling that the law is “probably an unconstituitional muzzle on free speech.””

GregS* writes “A petition is out to get 20th Century Fox to change the name of their new movie ‘I, Robot’ back to its original ‘Hardwired’. Apparently the movie came first, the Asimov references came second for marketing purposes. Everyone complains that movies butcher books but when the message is a complete 180 of the original then people feel the need to act.
Background article here.”

ChuckB writes “The AP reports on an international conference held on June 16 in Paris on the question of how to deal with hate speech on the internet. The report notes:

Librarians in the U.S. have traditionally championied free expression of and access to even obnoxious or repellent ideas. Are we right to do so, or should we come into line with European laws? Do such laws infringe upon the mission of libraries? Do any LISNewsters out there know European librarians who have expressed their thoughts on this matter?”

conservator writes “A project started by Jacksonville State University’s Dr. Safaa Al-Hamdani to collect textbooks for Baghdad University has attracted the attention of National Public Radio, NBC, FOX, ABC, the Associated Press and other media outlets.

Books or checks made payable to Books for Baghdad may be sent to Dr. Al-Hamdani in care of the Department of Biology, Jacksonville State University, 700 Pelham Road North, Jacksonville, AL 3626″