Kathleen writes “The Human Rights Video Project, a project of the American Library Association and National Video Resources, is a national library project created to increase the public’s awareness of human rights issues through the medium of documentary films. The project also encourages collaborations between public libraries and human rights advocacy organizations to present film screenings and discussion programs. Libraries hosting the series include Austin Public Library, Ephrata Public Library, and Louisville Free Public Library
. The London-based human-rights organization, Amnesty International, says respect for human rights across the world is on the slide. The 2005 annual report highlights the state of human rights in nearly 150 countries. The Human Rights Video Project is a pro-active way to initiate discussion on issues relating to human rights.”
May 2005
Clinton Library to Exhibit Former President’s Musical Connections
sabine01 writes “From the Washington Post: We all know of President Clinton’s saxophone performance on the Arsenio Hall show…
An exhibit at the Clinton Library will include an eclectic display of musical memorabilia
It’s a Final Curtain for Applause Books in NYC
Another independent bookstore going under…this time a vital city resource on all aspects of theatre, film, and dance, Applause Books is closing after twenty-five years.
The list of actors, writers, scholars, authors and others who have appeared over the years in readings or performances at Applause is long and impressive, from Stella Adler to (alphabetically) Lanford Wilson, with what seems like everybody in the world in between.
Glenn Young blames nobody for the demise of Applause Books, not his landlord, not his banker, not the huge chain bookstores like Barnes & Noble or Borders, or other corporate monoliths. Yet in a sense he blames, well, everybody. Cheerfully blames, you might say. He absolutely declines to cry woe. The story’s here, from Downtown Express.
Archives Thief Gets Two Years
sabine01 writes “In the Washington Post: A Virginia man has just been sentenced to two years in jail for stealing Civil-War Era archives. He tried selling some of these documents on eBay….”
More on Fingerprint Scanners…And Pulling A Fast One
Further to the discussion and poll about using fingerprint scanners @ your public library (Naperville IL), Jerry Kuntz, Electronic Resources Consultant
at the Ramapo Catskill Library System told Pub-Lib readers about the following interesting article from PC World demonstrating that Gummi Bears can fool a fingerprint scanner…in a pinch.
The article’s author Andrew Brandt says, “After I enrolled my thumb, the optical reader accepted the gummi bear imitation as my Windows log-in. It didn’t get every gummi fingerprint; and the ones it did read, it didn’t see clearly every time. But the gummi print worked, over and over again. I also managed to enroll a lime-green gummi as a user, and then used my thumb to log on. Gummi and thumb were interchangeable for log-on purposes, though my thumb wasn’t nearly as delicious”.
Praise the Lord and Pass the Profits!
Cortez writes “As corporate America gleefully plunges into the lucrative religious market, its the sacrificial demise of small Christian bookstores:
Business Week says:
“No one has taken a more aggressive approach than Wal-Mart. In the early 1990s, it “carried only two Christian books and two Bibles on a lower shelf in the social stationery department,” recalls Ron Land, senior vice-president of mass-market sales for Thomas Nelson, who has been working with Wal-Mart for some 15 years.
Read more in the continuation…
Cortez writes “As corporate America gleefully plunges into the lucrative religious market, its the sacrificial demise of small Christian bookstores:
Business Week says:
“No one has taken a more aggressive approach than Wal-Mart. In the early 1990s, it “carried only two Christian books and two Bibles on a lower shelf in the social stationery department,” recalls Ron Land, senior vice-president of mass-market sales for Thomas Nelson, who has been working with Wal-Mart for some 15 years.
Read more in the continuation…SQUEEZED OUT. But after Land helped convince the nation’s largest retailer it was missing a major market, the chain began a big expansion. Today, Christian books represent up to 20% of its book business, and Christian merchandise [including music] has been one of its fastest-growing categories,” he says. Similarly, Barnes& Noble, Target, and many other retailers have also been devoting far more space to Christian media.
And that’s created tough sailing for many Christian stores. “Our industry has been going through the perfect storm,” says Mark Scott, president of LifeWay Christian Stores, a chain of 123 outlets owned by the Southern Baptist Convention. It’s not just that Christian stores face far more competition. They’ve also had to trim margins to compete with retailers like Wal-Mart. In the resulting shakeout, some 1,000 Christian bookstores have closed their doors in recent years. Still, the Christian Booksellers Assn.’s Anderson argues that the surviving Christian bookstores can still prosper. “General retailers want to cherrypick, while we offer the full orchard,” he argues. “
Librarians, the library’s secret resource
Steven M. Cohen writes “From BYU NewsNet:
“Within the vast corridors of the library lies one of the best kept secrets on campus. That secret is not a piece of Noah’s Ark or indisputable proof of Bigfoot but something much more believable The more than 30 subject librarians at the Harold B. Lee Library are one of the most valuable yet underutilized resources available to students.”
howstuffworks: How Lightsabers Work
From howstuffworks, this should come in handy for any LISNewsters out there, fielding reference queries behind a desk somewhere on Tatooine:
Audio books: Loud, Proud, Unabridged
gsandler writes ” Here
is a story from the New York Times about how audio books are changing reading
habits. "For a growing group of devoted listeners, the popularity of audio books is redefining the notion of reading, which for centuries has been centered on the written word. Traditionally, it is also an activity that has required one’s full attention. But audio books, once seen as a kind of oral CliffsNotes for reading lightweights, have seduced members of a literate but busy crowd by allowing them to read while doing something else."
(Registration at the NY Times web site is required.)”
‘Women in Combat,’ Comment From a Librarian Serving as an Army Major in Iraq.
A long way from her library in Glenoma, Washington, Major Mary Prophit
explains in a WashingtonPost/SeattleTimes
article regarding the recent controversy over women
in combat positions that “”Women in combat is no longer an argument,”
she said matter-of-factly at her camp near the Mosul air field. “There
is no rear area.””
A librarian in Glenoma, and an army reservist, Maj. Prophit’s current
duties are with a Stryker
armored vehicle battalion in Mosul, Iraq.
Major Prophit’s mention was two paragraphs in journalist Ann Scott Tyson’s
article, “Realities vs. policy: Women face growing combat roles in Iraq,”
about women in the military effectively serving in combat positions in
Iraq because there is no clear front line to keep women behind.
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