May 2013

From USA Today:

A recent survey found that half of all readers had no interest in buying e-books and that the vast majority of people who buy e-books continue to buy print books as well.

Among them are author Marilyn Johnson, who’s written books about libraries (This Book Is Overdue) and the art of obituary writing (The Dead Beat). She says that “if you took my (physical) books away, I’d go crazy, but now that I’ve gotten hooked to readers (first a Kindle and now an iPad), I can’t imagine doing without that (digital) library.”
She finds her e-reader is essential when she’s traveling. She even buys or borrows an e-book copy of a book she already owns “just to lighten my load and continue reading as I move through the landscape.”

Johnson straddles any divide between print and digital.
Her ideal reading experience crosses all formats: “Hear the author read on an audiobook, read it myself on the page or e-reader, and own it in a beautiful dust jacket, alphabetized on a shelf, with my notes in the margins and an old review stuck in the pages, ready to be pulled down whenever I want.”

If you were hoping to cash in that Borders gift card for the latest Dan Brown novel — or at least hoping to get some cash for it — you’re too late.

A Manhattan federal judge on Wednesday ruled that the bankrupt and defunct book chain owes nothing to the roughly 17.7 million people who hold $210.5 million in unredeemed gift cards.

Full story

Bexar County, Texas, is set to launch a huge project they’re calling “BiblioTech”.

… the BiblioTech library will have 100 e-readers for loan, and an initial selection of 10,000 digital titles. The library itself will have a host of computer stations where patrons can study, use the Internet, and learn computer skills.

Meanwhile, readers at home can check out e-books without leaving the couch. It’s estimated that the library’s services will reach about 1.7 million people in Bexar County, which includes San Antonio. The BiblioTech project is designed to supplement the existing city library system.

We’ve heard of “virtual” libraries before, but what I find interesting about this is the emphasis on e-readers for loan, not just computer terminals or digital holdings. However, I have to wonder how 100 e-readers are meant to serve a population of 1.7 million. I assume that’s just a starting point, but I’m fascinated to see how this model develops and what it will mean for other public libraries and managing digital readership.

Edited to add – “Anonymous” in the comments below is absolutely right to call me out on using “without books” when I meant “paperless.” –Amy

Current darling of the literary world, Keith Richards, is in trouble with his childhood library.

The “Alternet” is one of three side-by-side installations that make up “Artists in the Archives: A Collection of Card Catalogs,” an exhibition that revitalizes library tools rendered obsolete by digital technology in the mid-1990s. Each installation includes a card catalog filled with art: the “Alternet” consists of works by 75 artists, “Book Marks” is the creation of a single artist, and “The Call to Everyone” contains contributions by several hundred members of the public.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/19/nyregion/artists-in-the-archives-at-greenburgh-public-library-in-elmsford.html?src=recg&_r=0

A first edition copy of “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” that contains author J.K. Rowling’s notes and original illustrations is going on sale at a charity auction.

The personal annotations from the bestselling author included comments on the process of writing and a section from an early draft of the novel. They also included a note on how the bestselling author came to create the game of Quidditch.

Read more: http://www.cp24.com/entertainment-news/harry-potter-book-with-author-s-notes-up-for-auction-1.1289081

A national atheist group said Monday that it will donate its literature for use in cabins and lodges in Georgia’s state parks after the governor’s recent decision to allow Bibles there.

David Silverman, president of the Cranford, N.J.-based American Atheists organization, said his group is just waiting for an answer from the state on what the best procedure is to donate several books, including one titled ‘‘Why I Am An Atheist.’’

The four-month-old Shelby White and Leon Levy Information Commons replaced the branch’s media section, providing a wood-paneled center with space for 70 laptop users, a 36-seat classroom and 7 meeting rooms, including a digital studio with green screen, microphone and video equipment.

It quickly became popular with freelance writers and other creative minds, but its uses have been quite varied, like as a safe space for immigrants to learn about the naturalization process and for parents to hold meetings about charter schools. And yes, even as a warm environment for a wedding.

“This is a sanctuary. It’s beautiful,”

More than ten years after becoming one of the first novelists to embrace the e-book format, Stephen King has become one of the first novelists to reject it.

King’s book, Riding the Bullet, was published as a one of the first e-books by Simon & Schuster in 2000 and sold for $2.95. Just recently King told the Wall Street Journal that he would withhold digital rights to his upcoming novella, Joyland, to be released in early June. The book will be sold by Hard Case Crime, an independent publisher of crime fiction paperbacks with pulp-style cover artwork. Hard Case Crime also published King’s The Colorado Kid in 2005.

Read more: http://communities.washingtontimes.com/neighborhood/its-about-time/2013/may/21/stephen-king-nixes-e-book-version-his-latest-novel/

From Melville House Books:

Beall’s list, created by University of Colorado metadata librarian Jeffrey Beall, collates the academic journals which he regards as questionable. His hard work on outing journals whose business and academic practices are less than reputable has caught the eye of one of the publishers he named and shamed, and now he’s being sued.

Bogus academic journals are a growing problem. Earlier this year, Gina Kolata in the New York Times called them a “parallel world of pseudo-academia”. Most of these journals are based on an online subscription model and call themselves “open access”. The ease with which people can be published in some of these journals, with only a semblance of legitimate oversight, has been met with concern by academics, who fear that junk research is being given the appearance of a properly accredited paper.

Jeffrey Beall is being sued by India’s The OMICS Group, which, according to Jake New in The Chronicle of Higher Education, has been the subject of scrutiny for bad practices, such as spamming and steep fees for authors after publication, not only by Beall, but also by The Chronicle.