March 2014

3 hurt as hawks dive-bomb Port Orange library patrons

http://www.news-journalonline.com/article/20140329/NEWS/140329421/1040?Title=3-hurt-as-hawks-dive-bomb-Port-Orange-library-patrons

The six, including a library employee, were attacked by the two red-shouldered hawks, but only three of the people suffered scratches to their heads when the birds dive-bombed at them outside the Port Orange Regional Library, said county spokesman Dave Byron. No one was hospitalized, he said.

The Oberlin Group Statement on Ebooks & Libraries

http://www.oberlingroup.org/node/14801

To summarize, we do not live in isolation. We all find ourselves impoverished—always indirectly and sometimes directly—when information fails to reach those in need. Our commitment to sharing is fundamental, as is our commitment to promoting and demanding models that make such sharing possible.

We thus assert the following: Contracts without provisions for transmitting material beyond our home institutions undermine our commitments to each other and artificially circumscribe the larger scholarly ecosystem. They constrain the research of students and faculty at our home institutions, who will soon find themselves unable to obtain essential material from institutions failing to secure such provisions. Looking out for ourselves means looking out for others.

UK Government takes important step towards modernising copyright

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-takes-important-step-towards-modernising-copyright

Changes to bring UK copyright law up to date for the digital age have taken an important step forward today (27 March 2014), as the government publishes the final Exceptions to Copyright regulations for consideration by Parliament.

The changes make small but important reforms to UK copyright law and aim to end the current situation where minor and reasonable acts of copying which benefit consumers, society and the economy are unlawful. They also remove a range of unnecessary rules and regulations from the statute book in line with the government’s aim to reduce regulation.

J.K. Rowling’s ‘Harry Potter’ Spinoff ‘Fantastic Beasts’ Will Be Trilogy

http://variety.com/2014/film/news/j-k-rowlings-harry-potter-spinoff-fantastic-beasts-will-be-trilogy-1201150069/

Following in the footsteps of “The Hobbit” franchise, Warner Bros. is planning “three megamovies” for J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter spinoff, “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.”

The New York Times reports in its profile on WB CEO Kevin Tsujihara that the hotly anticipated franchise will be a trilogy.

Back when the series was first announced in September, Tsujihara was relatively tight-lipped about the project, only saying “The hope is that we’re going to build a film franchise.”

Printing Wikipedia Would Take 1 Million Pages, But That’s Sort Of The Point

A German-based group called PediaPress is trying to raise enough money to make a print copy of all of Wikipedia. That’s right, Wikipedia, the ever-evolving, always-changing, inherently digital encyclopedia of information gathered by contributors all over the world. To say this would be a massive project is an understatement.

One thousand volumes, 1,200 pages each — more than one million pages in all — about 80 meters of shelf space. That’s what it would take to make a printed version of Wikipedia. The idea is to let people see just how much information is in the online encyclopedia, says Christoph Kepper and his partners at Pediapress.

Full piece at NPR

How Copyright Laws Keep E-Books Locked Up

Many publishing houses don’t allow their products to be lent out by digital libraries for fear of piracy. Articles and books by researchers are also affected. Readers are the ones who have to pay the price.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/how-copyright-laws-prevent-easy-sharing-of-e-books-a-961333.html

Librarian Among Those Killed in WA Landslide

From the Daily Herald:

Linda McPherson, 69, was a retired branch manager of the Darrington Library and a longtime Darrington School Board member and one of many who died in last week’s slide.

The disaster destroyed the home on the south side of Highway 530 that McPherson shared with her husband of nearly 45 years. Her husband, Gary “Mac” McPherson, was injured in the disaster but is out of the hospital. McPherson retired from the Sno-Isle Libraries branch in 2011 after 28 years as a librarian in Darrington.

There was a touching story in the New York Times about the McPherson’s personal tragedy.

Should authors use Snapchat to target a younger audience?

Teleread asks if authors should be using the Snapchat social media platform to promote themselves. Why?

“In this article on Brand Driven Digital, Nick Westergaard gives Snapchat a look and explains why it matters. Here’s why young adult authors and publishers should pay attention: “nearly half of Americans 12–24 use Snapchat.”

Oh? The exact audience that young adult writers crave.”

This begs the question: Should libraries be using Snapchat?

Attacking Academic Values

“This last point is why I have moved, in the past few days, from laughing at the bumbling way NPG seems to be fighting its battle against OA policies to a sense of real outrage. This effort to punish faculty who have voted for an internal and perfectly legal open access policy is nothing less than an attack on one of the core principles of academic freedom, faculty governance. NPG thinks it has the right to tell faculties what policies are good for them and which are not, and to punish those who disagree.”