Second Canadian Semantic Web Working Symposium 2009

Second Canadian Semantic Web Working Symposium 2009 - 24 May 2009 - Kelowna, British Columbia

ICADL 2008

ICADL 2008: Universal and Ubiquitous Access to Information - 2-5 December 2008 - Bali, Indonesia

5th Annual Gilbane Boston Conference

5th Annual Gilbane Boston Conference: Where Content Management Meets Social Media - December 2-4 - Boston, MA, USA

Fuel Economy Guide 2009 (US EPA)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) produce the Fuel Economy Guide to help car buyers choose the most fuel-efficient vehicle that meets their needs. Each vehicle in this guide has two fuel economy estimates. "City" represents urban driving, in which a vehicle is started in the morning (after being parked all night) and driven in stop-and-go rush hour traffic. "Highway" represents a mixture of rural and interstate highway driving in a warmed-up vehicle, typical of longer trips in free-flowing traffic. These fuel economy estimates are based on laboratory testing. All vehicles are tested in the same manner to allow fair comparisons. Free online at WOWIO

Japan launch a Living Library website

"On Wednesday the 6th of December, the first Living Library in Japan, will take place in Kyoto. It will be followed by an event in Tokyo on January 14th, but for those who cannot wait and want their information in Japanese, there is a Living Library Japan website open now. The site has been created by the organizers of the Living Library in Kyoto to help readers prepare for their visit"

Blue Peter Book Awards shortlists announced

The shortlists for the Blue Peter Book Awards have been announced. Winners are shortlisted by a panel of adult judges; then a group of young Blue Peter viewers judges the three categories:

Book I Couldn't Put Down
Best Book with Facts
Most Fun Story with Pictures

The winners of each category then compete for the accolade Blue Peter Book of the Year.

Best Book With Facts
Archaeology Detectives by Simon Adams (Oxford University Press)
100 Most Dangerous Things on the Planet by Anna Claybourne (A&C Black)
Horrible Geography Handbooks: Planet in Peril by Anita Ganeri, illustrated by Mike Phillips (Scholastic)

Book I Couldn't Put Down
Abela by Berlie Doherty (Andersen Press)
Shadow Forest by Matt Haig (Corgi)
Foul Play by Tom Palmer (Puffin)

Most Fun Story with Pictures
Mr Gum and the Dancing Bear by Andy Stanton, illustrated by David Tazzyman (Egmont)
Fleabag by Helen Stephens (Alison Green Books)
Lost! The Hundred-Mile-An-Hour Dog by Jeremy Strong, illustrated by Rowan Clifford (Puffin Books)

The winning author and/or illustrator in each category will be awarded a special Blue Peter Book Award Trophy on screen. In addition, an extract from each of the nine shortlisted titles will be dramatised on the programme. The winner of the Blue Peter Book Awards will be announced in the spring of 2009, to coincide with World Book Day

eIFL.net newsletter - No. 36

The eIFL.net newsletter - No. 36, November-December 2008, is now available. eIFL.net is a not-for-profit organisation that supports and advocates for the wide availability of electronic resources by library users in transitional and developing countries

Intellectual Property Office refreshed website and logo

"The Intellectual Property Office (United Kingdom) has announced the launch of its refreshed website and new logo from 1 December 2008. Enhancements to the website have been introduced as a result of extensive user consultation. The website now has a dedicated area for professional users, easier access to online services, improved access to consultations to broaden the audience who shape intellectual property policy and new interactive features to provide education and awareness. In the future, the Intellectual Property Office will introduce web-based toolkits and guides to help business' make the best use of their ideas"

BETT 2009

"BETT celebrates 25 years as the world's leading educational information and communications technology event in 2009. Dedicated to showcasing the best in UK and international educational technology products, resources and best practice, it has enabled thousands of practitioners to enhance their knowledge of learning through technology. BETT 2009 takes place on 14-17 January 2009, at Olympia in London"

Letters and Papers of Henry VIII now complete

From British History Online: "The Calendar of Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of Henry VIII is now complete. Covering the whole reign of Henry VIII, the calendars give direct access to key events, such as the divorce from Katherine of Aragon, the Henrician Reformation, and the fall of Thomas Cromwell. These essential calendars of state papers are freely available together for the first time, in transcriptions which have been carefully edited to ensure high-quality results"

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference - this week: An Ordinary Joe. Answers here.

This week's brainteaser is all about people named Joseph or Josephine or Joe. Try to identify them from these clues.

1. A Soviet dictator, originally named Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, notorious for his "cult of personality" and his brutal purges - which were denounced by Nikita Khrushchev.
2. US boxer known as "Smokin' Joe", who was defeated in 1975 by Muhammad Ali at the "Thrilla in Manila".
3. English rock singer, guitarist and songwriter who formed The Clash with Mick Jones. He died in 2002.
4. Polish-born novelist who wrote "Lord Jim" and "Heart of Darkness".
5. Empress of the French who married Napoleon in 1796.
6. Singer who had a British No. 1 hit in 1968 singing "With a Little Help from My Friends".
7. American revue dancer who lived in Paris from 1925. During World War II, she worked for the French Resistance.
8. He was one of the originators of hip-hop, a key figure in the development of the role of the DJ in the genre, and an early master of the arts of mixing and scratching. His group recorded the most successful of rap records - "The Message" - in 1982. His real name was Joseph Saddler, but what name did he give himself?
9. English landscape painter (1775-1851) whose works included "The Slave Ship" and "Rain, Steam and Speed".
10. US newspaper proprietor who, in his will, established annual prizes for literature, drama, music and journalism. The prizes bear his surname.

New improved ticTOCs Journal Tables of Contents service now available

The new version of ticTOCs, the journal Tables of Contents service, is now available. Now you can:

* Find over 11,000 scholarly journal TOCs from over 400 publishers by title, subject or publisher,
* View the latest TOC for each journal,
* Link to the full text of around 250,000 articles (where institutional or personal subscription allows),
* Export TOC feeds to popular feedreaders,
* Select and save (by ticking them) journal titles in order to view future TOCs

Child emigration schemes to Canada

From The National Archives (UK): "Child emigration schemes to Canada - 9 December, 14:00-15:00. British child emigration schemes operated from 1618 to 1967. It has been estimated that during this period some 150,000 children were sent to the British Colonies and Dominions, most notably America, Australia and Canada, but also Rhodesia, New Zealand, South Africa and the Caribbean. This talk examines the records and the reasons behind those schemes that operated in North America, where child emigration peaked from the 1870s until 1914, when some 80,000 children were sent to Canada. Roger Kershaw joined The National Archives, formerly the Public Record Office, in 1986 and is now the Head of Records Knowledge for the Advice and Records Knowledge Department. He has published four books, Immigrants and Aliens - a guide to sources on UK immigration and citizenship, Emigrants and Expats - a guide to sources on UK emigration and residents overseas, Family History on the Move, and New Lives for Old - the story of Britain's child migrants. This is a free event. Tickets will be issued on a first-come, first-served basis on the day and cannot be booked in advance"

Southend (UK) resident turns home into a library

"Southend residents Dennis Kerner and Anne Brooks have brought the library right to the door steps of their neighbours by opening a library in their own home. The keen bookworms have transformed Dennis' hallway into a very special library for residents to enjoy a free service. His home in Peartree Close, Southend has been transformed with shelves of books right up to the ceiling. Books have been donated by local churches and libraries and they have everything from Jeffery Archer, to Mills and Boon and even Winnie the Pooh"

Juan Marse wins Cervantes Prize

"Writer Juan Marse is the latest winner of the prestigious Cervantes Prize, among the most prominent literary awards in the Spanish-speaking world. Spanish Culture Minister Cesar Antonio Molina announced Marsé as the 2008 winner in Madrid Thursday. Established by Spain's Ministry of Culture in 1975, the Cervantes Prize honours the career achievement of a Spanish-language author from anywhere in the world. It carries a cash value of about $190,700 Cdn. Born and still based in Barcelona, the 75-year-old Marse is best known for his writing about post-Civil War Spain, including tales from the Catalonia region. Aside from a host of novels and a short story collection, he has also written for film and magazines. Marse will receive the prize at a ceremony presided over by King Juan Carlos in April. It takes place each year in Alcala de Henares, the birthplace of Don Quixote author and prize namesake Miguel de Cervantes. Past winners of the Cervantes prize include Mexico's Carlos Fuentes, Argentine poet Juan Gelman, Mexican writer and Nobel laureate Octavio Paz and Spanish essayist and philosopher Maria Zambrano"

Food for Fines at Harrison Memorial Library, December 1-31, 2008

Harrison Memorial Library, Carmel, California, will accept unopened, pre-packaged food in exchange for library fines. One food item equals $1 in fines. Acceptable items include: canned fruit or vegetables, soup, cereal, rice, canned meat or fish, pork and beans, etc. December 1-31, 2008

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week - November 27, 2008

Demarco Digital Archive

The Demarco Digital Archive comprises photographs plus documents, publications and other printed material either created or gathered by Richard Demarco. The digital records are drawn from the Demarco archives held by the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art and the Demarco European Art Foundation

Internet Resources Newsletter - Issue 168

Internet Resources Newsletter - Issue 168 - December 2008 - edited by Roddy MacLeod, Heriot-Watt University, is now available

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

Revista Cultura y Religión

Hematology/Oncology and Stem Cell Therapy

Artifara

Inonu University Journal of the Faculty of Education

International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems

Journal of Humanoids

Rodriguésia

Pharmaceutical Reviews

bookTome

"bookTome is a book management system which allows users to enter information about their book collection and then sort and search this information in a variety of different manners. bookTome can catalog and manage your library or personal book collection and it is suitable for collections of all sizes and types. bookTome is freeware and is compatible with Windows XP and Windows Vista"

2008 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize winner

The Secret Life of Words by Henry Hitchings won the 2008 John Llewellyn Rhys Prize

Library and Archives Canada partners with Ancestry.ca

"Library and Archives Canada has announced a collaborative partnership with Canada's leading online family history website, Ancestry.ca, which will allow the two organizations to provide unprecedented online access to the most comprehensive collection of Canadian historical records available. As part of the agreement, Ancestry.ca will digitize and index microfilm and original records held by LAC and make these available to Ancestry.ca members. All of the digitized records will eventually be available free of charge to users of the LAC website"

Catalyst Book Awards 2008

The winner of the Catalyst Book Awards 2008, as voted for by North Lanarkshire (Scotland) school pupils, is 'Zenith' by Julie Bertagna

Bookboon.co.uk

"Bookboon.co.uk is an online publisher of free books. You can download the books for free and without providing any personal details. The books are provided in PDF so that you can print the books and/or read them offline. In the books there are relevant advertisements on every third page in average"

Paediatrics & Child Health at PMC

Paediatrics & Child Health has been added to PubMed Central. Archive includes: v.11 (2006) to v.13 (2008). Additional content is forthcoming and will have a 12-month embargo

18thConnect

"18thConnect is a collaborative initiative headed by scholars at the Universities of Illinois, Miami-Ohio, and Virginia to develop a robust infrastructure for providing a comprehensive research environment for scholars working on the literature, history, the fine arts, and philosophy of the long eighteenth century (1660-1800). In partnership with NINES, 18thConnect will build on and extend the open source, generalizable tools for digital humanities research - Collex and Juxta"

CILIP Yearbook 2009

"CILIP: the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals Yearbook 2009 - Kathryn Beecroft, compiler. CILIP: the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals represents the largest professional body of librarians and information professionals in the UK. Its mission is to provide the membership organization needed by the library and information profession in the twenty-first century. Designed to complement the CILIP website, the Yearbook puts vital data on the key organization for information professionals at your fingertips"

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

"The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database is the culmination of several decades of independent and collaborative research by scholars drawing upon data in libraries and archives around the Atlantic world. The Voyages website itself is the product of two years of development by a multi-disciplinary team of historians, librarians, curriculum specialists, cartographers, computer programmers, and web designers, in consultation with scholars of the slave trade from universities in Europe, Africa, South America, and North America. The National Endowment for the Humanities is the principal sponsor of the project, and it is an Emory University Digital Library Research Initiative"

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

Phyllomedusa : Journal of Herpetology

Informatica Economica Journal

tripleC : Open Access Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society

Zoologische Mededelingen

Scripta Geologica

Canada Reads 2009

"Canada Reads is a week-long show hosted by Jian Ghomeshi. In this annual literary bun-fight, five celebrity panelists are asked to defend their favourite Canadian work of fiction. Day by day, books are voted off the list, until one panelist triumphs with the book for Canada to read this year. The half-hour debates will air on CBC Radio One from March 2 to March 6, 2009, at 11:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. (half an hour later in Newfoundland). The program will also air on Sirius 137 and will be available online or via podcast" - CBC

Project Gutenberg November 2008 Newsletter

The Project Gutenberg November 2008 Newsletter is now available online

ERIC Digitization Project releases full-text documents

ERIC has announced the release of nearly 60,000 additional full-text electronic documents. This release is part of the continuing effort underway within the ERIC Microfiche Digitization Project. To date, more than 170,000 documents scanned from microfiche are now available in full text. The majority of the documents in the current release were published prior to 1978

Children's Center at 42nd Street returns

"November 2008 marks the return of a circulating children's library to The New York Public Library on Fifth Avenue. The Children's Center at 42nd Street continues NYPL's tradition as a national leader in children's services. The collection offers a wealth of circulating material for children of all ages, and for adults with an interest in children's literature, music, and media"

JISC Podcast: An interview with Lynne Brindley

"The British Library is a national institution, a rich store of both British and world treasures and a place where students, researchers, business people and many others come to access a collection of resources that's pretty much unmatched throughout the world. But the library is more than this...it's also for some years been embracing technology in a variety of ways and in doing so helping to redefine the concept of the library in the digital age. Dame Lynne Brindley is the CEO of the British Library and she has led the way in its engagement with the digital environment and in a way that, as she makes clear in the following interview, has particular significance for the education and research sectors. How has the BL gone about this engagement? What were some of the underlying principles behind this engagement?

Ensuring a bright future for research libraries

The UK's Research Information Network has just published a document aimed at UK university Vice Chancellors, Presidents and Principals, Ensuring a bright future for research libraries

Real Travel via Exact Editions

Real Travel is now available for reading on the Exact Editions platform

Copac adds Royal College of Surgeons of England catalogue

From Copac: The library of the Royal College of Surgeons of England holds a collection of national significance. Focussing on surgical and medically related literature, the collection contains materials from the late fifteenth century onwards, including many unique historical materials in a variety of formats. Holdings include tracts and pamphlets, and many paintings, prints, drawings, and photographs, as well as extensive monograph and journal collections. The contemporary collections focus on surgery, dentistry, anatomy, physiology and pathology. The library also holds "an extensive collection of books, tracts and journals concerning the history of surgery, dentistry and medicine"

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #49

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #49 : "This week's episode of LISTen is in full form. Starting off the episode one finds a chat with Blake Carver about a recent conference he attended. The event was sponsored by OpenText and talked about its very own document management system. Following the chat with Blake, the episode turns to talking to Felicia Day. Ms. Day writes and produces the online series known as The Guild. Due to the paucity of materials detailing how such online ventures happen, Ms. Day helps fix in the tangible form of the podcast a discussion of such. The interview was geared towards giving YA librarians and others answers for when people inquire about how programs like The Guild are created. Following the chat with Ms. Day, a round-up of stories listeners might have missed at LISNews over the past week was given. Recognizing that the Thanksgiving holiday weekend is only occurring in the United States this week, it might be reasonable for listeners to question if an episode will be released on December 1st. The production team realizes that a sizable amount of listeners are located outside the territorial boundaries of the United States. Barring unforeseen complications, LISTen #50 is indeed slated to be released at 0500 UTC on December 1st". Previous Podcasts can be found here

Edward Elgar Publishing titles added to Credo Reference service

Credo Reference and Edward Elgar Publishing, recently agreed to integrate seven key Edward Elgar titles into the Credo General Reference collection. Edward Elgar is recognized as a leading publisher in the fields of economics, business and finance, as well as publishing other cutting-edge titles in law and public policy. The seven titles being added to Credo Reference, as a result of this new agreement, will provide Credo researchers with key content in the area of economics:

* A Biographical Dictionary of Dissenting Economists
* A Biographical Dictionary of Women Economists
* Elgar Companion to Feminist Economics (Choice Outstanding Academic Title)
* An Encyclopedia of Macroeconomics (Choice Outstanding Academic Title)
* An Encyclopedia of Keynesian Economics (Choice Outstanding Academic Title)
* Nobel Memorial Laureates in Economics
* Who's Who in Economics, 4th edition

RSP EPrints Training Day

"The Repositories Support Project (RSP) has announced that booking is now open for the first RSP EPrints Training Day, to be held at the University of London Computer Centre on December 11, 2008. Aimed at librarians and repository staff using the open-source EPrints software, the morning sessions will cover the installation and visual customisation of EPrints, metadata schema design and the batch importing of legacy records. The afternoon sessions will look at repository administration in more detail - deposit workflow, quality assurance, batch editing etc, and will include some practical exercises"

ABC-CLIO eZine - November 2008

The November 2008 issue of the ABC-CLIO eZine is now available online

KGCM 2009

The 3rd International Conference on Knowledge Generation, Communication and Management: KGCM 2009 in the context of The 13th World Multi-Conference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics: WMSCI 2009 - July 10-13, 2009 – Orlando, Florida, USA

Directory of Open Access Journals added to SUNCAT

"SUNCAT contains the serials' holdings of 67 UK research libraries, plus the CONSER database, the ISSN register and has recently added the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). The DOAJ is a comprehensive directory of scholarly open access journals, containing over 3700 titles. All journals included in the DOAJ are freely available and contain full text peer reviewed articles aimed primarily at researchers. The addition of the DOAJ to the catalogue ensures that these free titles are made visible and accessible to SUNCAT searchers alongside any subscription electronic journals they have access to. SUNCAT searchers can find these titles interspersed in their search results or can choose to limit their search to these titles alone"

Introduction to Metadata - Glasgow

Introduction to Metadata - This practical course will introduce the concepts, terminology and practical applications of metadata as it relates to library and information work. There will also be time for delegates to practise creating metadata records and adding them to a repository - 11 December 2008 - JISC Regional Support
Centre, Glasgow, Scotland

2009 NASIG Regional Unconference

2009 NASIG Regional Unconference: An Overview of Serials and Electronic Resources in Libraries - March 20, 2009 - Manhattan, Kansas, USA

Book View Cafe

"Book View Cafe is a consortium of over twenty professional authors with extensive publishing credits in the print world. The Internet is giving us an opportunity to make our out-of-print, experimental, or otherwise unavailable work available to you. Every day, new content available nowhere else will be served up on Book View Cafe: short stories, flash fiction, poetry, episodes of serialized novels, and maybe even a podcast now and then. The content will be archived and available after the posting date by visiting the author's bookshelf"

The Penny Readings 2008

"Now in its fifth year, The Reader Organisation presents the annual Penny Readings, updating the hugely popular readings given by Charles Dickens in Liverpool in the 1840s. Sunday 7 December at St. George's Hall, Liverpool. In a unique combination of music, dance, laughter, tears and great live readings, this is one unique Liverpool night out… for only one penny. For 2008 the world-famous actress Janet Suzman, renowned for her Shakespearean roles, will be joining us for the event. Tickets for the Penny Readings 2008 are available from Liverpool Central Library (Second Floor Information Desk, tel: +44 151 233 5829) from Monday 24 November" - The Reader

University of Minnesota Press launches Minnesota Archive Editions

"The University of Minnesota Press has announced an ambitious program, Minnesota Archive Editions, that will establish Minnesota as the first university press to return into print virtually every book published since its founding in 1925. 'We've already made more than 600 of our out-of-print titles available again,' stated Marketing Director Emily Hamilton, 'and within the next six months we will have every title back in print except those for which we don’t have full rights or which are not suitable for digital printing.' Minnesota Archive Editions is the result of an innovative four-way partnership of the Press; Minneapolis-based company BookMobile; BookSurge, an Amazon.com company; and Google Books"

Authors fight to preserve school library (UK)

"Philip Pullman, the bestselling author, has warned a school that it will become a 'byword for philistinism and ignorance' if it goes ahead with the closure of its library. The comprehensive in Chesterfield has become the focus of an authors' campaign since it announced that its librarian will be surplus to requirements after Christmas, when the school is to become a 'virtual learning environment'. Pupils will be encouraged to read at break times and at after-school clubs, but its traditional library will go. 'The idea that fiction is not worth looking after properly and does not need a qualified librarian runs contrary to every experience I have ever had,' Pullman wrote in a letter to Lynn Asquith, headteacher of the 759-pupil Meadows Community School. 'Are you going to relegate the whole activity of reading fiction to the status of a trivial and innocuous activity, like stamp collecting or playing with a Frisbee?' - Complete story in The Guardian

Ozmo

Copyright Clearance Center has announced the beta launch of Ozmo, a web-based service that makes it easy for independent content creators to license the use of their work for commercial purposes and for content users to tap into the wealth of user-generated content found online

Winners of 2008 Governor General's Literary Awards announced

Two four-time winners are among the list of winners of the 2008 Governor General's Literary Awards announced by the Canada Council for the Arts. The awards are given in the categories of fiction, poetry, drama, non-fiction, children's literature (text and illustration) and translation, in English and in French

UK survey points to high growth in eBooks over the next year

A recent survey in the UK conducted by NetLibrary; OCLC's eContent division has found that three-quarters of academic libraries and half of public libraries that responded intend to increase their collections of eBooks over the next year, in spite of the current fiscal climate. Nearly 300 libraries responded to the survey highlighting key issues in perceptions and usage of eBooks currently and going forward within the UK

Federal Register announces launch of new Electronic Public Inspection Desk

"The Office of the Federal Register (USA) has created an Electronic Public Inspection Desk to provide free worldwide electronic access to public documents. For the first time in the 72-year existence of the daily Federal Register, the documents on file are available for viewing anytime, anywhere. Every Federal business day, anyone with access to a computer now can read critical documents governing Federal regulations relating to business, health, and safety as soon as the documents are placed on file"

Information Matters

"The UK Civil Service has published a new strategy to help government seize the opportunities and meet the challenges of managing knowledge and information in a digital era. The development of the strategy, Information Matters: building government´s capability in managing knowledge and information, has been led by the cross-government Knowledge Council. 'Information Matters' will help develop the framework, tools and capabilities for knowledge and information management. This will enable all civil servants to meet the challenge of delivering effective and efficient public services while simultaneously protecting individuals' privacy"

Podcast: Radicalism and Unrest

Podcast: Radicalism and Unrest - "From the various corresponding societies and early trade unions of the 18th century, through the Luddite and 'Swing' disturbances of the 1810s and early 1830s, to the Chartists of the late 1830s-40s, people sought to improve, or at least protect, their standards of living. But what did ordinary people really think about their world and what types of records should we be looking at in order to see how they tried - and sometimes succeeded - in changing their part of it?" - UK National Archives

The Liblog Landscape 2007-2008

"Liblogs - blogs written by library people, as opposed to official library blogs - provide some of today's most interesting and useful library literature. This book offers a broad look at English-language liblogs as they are and as they've changed between 2007 and 2008. The book includes more than 600 blogs with detailed analysis of 27 metrics for 2007 and 2008 and changes from 2007 to 2008 - and, for 143 of them, 2006 as well. Through tables, charts and text, we explore the liblog landscape. Written by Walt Crawford

Uncontrolled Vocabulary #63

Uncontrolled Vocabulary #63 is now available for download. Topics:

1. ALA Grassroots Program Proposal (ALA)
2. Full draft of RDA (Library and Archives Canada)
3. List of content related to the OCLC Policy Change (wiki.code4lib.org)
Rule #1 for Surviving Paradigm Shifts: Don’t S**t Where You Eat (Stefano’s Linotype)
Stealing Your Library: The OCLC Powergrab (Raw Thought)
OCLC on the Run (Raw Thought)
Stop the OCLC powergrab! (Watchdog.net)
An open letter to the OCLC membership on the Worldcat Record Use policy (OCLC)
4. ALA Comments to FCC on E-rate: Audit Findings Point to Need for Simpler Program (District Dispatch)
5. D.C. Libraries: Not a Homeless Shelter, Especially in the West End (Washington City Paper)
Affluent white people can help themselves, thank you (Closed Stacks)
6. Whatever Happened to Library Blogs? (Pegasus Librarian)
Is the blog dead? (Bibliothekia)

JISC Podcast/feature: Exploring eBooks

"Electronic books (e-books) could revolutionise the way in which learners access information. A recent Exploring e-books event provided an opportunity to speculate, disseminate and evaluate the current issues and potential future of the e-book within UK further and higher education. Organised by Virginia Havergal at JISC's Regional Support Centre (RSC) South West, library and information professionals as well as technical experts and JISC Collections project leaders shared their experiences and research findings with a view to maximising the benefits of e-books for users and for institutions"

Sidewalk via Exact Editions

Sidewalk, the magazine that has been documenting the British skateboard scene from the inside for over a decade, is now available at Exact Editions

Google launches SearchWiki

Google launches SearchWiki "a way for you to customize search by re-ranking, deleting, adding, and commenting on search results". Watch the video explanation:

E-News for ARL Directors - November 21, 2008

E-News for ARL Directors, November 21, 2008 is now available online

Associates - November 2008 issue

The November 2008 (Vol. 15, no. 2) issue of Associates: The Electronic Library Support Staff Journal is now available

NASIG announces the 2009 Awards application process

The North American Serials Interest Group (NASIG) has announced the application process for its 2009 grants, awards, and scholarships to be awarded at the 2009 Annual Conference being held in Asheville, North Carolina, June 4-7, 2009. Deadline is February 16, 2009

LITA names newest Emerging Leaders

"The Library and Information Technology Association (LITA) Board of Directors has selected Holly Tomren and Lisa Thomas to participate in the ALA 2009 Emerging Leaders Program. Tomren and Thomas will receive LITA sponsorship, which will include a $1,000 stipend to help offset the costs of attending the 2009 Midwinter Meeting and the 2009 Annual Conference. In addition, Lisa and Holly will each work on LITA projects and be mentored by the LITA leadership"

The Global Library of Women's Medicine

The Global Library of Women's Medicine is "a unique web library incorporating a vast range of detailed clinical information across the whole field of women's medicine. It consists of 442 main chapters and 53 supplementary chapters, supported by over 40,000 references, which will be kept permanently up-to-date. The chapters have been written by more than 650 specialists and will reflect some of the very best worldwide opinion. All the expert authors and editors of The Global Library of Women's Medicine have generously made their contributions without any form of financial remuneration - and the British publishers have originated, developed and implemented the site entirely from their own funds - in order to support this significant global initiative which it is hoped may make some contribution to the ongoing efforts to improve women's healthcare around the world"

2009 LITA National Forum Call for Proposals

The 2009 LITA National Forum Committee seeks proposals for high quality concurrent sessions and poster sessions for the 12th annual LITA National Forum to be held at the Hilton Salt Lake City Center hotel in Salt Lake City, Utah from October 1-4, 2009. Due date for proposals is February 20, 2009

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference - this week: General Knowledge. Answers here.

1. If something is "diminutive", is it very large or very small?
2. Which television series centred on the everyday life of the Ewings, including JR, Gary and Bobby?
3. The Matterhorn is on the border between which two countries?
4. What is the square root of one hundred?
5. In finance, what is a sub-prime lender?
6. Which was the title of the second "Bridget Jones" book (1999) and film (2004)?
7. Sauerkraut is made by pickling which vegetable?
8. Name two signs of the Zodiac which start with the letter "A".
9. What is the currency of Turkey?
10. Which English model appeared in pop music videos such as Elton John's "The Way You Look Tonight" and Primal Scream's "Kowalski"?

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

Ethicomp Journal

Open Education Journal

Open Mineralogy Journal

Open Urology & Nephrology Journal

Plant Omics

PC Magazine goes 100% digital

"An Open letter to PC Magazine (Print) Readers. The January 2009 issue (Volume 28, Issue 1) of PC Magazine will mark a monumental transition for the publication. It is the last printed edition of this venerable publication. Of course, as with any technology-related enterprise, this is not the end, but the beginning of something exciting and new. Starting in February 2009, PC Magazine will become a 100-percent digital publication. So, in addition to our popular network of Websites, which includes our centerpiece, PCMag.com, as well as ExtremeTech, blogs like Gearlog and AppScout, and audio and video content that includes PCMag Radio, Cranky Geeks and DL.TV, we'll offer PC Magazine Digital Edition to all of our print subscribers. The PC Magazine Digital Edition has actually been available since 2002. So for thousands of you, the benefits of this unique medium are already clear. And those benefits will continue to multiply in the coming months, as we work hard to enhance your digital experience"

Learning on Screen Conference 2009

"The Learning on Screen Conference 2009 will be held at The Wellcome Collection, London, on 7 and 8 April 2009 and the Learning on Screen Awards evening, which is part of the conference, will take place at the nearby Holiday Inn Regent's Park on the evening of 7 April. The conference is being held with the kind assistance of The Wellcome Trust. Learning on Screen, the annual conference established by the Society for Screen-Based Learning, focuses on the delivery of learning and research with moving image and sound - be it broadcasting, web delivery or cinema"

Web Design & Construction for Libraries Part 1: XHTML and CSS (beginners)

This hands-on course focuses on the basics of Web site planning and design and content development. The course will also examine Web standards, usability, and accessibility. XHTML and CSS (external) will be introduced. The course begins with XHTML/HTML basics tutorials and a practice activity to make sure everyone has the basic skills. Students will plan and design a representative site during the course. Course teacher is Diane K. Kovacs

Volunteer opportunities at Open Access Directory

The Open Access Directory has put out a call for volunteers who would like to help the cause. OAD is hosted by the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at Simmons College and supervised by an independent editorial board

British History Online: Calendar of Close Rolls

"The 15 volumes for Henry III are now live. Included as part of our premium content service, the Calendar of Close Rolls is a fundamental source for the study of medieval England. The complete series, from Henry III to Henry VII, will be made live over the next few weeks" - British History Online

FreePint Newsletter 265

FreePint Newsletter 265 - 20 November, 2008 now available

Royal Society Digital Journal Archive - free access

"The Royal Society Digital Journal Archive, incorporating all content from 1665 to 2006, is easily the most comprehensive archive in science and contains some of the most significant scientific papers ever published. Covering almost 350 years of scientific research across the disciplines it is a priceless academic resource, free and exclusive to our journal package subscribers - free to access until 1 February 2009"

New British Library opens in Tbilisi

"With British Council support a new British Library was launched on November 18 at Tbilisi State University. About 6,000 of the British Council's contemporary British books and multimedia items were transferred to the new Library. Located in the second building of TSU, the British Library will serve as a cultural and information centre for students, academics, young professionals and all people interested in British culture and education. H.E. Ambassador Denis Keefe and British Council Georgia Director Paul Doubleday attended the official opening, which brought together book lovers, students and professors. Ambassador Keefe emphasized the successful ongoing partnership between TSU and British Council. Paul Doubleday stressed the prospects of future productive cooperation between the two institutions"

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week - November 20, 2008

A Guide for the Perplexed: Libraries and the Google Library Project Settlement

A Guide for the Perplexed: Libraries and the Google Library Project Settlement - an ALA-ARL sponsored 23-page explanation of the pending Google Library copyright settlement

Primary Source - November 2008

Primary Source - November 2008 issue now available from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, Washington, DC, USA

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

College Forum

College of the Bahamas Research Journal

Open Geriatric Medicine Journal

Open Industrial & Manufacturing Engineering Journal

Open Law Journal

Tripodos

Library 2.0 Gang Podcast: November 2008: OCLC & Google Book Search

"This month's Library 2.0 Gang conversation is stimulated by recent announcements from two significant organisations in their spheres of influence. Gang regulars Tim Spalding and Marshall Breeding chew the fat on OCLC's policy change announcement(s) which has set the library blogosphere alight over the last couple of weeks and was the subject of a Talking with Talis podcast with OCLC's Karen Calhoun & Roy Tennant.. What are the motivations behind it - is OCLC a good thing - what could the ramifications for the wider community - does the wider library community care enough about it? Google Book Search and their provisional settlement with the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers (AAP) around copyright issues. One of the spin offs from the settlement being the setting up of Book Rights Registry, managed by authors and publishers, that will work to locate and represent copyright holders Book Rights Registry, managed by authors and publishers, that will work to locate and represent copyright holders. Is this the beginnings of a change in the publishing industry to take on some of the attributes of the music industry?"

Europeana has been launched

Europeana, the European digital library, opens to the public today. The on-line service offers users around the world access to more than two million books, maps, recordings, photographs, archival documents, paintings and films from national libraries and cultural institutions of the EU's 27 Member States. Europeana is the result of a series of projects funded by the European Commission and has a strong support of the European Parliament. The service is run by the European Digital Library Foundation, which brings together Europe's major associations of libraries, archives, museums, audiovisual archives and cultural institutions. Europeana is hosted by the Dutch national library, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek.

2008 National Book Award winners announced

The winners of the 2008 National Book Award have been announced:

* Fiction: Peter Matthiessen, Shadow Country (Modern Library)
* Nonfiction: Annette Gordon-Reed, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (W.W. Norton & Company)
* Young People's Literature: Judy Blundell, What I Saw and How I Lied (Scholastic)
* Poetry: Mark Doty, Fire to Fire: New and Collected Poems (HarperCollins)

Patrick Ness novel wins 2008 Booktrust Teenage Prize

The winner of the 2008 Booktrust Teenage Prize is Patrick Ness for The Knife of Never Letting Go (Walker). Patrick received a cheque for GBP2,500 and a trophy at a ceremony in London on 18 November

Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship - Fall 2008

Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship - Number 55, Fall 2008 - is now available

Warwick Prize for Writing longlist announced

"The Warwick Prize for Writing has announced a longlist which is set to redefine traditional forms of writing. For the first time, political scientists will compete against novelists, mathematicians against poets and economists against historians. The GBP50,000 inaugural prize, run by the University of Warwick, stands out as an international cross-disciplinary biennial award open to substantial pieces of writing in the English language, in any genre or form"

The Sloane Printed Books Catalogue (British Library)

The Sloane Printed Books Catalogue, a joint initiative by the British Library and the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine at UCL, is now available on the British Library website. The catalogue aims to 'virtually' reunite the printed book collections formerly owned by the renowned physician, scientist and collector Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753). His collection, comprising around 40,000 printed books, was one of the largest libraries in Europe of its time and is particularly significant for its holdings of medical and scientific material

Amazon CloudFront

"Amazon CloudFront is a web service for content delivery. It integrates with other Amazon Web Services to give developers and businesses an easy way to distribute content to end users with low latency, high data transfer speeds, and no commitments"

LIFE photo archive hosted by Google

"Search millions of photographs from the LIFE photo archive, stretching from the 1750s to today. Most were never published and are now available for the first time through the joint work of LIFE and Google"

Search LIFE images

Atypon Systems, Inc. announces launch of integrated content delivery platform for American Chemical Society

Atypon Systems, Inc. has announced the launch of a new online publishing and content delivery site to transform the American Chemical Society’s online journals. The new offering provides a fully integrated web platform rich with new features and functionality, customized to deliver a more robust electronic journal and to enhance the online reading experience for American Chemical Society customers

SAGE partners with FEDLINK to offer electronic resources to federal libraries

"SAGE has announced that it has signed an agreement with the Federal Library and Information Network (FEDLINK), to provide its online products to participating US federal libraries. SAGE has been awarded a Basic Ordering Agreement ((BOA) No. LC09G7060, Service ID=SG) by FEDLINK and now offers the Direct Express ordering option to US federal libraries. FEDLINK librarians across America can now explore award-winning, content-rich resources"

Digital Humanities Observatory

The Digital Humanities Observatory is a central component within the Humanities Serving Irish Society initiative. The DHO was established under auspices of the Royal Irish Academy to manage and co-ordinate the increasingly complex e-resources created in the arts and humanities. It will enable research and researchers in Ireland to keep abreast of international developments in the creation, use, and preservation of digital resources

Introduction to DSpace video

"DSpace, with the help and support of the service provider, @mire, has developed a brief Introduction to DSpace video. The video explains repository software basics and demonstrates a few of the key features of the DSpace platform"

Podcast: God's Wonderful Railway

"Find out how the development of the railways transformed the landscape of Great Britain and became the agent of enormous social change. Bruno Derrick explores the early years of the Great Western Railway, from its foundation to the death of Isambard Kingdom Brunel in 1859, and brings to light the vast collection of records in the custody of The National Archives in the UK"

The New York Times: The Complete Front Pages: 1851-2008

The New York Times: The Complete Front Pages: 1851-2008 contains 54,267 front pages. The eight pound book has 300 front pages in the book and the other 50,000 on a three DVD set that comes with the book

International Conference on Academic Libraries

International Conference on Academic Libraries is being organized to come up with a vision for next generation academic libraries in order to meet the challenge of knowledge society, in giving the country a competitive edge in knowledge economy. The conference will provide an international platform to all stakeholders to address all issues of importance to academic libraries, discuss and debate roles that academic libraries can play in the higher education system in developed and developing countries with particular reference to India by 2020. The scope of the conference will be: knowledge sharing, ICT management, digital repository management, e-teaching, e-tutorials, stronger library-faculty relationships, and user centric services - October 5-8, 2009 - Delhi, India

drupal4lib camp

drupal4lib camp is taking place February 27, 2009 at the Darien Public Library, Connecticut, USA. The camp will be an opportunity for libraries working with Drupal to get together share experiences, solve problems, and collaborate. Attendance is limited to 70 participants

EDUCAUSE Quarterly - Volume 31, Number 4 2008

EDUCAUSE Quarterly - Volume 31, Number 4 2008 is now available

D-Lib Magazine - November/December 2008

D-Lib Magazine - November/December 2008 is now available. D-Lib Magazine is a solely electronic publication with a primary focus on digital library research and development, including but not limited to new technologies, applications, and contextual social and economic issues. The magazine is currently published six times a year

Manuscript Collections on the Web, SPEC Kit 307 from ARL

The Association of Research Libraries has published Manuscript Collections on the Web, SPEC Kit 307, which surveys ARL libraries' current efforts to provide information about their manuscript collections online

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #48

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #48 : "This week's episode is a brief one. After the run down of stories you might have missed, the program's engineer presents another installment of Tech for Techies. In the fourteenth installment of that segment, the engineer gives a brief overview of how to record audio at conferences and conventions. A lighter commentary is presented touching upon the need for authority control in today's increasingly interconnected world. The wrap-up contains a unique announcement". Previous Podcasts can be found here

The 2008 SLA Salary Survey & Workplace study

The 2008 SLA Salary Survey & Workplace study shows that the average salary increases for SLA members have again outpaced inflation. Based on salaries as of April 1, the mean percent increase in salaries for 2008 over 2007 was 5.3% for U.S. based respondents. The average salary for U.S. members who answered the survey was $71,812, compared with $69,426 in 2007 and $67,400 in 2006

Cites & Insights 8:12 (December 2008)

Cites & Insights 8:12 (December 2008) is now available for downloading

Nuevo Texto Critico via Project Muse

Nuevo Texto Critico is now available on project Muse

2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award

The 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award brings together talented writers, reviewers and publishing experts to find and develop new voices in fiction. The prize is a $25,000 publishing contract with Penguin Group (USA) and the distribution of your novel on Amazon.com. Authors will be able to submit their manuscripts between February 2 and February 8, 2009

Ariadne - Issue 57, October 2008

Ariadne - Issue 57, October 2008 is now available. Ariadne is targeted principally at information science professionals in academia, and also to interested lay people both in and beyond the Higher Education community. Its main geographic focus is the UK, but it is widely read in the US and worldwide

Stanza for iPhone and iPod Touch

"Stanza is a free application for your iPhone and iPod Touch. Use it to download from a vast selection of over 40,000 books and periodicals, and read them right on your phone"

2009 National Leadership Grant guidelines now available

"The Institute of Museum and Library Services is accepting grant applications for the agency's 2009 National Leadership Grant program. Applications, guidelines, and examples of successful proposals can be found on the agency’s Web site. The deadline for submitting applications is February 1, 2009"

The Global Gender Gap Report 2008

The Global Gender Gap Report 2008 is published by the World Economic Forum. It is the result of collaboration with faculty at Harvard University and University of California, Berkeley

OCLC Talk with Talis about the new Record Use Policy

Richard Wallis is joined in this Talking with Talis conversation by two well known OCLC names - Vice President WorldCat and Metadata Services, Karen Calhoun, and Senior Programme Officer, Roy Tennant

University of Alaska Fairbanks joins OpenCourseWare Consortium

"The University of Alaska Fairbanks has joined the OpenCourseWare Consortium, a partnership of more than 200 universities and colleges in 29 countries. UAF students will be able to access courses from the other universities involved, and UAF will contribute 10 courses to the program in the next two years. Open courses do not have instructors and are not graded, but all materials are available online and instructors can use the materials in their classes" - Daily News-Miner

Repositories Worldwide

Repositories Worldwide "brings together the recent DSpace, EPrints and Fedora news releases, the latest repository-relevant personal postings from individual and project blogs, as well as recent postings on two of the key repository agendas - Open Access and Data Curation."

WorldCat iPhone application

"An experimental iPhone interface to WorldCat is now available on the Apple Web applications page. The new WorldCat application lets you find what you want in a library near you on your iPhone or iPod touch"

Greenstone v2.81 released

Greenstone v2.81 released. Greenstone is a suite of software for building and distributing digital library collections. It provides a new way of organizing information and publishing it on the Internet or on CD-ROM

PEN 2008 Literary Awards competition

"PEN USA, the West Coast center for the renowned writers' organization International PEN, has unveiled the winners of its prestigious 2008 Literary Awards competition. The prizes, announced by PEN USA Executive Director Adam Somers, honor outstanding work by writers in 10 separate genres. They will be presented at the 18th annual Literary Awards Festival gala dinner (LitFest), which will be held at the Beverly Hills Hotel in Beverly Hills on Wednesday, December 3, 2008"

ARL: A Bimonthly Report - October 2008

ARL: A Bimonthly Report, no. 260 (October 2008) is now available

Women and Social Movements - new release

From Alexander Street Press: "Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000 has just been updated and migrated to a new platform. Whether your library has access to the Basic Edition or the Scholar's Edition, you will see several improvements to the collection. We have added 6 new document projects, bringing the total up to 85. Subscribers to the Scholar's Edition will also have access to more than 72,000 pages from State Commissions on the Status of Women, as well as the first three volumes of Harvard University Press' Notable American Women: A Biographical Dictionary. This marks the first time the landmark work is available in electronic form. Both the Basic and Scholar's Editions can be accessed and browsed for free. You will not be prompted to log in until you browse deeper within the collection. You may request a free trial for your library on our Web site"

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference - this week: Assassinations. Answers here.

1. The assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in 1914 set off a chain of events that led to the start of which war?
2. Which American president was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth in 1865 while attending a performance at Ford's Theatre in Washington, DC?
3. Which Roman dictator was assassinated on the Ides of March, 44 BCE?
4. Lee Harvey Oswald was alleged to have assassinated which American president in 1963?
5. Which Russian revolutionary was assassinated in Mexico City with an ice pick in 1940?
6. Hendrik Frensch Verwoerd was the prime minister of which country when he was assassinated in 1966?
7. French aristocrat Charlotte Corday is remembered as the assassin who stabbed which revolutionary leader in his bath in 1793?
8. What was the name of the eldest son of Indira Gandhi, who became prime minister of India after her assassination in 1984, and was himself assassinated in 1991?
9. Which Egyptian president was assassinated in 1981 - Nasser, Sadat or Mubarak?
10. Which Irish dramatist wrote "Assassination is the extreme form of censorship"?

Biblio Tech Review - November 2008

The November 2008 issue of Biblio Tech Review is now available

International Children's Digital Library signs historic agreement with Google

"The International Children's Digital Library has announced that it has signed an agreement with Google to augment its vast collection of public domain children's literature with public domain titles digitized using Google's state-of-the-art scanning technology. The result will be the addition of potentially thousands of scanned, searchable children's books to the ICDL. As part of the agreement, the ICDL and Google will share their public domain titles making them available via the ICDL and Google's Book Search" - PRNewswire

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week - November 13, 2008

Video: Don Tapscott discusses 'Grown Up Digital'

Author Don Tapscott sat down with CIO Canada at the recent Showcase Ontario and discussed his new book. Find out why the next generation is more sociable and better at collaborating than the TV generation:

Clio Notes added to America: History & Life and Historical Abstracts on EBSCOhost

CLIO Notes are now part EBSCOhost's America: History & Life and Historical Abstracts"

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

Aspeers : Emerging Voices in American Studies

African Journal of Accounting, Economics, Finance and Banking Research

Latin-American Journal of Physics Education

Política & Sociedade : Revista de Sociologia Política

Virtual Reference Competencies III: Maintain and Build Reference Skills and Knowledge

Virtual Reference Competencies III: Maintain and Build Reference Skills and Knowledge: An ACRL Online Seminar - November 24 to December 13, 2008. Instructor is Diane Kovacs, Kovacs Consulting

Archivists' Toolkit Version 1.5 released

The Archivists' Toolkit team has announced the availability of version 1.5.0 of the AT application

RefSeek

"RefSeek is a web search engine for students and researchers. RefSeek aims to make academic information easily accessible to everyone. RefSeek searches more than one billion documents, including web pages, books, encyclopedias, journals, and newspapers"

Genome Medicine

"Genome Medicine is an online peer-reviewed journal which publishes open access research articles of outstanding quality in all areas of medicine studied from a genomic or post-genomic perspective. The journal will have a special focus on the latest technologies and findings that have an impact on the understanding and management of human health and disease. In addition to publishing high-quality research, Genome Medicine serves the international research community as a forum for the discussion and critical review of information about all areas of medicine informed by genomic research"

Infor announces general availability of its V-smart web-based ILS

"Infor Library and Information Solutions has announced the general availability of V-smart, a new web-based Integrated Library System. V-smart offers libraries distinctive advantages including faster deployment, easier maintenance, enhanced access to system data, and reduced cost of ownership."

Library Journal: Placement and Salary Survey for 2008

Library Journal has released its Placement and Salary Survey for 2008

Concord Free Press

What is Concord Free Press? "We publish books and give them away for free - online and via a network of independent bookstores. In exchange, we ask readers to make a voluntary donation to a local charity or someone in need in their community. And we ask them to pass the book on, so that every time the book changes hands, it generates more contributions"

DailyLit books now available through Viigo

"DailyLit has worked with Viigo, a developer of mobile content and delivery platforms for smartphones, to make 25 of its most popular books available through the Viigo service. Viigo works as a mobile RSS reader and complements DailyLit's current offering of books by email and RSS by giving readers another way to enjoy DailyLit on their mobile devices (iPhone, Blackberry, etc.). The current books available on Viigo include Pride and Prejudice, Dracula, Moby Dick, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and other well-known books"

Palgrave Macmillan and Nature Publishing Group collaborate to launch new ebook platform

"In response to the growing demand for digital resources Palgrave Macmillan will launch its own ebook platform, Palgrave Connect, in January 2009. Developed in association with Palgrave Macmillan's sister company, Nature Publishing Group, Palgrave Connect offers libraries a flexible approach to building an ebook collection in the Humanities, Business and Social Sciences. From January over 4000 ebooks will be available in collections organised by year of publication and by discipline. 2009 collections will be updated quarterly with newly published titles. Both 2009 and backlist collections are available to purchase on a one-time fee perpetual access basis"

Librarians' e-Newsletter from Palgrave Macmillan - October 2008

The October 2008 edition of Palgrave Macmillan's e-newsletter for librarians is now available

Treasures of The New York Public Library Video Series

Watch as curators and librarians from The New York Public Library share their passion for the treasures of our remarkable collections

Tantor Media adds 1,000 audiobook titles to OverDrive Library Collection

OverDrive has announced the addition of 1,000 Tantor Media audiobooks to its catalog of 150,000 digital titles. The new audiobook content includes hundreds of popular and best-selling audiobooks like "The White Tiger," "Three Cups of Tea," and "Body of Lies," a collection of 'always available' titles for simultaneous download, and a collection of iPod-compatible MP3 audiobooks

Thomson-West launches Westlaw China

West has announced the launch of Westlaw China. The much needed service provides access to Chinese legal information, primary sources and secondary materials. In some instances, English translations appear side-by-side the original Chinese text. Stephen Yao, president and CEO, Westlaw China, talks about how Westlaw China will be used in the U.S.:

Armistice Day anniversary marked by launch of Great War Archive

Oxford University is marking the 90th anniversary of Armistice Day by launching two new, free to access websites, thanks to funding from the JISC Digitisation Programme. These resources will allow educators, scholars and the public to view previously unseen memorabilia and poetry from World War I. The Great War Archive and the First World War Poetry Archive bring together 13,500 digital images of items mainly of rare primary source material. Many items submitted by members of the public are treasured family heirlooms which have never been on public display

Semantic Digital Libraries book announcement

Semantic Digital Libraries, edited by Sebastian Ryszard Kruk and Bill McDaniel, is now available from Springer-Verlag

Code4Lib 2009 Conference - call for proposals

Code4lib 2009 is now accepting proposals for prepared talks. The conference will be held Monday, February 23 (pre-conference day) through Thursday, February 26, 2009 in Providence, Rhode Island, USA

The New York Public Library now on Facebook

The New York Public Library now has a Facebook fan page

Joseph Boyden wins 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize

New Orleans resident Joseph Boyden has won the 2008 Scotiabank Giller Prize for his second novel, 'Through Black Spruce.' The Giller, which is worth $50,000, is celebrating its 15th year. Boyden's book is a portrait of contemporary aboriginal life and family struggles that ensue after a beautiful young woman goes missing"

Directory of Open Access Journals - recently added titles

Advances in Bioinformatics

Analele Universitâtii din Oradea, Fascicula Biologie

Aquaculture, Aquarium, Conservation & Legislation

Estudos em Design

International Journal of Reconfigurable Computing

Liberabit

Progress In Electromagnetics Research

Progress In Electromagnetics Research B

Progress In Electromagnetics Research C

Progress In Electromagnetics Research Letters

Progress In Electromagnetics Research M

Revista ANACEM

Policy Studies Organization partners with Berkeley Electronic Press to publish its new journals

Berkeley Electronic Press has announced that it will partner with the Policy Studies Organization to publish a new collection of PSO journals, and to provide additional online society services

Volunteers bring to life the world of the Victorian poor

"Volunteers around England and Wales are embarking on an exciting project to unearth the often sad and gruesome world of the Victorian poor. Led by The National Archives, the 'Living the Poor Life' project will involve more than 200 local and family historians in cataloguing memos, letters and reports held within the records of 22 Poor Law Unions. Over the next 18 months the volunteers will catalogue more than 100,000 pages of documents dating from the mid-1830s to around 1850. From the running of the workhouses, to tales of family breakdown, greed and corruption, these records provide a detailed snapshot of a key period in Britain´s history. The scanned records will be eventually be made available on The National Archives' website. Local and family historians will be able to search by name, place, date and event, providing a level of detail not found in any other records from this period. 'While the 19th century saw a huge growth in Britain's economy and industrial capacity, not everyone shared the material benefits,' says Dr Paul Carter, Principal Modern Records Specialist at The National Archives. 'These are the kind of records that will help researchers, whether a family historian or an academic, answer the question of what life was like for these people.' The National Archives is funding the current work and is seeking additional funding to extend the project through to records from the early 1870s." UK National Archives

November Early Reviewer books at LibraryThing

The November batch of Early Reviewer books is now available at LibraryThing. There are 1,645 copies of 60 books available this month

The Golden Notebook Project

The Golden Notebook Project is an experiment in close-reading in which seven women are reading the book and conducting a conversation in the margins. The project went live on Monday 10 November 2008

DigitalPreservationEurope newsletter - October 2008

DigitalPreservationEurope newsletter - Issue 3, October 2008, is now available for download

The Tech Static from Rachel Singer Gordon

The Tech Static is focused on technology-related collection development in libraries. The Tech Static's creator, Rachel Singer Gordon, wrote Library Journal's "Computer Media" review column from 2002 until it was retired in October 2008. She launched The Tech Static in November 2008 to fill the resulting gap in the library literature; few library-oriented publications currently review computer books

Society for Endocrinology journal prices 2009

The Society for Endocrinology has announced its journal prices for 2009

2008 Shirley Olofson Memorial Award winner

The Shirley Olofson Memorial Award has been awarded to Annie Paprocki. She received $1000 to attend ALA Annual 2008 in Anaheim, CA.

Conference on Intellectual Property

The inaugural Conference on Intellectual Property (CIP) will be held June 12-13 2009 at Iona College in New Rochelle, NY, and will include keynote addresses by Laura M. Quilter, M.L.S., J.D. and painter Joy Garnett

ECDL 2009

ECDL 2009: 13th European Conference on Digital Libraries - September 27 to October 2, 2009 - Corfu, Greece

New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Children's Books 2008

The New York Times Book Review has announced its Best Illustrated Children's Books 2008 winners

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #47

LISTen: The LISNews.org Podcast - Episode #47 : "This week's episode brings a chat with Blake, a chat with an artist about the business of art, and a commentary.Although we have had video releases accompanying audio releases, such is delayed until a later day this week". Previous Podcasts can be found here

San Rafael Public Library joins Facebook

San Rafael Public Library, California, has recently joined Facebook

ELPUB 2009

ELPUB 2009: 13th International Conference on Electronic Publishing - 10-12 June 2008 - Milan, Italy

The Second International m-Libraries Conference

The Second International m-Libraries Conference aims to explore and share work carried out in libraries around the world to deliver services and resources to users 'on the move,' via a growing plethora of mobile and hand-held devices. The conference will bring together researchers, technical developers, managers and library practitioners to exchange experience and expertise and generate ideas for future developments - 23-24 June 2009 - University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Library of Congress Information Bulletin - June 2008

Library of Congress Information Bulletin - Vol. 67, No 6 - June 2008 - is now available online

ebrary launches QuickView for instant document viewing in a browser

ebrary has announced the availability of ebrary QuickView, which enables end-users to view documents in many web browsers and on the iPhone. No software downloads or installations are needed

Pathogenetics

"Pathogenetics is a peer-reviewed, online open access journal, which features studies on the pathogenesis of genetic diseases, phenotypes and traits. Such studies may use molecular, biochemical, cellular, and physiological methods, as well as genome-wide approaches, to provide novel insights into the biological mechanisms underlying the phenotypic manifestations of genetic diseases."

FreePint Newsletter 264

FreePint Newsletter 264 - 6 November, 2008 now available

Amsterdam Law Forum

The Amsterdam Law Forum is an open access initiative supported by the VU University Library. Netherlands

Oxford University Press (USA) Holiday Sale

The Oxford University Press (USA) Holiday Sale is now on, with savings of up to 80%

PLATFORM: Journal of Media and Communication

"PLATFORM: Journal of Media and Communication is a biannual open-access online postgraduate publication. Founded by the Media and Communications Program, School of Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne, PLATFORM has just been launched in November 2008. This new postgraduate journal, PLATFORM, is refereed by an international board of established and emerging scholars working across diverse paradigms in Media and Communication. It is planned to develop it as an international journal"

Directory of Open Access Journals updated

Directory of Open Access Journals covers free, full text, quality controlled scientific and scholarly journals. There are now 3728 journals in the directory. Currently 1304 journals are searchable at article level. 219688 articles are included. There are also daily, weekly, and monthly RSS feeds available for new titles added.

Podcast: The parish: administration and records

For hundreds of years the parish was the most important unit of local government. This talk covers the historical administration of the parish, its officials and their records, as well as showing you how you can use these records to trace your ancestors and find out more about their local community - UK National Archives

Liverpool University Library opens following GBP17 million investment

The University of Liverpool's Sydney Jones Library has opened following a GBP17 million redevelopment project. The project, which has taken two years to complete, has extended the original library building into the University's former headquarters building, Senate House. Named after former Lord Mayor of Liverpool and University benefactor Sir Charles Sydney Jones, the library is now home to more than 1.2 million books, as well as student IT facilities, teaching rooms and a cafe with outdoor terrace. Liverpool poets and honorary graduates Roger McGough and Brian Patten opened the Library on 6th November 2008

Reference Extract

"Reference Extract is envisioned as a web search engine, like Google, Yahoo and MSN. However, unlike other search engines, Reference Extracts will be built for maximum credibility by relying on the expertise and credibility judgments of librarians from around the globe. Users will enter a search term and get results weighted towards sites most often referred to by librarians at institutions such as the Library of Congress, the University of Washington, the State of Maryland, and over 1,400 libraries worldwide. This grant will support planning for Reference Extract and building the foundation necessary to implement it as a large-scale, general user service"

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference

The Friday Brain-teaser from Credo Reference - this week: Superheroes. Answers here.

1. Which superhero's real name is Bruce Wayne? His assistant is Robin, the Boy Wonder.
2. Which superhero was born on the fictitious planet Krypton and also leads an ordinary life as newspaper reporter Clark Kent?
3. Which comic strip hero is this: his real name is Peter Parker; as a youth he was bitten by a mutant animal; and his costume is a red and blue uniform decorated with black webbing?
4. Which US comic-book superheroine was created in 1941, has a costume suggestive of the star-spangled banner, and is armed with a magic lasso?
5. What does mild-mannered scientist Bruce Banner change into when he is stressed?
6. Which spaceman hero, created in 1934, has a series of adventures on the planet Mongo with his girlfriend, Dale Arden?
7. Which red-suited, tough-muscled superhero of American comics is nicknamed "the Big Red Cheese"? His magic word is "Shazam".
8. Which US children's animation featuring an inept superhero and his streetwise cat was first shown on British television in the mid-1970s?
9. "I Am the Law" is a line associated with which comic-book character?
10. Which actress had her first starring role as the superhero Storm in "X-Men" (2000)?

The British Cartoon Archive

"The British Cartoon Archive is located in Canterbury at the University of Kent's Templeman Library. It has a library, archive, gallery, and is a registered museum dedicated to the history of British cartooning over the last two hundred years. It holds more than 130,000 original editorial, socio-political, and pocket cartoons, supported by large collections of comic strips, newspaper cuttings, books and magazines. The collection of original artwork dates back to 1904 and includes work by W.K.Hasleden, Will Dyson, Strube, David Low,Vicky, Emmwood, Michael Cummings, Ralph Steadman, Mel Calman, Nicholas Garland, Chris Riddell, Carl Giles, Martin Rowson, and Steve Bell, amongst many others"

European Conference on OCR and Mass Digitisation

On 6 and 7 April 2009 the IMPACT project will organise a conference on OCR in mass digitisation projects. This conference will focus on exchanging views with other researchers and suppliers in the OCR field, as well as presenting some preliminary results from the first year of the IMPACT project. The venue will be the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB – National Library of the Netherlands) in The Hague. There is a maximum of 150 participants

DailyLit launches Book Samplers

"Book Samplers combine short excerpts from different books and allow you to easily sample a number of different titles. If you like the excerpt of the book contained in the sampler, you can easily access the full book on DailyLit to start reading it or give it as a gift using our gifting feature. Or, you can add it to your To-Read BookList with one click"

Announcing the Calendar of Cecil Papers

British History Online has announced the digitisation of the 24 volumes of the calendars of the Cecil Papers in Hatfield House. These documents of William Cecil, Lord Burghley, represent state papers which have remained in the Hatfield archives. As the papers of the central governmental figure of Elizabeth's reign, they will provide an essential complement to the calendars of state papers online. The Calendar of Cecil Papers is scheduled to go online in spring 2009 and will be free to all users

E-News for ARL Directors, November 6, 2008

E-News for ARL Directors, November 6, 2008 is now available online

C&RL News - November 2008

C&RL News Volume 69, No. 10, November 2008 is now available from ACRL

Access 2009

Access 2009 is taking place from September 30 to October 3 in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada

Open Access Day 2009 participation

The organizers of Open Access Day 2009 are seeking ideas for participation

Collaborative Librarianship

Collaborative Librarianship is a forthcoming peer-reviewed OA journal. It is published by the Colorado Academic Library Consortium, the Colorado Library Consortium, the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries, Regis University, and the University of Denver

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week

Librarians' Internet Index - New This Week - November 6, 2008

New website from ProQuest

"ProQuest's new Website offers enhanced ways to search and browse product information and introduces the new ProQuest Support Center for 24/7 answers to questions"

Next Generation Learning from Becta

"Becta is the UK government agency leading the national drive to ensure the effective and innovative use of technology throughout learning. It is our ambition to utilise the benefits of technology to create a more exciting, rewarding and successful experience for learners of all ages and abilities, enabling them to achieve their potential. Next Generation Learning is a Becta-initiated campaign to transform our education and training system for the better, enabling people to get better results, creating a more highly skilled workforce to benefit the UK economy so everyone succeeds"

UNC Cause 2008

UNC Cause 2008 will be held in Greensboro, NC, USA, at the Greensboro Mariott Downtown from November 17-19. This year's conference theme is "The University of North Carolina Tomorrow: Striving for Excellence Through Technology and Collaboration."

Reading magazines with the Nintendo Wii

Here is an example of reading "The Spectator" on the Exact Editions platform with the Nintendo Wii:

LIASA Librarian of the Year for 2008

Dora Ackerman is Library and Information Association of South Africa Librarian of the Year for 2008

Novelist Michael Cunningham receives Fairfax Prize

Novelist Michael Cunningham was the recipient of the 2008 Fairfax Prize for Lifetime Achievement in the Literary Arts. This award was funded by the Fairfax Library Foundation, at the 10th annual Fall for the Book Festival

TheLancet.com has relaunched

"The Lancet has announced the relaunch of its online medical journals. Owned by Elsevier, TheLancet.com is the company's latest solution for delivering flagship medical journal content in daily, contextualised updates for the clinical community"

Scholarly Electronic Publishing Weblog update

The November 5, 2008 edition of the Scholarly Electronic Publishing Weblog from Charles W. Bailey, Jr. is now available

Say It Right: Speaking Confidently and Effectively

Reminder: Say It Right: Speaking Confidently and Effectively with Cheryl Stenstrom - Online course - November 10 to December 8, 2008 - Developed for the Education Institute by Darlene Fichter's Northern Lights Internet Solutions, Inc., Saskatchewan

SAGE to publish Human Factors in 2009

SAGE has announced that it will become the publisher of Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society beginning in January 2009

Academic Publishing in the Digital Age

Academic Publishing in the Digital Age is the November topic on the HASTAC Scholars Forum

UK National Archives website short-listed for Children's BAFTA

"A groundbreaking education website from The UK National Archives, Focus on Film, has been short-listed for a Children´s BAFTA in the annual British Academy of Film and Television Arts awards. Focus on Film explores film as a historical source and features a range of original footage from the twentieth century and historical reconstructions of earlier periods. It includes activities for children, such as an innovative tool which enables students to experience working with a film editor"

ALA seeks $100 million in stimulus funding for public libraries

"The American Library Association is asking Congress for a one-time infusion of $100 million in stimulus funding to help libraries aid Americans as they deal with the nation's current fiscal crisis. At a time when Congress is considering another economic stimulus package, ALA points out that public library usage has risen during this tough economic time while their budgets face severe budget cutbacks. While public libraries depend heavily on local property taxes to maintain operations, increased foreclosure rates, lower home values, and fewer sales have sharply reduced available funds, forcing libraries to cut services and hours" - Library Journal

One UK library closing every week

"One library is closing in the UK every week, according to new figures. The number of professional staff working in libraries fell by 6.2 per cent. LISU, The Library and Information Statistics Unit, research also showed spending on books fell by GBP800,000 and now represents just 8.7 per cent of total library expenditure. 'This survey demonstrates the severity of the crisis facing library services across the country,' said Liberal Democrat culture spokesman Don Foster. 'Libraries play a vital role in our communities yet this government has allowed the slow death of hundreds of services across the country'"

HeinOnline Update October 2008

HeinOnline Update October 2008 is now available online

JISC Podcast: Work Related Learning

"Work-related learning is increasing its importance in the curriculum landscape. There is evidence that it helps students relate their learning to their current and future working lives. While also offering employers an opportunity to contribute directly to education and training. Work-related learning is involved in a wide range of activities. These include developing awareness of the local and broader economy, seeing connections between the national curriculum and other topics, careers education and learning about the world of work. In this podcast Rebecca O'Brien from JISC talks to experts in this field who provide examples of the types of support being provided by JISC and the Academy in this fast developing area"

Communications in Information Literacy: Vol 2 Issue 1

Communications in Information Literacy: Vol 2 Issue 1 2008 now available

4th ALIA New Librarians' Symposium

4th ALIA New Librarians' Symposium: The objectives of the 2008 symposium are to showcase new and innovative developments by addressing various issues which affect new graduates, providing a forum for professionals from all library and related sectors to network, exchange ideas and learn from each other. It is in the context of this networking and innovative environment that the New Librarians' Symposium in 2008 will be organised, to address the various issues currently facing library and information professionals - 5-6 December 2008 - Melbourne, Australia

Internet Detective - Welsh version now available

Intute has launched a Welsh translation of the Internet Detective tutorial as a free download for universities and colleges to make available via their Virtual Learning Environments

DPC What's new in digital preservation - issue 18

DPC What's new in digital preservation - issue 18, March 2008-August 2008, compiled by Najla Semple for the Digital Preservation Coalition

Information Today November/December 2008 issues

The November/December 2008 issues of Computers in Libraries, Information Today (November only), and Searcher, are now available

SPARC Open Access Newsletter, issue #127

SPARC Open Access Newsletter, issue #127 - November 2 2008 is now available