Libology Blog

I will be posting about the conference soon, but since I have already posted photos, I thought I would offer the link now:

One Big Library Unconference photos on Flickr

More soon!

p.s. here’s a sample:

Zoomii Books is not library related… yet. It is a virtual bookshelf built around Amazon’s book cover images and inventory. However, the concept would make for an excellent method of “browsing” a library catalog. The company founder has even mentioned that he would love to adapt the software to work with a library catalog.

It reminds me very much of a Firefox add-on called PicLens, which uses a similar interface for viewing a large number of images. If you haven’t tried it, you really should, if only to experience how much it improves image search and browse.

Mentioned on the NCG4lib list by B.G. Sloan

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been making some changes to the Scriblio installation on Libology.

The improved:

• I installed the Pop Blue theme, mainly because I didn’t like the way the default Scriblio theme used screen space. I like the layout, but need to format the content sections in the search results pages, as it looks more like gibberish than holdings information.
• I upgraded WordPress to the current version. This would have been done several weeks ago, except that the database is so large that I had to experiment with a wide variety of backup processes before finding one that worked.
• The facets work! Yea!

The not-improved:

• It is still slow, slow, slow. I was talking with a database programmer over the weekend, and she confirmed my guess that it is probably an indexing issue. Now to figure out the details…
• Book covers are gone with the upgrade, even though the placeholders are still there. I haven’t spent any time figuring out why.

I am a little happier, but still wouldn’t consider using this as a replacement for my work’s OPAC. Time and effort will tell. I am learning a lot, which was the point all along.

An interesting situation is brewing over at the TechCrunch blog.  Michael Arrington, upset over the Associated Press going after bloggers who quote from AP stories, has argued that the AP is not taking Fair Use into consideration and has declared that he will not report on stories distributed by AP.

Extreme?  Not if you take into consideration the APs rate schedule for online quoting of their articles.  If your quote of an AP source contains just five words, you are supposed to pay them $12.50!  I doubt that there are many AP articles short enough to make a five word quote not fall into Fair Use (plus, I assume under this fee schedule that quoting just four words is free).

The new twist is that an AP article about the controversy contains a 22-word quote from the TechCrunch blog that Arrington says was “in clear violation of their warped interpretation of copyright law”.  His response:  his lawyer is submitting a takedown request and a bill for $12.50, in order to hold the AP to their own standards.

I have written about “copyfraud” before, most notably here, but this is a fantastic example as it involves a company that derives tremendous benefits from the application of Fair Use.

The Medici Effect: Breakthrough Insights At The Intersection Of Ideas, Concepts, And Cultures, Frans Johansson; Harvard Business School Press

Find in a library

The Medici Effect is, besides the title of a book, a description of a method of problem solving and innovation. The idea is not new, in fact the term comes from the Medici families and the Renaissance.

Simply put, the Medici Effect is what occurs when different disciplines intersect. People tend to approach problem solving by applying what they already know and what has worked in the past. This is good, but is less likely to create a new paradigm, or to fit the solution to anything broader than the scope of the person’s knowledge and experience.

However, when the same problem is addressed by someone with a different background and a different knowledge foundation, the potential increases for finding a solution that better fits the big picture. Purposefully mixing staff with a variety of approaches and backgrounds can help to encourage this effect, and in the long run can make any organization more efficient and innovative.

In my opinion, this is also a great argument for cross-training. The better someone knows your job, the better they can do theirs, and vice-versa. Very few of us do everything for our library (though it is wise to remember that some library staff in small libraries do this) and understanding how other areas do their work can only help us when we approach our own work.

found via The Medium is the Message

By the way, this is my first application of the OpenBook plugin, which imports book covers and basic information from the OpenLibrary project. I hope you like it!

OCLC: A Review (PDF here) is the title of an essay by Jeffrey Beall that is included in a book titled Radical Cataloging: Essays at the Front.

First, let me reiterate my own attitude about OCLC: They are, for good and for bad, the 800 pound gorilla of the library world. Decisions that they make, and the approach they take towards librarianship, effect us dramatically, and there is not much that we can individually do about it.

They have done great things, from WorldCat.org to providing as complete a set of bibliographic records as exists in the world. Among the negatives are the cost barriers that can eat away much of the budget of smaller libraries, as well as the one-way trip that bibliographic information seems to make into their system.

This article, however, is a strong attack on OCLC that simply overreaches. Many of the projects run by OCLC, including WorldCat, have benefitted from their monolithic approach, and while I would much prefer to see them be more open and flexible, I still appreciate their scope and vision.

One example of the style of his argument: He opens the article with criticism for the title of Karen Schneider’s posts on ALA TechSource (”How OPACs Suck” (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)). He states that her title is “specious, of course” because “they have quietly and efficiently been linking researchers and others with desired information for about twenty years.” He does not address the main concerns of the posts, which is how library search tools have fallen behind, and that the search capabilities that people have grown to expect are lacking in many of the major ILS OPACs.

It would be interesting to see an article that addressed each of her points in detail, explaining how the results she retrieved from various libraries in Part 1 are both valid and desired. What we get is his calling the TechSource editor “spineless” for allowing “such rubbish to be published”.

Near the end of the essay he also takes on Lorcan Dempsey, OCLC Chief Strategist and Vice President of Research. Again, he doesn’t quote, doesn’t give specifics, and doesn’t keep it on an opinion level:

“Have you ever tried reading one of his articles? They are some of the most incoherent and desultory articles in the history of information.”

“…of course, has a blog. He lives for new technology. It seems as if he thinks that any new library or information technology is automatically better than the technology that predates it and it must be implemented immediately, especially if OCLC has a hand in it.”

I use these two examples because I have been reading Karen and Lorcan’s blogs for some time. I saw Lorcan Dempsey present at the Ohio State University Library 2.0 Seminar last year. I can vouch that they have substance behind what they write, and that they are well worth reading. His blanket portrayal of OCLC as existing only to “separate libraries from their money” reminds me of a library director I met who once referred to the OCLC logo as a “swastika”.

And so, about this essay? Read it and recognize that there are some very valid criticisms contained within. Some of these are criticisms that I have expressed over the years. However, beware the hyperbole and the personal nature of his criticism, for they strongly overshadow that which is worth stating.

found via ResourceShelf

Making a Business Case for Open Source ILS is a column by Marshall Breeding that appeared in the March 2008 issue of Computers in Libraries.

You may remember Marshall from his annual survey of Integrated Library Systems (the words behind the ILS acronym). If you think the idea of using an open source ILS is interesting, then you should read this column.

His comments highlight one of the interesting aspects of how libraries approach technology : we tend to hang on to technology, even if it causes us added work and grief, until there is a critical mass of other libraries that switch. Part of this is human nature and a healthy dose of conservatism. Part of this, however, is a symptom of what has been holding us back.

On a small scale (i.e. within our own libraries and/or systems), we need to be inventive and creative. We need to be constantly trying new technology and ways to improve our services. This can be as simple as trying a different web browser, or altering our work flow. It can be as complex as trying out a new OPAC or ILS to see how they compare and contrast to the current offerings.

With Open Source, the primary cost in all of this is time. What you gain, both individually and as an institution, is the broader understanding of what exists and what is possible. You better appreciate what you currently have, and you discover the possible improvements (and/or trade-offs) that come with the new.

Am I saying that your library needs to download and install the latest version of Evergreen or Koha, or set up an alternate OPAC like Scriblio or vufind? Nope. You should learn what they can do, play with their OPACs, and then decide if you want to experiment a bit. This will cost time, and you have to decide what amount of time you can afford. You also have to decide what amount of time you can afford not to learn and experiment, and what that will cost your library in the long run.

found via GuidePosts

Revolution in the Stacks is the title of an article in the June 2008 issue of Governing magazine.  An exerpt:

“When library experts talk about the future, it’s remarkable how little the topic of books comes up. To be sure, libraries will carry books for as long as a critical mass of people wants to read them. The same is true of newspapers, magazines, CDs, DVDs and every other form of media that libraries have adopted over the years while following consumer tastes. Increasingly, however, libraries are talking about flipping the content equation around. That is, rather than thinking of themselves merely as a place to find content created by somebody else, the library will create content — and give patrons the tools to create content of their own.”

I don’t think that it is as cut-and-dry as the quote suggests, but we need to recognize that information is not only becoming easier to find, copy, and make available, but that we are going to discover that the next upheaval will be the combining of different resources to add depth and context to all of the information contained within them.

Our job will be making resources such as literary reviews, patron reviews, reading trends, additional sources, and whatever else is relevant to the topic available to users (and to us!).  Are we up to this?  We’d better be!

thanks to Jo Budler, Ohio State Librarian for sending the link!

The work cycle of Library Technical Services as told by the Arlington Heights Memorial Library (in the style of ER).

TS (YouTube video)

Bonus creative points for the idea of using a packing tape dispenser in the style of CPR as a defibrillator!

thanks to Cindy for passing this along