Jon Frater

Will Femia, author of the "Clicked" blog on MSNBC.com, declares today that:

"Lessig is wrong — Lawrence Lessig
is a champion of the Creative Commons movement and an advocate for
loosening copyright restrictions.  His current battle is over the
digitization of books.  Google wants to scan books into a database to
make the text searchable.  You wouldn’t get the whole book in a search,
just an excerpt.  Ignoring whether this is a good idea or a handy
utility, this blogger makes a good argument against Google’s plan.  For
what it’s worth, there is a larger issue at play as well, which is
whether search engines and other services that surface material from
the Web (like RSS aggregators) are taking advantage of the original
content holders."

There’s more to it than this excerpt, so check out the whole thing if you have the time. Actually, you should probably make the time regardless.  This issue will not go away any time soon.

I think "Ick!" says whatever the title doesn’t:

Human Skin-Bound Books in Many Libraries

Apparently this was a big thing in the 19th century.  Enjoy! (or, well . . . whatever.)

Also new in 2006: it’s now a federal crime to send someone an annoying e-mail anonymously. I’d pay to hear a few FBI agents talking about how’d they go about enforcing this one. I doubt it would stand any realu judicial scritiny (or, I hope it wouldn’t) but it could just be seen as the logical conclusion of a country run by people who all think they’re special (or at least all think they deserve special consideration for something by someone), who have lost any sense of dignity and are on the verge of losing their sense of humor.  On the other hand, the law apparently says that it’s okay to flame someone as long as you use your real name, so perhaps this is a mid-term election stunt of some kind.

At any rate, the new law is described here, so take a look for yourself.

Personally, yes, I think cyberstalking is a major problem.  Anonymous e-mail that someone may take offense at is another story.  Criminalizing it is one of those very tricky propositions that looks great on paper but is probably a lot less effecacious both in terms of prevention and enforcement in real life. The article notes that the version of the bill that passed was its second incarnation: an earlier version of the bill had a higher standard of proof of damage (one had to use an "interactive computer service" to cause "substantial emotional harm.") Criminalizing merely obnoxious e-mail is impossible to enforce unless the FBI plans to filter literally every email that passes between two American citizens. They can’t really do that, can they?

Well, can they?

None of these (late again!) tidbits have anything strictly to do with library science, library management, library work, reference work, or other facets of Libraryland’s inner workings (when will I learn to be on topic with this stuff?) but they all have to do with library-related stuff that I think about from time to time.

Another bit about Google; yes, I am obsessed with Google. I am obsessed with what Google’s continued growth and ambition means for libraries and librarianship. I am obsessed with the precedents that Google’s operations and plans are setting for those of us who deal with data management on a daily basis and with its implications for the methods and goals of research for everyone. This particular article comes from author Douglas Rushkoff, whose work I’ve read (and enjoyed) and who I have real respect for. I don’t agree with his final point, that Goggle somehow has sullied its otherwise sterling reputation as a genuinely new internet company by buying five percent of AOL. From what I can find, it wasn’t this purchase that made them a competitor to Microsoft–they were always competitors of Microsoft. Every tech company that is not Microsoft competes with Microsoft in some way, shape or form–that’s a message the Bill Gates has sent to the world loud and clear over the past twenty years. If it isn’t, then why has Microsoft bought so many new and interesting companies and technologies and done its best to integrate the newest tech into their own products? (Please don’t try to tell me it’s all about making Windows the best OS ever–it hasn’t been the case for over a decade.) That’s what Bill repeatedly calls "innovation." (I call it "eating the opposition.") But the point is the same–the relationship between huge mega-companies in the tech field is complicated and ever-shifting, with each year bringing events that nobody very  accurately anticipates. If Google feels that owning a bit of AOL gives them an edge in the marketplace, and they’re using their own funds to do it, that’s good enough for me.

That’s not to say this is necessarily a great strategy for Goggle, mind you. I still can’t figure out how they intend to make this new purchase work for them–I don’t know what AOL has they can genuinely make use of (except enormous cash flow, which is not a bad thing.) Must be why I’m not a MBA.

Another speech from Bill Moyers: read everything Moyers ever wrote, said, or otherwise spoke of. You won’t go wrong.  Even if you hate him and everything he stands for (social justice, equality, integrity) you will learn from his work. I promise.

Finally, we have this bit from Andrew Tobias’ website. Please don’t tell me this is off topic. Integrity in data formulation is always on-topic for a library blog. This is a big deal, folks. A. Very. Big. Deal.

Update: Here’s a follow-up to Friday’s article on Andy’s site, and here is a link to a GAO report on the veracity of our election process. A. Very. Big. Deal.

I know, I’m a day late (again). I came back from vacation yesterday to dive right into integrating our new electronic journal list from our new serials vendor into our catalog, which process includes verifying the back files of each title and making sure that the overlapping databases (our general link resolver, whatever we get through other electronic resource vendors, etc.) It’s a lot of work and not one of these major companies has any way of doing batch updates (other than the typical batch activations that we use to upload changes and updates to the link resolver). Blah. And we just purchased a huge bundle of new material which also has electronic formats that needs to be integrated the same way, so . . . Double Blah.

Anyway, my boss forwarded this to us yesterday: "Do Libraries Matter: On Library & Librarian 2.0" by Michael Stephens on the ALA TechSource blog. I’m not sure that there’s much material here that hasn’t been written on or imagined by at least someone in Libraryland, but it’s good reading just the same and the links are active.

Enjoy!

Found this on Slashdot.org today: " Metadata in Vista Could Be Too Helpful."

In part:

"Windows Vista will improve search functionality on a PC by letting
users tag files with metadata, but those tags could cause unwanted and
embarrassing information disclosure, Gartner analysts have warned. Search and organization capabilities
are among the primary features of Windows Vista, the successor to
Windows XP due out late in 2006. While building those features,
Microsoft is not paying enough attention to managing the descriptive
information, or metadata, that users can add to files to make it easier
to find and organize data on a PC, according to Gartner. ‘This opens up
the possibility of the inadvertent disclosure of this metadata
to other users inside and outside of your organization,’ Gartner
analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald wrote in a research note
published on Thursday."

Well, okay, that’s ‘in whole’, but the idea doesn’t change with that (the links are live and very much worth checking out.) The question remains for at least some of us with a touch of paranoia like myself (can I have a show of hands? Oh, come on, I know there are more of you  out there than that . . . come on . . . you three in the back, let’s see those hands  . . . I thought so . . . yeah, that’s more like it), which is more desirable, secure data or hyper-sensitive search capability?

I know most people who come into the Academy library are not metadata whizzes. Some of them are: the professional researchers know the differences between searching for authors, title, subject, call number, and keyword, and they tend to devise very carefully scripted search strategies to make use of this knowledge. I’m willing to bet, though, that most people (more than 75% I’d roughly guess) use the title or the author (title is more common in my experience) and the keyword searches are by far the most common from what I’ve seen. This is not a problem per se, as long as one is willing to acknowledge that they keyword searches are the least likely to return useful results: you will get results, several tens of thousands of them (up to millions if you use Google or Yahoo! or another major search engine.)

So with this in mind, has anyone thought to do a study on how people utilize search patterns on their desktops at work and/or home? I’m not sure how one would design such a study–I know there have been a number of studies that track how people search at library computers, but those may not help us here because there’s no way of knowing if those same people are searching for data different at the library, where the systems are set up by librarians and their IT departments, than they are on their home PCs, where they are either customizing their desktops or, more often, and therefore more likely, using whatever searching software was given to them by Microsoft or Apple.

My point is that most people are not all that computer savvy, and so they probably don’t put much thought into how to search for data, or even what data they should be searching for on a given project.  Which I think makes this question of trading off security for descriptive power even more important. (Deep down, I’d like this to not be a question of trading off one for the other but I haven’t been able to imagine how other than to think that technology companies should probably be thinking about security issues before they think about features. Yet.) What does worry me is the fact that Microsoft (with Vista) and Apple (through Sherlock), and Google (through Google Desktop) and other companies I can’t think of right now are developing these search strategies for us by creating search interfaces that are becoming more powerful (or rather potentially powerful, considering that most people won’t use them to fullest advantage.) Is that wise? Considering that people will generally buy convenience and cool features before security, is there anything to be done for it? And if so, then what?

Does this make any sense? Or am I just being paranoid?

Another fast update from the other day: Charles H. Featherstone writes this in response to the fact that all reading is apparently now suspect by the lovely folks in the U.S. government. Or, at least all the material that’s worth reading. (Yes, I think Mao’s "Little Red Book" is worth reading. If you  care about understanding modern Chinese history, anyway.  I don’t understand how someone can figure out modern American history without understanding what was happening in China over the same period of time and why. But, perhaps I’m just strange that way.)

Anyway, I thought this article from Michael Masterson was appropriate, seeing as how readers really do keep us in business, at least to some extent.  As I went over this one, it occurred to me that very few of the people I know in general really like to read as a recreational activity, other than my immediate family (including my in-laws).  So I wonder just how common recreational reading is these days.  Reasons that I bother to wonder are phrases I come across from average, every-day folk. Things like:

"Looks like we got a reader here. Hey, fella, what’cha reading for?"

"The boy’s a real bookworm, huh? Better than drugs, I guess."

"Your son’s a writer? Ah, well, I guess they can’t all be brain surgeons, can they?"

(Yes, these are all real quotes, and thanks to the late Bill Hicks, Chris Borecky from the Academy’s Access department, and my late, though not as late as Bill Hicks father respectively for providing them.)

The ugliest part of these sorts of left-handed compliments is that the people who say them are almost never being sarcastic or obnoxious when they do. They’re perfectly honest, well-meaning people who can’t imagine reading being anything but hard, unpleasant work. They can’t imagine that reading for fun can be, well, fun. That’s not necessarily bad . . . lots of people enjoy things that I can’t imagine volunteering for–skydiving comes to mind. Bungee jumping is another. But IME, people don’t generally mock you for skydiving or bungee jumping, they just stare and say "Wow!" or "Why would you do that?" or such like. Even if they don’t understand, they’re likely to respect you for it.

These same people view reading, especially reading for enjoyment, more like a waste of time, or at least time spent doing something less important than, say making money. Now, if you’re all about making a buck (possibly making serious big bucks, which I don’t) and you’re really good at it, that’s great. You’ve got a right to scoff if you’re really talented, and making money is a highly valued skill in this current place and time, so laugh away. If not, well, it’s your preference vs. mine, isn’t it? And maybe my particular preference is to learn a bit more about the world or some subject in it by reading instead of watching the tube or whatever. There’s nothing wrong with the tube (although Neil Postman would say otherwise), but how the average American watches 8 hours of it each day, I’ll never know.

As to MM’s view of the literary crowd, I admit I’ve drifted farther and farther away from that segment of society since I left college. I admit I’ve forgotten most of what I learned in various English classes, but I kept up my writing, which is what I concentrated on at QC.  I like to think that it keeps me sharp, even if I have been relying more and more on spell checkers.

Enough rambling.  Read, damn you! READ!

 

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