I taught my class on E-Journals this morning at the NYAM Library Open House (and got a great reception from the 10 people who showed up–yea, me!) so I thought I’d devote today’s space to something genuinely nifty if not exactly library-related. Alan Boyle’s Cosmic Log on MSNBC.com is too cool to not be part…
This piece by Kate Wittenberg from EPIC at Clumbia U. is definitely worth reading. It’s titled "Beyond Google, What’s Next for Publishing" and does a fine job of discussing how online environments are affecting (and being affected by) the publishing industry. Here’s an excerpt to get you started: "While we have been busy attending conferences,…
From today’s New York Times (links & excerpt): Four Librarians Finally Break Silence in Records Case By ALISON LEIGH COWAN Published: May 31, 2006 Four Connecticut librarians who had been barred from revealing that they had received a request for patrons’ records from the federal government spoke out yesterday, expressing frustration about the sweeping…
From this week’s BusinessWeek (link & excerpt): The Library: Next Best Thing to an MBAAcross the country, public libraries are giving would-be entrepreneurs a helping hand with resources and expert guidance… Five years ago, Farid Ali was a Web designer for a Manhattan law firm when a friend, George Constantinou, suggested they open a restaurant…
I found this project by David Plotz on Slate.com this morning (I’m already behind the curve as he started this weeks ago), but it’s interesting to me since I started reading The Bible Unearthed by Neil Asher Silberman and Israel Finklestein over the weekend. The Old Testament (as you non-Jews call it) is not history…
If the names Ginsberg, Kerouac, Burroughs and Cassady don’t ring an immediate bell with you, go and read this article by Donald W. Miller. Actually, even if they do ring a bell, read the article anyway; it’s a nicely organized, compact overview of some of the Beats’ better (and lesser) known history. You’ll notice at…
If you’ve been involved with collaborative web projects you’ve probably heard of "wikis." If not, a "wiki" is a shared website that’s generally devoted to informational projects. Anybody can post, within certain limits, anything they like as long as it’s topical. The idea being that one person rarely can know everything about a subject, but…
Two things worth investigating if you’re so inclined, today: COinS in WorldCat: "OCLC has added COinS to its Open WorldCat Web pages. COinS, orContext Objects in Spans, is a standardized way to invisibly embedbibliographic metadata into a Web page’s HTML, using the OpenURLmetadata. This allows other tools, such as Web browsers, to identifycitation metadata in…
I’m not going to comment on the new Judas Gospels other than to say that I think this is the coolest historical find since they located the Dead Sea Scrolls. And, of course, to point people to what resources I found on the subject: From the NY Times: Judas, minus the betrayal. Here, too. Also,…
It’s probably not wise for a bibliophile to admit, but I’ve never been much of a fan of Dorothy Parker or Lillian Hellman. That said, this article by Marion Meade in the latest Book Forum was fascinating all the same. Enjoy!