2008 June 21 archive at Information Innovation Exchange

Archive for June 21st, 2008

Top Tech Toys To Buy With Tax Rebate Checks

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in innovation and technology. 0 Comments

Your IRS tax rebate check can buy more tech fun than you think. A search for goodies from Apple, Asus, LG, Magnavox, Garmin, and others turns up computers, flat screens, a Blu-ray DVD burner, and more.

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101 Job Resources for Librarians

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries and librarians/information professionals. 0 Comments

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The Transparent Library: How To Find the Right Fit

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries and librarians/information professionals. 0 Comments

You’re fresh out of library school and eager to work. Don’t just take any job, say the Michaels. Put your research skills to work and analyze the library first: are its values your values, is staff celebrated, are newbies encouraged to voice ideas, is personal blogging allowed, are mentoring opportunities available??? Find out these answers before accepting a job, and you’ll be happier.

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How to Annoy Your Friendly Public Librarian

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries and librarians/information professionals. 0 Comments

Five suggestions from Roland Saint-Laurent, among them: “If the computer you’re working at has icons, delete them all as soon as you finish your session. I don’t know why patrons do this, but I will occasionally see a computer station with either one, a couple, or all of the icons missing. Since there are a ton of computers in the library, it’s usually not a terrible inconvenience to the public,” but it certainly is annoying to the staff.

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57 Useful Google Tools You’ve Never Heard Of

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in Google. 0 Comments

If you’re like most people, you use Google’s products several times a day to search for information, check email, get a map and lots of other useful functions. What most people don’t know, however, is just how many useful tools Google has out there than can make everything from tracking a package to creating and publishing webpages a breeze. Here are just a few of the products Google offers that may be worth giving a try.

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iPhone - Extension of Web 2.0 or Beginning of Web 3.0?

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in web 2.0 and iPhone. 0 Comments

What is the Web 3.0, and when will it begin? We all know the present web 2.0 era very well and we’re all used to it in one form of the other. Collaborative applications, nice UI’s, interactive websites and social networks. To say that web 2.0 era has just reached its peak wouldn’t be wrong, as we have web applications providing their API’s so that developers can build on them and improve the user experience by creating Rich Internet Applications (and also so they can slap on their advertisements and get rich ). We can snoop around in social networks as end users, and interact through huge number of ways possible, some even silly (hint: Facebook superpokes ).So, at present, the industry is kind of saturated, with developers and companies creating whole new interactive user experiences while trying to find every possible way of minting out cash from their applications. What does the new iPhone bring us to then? The web apps developed for it are very close to what Web 3.0 has been described as by Eric Schmidt.

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IMLS Grants $20 Million to Support Librarians

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries and librarians/information professionals. 0 Comments

On June 17, the Institute of Museum and Library Services awarded 31 institutions grants totaling $20.3 million as part of the Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program. This year’s grantees will provide educational opportunities to library students and staff to strengthen Gulf Coast libraries; support school library media programs; increase the number of librarians, archivists, and library and information science professors; increase diversity in the library workforce; and strengthen that workforce to better meet the needs of users of all types of libraries

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NYPL’s Outstanding Books to Remember from 2007

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in books and NYPL. 0 Comments

The New York Public Library has selected 25 Books to Remember from 2007. Chosen by a group of librarians who are specialists in their genres, these outstanding works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry provide an informative or transformative reading experience, and are chosen for their literary excellence, uniqueness of concept, and command of subject matter. Among this year’s choices are the novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (Riverhead Books) by Junot Díaz and Time and Materials: Poems 1997–2005 (Ecco) by Robert Hass.

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More Than Hours of Books - Teen Summer Reading Programs Round-Up

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in books and reading. 0 Comments

Asking teens to read ten books and log their hours is, well, just a big yawn to them. Teens and young adults need interaction and energy-expending activities more than ever during the summer months, and we’ve turned up some great Teen Summer Reading Programs that put a new spin on spending time at the library.

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50 Reasons to Read More

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries, library services and reading. 0 Comments

Librarians need no excuse to read more, but our patrons, funding agencies, and skeptical acquaintances might derive some benefit from this list. “ 15. Experience other people’s adventures: From climbing Mount Everest to building a multibillion-dollar corporation, you can experience part of these feats by reading about them.”

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School Librarian Dons Different Personas to get Kids to Read

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in children, librarians/information professionals and reading. 0 Comments

With her students out on summer break, now might be the only time to learn the whole story about Cary Kelly, the one-of-a-kind librarian with the multiple personalities. A former professional ballet dancer, Kelly, 60, sees her job these days as a different kind of performance – one that inspires children to embrace the joy of reading and grasp life lessons not easily addressed in a traditional curriculum. The Sacramento Country Day School librarian does it in ways that may be unlike any educator in the country – she goes into character, time after time after time. Voices, costumes, lingo, the whole bit.

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Pics from Scott & Diana’s Library-Themed Wedding

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries. 0 Comments

When Southern Californian public librarian Scott Douglas La Counte, aka “Scott Douglas,” author of both the Library Journal -reviewed memoir Quiet, Please and our upcoming “OC Eats” restaurant review listings, met library assistant Diana, library love ensued. You’ll remember Library Journals mention of their library-themed wedding invite; now see pics from the loving couple’s library- and book-themed ceremony and reception, courtesy of wedding photographer Jack Rodriguez.

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Penguins, Pirates, Steelers, And Startups

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in innovation and technology. 0 Comments

John Foley writes “Pittsburgh is known for its sports teams, three rivers, steel-manufacturing heritage — and increasingly for its technology innovation. The Penguins’ championship bid just ended and the Pirates are in last place, but there are other reasons for “the Burgh” to cheer. A startup incubator has just opened on the city’s South Side, and the Gates Center for Computer Science is under construction to the east.”

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Slide Show: An Index of Innovative Companies

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in innovation and corporations. 0 Comments

Innovation is proving to be a defining factor for successful corporations. Drawing from the magazine’s annual survey, the newly-launched S&P/BusinessWeek Global Innovation Index tracks the performance of 25 of the world’s most innovative public companies. Since 2 of our top 25 are privately held, AT&T and Samsung Electronics (Nos. 26 and 27) moved into the index.

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The Art of Librarianship at the Ringling Museum

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries. 0 Comments

After decades of cramped storage in an old facility, the art books owned by circus entrepreneur John Ringling (1866–1936) now have a glorious home inside the 13,000-square-foot art library that opened last year in the Education and Conservation Building at the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, Florida. The new library, home to 70,000 volumes and exhibition catalogs and 100 periodical titles, is a sweet reward for Linda McKee, who has served as the head librarian at Ringling since 1994.

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How READ Posters Get Made

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries, American Library Association, library services and reading. 0 Comments

In addition to the hundreds of celebrity suggestions from librarians, teachers, readers, and fans, ALA Graphics staff seeks out celebrities from a wide range of occupations: movie and TV stars, comedians, athletes, musicians, innovators, heroic figures, and the like. They try to find highly recognizable—and therefore popular—celebrities. They also consider a variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds to reach the diverse populations libraries serve.

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Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in Google. 0 Comments

Nicholas Carr writes: “Over the past few years I’ve had an uncomfortable sense that someone, or something, has been tinkering with my brain, remapping the neural circuitry, reprogramming the memory. My mind isn’t going—so far as I can tell—but it’s changing. I think I know what’s going on. In Google’s view, the more pieces of information we can ‘access’ and the faster we can extract their gist, the more productive we become as thinkers. The last thing these companies want is to encourage leisurely reading or slow, concentrated thought.”

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Heart Surgeons as Video Gamers

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in video games, innovation and technology. 0 Comments

Cardiac surgeons have borrowed a 3-D stereoscopic imaging technology from the video-game industry to help them guide their tools during intricate beating-heart surgeries. In tests of the new imaging device, a surgeon was able to more accurately navigate into pigs’ hearts and then to more quickly repair the hearts’ torn walls. Eventually, the stereoscopic system may make beating-heart surgery more efficient and less dangerous, perhaps expanding its use into relatively complicated heart repairs.

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Wikipedia Five Years After

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in Wikipedia. 0 Comments

According to Nielsen//NetRatings, a service of The Nielsen Company, from April 2003 to April 2008 Web traffic to Wikipedia skyrocketed, increasing nearly 8,000 percent. The surge was driven by search engines led by Google. In April, 61 percent of visitors from home and 66 percent of visitors from work to en.wikipedia.org were referred from Google. Yahoo! Search was the second most common referring site to English-language Wikipedia, referring 19 percent and 16 percent of visitors from home and work, respectively. “Search providers dominate Wikipedia’s referring traffic because of its scope and value as an information resource,” said Michael Pond, Media Analyst, Nielsen Online. “The site’s rapid ascent, with audience levels comparable to popular brands, such as eBay and MySpace, demonstrates the success of its collaborative nature—readers can edit entries and add information. This consumer involvement has led to an increase in blog mentions of Wikipedia, which builds the site’s relevance and credibility.”

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Scholarly Publication at the Digital Tipping Point

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in open access. 0 Comments

In “Scholarly Publication at the Digital Tipping Point,” Phil Pochoda, director of the University of Michigan Press, focuses on an open-access monograph publishing arrangement between the press and the library at Michigan, a specific example of what Steele writes about more generally.

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Scholarly Monograph Publishing in the 21st Century: The Future More Than Ever Should Be an Open Book

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in publishing, open access and e-books. 0 Comments

Seventeen years ago people said “maybe” they would use computer networks for short pieces like journal articles, but books, never! In this issue two authors write about electronically publishing books. Colin Steele, former university librarian at Australian National University, looks at open access monograph publishing arrangements between libraries and publishers in Australia, the U.S., and Europe

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Open Access 2.0: Access to Scholarly Publications Moves to a New Phase

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in publishing and open access. 0 Comments

Joseph J. Esposito, an independent consultant focusing on digital media, looks at how the market determines publishing strategies and business models in “Open Access 2.0: Access to Scholarly Publications Moves to a New Phase.” The less a reader knows about a field, the more he needs the mediation of a publisher, and the less useful open access may be, Esposito writes.

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Portico and Ithaka Release Results of Digital Preservation Survey of US Library Directors

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in digital, archives and preservation. 0 Comments

In September 2005, library directors from 17 universities and colleges met to discuss the current state of electronic journal preservation and endorsed a statement calling for ‘Urgent Action’ to preserve scholarly e-journals. Over two years later in January 2008, Portico and Ithaka invited 1,371 library directors of four-year colleges and universities in the US to respond to a survey examining current perspectives on the preservation of e-journals. Both parties have now released the results of the Digital Preservation Survey of US library directors. The survey finds widespread agreement that the potential loss of e-journals is unacceptable, and a significant majority of library directors believe their own institution has a responsibility to take action to prevent intolerable loss of scholarly records.

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Floods Decimate Cedar Rapids Libraries

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries. 0 Comments

The Cedar Rapids PL, National Czech and Slovak Museum & Library, and other area facilities fell victim to “historically unprecedented flooding,” with water rising as high as the second floor. Volunteers at the University of Iowa in Iowa City moved more than 100,000 books and other materials from the threatened Main Library basement to higher ground.

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Proposed Library Closings in Queens Raise Ire from Community

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries. 0 Comments

Tracy Davies was stunned to learn her library in Astoria might close on Saturdays because of budget cuts. “It’s ridiculous,” said Davies, who specializes in making computer Web sites easier to use. “Saturday is the only time a lot of people can get there.” In response, the 44-year-old Astoria resident put her computer knowledge to work and created an online petition against the budget cuts.

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Any Book Can Be a Rare Book in Bookstore-Hungry Newark

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in books. 0 Comments

Bookstores here are so scarce that many readers have trouble naming one. Amiri Baraka, New Jersey’s former poet laureate, buys books at the Montclair Book Center, nine miles away. The chancellor of Rutgers-Newark, Steven J. Diner, orders online or shops for books in New York City. Alix Takouezim, who moved here two years ago from Bayonne, says she often borrows books from friends or colleagues for her 7-year-old daughter and 4-year-old son. In 2007, Newark ranked last among the nation’s 69 largest cities in the number of bookstores per capita, with 15 stores for 281,000 people, or 0.53 stores per 10,000 residents, according to a study titled “America’s Most Literate Cities,” by Jack Miller, the president of Central Connecticut State University. (For what it’s worth, New York City, well known for having many bookstores but also many people, ranked 63rd.)

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New Great Websites for Kids from Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC)

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in web sites, children and American Library Association. 0 Comments

ALSC has added 17 new websites to Great Web Sites for Kids, its online resource containing hundreds of links to commendable websites for children. GWS features links to interesting websites, organized by subject. There is also a special section with sites of interest to parents, caregivers, and teachers, and an area devoted to sites in Spanish.

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An Update on Knowledge Management in the Federal Government

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in knowledge management and government. 0 Comments

This year’s Knowledge Management Conference was held, as it has been since the year 2000, in April at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center in Washington, DC. As we have done at all these events, we surveyed the attendees in relation to their agencies’ knowledge management (KM) initiatives. There were close to eight hundred participants in attendance at the conference and exhibits. They were mainly knowledge management practitioners from the public sector at large, but primarily from the federal government. While the survey clearly is not a scientifically representative sample of the public sector, the results do enable us to understand a bit better what the current state of knowledge management is within the federal government.

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Business Intelligence + Enterprise Resource Planning = Competitive Advantage

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in corporations and business intelligence. 0 Comments

In the past, business intelligence (BI) simply meant software designed to enable organizations to understand their business. Today it has evolved to become a term describing how organizations use and analyze information to make decisions and manage performance. It has moved from an application used on a limited project basis to multiple applications that can be utilized not just at a departmental or company-wide level but across an organization’s entire business network. BI technology is now much easier to use. Gone are the slow and archaic systems. Today’s BI tools are sophisticated and user-friendly, enabling companies to improve the way they do business; supporting top business goals, attracting and retaining new customers and creating new products and services. So it is no wonder that business intelligence is the number one technology priority for CIOs, according to a survey released by Gartner in January this year.

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Knowledge Management and Business Intelligence

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in knowledge management and business intelligence. 0 Comments

What is the relationship between knowledge management and business intelligence? Many confuse knowledge management (KM) with business intelligence (BI). According to a survey by OTR consultancy, 60% of consultants did not understand the difference between the two. Gartner clarifies this by explaining business intelligence as a set of all technologies that gather and analyze data to improve decision making. In business intelligence, intelligence is often defined as the discovery and explanation of hidden, inherent, and decision-relevant contexts in large amounts of business and economic data. Knowledge management is described as a systematic process of finding, selecting, organizing, distilling and presenting information in a way that improves an employee’s comprehension in a specific area of interest. Knowledge management helps an organization to gain insight and understanding from its own experience. Specific knowledge management activities help focus the organization on acquiring, storing and utilizing knowledge for such things as problem solving, dynamic learning, strategic planning and decision making. Conceptually, it is easy to comprehend how knowledge can be thought of as an integral component of business intelligence and, hence, decision making. I argue that knowledge management and business intelligence, while differing, need to be considered together as necessarily integrated and mutually critical components in the management of intellectual capital.

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Creating a Receptive Environment for Knowledge Management Implementations

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in knowledge management. 0 Comments

Applying Knowledge Management (KM) within a business preserves institutional knowledge, captures new knowledge and makes relevant information more widely available throughout the organization. This improves business efficiencies and enhances decision making and planning tenfold. However, adopting KM requires more than the mere installation of a few collaborative technologies. A culture change is essential to create a receptive environment.

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100 Useful Web Tools for Writers

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in writing. 0 Comments

Laura Milligan writes: “Whether you’re a freelance writer or someone with regular hours, the internet can provide you with unending support for your practical duties (like getting paid) and for your more creative pursuits—like developing a plot, finding inspiration, and playing around with words. Turn to this list for 100 useful web tools that will help you with your career, your sanity, and your creativity whenever you write.”.

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Writing Style for Print vs. Web

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in writing. 0 Comments

The most recent issue of Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox, a biweekly newsletter on Web usability, says that the differences between print and the Web may not seem strong, but to achieve optimal results, each requires a distinct content style. The differences between writing for print and writing for the Web? Summary: Linear vs. non-linear. Author-driven vs. reader-driven. Storytelling vs. ruthless pursuit of actionable content. Anecdotal examples vs. comprehensive data. Sentences vs. fragments.

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ProQuest to Acquire Dialog

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in databases. 0 Comments

Ann Arbor, Michigan–based electronic publishing company ProQuest signed an agreement June 12 to purchase the Dialog database service from media company Thomson Reuters. The transaction is expected to close by mid-July, pending completion of a formal consultation period and other customary closing conditions, ProQuest CEO Marty Kahn told American Libraries. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed

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Is Kindle the iPod of e-books?

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in technology, Amazon and Kindle. 0 Comments

Is the Kindle about to catch fire? Could Amazon.com’s seven-month-old wireless e-book reader - a rectangular wonder in antique iPod white, able to download any of 125,000 books adapted to its format - be the tipping point that marks the decline and fall of the paper book? If those two questions continue to dominate techno-talk in the book-publishing industry, it’s because book folk, being weaker in gizmo-related prognostication than, say, the devotees of a consumer electronics show, aren’t sure. But earlier this month here at Book Expo America, the yearly meeting of the American publishing business, they ran into one man who seems absolutely sure: Jeff Bezos, founder and master marketer of Amazon,

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Google Books vs. BISON

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in libraries, library services and Google. 0 Comments

The State University of New York’s (SUNY) Buffalo Information System ONline (BISON) goes head-to-head with Google Books—and it ain’t pretty! SUNY librarians Mark J. Ludwig and Margaret Wells assert that Google grinds BISON into burgers and that libraries “had best adapt, change quickly, and build on past successes.”

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Short and Sweet: Technology Shrinks the Lecture

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in education. 0 Comments

Professors venturing into online education are discovering that shorter lectures work better outside the lecture hall, and some professors are taking that lesson back and applying it to traditional classroom teaching.

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12 Windows Vista Tweaks To Boost Your PC’s Performance

Published by rwatstein June 21st, 2008 in Microsoft and Vista. 0 Comments

Information Week’s tips on finding and weeding out system performance hogs, optimizing memory, and restraining Vista’s features will make your system soar. Soon after Windows Vista came out, many suggestions for tweaking the operating system to improve performance emerged. Unfortunately, most of those tweaks turned out to be pretty disappointing: they either provided the illusion of better performance but did nothing of substance, or they were rehashes of existing Windows XP tips that might note even be valid on Vista. Still, there are plenty of things that can be done to make Vista run better. Over the past several months I’ve kept an eye peeled as to what actually works, what doesn’t, and why. With less work than you might think, it’s entirely possible to have Vista running quite snappily.

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