Today was a mellow day! My only LITA commitment was to attend the Assessment and Research Committee meeting in the afternoon. We had good discussion about a policy governing LITA data that we have been crafting, and we looked briefly at the data dashboard (http://connect.ala.org/node/166314) and the financial dashboard (link coming soon!).
In a day jam-packed with sessions, meetings, speakers, and more the tweets were flying. Hot topics included the Think Fit Fun Run, Susan Cain’s talk about the power of introverts, the Conversations session, and it seems David Levithan did a little dance.
Friday was a pretty busy day. I spent my morning in meetings of the ALA Executive Board. We had a full but informative agenda. There are a lot of great people who make up the ALA Executive Board and dedicate their time and energy to making our Association a better place. A great thing to remember is that these are members just like you and me.
See Saturday’s edition of ALA Cognotes for photos from around alamw12, a recap of the Unconference, ALA election coverage, and previews of many of the meetings taking place in Dallas over the next few days.
ALA Cognotes Saturday January 21 - attached in PDF for download.
More than 100 Midwinter attendees met at Dallas’s Reverchon Park before dawn for the 5K Fun Run. Part of the Think Fit initiative, the Fun Run returns to the ALA lineup after a hiatus of several years. It was moved to Midwinter from its traditional Annual spot in hopes of making it easier for attendees to participate. Winners this year were Eric Forte and Nancy Fawley.
One of the major themes at this conference is community connections. This is being explicitly talked about in sessions, such as David Lankes’s presentations/discussion, and popped up in the Unconference Friday morning as well. This theme is also going on within the community of librarians.
A panel of five copyright experts offered helpful tips and advice on orphaned works and digitization at the ALA Washington Office session this morning in Dallas.
Much of the conversation revolved around copyright fair use and the willingness of academic and public library leaders to take risks that authors and copyright owners might appear and sue for damages.
Friday was a day of LITA activities. We had our first board meeting session, then the LITA 201 session, then LITA happy hour. I met a few new members at LITA 201 and answered their questions about being involved in LITA committees and IGs. As usual, the crowd for happy hour was large. It was great to see new faces and to catch up with old friends.
Check out this collection of three short interviews with Emerging Leaders Jovanni Lota, John Jackson, and Yuan Li. They share their thoughts on their bright futures.
