A federal court jury convicted Thomas James Zajac, 57, on October 4 of planting a pipe bomb in the Salt Lake City Public Library’s main facility that went off September 15, 2006, on the third floor and prompted the evacuation of some 400 patrons and staff members. No one was injured in the explosion that … Continue reading Illinois Man Convicted of 2006 Salt Lake City Library Bombing
OpenURL link resolvers have become a vital part of many libraries’ offerings, especially those of academic libraries. As resolvers have become more important, they have undergone the same iterative usability testing and interface improvements that are common for library websites and catalogs. Only recently has effort been devoted to improving the functionality of resolvers by … Continue reading Rethinking Library Linking: Making OpenURL Better with Data, Data, and More Data
I have never been prouder to be a part of this profession than I was on September 11 this year, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Barbara Jones, director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, at the entrance to ALA headquarters here in Chicago, making a simple statement of opposition to book burning. At our sides were Gerald … Continue reading Banning and Burning
I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that politically the library profession is quite liberal. There may be a lot more conservatives in the profession than I know about but if they exist, they are for the most part quiet and under cover. My experience is that the library profession is not just overwhelmingly … Continue reading The Conservatives Among Us
A man armed with an AK-47 rifle committed suicide on the sixth floor of the University of Texas at Austin’s Perry-Castañeda Library (PCL) about 8:50 a.m. Central time September 28. No one else was reported hurt by gunfire and the library was shut down for the rest of that day. Witnesses who were being sheltered … Continue reading UT Austin Shooting Rampage Ends Tragically in the Library
In Stevens County, Washington, public libraries are a fairly new concept. Residents voted to form a library district in 1996, transforming a hodgepodge of donation-based collections run by volunteers into a modern system. Over the past decade library staff have worked hard—not only at providing service but also on shaping perceptions of what exactly a … Continue reading Transforming a Hodgepodge
Today’s Banned Books Week kick-off in Chicago drew some 200 people to the city’s historic Bughouse Square, across the street from the legendary Newberry Library. Critically acclaimed and much-censored author Chris Crutcher emceed this year’s “Read-Out!” The annual celebration is sponsored by the American Library Association to bring attention to books that have been banned … Continue reading Chicago Banned Books Week Read-Out 2010
Following my return in August from the 76th International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions General Conference and Assembly in Gothenburg, Sweden, I was interviewed on two successive days about the state of America’s libraries by David Graham of Newsweek and Bob Edwards of Sirius XM Radio. I was heartened by the interest of the … Continue reading With a Little Help from Our Friends
A new Delaware law that went into effect September 15 is enabling public libraries to get their internet use policies ready for the inevitable influx into their facilities of patrons wielding wireless devices. HB 340 extends libraries’ acceptable-use policies to any mobile devices that individuals bring onto library premises, and specifies that, while in the … Continue reading Acceptable-Use Policies Go Mobile in Delaware
I’ve spoken to library staff from libraries all over North America and have heard countless stories about innovative new services that failed. I always ask people why they think the initiative didn’t work at their library and the answer has always been about the culture—whether it was because of controlling IT staff, managers who wouldn’t … Continue reading Nurturing Innovation
When she was researching her first book, The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs, and the Perverse Pleasures of Obituaries (2006), Marilyn Johnson decided that “the most engaging obit subjects were librarians,” especially since so many of their obituaries contained some form of the sentence: “Under her watch, the library changed from a collection of … Continue reading Outside In
