September/October 2018

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Features & Trends

2018 Library Design Showcase

By Phil Morehart

2018 ALA/AIA Library Building Awards

By Phil Morehart

The following libraries are winners of the 2018 Library Building Awards, sponsored by the American Institute of Architects and the American Library Association’s Library Leadership and Management Association. The awards recognize the best in library architecture and design and are open to any architect licensed in the United States. Projects may be located anywhere in … Continue reading 2018 ALA/AIA Library Building Awards →

2018 ALA Award Winners

Clara Chu BETA PHI MU AWARD Chu’s work is notable for extending beyond the classroom, most recently in support of Southeast Asian refugees. Letters in support of her nomination noted her encouragement, intellectual scope, and the care she takes with her students. Her multilingual contributions to the field include more than 40 articles and … Continue reading 2018 ALA Award Winners →

Repurpose with a Purpose
By Fred Schlipf and John A. Moorman
Design on the Cheap
By Phil Morehart
A Movable Feast
By Lara Ewen
Newsmaker: Susan Orlean
By Amy Carlton
By the Numbers: Open Access Week
By Jordan Sarti
Allied Against Inequity
By Andrew Amelinckx
Cutting Out the Clip Art
By Anne Ford
Data Collection and Privacy
By Greg Landgraf
Sing a Song of … Early Literacy
By Emily Elizabeth Lazio and Maggie Jacobs and Sean R. Ferguson
Bookend: Shaking up Book Sales

Columnists

Latest Library Links

2d

Genevieve Trainor writes: “The Guinness World Record holder for Most Prolific Book Thief is Ottumwa (Iowa’s) Stephen Blumberg. The 23,600 volumes he accumulated between the 1970s and his arrest in March of 1990 were all stashed in his 17-room home. Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, got involved with Blumberg as part of the FBI’s efforts to return the stolen manuscripts and rare books to their museums and libraries. Referred to as the Omaha Project, the information science proving ground involved four weeks, 44 catalogers and reference librarians and 600 volunteer hours to determine who might be the rightful owners.”

Little Village (Dubuque, Iowa), Dec. 4
2d

Casey Newton writes: “At the moment, no one knows for sure whether the large language models that are now under development will achieve superintelligence and transform the world. And in that uncertainty, two primary camps of criticism have emerged. The first camp, which I associate with the external critics, holds that artificial intelligence (AI) is fake and sucks. The second camp, which I associate more with the internal critics, believes that AI is real and dangerous. Today I want to lay out why I believe AI is real and dangerous.”

Platformer, Dec. 5
3d

Latia Ward writes: “One way to keep current with what students think of the library and its services is through Student Library Advisory Committee meetings. These meetings are a way to gather feedback and reinforce the library as a welcoming place. How do librarians create a welcoming environment within Student Library Advisory Committee meetings? Librarians create a welcoming environment through community, purpose, and dedicated space.” Also see part 1 of this blog post.

RIPS Law Librarian Blog, Nov. 13, Dec. 5
3d

Eleanor Hecks writes: “Few things are as frustrating to a user as when a site won’t respond. Unfortunately, it’s also an all-too-common scenario. Graceful degradation is a design approach that ensures the basics of a website will still function even if specific individual parts of it stop working. The approach removes single points of failure: just because one thing stops working doesn’t mean the system as a whole fails. A site following this principle fails in pieces instead of all at once, so the most important features remain available when some components encounter an error.”

Smashing Magazine, Dec. 6
4d

Camruinn Morgan-Rumsey and Lexi Lepof write: “On December 3, Knox County (Tenn.) schools received a list from the district of books to be removed from school libraries under Tennessee’s Age-Appropriate Materials Act. Knox County’s board of education voted in July, passing a policy to remove ‘explicit’ books from everyday student access in response to the new law. Some of the books on the list of nearly 50 titles might surprise parents. Among those to be removed are Shel Silverstein’s A Light in the Attic and Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five.”

WVLT-TV (Knoxville, Tenn.), Dec. 4
4d

Joe Foley writes: “Copyright rules vary from country to country and have changed over time. In the US, works created between 1929 and 1963 that gave notice and renewed copyright have 95 years from their first publication date. That means that on January 1, 2025, a host of works from 1929 will enter the public domain. This means that copyright will expire on Buck Rogers, Captain Easy, Horace Horsecollar, Tintin, Hal Foster’s first Tarzan comic strips and, yes, Popeye.” Other notable works entering public domain in the United States include the Marx Brothers’ first film, The Cocoanuts, contralto Marian Anderson’s first record, and Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms.

Creative Bloq, Dec. 7; Everybody’s Libraries, Dec. 3, Dec. 7; Public Domain Review, Dec. 10
5d

Brittany Adams writes: “The digital landscape of libraries is expanding rapidly, with an increasing shift towards electronic resources and online services. As members of the library community, we’re witnessing a transformative era where physical collections are complemented—and sometimes replaced—by digital ones. This transition offers new opportunities for enhancing accessibility and engagement, but it also presents challenges, especially for young patrons and their families. It is essential to equip children and their caregivers with the tools and knowledge they need to navigate this evolving space confidently.”

ALSC Blog, Dec. 9

View more Latest Library Links

September/October 2018

Features & Trends

2018 Library Design Showcase

2018 ALA/AIA Library Building Awards

2018 ALA Award Winners

Repurpose with a Purpose

Design on the Cheap

A Movable Feast

Newsmaker: Susan Orlean

By the Numbers: Open Access Week

Allied Against Inequity

Cutting Out the Clip Art

Data Collection and Privacy

Sing a Song of … Early Literacy

Bookend: Shaking up Book Sales

Columnists

From Local to Global

Plan Now for a STEAM-y Summer

The Power of Primary Sources

Shaping Digital Citizens

Virtual and Augmented Reality

Ready, Steady, Build!

Future Strategies