“That is the sound that I would like to go around to all the people who are standing, especially our sister down in Texas,” she said to applause, referring to Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis, who recently filibustered for 11 hours to temporarily block a controversial anti-abortion bill in the state. Women must control our … Continue reading Alice Walker: The Library Has Been a “Haven”
There are so many wonderful things that come along with attending Annual. Amazing and innovative sessions; the exhibit hall . . . the accompanying blisters, and of course the people. Librarians from all corners of the profession come together to talk, share, laugh, and sometimes get a little silly. (I’m looking at you, J. P. … Continue reading The Thing about Money . . .
Digital Content: What’s Next, the third supplement on ebooks and digital content from American Libraries, is now available. The supplement, launched May 22, examines both the big picture and the nitty-gritty of libraries and publishing, looking at how libraries are evolving in response to the digital revolution, from taking advantage of opportunities in content creation … Continue reading New Digital Supplement on Ebooks Launches
And here we are, at my 100th column. Readers with long memories (or nothing better to do) may recall that for my 50th (Feb. 2007, p. 27) and 75th (Aug. 2009, p. 36) columns, I pioneered the groundbreaking idea of letting the internet do my work by, respectively, googling the numbers “50” and “75” and … Continue reading The Wheel Turns Again
A year ago, then–ALA President Molly Raphael called for “all of us to work together and build a better future for all library communities.” As president-elect I took these words to heart and made the commitment to continue the work of Molly’s presidency during my term. Our strategic plan, ALA 2015 (PDF file), is an … Continue reading Rethinking ALA
Proposition 13, the California property tax–cap initiative that unleashed an era of fervent antitax sentiment and activism across the US, is 34 years old today. The necessary two-thirds of the voters who turned out passed the People’s Initiative to Limit Property Taxation on June 6, 1978. Stable funding for public services, including libraries, hasn’t been … Continue reading Happy Birthday, Prop. 13
I’m sure you found all of these as fascinating as I did, undoubtedly also wondering where this was going. These facts and a few gazillion others come to you courtesy of Factual, the brainchild of mathematician Gilad Elbaz, who gave us the company that is now Google’s AdSense. In Factual’s 500 terabytes of storage, there’s … Continue reading Data, Data Everywhere
I had a splendid time at the Internet Librarian conference last fall (and not just because I made it into a birthday-celebration weekend in Monterey, though that and the yummy meals didn’t hurt matters any). It’s a crisply conducted conference and draws a varied and eager crowd. This year, I was particularly attracted to an … Continue reading No Relax
The feature film Flipped, directed by Rob Reiner and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, opens in six cities (New York, Toronto, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, and Indianapolis) August 27. Based on the 2001 YA novel by Wendelin Van Draanen, the film flips back and forth in showing the thoughts and feelings of two protagonists, 8th-graders … Continue reading Filming Flipped: An Interview with Director Rob Reiner
“So what do you do for a living?” she asked, pushing her comb through my dampened hair. It was an innocent question from a hair stylist, who by all outward appearances, seemed to be innocent herself. I know it’s one of the first questions we all ask when we meet people, but I absolutely hate … Continue reading A Bookworm By Any Other Name
Copyright is a subject with which I believe most librarians have a love-hate relationship. I am mostly in the love-it camp, but not necessarily in the love-all-the-regulations-and-guidelines one. I enjoy immensely the detective-work aspect of finding the copyright owner and then requesting permission for use of a copyrighted work. Nothing makes my day more than … Continue reading A Passion for Copyright
Library publications and blogs are filled with two types of articles these days: horror stories and fantasies. First, the horror stories. These are the news reports of budget cuts, most of which are in fact quite horrible. Academic Library X is getting its budget cut by 30%; School District Y is firing all of its … Continue reading Winning the Budget Wars
