Library news
Get flash to fully experience Pearltrees
Sounds in the silence of Brisbane Square Library from musician Dan Acfield. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen Source: The Australian DOWN a quiet street, the sound of jazz can be heard.
City libraries turn up the volume with live performance programs
Libraries have made as much difference to me as they have to John Scalzi and Ray Bradbury. The now-vanished library on Montague Street with vaulted interior, old Pennsylvania Statione in miniature (Asimov’s inspiration for Trantor). Then the main Brooklyn Library and Grand Army Plaza, where I read the Foundation Trilogy, a few blocks from the Asimov’s candy/cigarette/pulp magazine store. “Is there anything sadder than a boy who won’t LIKE his mother’s page on Facebook?” That was the opening line of a short story that I dreamed, last night, that I wrote.
A Personal History of Libraries
I didn’t expect a big crowd at the Walnut Grove Public Library. One of the many tasks we undertake at The Tribune is the occasional ribbon cutting, dedication and similar events.
Crowds still flock to public libraries - WaltonTribune.com: Stephen Milligan
The e-book lending wars: When authors attack
We’ve written before about how complicated the process of lending an e-book is , and how much of this is a result of conflicting DRM locks and platforms, as well as a reluctance on the part of publishers to allow their books to be loaned . But authors can also be a roadblock when it comes to lending, and we’ve just had a classic example of how that can happen with the brouhaha over LendInk , a service that allowed readers to connect with others in order to share e-books. The site has effectively been put out of business by a virtual lynch mob of authors claiming it breached their rights, even though what it was doing was perfectly legal.
Sometime last year, the New York Public Library (NYPL) retired its pneumatic-tube system, which had been used to request books for more than a century. This change was made without ceremony or fanfare; I learned of it unexpectedly, when I walked into the catalog room prepared to deliver a call slip to a clerk behind a large wooden desk, only to find a notice directing me elsewhere.
Still Here
Ryan Stokes ... new technology can enable more people to enjoy collections.
Digital age takes libraries off the shelf
Dear FCC and ALA: Do You Really Not Get It?
So I get up this morning to find this story in my inbox courtesy of Bobbi Newman, a fellow member of the ALA/OITP Digital Task Force.
Over 70 library systems from the United States and Canada — including New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Toronto, and Chicago — today issued a joint statement demanding vastly improved ebook services for library users in North America. The statement, dubbed the ReadersFirst Initiative , outlines four principles the libraries want e-content providers — the middlemen between publishers and libraries — to follow in order to lift content restrictions and also make the borrowing experience less cumbersome.
Top Libraries in U.S. and Canada Issue Statement Demanding Better Ebook Services
Christian Zabriskie: Confronting The Biggest Threat To The Public Library
There is something ineffably sad about abandoned books. They sit, discarded, a story that will never be shared, pages that will never be turned. People are drawn to them, they are protective of them.There is a quote by John Milton engraved over the entrance to the main reading room at the New York Public Library's stunning Beaux-Arts building on Fifth Avenue: "A good Booke is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, imbalm'd and treasur'd up on purpose to a life beyond life."
New York Public Library's plan to take books off shelves worries scholars | World news
Or get out at least until there is a better system? I know what you are going to say, I can hear it already – “We can’t! Our patrons demand ebooks!”