Web Search–Teoma
Coming Tuesday: Teoma Set to Introduce Toolbar App
Teoma is getting into the toolbar game. Amongst its features will be an option that allows users to e-mail any web page and message to a friend or colleague. More details on 6/25.

Enterprise Search
Source: eWeek
“Taking a Swing at Enterprise Search”
From the article, “Two new software products and an upgraded appliance are attempting to solve the vexing problem of enterprise data search. AskJeeves Inc. this week announced the latest version of its natural language search product, JeevesOne Enterprise, while relative newcomer Recommind Inc. last week debuted its MindServer 2.0 suite, which groups search results by categories and topics.”

Search Engines
National Public Radio Will Reevaluate New Linking Policy
Various discussion group postings, including a post from NPR’s V.P. of Communications, have informed us that NPR is going to reevalute the new linking policy with the hope of finding a better solution. Complete details can be found on this updated page from NPR. From the page, “…NPR also recognizes that the majority of the linking on the Web is not infringement. We are working on a solution that we believe will better match the expectations of the Web community with the interests of NPR. We will post revisions soon at www.npr.org.”

Resources, Tools, and Full-Text Documents
Poverty–Worldwide–Statistical Reports
Source: UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development)
Full-Text Report, “The Least Developed Countries Report 2002″
The full-text of the report is free to download and/or read online until July 18th. Included in the report is a 47 page statistical annex that includes basic data on the least devleoped countries

Search Engines
National Public Radio’s New Linking Policy and Search Engines
Much is being written about NPR’s new linking policy. I’ll save the big legal and enforcement discussions for later, but I wanted to share a thought or two. I’m wondering how NPR is going to monitor for non-authorized links? My guess, using web search engines (note: other, more sophisticated approaches are possible). However, this might not be a good idea. Why? Will they only use one search engine? Remember, each of the major engines have unique databases. How will they track down pages that are completely indexable but not accessible from any engine? Will the search engines get involved and not allow the engines to be used for this purpose? Another point (it was coincidentally mentioned on the weblog yesterday), is the fact that any server owner can place a file on the server and not permit the crawler/spider to crawl, what the engines send out to build their databases, and make the content on the page non-accessble via a search engine. It would be very easy for someone to place his or her pages with NPR links in a directory and then tell the Google spider to crawl the content except for the pages in that directory. Heck, it’s even easier than that and you don’t even have to have server access. All a web page author needs to do is place a META tag in the html coding of a page and that tells the crawler/spider NOT to crawl that particular page. Finally, what are the long term implications if NPR and other organizations with linking policies use search engines to monitor for violators? Will the amount of material not accessible to the general web engines grow because page authors use META tags and methods?
Note: I’m doing my best to get a comment from NPR.
(Updated 6/22) NPR To Reevaluate Linking Policy, See Current Posts

Internet Filtering–United States
Source: The Washington Post
CIPA (Children’s Internet Protection Act) Heading To U.S. Supreme Court
From the article, “In a case that tests the limits of constitutional free speech rights on the Internet, the Bush administration today asked the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold a law that denies federal funds for public libraries that allow patrons to look at pornographic Web sites…The Supreme Court likely will hear arguments in the case early next year. Assuming the high court does not dismiss the appeal, it probably “won’t issue some type of ruling on the case until this time next year,” a Justice Department spokesman said.”

Resources, Tools, and Full-Text Documents (2 Items)
E-Government–Worldwide
Source: United Nations Online Network in Public Administration and Finance
Full-Text Report, Benchmarking E-Government: A Global Perspective
This report, 148 pages .pdf, “assess the progress of U.N. member states”. The Office of Management and Budget, from the U.S., has issued a press release commenting on the report.
-
Celebrities–Lists & Rankings
Source: Forbes
Now Available, Forbes Celebrity 100, 2002 ed.
Several related articles are also available. This list can be sorted by several criteria. Links to the lists are located on the right side of the page.

Resource of the Week
Health and Medical Research–PubMed
Alert Tools–PubCrawler
Relax and Search at the Same Time? Yes It’s True, Thanks PubCrawler!
Those of you who use Pubmed via the National Library of Medicine will appreciate this alert tool developed at the Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland. In a nutshell, Pubcrawler allows you to formulate searches on the PubMed database (you can utlize all available syntax and limits) and have the search run automatically at an interval you desire. New results are returned directly to you, via one of several methods, including e-mail. There’s no limit on the amount of searches you formulate and run on the service. Set-up takes just a few minutes. Oh yes, almost forgot, PubMed is a completely free service. For those tech types out there, you can learn more about precisely how the system operates on this page. Finally, if you want to learn more about why it’s called PubCrawler, this photo will help clue you in. Another clue, the programs trademarked is, “It goes to the library. You go to the pub.” �

Copyright–United States
The Copyright Office at The Library Of Congress Posts Webcasting Rates
The rates were announced at 5pm. You can learn more about the process on this web page from LC.

Internet Filtering
Source: The New York Times
“The Librarians Web Dilemma”
From the article, “So with the issue back where librarians say it should be � at the local level � libraries face two issues: protecting children from stumbling onto pornography while surfing the Web and dealing with adults who seek out materials that are either blatantly obscene or at least inappropriate for children.”

Web Search–Spam
Source: News.Com
Spammer Attacks AOL’s Search Engine
Always something new! From the article, “Search engines beware: Web spammers are becoming more sophisticated. The latest case occurred Wednesday when America Online’s AOL Search and its technology partner Inktomi began displaying thousands of search results that linked to a Web site based in Russia. Web spamming, a term used to describe how sites trump legitimate search results with their own pages, has been going on since the birth of search engines. But this time, Web spammers have found a savvier technique.”

Web Search–Legal Issues
Source: Bloomberg
“Google Seeks to Invalidate Rival Overture’s Web Search Patents”
From the article, “Google Inc. is asking a federal judge to invalidate a patent owned by rival Overture Services Inc. that lets businesses, for a fee, have Web sites listed in the results of Internet queries. Google, based in Mountain View, California, denies that it infringes the Overture patent. In court papers responding to Overture’s patent-infringement lawsuit in San Francisco, Google also challenges the validity of a patent issued to Overture under its former name, GoTo.com.

Resources, Tools, and Full-Text Documents
-
A Couple of Webby Award Winners
-
Tolerance–United States
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center
Webby Award Winner: Tolerance.Org
I noticed that this important site was awarded a Webby Award the other night. While the entire site is highly useful and valuable, here are a few portions of the site that could be of use in a ready reference situation. 1) U.S. Map of Hate Groups, 2) Identify Hate Incidents in the U.S. (Stories in the Mainstream Press, Limit by State/Type of Incident), Hate in the News upcoming events and recent events.
–
Nature
Source: National Wildlife Federation
Webby Award Winner: eNature.Com
Ready reference suggestions:
eNature Online Field Guides, Native Plant Guide, Zip Guides, (Wildlife Guides by Zip Code), ParkFinder.
See Also: A List of the Other Webby Award Winners (Many of Other Quality Resources)
–
Web Search Engines–Robots.Txt
Another Webby Award Winner: The Food and Dining Site, Epicurious.Com
The Epicurious Recipe Database has a great advanced interface and is home to over 14,000 recipes. However, most of these recipes are NOT crawled, indexed, and made searchable by the major general search tools. That’s right, the only way to get at these resources is by using this database. Why can’t you find these pages in Google, AllTheWeb, or AltaVista? It’s quite simple. After running a search and finding a recipe, you’ll see that the recipes sit in a directory called /run http://www.epicurious.com/run/recipe/view?id=10141. The site owners have placed a file on the Epicurious.Com server telling robots/crawlers, the software used to build web search databases, to “Keep Out” of this directory. The file (it sits on the web server) that directs the crawlers to “keep out” of this or any other directory or entire site, is called a robots.txt file and can be viewed here. Web page authors can also tell web crawlers to specifically stay away from specific pages by placing a meta tag in the html coding of the page. If you want to learn more about robots.txt and related protocols this is a great place to start.

Resources, Tools, and Full-Text Documents
-
A Couple of Webby Award Winners
-
Tolerance–United States
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center
Webby Award Winner: Tolerance.Org
I noticed that this important site was awarded a Webby Award the other night. While the entire site is highly useful and valuable, here are a few portions of the site that could be of use in a ready reference situation. 1) U.S. Map of Hate Groups, 2) Identify Hate Incidents in the U.S. (Stories in the Mainstream Press, Limit by State/Type of Incident), Hate in the News upcoming events and recent events.
–
Nature
Source: National Wildlife Federation
Webby Award Winner: eNature.Com
Ready reference suggestions:
eNature Online Field Guides, Native Plant Guide, Zip Guides, (Wildlife Guides by Zip Code), ParkFinder.
See Also: A List of the Other Webby Award Winners (Many of Other Quality Resources)
–
Web Search Engines–Robots.Txt
Another Webby Award Winner: The Food and Dining Site, Epicurious.Com
The Epicurious Recipe Database has a great advanced interface and is home to over 14,000 recipes. However, most of these recipes are NOT crawled, indexed, and made searchable by the major general search tools. That’s right, the only way to get at these resources is by using this database. Why can’t you find these pages in Google, AllTheWeb, or AltaVista? It’s quite simple. After running a search and finding a recipe, you’ll see that the recipes sit in a directory called /run http://www.epicurious.com/run/recipe/view?id=10141. The site owners have placed a file on the Epicurious.Com server telling robots/crawlers, the software used to build web search databases, to “Keep Out” of this directory. The file (it sits on the web server) that directs the crawlers to “keep out” of this or any other directory or entire site, is called a robots.txt file and can be viewed here. Web page authors can also tell web crawlers to specifically stay away from specific pages by placing a meta tag in the html coding of the page. If you want to learn more about robots.txt and related protocols this is a great place to start.

Resources, Tools, and Full-Text Documents
-
A Couple of Webby Award Winners
-
Tolerance–United States
Source: Southern Poverty Law Center
Webby Award Winner: Tolerance.Org
I noticed that this important site was awarded a Webby Award the other night. While the entire site is highly useful and valuable, here are a few portions of the site that could be of use in a ready reference situation. 1) U.S. Map of Hate Groups, 2) Identify Hate Incidents in the U.S. (Stories in the Mainstream Press, Limit by State/Type of Incident), Hate in the News upcoming events and recent events.
–
Nature
Source: National Wildlife Federation
Webby Award Winner: eNature.Com
Ready reference suggestions:
eNature Online Field Guides, Native Plant Guide, Zip Guides, (Wildlife Guides by Zip Code), ParkFinder.
See Also: A List of the Other Webby Award Winners (Many of Other Quality Resources)
–
Web Search Engines–Robots.Txt
Another Webby Award Winner: The Food and Dining Site, Epicurious.Com
The Epicurious Recipe Database has a great advanced interface and is home to over 14,000 recipes. However, most of these recipes are NOT crawled, indexed, and made searchable by the major general search tools. That’s right, the only way to get at these resources is by using this database. Why can’t you find these pages in Google, AllTheWeb, or AltaVista? It’s quite simple. After running a search and finding a recipe, you’ll see that the recipes sit in a directory called /run http://www.epicurious.com/run/recipe/view?id=10141. The site owners have placed a file on the Epicurious.Com server telling robots/crawlers, the software used to build web search databases, to “Keep Out” of this directory. The file (it sits on the web server) that directs the crawlers to “keep out” of this or any other directory or entire site, is called a robots.txt file and can be viewed here. Web page authors can also tell web crawlers to specifically stay away from specific pages by placing a meta tag in the html coding of the page. If you want to learn more about robots.txt and related protocols this is a great place to start.

Professional Reading Shelf
Web Resources–Reviews
The June Issue of Peter’s Digital Reference Shelf is Now Online
This month Peter Jacso takes a look at the AP Multimedia Archive and Greg Notess’s Search Engine Showdown.

Professional Reading Shelf
Web Resources–Reviews
The June Issue of Peter’s Digital Reference Shelf is Now Online
This month Peter Jacso takes a look at the AP Multimedia Archive and Greg Notess’s Search Engine Showdown.

Professional Reading Shelf
Web Resources–Reviews
The June Issue of Peter’s Digital Reference Shelf is Now Online
This month Peter Jacso takes a look at the AP Multimedia Archive and Greg Notess’s Search Engine Showdown.

Hooray, RSS Beta is Now Available
As promised, the VAS&ND is beginning to offer a RSS feed. You can find the feed at http://resourceshelf.freepint.com/resourceshelf.xml For those of you who are unfamilar with RSS, let the library world’s RSS evangelist, and our friend, Steven Cohen get you up to speed.

Commentary: Librarian Salaries in the U.S.
Source: Marketplace (MPR/PRI/NPR)
ALA’s President-Elect Mitch Freedman shares a few comments about librarian salaries with Marketplace, a public radio program, heard on many NPR stations. You’ll need RealAudio to listen to the segment. Mitch’s comments begin at the 16:01 mark of the program. Here’s a blurb about the segment, “In just 7 years, nearly 1 in 4 librarians will be of retirement age. But where will the new librarians come from? Many library science Masters degree programs have been forced to close their doors from sheer lack of students. Commentator Mitch Freedman thinks this apathy may have something to do with the meager paycheck most new librarians can look forward to.” Note: If the primary link does not work properly, click on the “listen to today’s show” link on this page.