Reed Business Information is putting Publishers Weekly and its affiliated publications, Library Journal and School Library Journal, up for sale. The sale of the group is part of RBI’s strategy to divest most of its trade magazines in the U.S.
Source: Publishers Weekly
Hat Tip: Teleread
Note: The complete reports that the following statistics come from is a fee-based serial. Learn more here.
In July 2008, the top 25 titles on Amazon’s bestseller list for the four weeks averaged $9.25 and the top 25 in June 2009 averaged $8.04 after decreasing fairly steadily during the interim. For Sony, after starting at $10.13 in July 2008 then increasing to $11.68 in November thanks to a few well selling bundles, the average price of the top 25 fell to $9.97 in June.
[Snip]
Of course lower prices aren’t the only ways to add value to the consumer experience. Sony recently added about 500,000 free public domain e-books to its library, a move that pushed the company’s selection far beyond Amazon’s. That was replicated by Barnes & Noble’s announcement earlier this month when it opened its new e-book store. These and other companies continue to experiment with their user interface, loyalty programs, and other means to get a competitive edge in this complicated marketplace.
[Snip]
According to “Trade E-Book Publishing 2009,” about 8% of the U.S. adult population purchased at least one e-book during 2008; a figure undoubtedly on the rise.
See Also: More About Sony E-Books (They Now Have Over 1 Million Free Public Domain Titles from Google) (via Teleread)
See Also: Barnes & Noble Launches e-Book Store (via Publishers Weekly)
Source: Simba Information
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum announced today the update of its Google Earth initiative, Crisis in Darfur, with U.S. Department of State data that shed new light on the extent of the genocide in Darfur.
The new data show that more than 3300 villages have been damaged or destroyed in the Darfur region of Sudan, primarily between 2003 – 2005. This is more than twice the number that were identified in previous U.S. government assessments, and strengthens the evidence of a vast, targeted campaign of destruction against civilians in the region. The updated data come from recent analysis of high resolution satellite imagery, released by the Humanitarian Information Unit of the U.S. Department of State in July 2009.
[Snip]
For the first time, the data in Google Earth also include hundreds of “before and after” satellite images of villages throughout Darfur.
[Snip]
Crisis in Darfur, a Google Earth layer tracking the path of destruction in Darfur, was launched in April 2007. The following year the Museum launched its second Google Earth initiative, World Is Witness, which brings together testimonies, photographs, videos, and other first-hand data documenting the lives of people affected by contemporary genocide. Both of these layers can be found in Google Earth’s Global Awareness folder under the heading “USHMM,” or at the Museum’s Web site, www.ushmm.org/maps/.
Source: USHMM
When it opens in fall 2010, the University of Calgary’s new Taylor Family Digital Library will be the most technologically advanced student library in Canada, marrying traditional resources such as printed books and periodicals with modern media, including digital video, e-books and touch-screen information kiosks.
[Snip]
“Any citizen will be able to walk in and make use of the resources here, and anyone with an Alberta library card will be able to check out any book in the building or make use of our licensed resources,” he [U of C head librarian Tom Hickerson] said.
The article goes on to discuss the Taylor Family Library Being Built at the University of Calgary
Source: Calgary Herald
See Also: Academic Libraries: U of Calgary ‘Moving to the Next Level’ With New Digital Library
Wolfram|Alpha is a great resource for writers. It has an enormous words and linguistics database that writers can use for such things as word definitions, origins, synonyms, hyphenation, and Soundex lookups.
Source: W|A Blog
As the audience for online video continues to grow, a leading edge of internet users are migrating their viewing from their computer screens to their TV screens. At the same time, more cell phone users are opting for the convenience of watching video on smaller screens via their handheld devices.
According to an April 2009 survey by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, the share of online adults who watch videos on video-sharing sites has nearly doubled since 2006. Fully 62% of adult internet users have watched video on these sites, up from just 33% who reported this in December 2006.
Over time, online video has also become a bigger fixture in everyday life, garnering 19% of all internet users who use video-sharing sites to watch on a typical day. In comparison, just 8% of internet users reported use of the sites on a typical day in 2006.
Access the Complete Report Available in HTML. You can also download the report as a PDF file.
Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project
Two new resource guides and improved searching of the Japanese Prints & Drawings are now available from the Library of Congress.
1) Robert Fitzgerald: Online Resources
This guide compiles links to resources on poet Robert Fitzgerald throughout the Library of Congress Web site, as well as links to external Web sites that include features on his life or selections of his work.
The Prints and Photographs Division houses more than 2,500 Japanese woodblock prints and drawings, dating from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries, by such artists as Hiroshige, Kuniyoshi, Sadahide, and Yoshiiku. They have been online for some time, but searching them was challenging because of the lack of description. All images now have titles (Japanese and English translation) and subjects, enhancing searching and identification of these woodblock prints and drawings.
3) Franklin Pierce: A Resource Guide
The digital collections of the Library of Congress contain a wide variety of material associated with the 14th U.S. President. This resource guide compiles links to digital materials related to Pierce such as manuscripts, broadsides, government documents, and images that are available throughout the Library of Congress Web site.
Source: LC
PBS today announced the launch of the PBS Digital Learning Library, a PBS system-wide online repository of digital education assets from public broadcasting programs and services nationwide. The PBS Digital Learning Library will be a comprehensive source of “learning objects,” including video, audio, images, games, and interactive simulations designed specifically for classroom use, delivered to teachers exclusively through local PBS stations. Services to deliver these resources to teachers and learners will be available in fall 2009.
As part of an ongoing, multi-year research initiative to identify and provide effective digital media in the classroom, PBS is aggregating its educational content to make it more accessible and practical for classroom use.
Learn More About the PBS Digital Learning Library
Source: PBS (Public Broadcasting Service)
But no matter how much you back up, all that precious data could be easily wiped out or rendered unreadable in the future anyway because of out-of-date or redundant technology.
[Snip]
So imagine the headache archivists face having to figure a way to back up and preserve our digitised heritage and make it accessible for future generations – even 1,000 years into the future – and avoid what many dread: a digital Dark Age.
[Snip]
Researchers working in Japan say they might have the breakthrough archivists are praying for – a sealed permanent memory bank that will be easily readable now and far into the next millennium.
Source: BBC News
The Public Index is a new Web site created to study and discuss the proposed Google Book Search settlement. The site is a project of the Public-Interest Book Search Initiative and the Institute for Information Law and Policy at New York Law School.
Source: Public Policy Connections (A Special Libraries Association Blog)
Prof. Michael Omolewa really loves libraries and librarians. Wow!
A world without librarians and a library would be void, unexciting and without consolation of any type, Nigerian Ambassador/Permanent Delegate to UNESCO, Prof. Michael Omolewa has said.
[Snip]
Librarians, he said, are known as information managers whose power can always be enormous. They influence every segment of the society of all ages and various calling, and at all levels of the educational system, and social groups.According to him, “everyone needs the input of the information manager. It is therefore imperative for the librarian to support all initiatives to build a society of the future that will be fair, just and noble. Where there are vices, it becomes mandatory for the librarian to encourage a change in attitude and orientations. In the specific area of cultural development, the librarians can make an investment in the development of cultural heritage literacy and encourage the development of suitable and appropriate curricula, school libraries and community reading rooms.
Source: allAfrica.com
From the Portal Home Page:
The WB [World Bank] Climate Change Portal is intended to provide quick and readily accessible climate and climate-related data to policy makers and development practitioners.
The site also includes a mapping visualization tool (webGIS) that displays key climate variables and climate-related data.
Access the Climate Change Portal
The World Bank recently debuted a beta release of their climate change web site. You can access it here.
It includes a new climate change data visualization tool about midway down this page.
Source: World Bank
This impressive directory compilation offers direct links to hundreds of television programs (and some movies) that can be viewed online (many in their entirety) for free. Browse the compilation by show category and/or network. The service also has a blog and several “how to” videos. One video provides step-by-step instructions about how to offer direct links to specific programs from the directory.
Their is also an iPhone version of the directory at: http://iphone.spreety.com. Programs (and snippets) that can be viewed via the iPhone are found in the “featured” section of the directory and marked with a star.
Absolutely worth a bookmark.
This means that sometime in the next two years and pending regulatory approval, Microsoft’s Bing search technology and results will “power” Yahoo’s web search results. Microsoft will have the right to use Yahoo search technology thats been developed to this point. Yahoo has the option to use (not in the works at this time) Microsoft’s technology for their mobile products. So we don’t really know what will happen to SearchMonkey, Search Pad, etc.
Update: According to SEL, (they spoke to Yahoo and Microsoft execs) the deal means that Yahoo will use Microsoft’s technology to power web, image, and video search. There will be a single crawl/database.
Yahoo is giving up running their own algorithmic search engine to concentrate on other areas. It’s a 10 year deal. Other than these important points, this deal has MAJOR implications for search engine advertising business. More search “implications” (the nuts and bolts for searchers) will come over time. More about that in the articles linked below.
Learn More:
+ It’s Finally Official, Microsoft & Yahoo Make A Deal, Yahoo Gives Up On Search (via SEL)
+ Microsoft and Yahoo Reach Deal on Search Partnership (via NY Times)
+ Live Blogging of the Microsoft/Yahoo News Conference (via TechCrunch)
+ MicroHoo Deal Finally Official in a 10-Year Landmark Partnership (AllThingsD)
+ What Our Microsoft Deal Means to You by Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz (Yodel Anecdotal Blog)
+ A New Web Site: ChoiceValueInnovation.com has been set-pp by both companies to provide Information about the deal going forward.
A New York librarian has been chosen to become the next archivist of the United States
President Barack Obama on Tuesday announced the nomination of David S. Ferriero to the run the National Archives and Records Administration.
The 63-year-old Ferriero is currently the director of research libraries at the New York Public Library.
See Also: New York Librarian Chosen as U.S. Archivist
Much more about the Ferrieo and the NARA appointment.
See Also: News Release About Ferrieo from 2004 (Contains Extensive Bio Information)
See Also: David Ferrieo’s Wikipedia Entry
Source: AP
Researchers at Microsoft’s labs in Redmond, WA, have released an online game to help fine-tune search results.
Called Page Hunt, the game presents players with web pages and asks them to guess the queries that would produce the page within its first five results. Players score 100 points if the page is no.1 on the list, 90 points if it’s no.2, and so on. Bonuses are also awarded for avoiding frequently-used queries.
The idea is to gather useful information on user search habits which could be used to fine tune search algorithms and ranking scheme.
Source: Technology Review
Hat Tip: SEL
Subscribe to the
ResourceShelf
Newsletter »
Also check out DocuTicker, a compendium of 'grey literature' (reports published by government agencies, think tanks, research institutes and other public interest groups) available for free on the web.
You are currently browsing the ResourceShelf blog archives for July, 2009.