Archive for October, 2009

« Older Entries

Quick and Efficient: Review the News from Multiple Sources with Newsy (Beta)

Saturday, October 31st, 2009

Here’s an idea we haven’t seen before. We were a skeptical at first but after a short time we can say we like what Newsy is up to. The current version of the service has been available since April, 2009 when it was relaunched. The Newsy iPhone app launched a couple of weeks ago.

The idea is as simple and and fresh. We’ve not seen anything similar available for free. Basically, take stories in the news and then bring together multiple video (and sometimes text-based) news reports from a number of sources and place them all on a single location. It’s not only a great way to see how a news story is reported but viewing the same story from different news organizations can potentially turn up facts from one source that the other source does not report on. By the way, the company likes to think to think of themselves as “news analyzer” and not a news aggregator. We think both phrases can work together Whatever you call Newsy there is plenty of value here.

Newsy can be useful in many situations. One potential use is helping to teach critical information skills by reviewing what is and is not reported on in a news story and how it’s reported. For example, how much time does each source give to the story.

But wait, there’s more. In addition to aggregating news reports on the same story, Newsy produces their OWN original video content summarizing the material from each source into a single report. For those who don’t want to view each source video one at a time, here’s a way to learn what each one is reporting in just a minute or two.

You can keyword search Newsy (you’re searching metadata) or browse by one of seven categories:

+ World
+ Economy
+ U.S.
+ Politics
+ Tech/Sci
+ Environment
+ Culture

You can also sort results by:

+ Most Popular
+ Most Recent
+ Most Commented
+ Highest Rated
+ Editor’s Picks

Let’s review how Newsy works:

1] Find a story, search or browse
We searched for “Obama” and got back 10 results.

2] Select the story; We chose “Obama Gives Donors Access to White House” from October 29, 2009 with a video summary that runs about three minutes.

3] After clicking the play we were taken to this page.

5] Immediately, Newsy’s own video summary begins playing.

6] Above the video box (which can be embedded on any web page) notice the direct links to the various news sources used in the summary.

7] In this case the sources are:

+ Fox News
+ The Hill (Text-Based)
+ CNN
+ The Washington Times
+ CBS
+ The Washington Post

A good and well-balanced selection of sources. If you click on any of them, a new window opens and the “source” video (or text) begins playing. Text sources link directly to the article. No more going all over the web to find the content.

Quick Hits

+ Newsy does not offer its services for every news story. That’s minor when you sit back and review what we think is real value in what they offer. Hopefully, they’ll be able to cover more in the future.

+ An iPhone version of Newsy is also available. It’s a free app. Here’s a link to get Newsy iPhone (via the iTunes App Store).

+ If you register for the site you can comment on any story.

+ A text transcript of each Newsy original summary is available. You’ll find it below the summary video box.

+ You can share reports using direct links to many social networks or e-mail a link to the selected story.

+ An RSS feed of stories is available as well as the Newsy blog.1

We hope that Newsy continues to offer a wide variety sources and a well-balanced set of sources for each story it covers. One thing we would love to see is a source list (we’re guessing the Newsy uses more sources than listed on this page) and perhaps the expansion of this page about how news stories are selected. Another page about the news source selection process would be useful. Finally, we would be very happy if you could view stories by source. In other words, show me all of the stories that use video from MSNBC, BBC, CBS, etc.

You can learn more about the company this STLToday article. For example, they are based in Columbia, MO and have a staff (as of a few weeks ago) of 19.

Many Thanks to Charles Knight over at AltSearchEngines for letting us know about Newsy.
Yesterday, Charles ran a post about Newsy focusing on the success of their iPhone app.

Posted in Media, News Search, Search News | No Comments »

Ready Reference: Online Meteorological Calculator from the National Weather Service

Saturday, October 31st, 2009

Using the Calculator on this Page you can:

+ Convert Temperatures from Fahrenheit to Celsius and Celsius to Fahrenheit

+ Calculate Windchill
See Also: Windchill Chart

+ Calculate Relative Humidity

+ Calculate Heat Index
See Also: Heat Index Chart

+ Wind Speed Conversion (mph; knots; m/s; ft/s; km/h

+ Station Pressure

Source: National Weather Service, Peachtree City, GA

Posted in Reference Tools, Resources, Science | No Comments »

E-readers: To Bo Open or Not to Be Open — That is the Question

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From an Article by Matt Hamblen:

LibreDigital Inc. is previewing its AllAccess content delivery platform to allow publishers, authors and book resellers to offer book readers the option of downloading and reading e-books they purchase on virtually any device, such as a desktop computer, Apple iPhone, Amazon Kindle or Sony Reader.

AllAccess will be available sometime in the first half of 2010, a spokesman for LibreDigital told Computerworld today.

[Snip]

Customers will pay for the books, textbooks and periodicals that they receive via AllAccess at prices set by publishers and resellers. LibreDigital will take a percentage of that cost, an amount still not determined, the spokesman said.

AllAccess is also supporting a wide variety of open e-book publishing standards, including ePub. In addition, LibreDigital is offering the ability to enhance and optimize book art and text for all the devices it will run upon, the LibreDigital spokesman said.

Anyone with Web access can get a preview of an actual book with the AllAccess tool through the Texas Book Festival Web site.

Source: Computerworld

See Also: Learn More about Libre Digital via Their Web Site

See Also: Keep Current With LibreDigital via their Twitter and/or RSS Feeds

See Also: Teleread, the expert site in eBooks, has more in this post.
Make sure to note the demo link.

Posted in E-books, Information Industry | No Comments »

Cornell University Library Publishes New Digitization Manual

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Our friends at TeleRead.org let us know about a new digitization manual from Cornell University Library.

From the Announcement:

“Copyright and Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for Digitization for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums,” a new book published today by Cornell University Library, can help professionals at these institutions answer that question.

Based on a well-received Australian manual written by Emily Hudson and Andrew T. Kenyon of the University of Melbourne, the book has been developed by Cornell University Library’s senior policy advisor Peter B. Hirtle, along with Hudson and Kenyon, to conform to American law and practice.

The development of new digital technologies has led to fundamental changes in the ways that cultural institutions fulfill their public missions of access, preservation, research, and education. Many institutions are developing publicly accessible Web sites that allow users to visit online exhibitions, search collection databases, access images of collection items, and in some cases create their own digital content. Digitization, however, also raises the possibility of copyright infringement. It is imperative that staff in libraries, archives, and museums understand fundamental copyright principles and how institutional procedures can be affected by the law.

“Copyright and Cultural Institutions” was written to assist understanding and compliance with copyright law. It addresses the basics of copyright law and the exclusive rights of the copyright owner, the major exemptions used by cultural heritage institutions, and stresses the importance of “risk assessment” when conducting any digitization project. Case studies on digitizing oral histories and student work are also included.

The rest of the news release provides background about each of the Peter Hirtle and Anne R. Kenney, the authors of the manual.

Access
The manual is available for purchase $39.95 from CreateSpace.

You can also download the entire book for free by visiting the Social Science Research Network and the eCommons@Cornell.

Source: Cornell University Libraries
Hat Tip: TeleRead

Posted in Digitization Projects | No Comments »

The Library of Congress Unveils API for Chronicling America Digitized Newspaper Database and Directory

Friday, October 30th, 2009

What follows is a post that might be of special interest to web developers, webmasters, site owners, or anyone who can work with an API (Application Programming Interface), It comes from a digitized collection of more than 1 million historic newspapers and a searchable directory of newspaper info. Even if you are don’t have the technical skills required, it’s possible you know someone who does and with their help you can partner to develop new resources, create mashups, etc. Btw, if you know of people who are able to work with an API, feel free to share this post with them.

First, some background.

We’ve posted about the CA program since the day it launched in March, 2007. The project is a joint effort between the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities to digitize historic American newspapers. In addition to the digitized newspaper database CA also provides Chronicling America directory. It’s both searchable with a powerful interface (a great example of what good metadata can do) and browsable. The directory contains information about most American newspapers published from 1690 to today.

On June 16, 2009, we ran a story about CA reaching a milestone. CA had just hit the one million digitized pages mark. It has grown a lot since then. About five weeks ago we posted an item about CA adding more than 192,000 pages to CA. The media release said the size of the database at that time contained 1,442,000 digitized pages from 171 titles, that were published between 1880 and 1922.

Thanks for the info but what about the API (Application Programming Interface) ?

The following from the “About the Chronicling America API” web page:

Chronicling America provides access to information about historic newspapers and select digitized newspaper pages. To encourage a wide range of potential uses, we designed several different views of the data we provide, all of which are publicly visible. Each uses common Web protocols, and access is not restricted in any way. You do not need to apply for a special key to use them. Together they make up an extensive application programming interface (API) which you can use to explore all of our data in many ways.

The rest of the web page offers technical details about the API.

Programmable Web has also posted about the new API.

Here are a couple of highlights:

Search results are available on the web site appear with terms highlighted. The API does not have access to highlight information, but it does contain thumbnails. Each page has a permalink back to the Library of Congress site, which displays the page in a zoomable, draggable viewer similar to Google Map.

The Library of Congress is focused on making these public domain works widely available. As such, this is an API without any registration or key necessary. That’s pretty wide open.

Among the interesting technical details is that the API can return linked data via RDF. It’s good to see reference sites, especially government ones, support semantic web formats (there are now 20 APIs in our directory with RDF support.)

Sources: Library of Congress, Programmable Web
Hat Tip: Dan C.

Posted in Databases, Directories, and Guides, Digitization Projects, History, Info Management and Retrieval, Media | No Comments »

Book War Continues: It’s Time to Ration Titles

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Remember the book war that broke out two weeks ago between Amazon.com, Wal-Mart, and Target and continues today? All three stores continue to sell the same 10 books (preorders) from major authors or personalities. Each book is selling for $9 (Amazon), $8.99 (Target) and $8.98 (Wal-Mart) and only available (for Wal-Mart and Target) online.

Now things are changing, the books are being rationed.

According to the Wall Street Journal:

The limits will stop other booksellers from scooping up cheap copies in large quantities and reselling them.

[Snip]

The retailers are losing money on each copy sold because publishers charge them about 50% of a book’s hardcover price. The prices for the 10 books involved in the promotion are also lower than the wholesale price independent booksellers pay for the merchandise.

Arsen Kashkashian, head buyer at the Boulder Book Store, in Boulder, Colo., said he had intended to buy as many as 70 copies of Barbara Kingsolver’s “The Lacuna” from Walmart.com, Target.com or Amazon, because their prices are “more than $5 cheaper than what we can get it for from the publisher, Harper.

[Snip]

On Walmart.com, customers can preorder two copies of Mr. Koontz’s “Breathless,” while they can buy three copies on Amazon, and five on Target.com. A spokesman for Walmart.com said the retailer has “always limited the number of preorder book titles to two units per title.” An Amazon spokesman declined to comment. A spokeswoman for Target.com said the retailer “always reserves the right to limit the number of items that are purchased.”

Source: Wall Street Journal

Access the Complete Wall Street Journal Article

See Also: American Booksellers Association Sends Letter to Feds Re: Book Price Wars from Wal-Mart, Amazon and Target

Posted in Information Industry, Print Publications | No Comments »

British Library Welcomes Government’s Copyright Roadmap

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From the Announcement:

The British Library has welcomed initiatives to make copyright fit for the digital age, announced yesterday by Lord Mandelson and IP Minister David Lammy. As one of the UK’s leading research institutions, the Library has long argued that educators and researchers will profit from the resolution of issues on copyright and improved access to research material; and that these changes will boost the UK knowledge economy.

+ This is welcome recognition that the issue of Orphan Works is a vital stepping stone in the copyright roadmap. Allowing Orphan Works to be used without fear of liability will free up one of the obstacles that the creative industries face on a day-to-day basis.

+ The Library also welcomes and looks forward to the results on the SABIP study on the relationship between copyright and contract law to be published at the end of 2009. A recent review by the British Library showed that 80% of scholarly information will be digital by 2020. Research is built upon clarity of access to and reuse of copyright material – something that contract by contract differing access and reuse provisions does not provide. It is imperative that limitations and exceptions that do provide a common base-line for access and reuse can not be undermined by contract law.

+ Exploring the difference between commercial and non-commercial intent and use is also welcomed by the British Library. In line with recent statements from the European Commission this will potentially facilitate mass digitisation of historical material that has no commercial value, but of high academic importance that sits in Libraries, Museums and Archives.

CEO of the British Library, Dame Lynne Brindley said: “The Library welcomes these proposals which confirm the importance of the creative sector to the UK economy. The Library believes that greater access to our increasingly digital collections will allow innovation, education and research to flourish even further within the knowledge economy.”

Dame Lynne continued: “The Library also welcomes the policy areas outlined in David Lammy’s Written Ministerial Statement, Copyright for the Digital Age. Providing access to Orphan Works and conducting a review of the relationship between copyright and contract law strike a chord with the British Library’s own principles on copyright law. Such initiatives are right for the digital age and will ensure that we keep pace with technological advancements and the needs of today’s modern researcher.”

The post continues with the The British Library’s Principles on Copyright Law

Source: British Library

See Also: David Lammy’s Written Ministerial Statement, Copyright for the Digital Age (via TheyWorkForYou.com)

See Also: Full Text Report: © the way ahead: A copyright strategy for the digital age (53 pages; PDF) ||| News Release/Summary

Posted in Intellectual Property, Libraries and Librarianship | No Comments »

NIH Library Begins Beta Test of Metasearch Tool

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Think metasearch with the beta release of the NIH Library AllPlus Search Demo.

In a single search click you’re able to retrieve results from PubMed, MedlinePlus, and the NIH Library Catalog. You can also personalize the search by selecting which databases you want to search. Look for the “select sources” box located directly next to the search button. To the left of the search box is a drop down menu where you can select searches limited to keywords, title, or author.

After you click search and before the results appear you’ll see each database being tapped with the number of records retrieved.

Here’s are search results for H1N1

Results pages contain a great deal of info and appear a bit busy making it a small challenge to actually find the search results. But that’s why this is a beta.

+ At the top of the results page is “Explore and Discover” offers related terms that are hyperlinked.

+ Below “Explore and Discover” are the numerical totals of how many results were retrieved by the engine

+ In the left margin are what appears to be dynamically generated categories that allow you to focus your search and potentially find relationships that could not be seen reviewing one result at a time. Categories can be sorted by topics, source, or topics graph. Selecting the topics graph opens a new window and provides (we think? Topics Graph did not work when we tried it) a visualized view of the categories).

+ In the middle column are the actual search results with the database source listed below the snippet. At the top of the results column a drop down menu let’s you sort results by relevance or date. What does date mean? The day the page was created? The day the page was first crawled? The date it was last updated? The date the page was last crawled? You’ll also notice a magnifying glass icon next to the title of each result. Click it and a box will appear with the actual page you want to view. In other words, you never leave the results page.

+ The third column contains hypertext links to other databases (Worldcat.org; USA.gov; PubMed Central and many others) and the number of results they contain for your search term. Click and run the search in the selected database. So, in reality, AllPlus Search allows you to quickly find results from more than three databases. Results from Ask, Google, and Yahoo are also available here.

Finally, for our H1N1 search you’ll find images (from Google Images) in the fourth column.
,
At this point, we were unable to find any search documentation or help pages.

This is an early beta that we will check often for changes and updates. Many of the issues are aesthetic rather than technical.

We’ve learned that the technology that powers AllPlus search comes from HealthMash (federated search and clustering) from WebLib. It also utilizes the new HealthMash Knowledge Base. This technology, also from WebLib, powers the “Explore and Discover” related terms at the top of all results pages.

Here’s a January, 2009 interview that Hope Lehman from AltSearchEngines did with Weblib CEO, Endre Jofoldi.

Access the NIH Library AllPlus Search Demo

Source: NIH Library Blog
Hat Tip: Charles Knight, AltSearchEngines

UPDATE: The All-Plus search beta now allows you to decide via links on the home page which type of data or format your looking for before entering search terms and clicking search.

+ Basic Search
+ News
+ Video Evidence-based Medicine
+ Academic Web
+ Alternative Medicine
+ Animal Studies
+ Drugs and Chemicals
+ Search Engines (Lets the searcher quickly identify the number of results in each database), somewhat similar to DIALINDEX (File 411)
+ Images
+ Consumer Health

Posted in Libraries and Librarianship, Resources, Search Tools | No Comments »

Just Released by Library of Congress: Reports on Bibliographic Record Production

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From the News Release:

The Library of Congress is releasing today the results of its analysis of the creation and distribution of bibliographic data in U.S. and Canadian libraries.

The Library commissioned R2 Consulting LLC of Contoocook, N.H., to search and describe the current marketplace for cataloging records in the MARC format, with primary focus on the economics of current practices, including existing incentives and barriers to both contribution and availability. Paired with the study online is a report of an internal working group indicating how recommendations from “On the Record: Report of the Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control” may be implemented at the Library. Both reports are available at www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/.

R2 summarizes its 10 findings concerning Library of Congress cataloging and how it supports bibliographic-description needs across the U.S. and Canada. The report indicates there is adequate cataloging capacity in North America, but distribution channels and cooperative use of the records have not achieved their full potential. It also describes the market for cataloging records as “conflicted,” meaning that it faces demands to be commercially solvent as well as freely accessible and open.

See Also: New Report & Study Available

The Library commissioned R2 Consulting LLC to research and describe the current marketplace for cataloging records in the MARC format, with primary focus on the economics of current practices, including existing incentives and barriers to both contribution and availability. [Our emphasis] In addition, a new report from an internal working group indicates how recommendations from On the Record may be implemented at the Library.

Source: LC

Posted in Cataloging and Metadata, Libraries and Librarianship | No Comments »

From Washington: House Re-Introduces SKILLs Act Emphasizing Role of School Librarians

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From the ALA’s District Dispatch Blog:

The Strengthening Kids’ Interest in Learning and Libraries Act, or the SKILLs Act, was re-introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives this week with support from both sides of the aisle. This legislation is intended to ensure that all students will have the support and resources they need for a quality education by establishing a goal that all public school libraries employ no less than one highly qualified school library media specialist.

H.R. 3928 was introduced by Representatives Raul Grijalva (D-AZ-7) and Vernon Ehlers (R-MI-3) and was referred to the House Education and Labor Committee.

The post continues with info about SKILLs Act legislation during the 110th Congress in 2007.

Source: ALA District Dispatch

See Also: Read and Track the Legislation (H.R. 3928) Using GovTrack.us

Posted in Libraries and Librarianship | No Comments »

New ELI 7 Things… Brief Explores Google Wave

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Access the Document (2 pages; PDF)

From the Summary:

Google Wave is a web-based application that represents a rethinking of electronic communication. Users create online spaces called “waves,” which include multiple discrete messages and components that constitute a running, conversational document. Users access waves through the web, resulting in a model of communication in which rather than sending separate copies of multiple messages to different people, the content resides in a single space. Wave offers a compelling platform for personal learning environments because it provides a single location for collecting information from diverse sources while accommodating a variety of formats, and it makes interactive coursework a possibility for nontechnical students. Wave challenges us to reevaluate how communication is done, stored, and shared between two or more people.

Source: EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative

A Brief Comment From Gary:
I’ve been using Google Wave for about a month and I’m still unsure if this is going to be the next big thing. It’s a potentially powerful tool and might be extremely useful where and when instant collaboration needs to take place between people at different locations. Yes, many of these things can be done with any IM client and that’s how I think of Google Wave as of today (remember this is not even a beta release, it’s a preview) as IM on steroids. If developers are able to integrate compelling and useful applications into the Google Wave service, then it might be a home run. The other challenge Google could face if they expect the masses to use Wave is the learning curve. For many potential users, it will not be as easy to ue as is, let’s say, Google search is. Just type and press search. There are a lot of bells and whistles and without using some of its many features these users might stay with tools they are familiar with like IM, SMS, e-mail, and/or one of the many collaboration tools the’re already familiar with. Of course, for many companies who pay for this type of service, the price point, free, might be a reason to retrain staff on how to best use the power of Google Wave.

Posted in Information Industry, Software and Web-Based Applications, Technology and Internet | No Comments »

OCLC Makes OAIster Records Available Through WorldCat.org; Separate OAIster Only Interface Arriving in January

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Today’s news comes from a partnership between the University of Michigan (home of OAIster) and OCLC that we posted about in late January, 2009.

From the Announcement:

The University of Michigan and OCLC today announced that they have successfully transitioned the OAIster database to OCLC to ensure continued public access to open-archive collections, and to expand the visibility of these collections to millions of information seekers through OCLC services.

OAIster records are now fully accessible through WorldCat.org, and will be included in WorldCat.org search results along with records from thousands of libraries worldwide that add their holdings to WorldCat. [Our emphasis] OCLC plans to release a freely accessible, discrete view of the OAIster records in January 2010 through a URL specific to OAIster. OAIster records will also continue to be available on the OCLC FirstSearch service to Base Package subscribers, providing another valuable access point for this rich database and a complement to other FirstSearch databases. OCLC will continue to develop and enhance access to open archive content.

OAIster is a union catalog of digital resources hosted at the University of Michigan since 2002. Launched with grant support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, OAIster was developed to test the feasibility of building a portal to open archive collections using the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH). [Our emphasis] OAIster has grown to become one of the world’s largest aggregations of records pointing to open archive collections with more than 23 million records contributed by over 1,100 organizations worldwide.

OCLC plans to release a freely accessible, discrete view of the OAIster database in 2010 that will be updated regularly. This will allow WorldCat.org searchers to view only items harvested through OAIster.

Right now, OAIster.org redirects to http://www.oclc.org/oaister/ a site that’s home to a number of facts about OAIster; an alphabetical list of metadata contributors (over 1,100); a brief history of the OAIster project; how to become a contributor to the database; how to access OAIster;; containing index labels and expert search examples. and the OAIster FAQ.

Source: OCLC

Posted in Databases, Directories, and Guides, Information Industry | No Comments »

Facebook Invites User Comments on Proposed Changes to Privacy Policy

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From an Article

Facebook head of communications Elliot Schrage posted a company blog entry on Thursday inviting members to review proposed updates to the social network’s privacy policy, and much of it deals with what happens to the content of accounts that members have opted to delete.

“Specifically, we’ve included sections that further explain the privacy setting you can choose to make your content viewable by everyone, the difference between deactivating and deleting your account,” and the process of memorializing an account once we’ve received a report that the account holder is deceased,” Schrage wrote. Earlier this week, Facebook detailed the process of “memorializing” an account, which leaves the profile intact to current friends but hides potentially sensitive information.

Now, in the proposed new policy, which members are invited to review and comment on until November 5, Facebook explains to users that they can “deactivate” their account, which hides it but keeps information stored for potential reactivation, or alternately choose to delete it for good.

Access the Complete Article

Source: CNET

See Also: Access the Facebook Blog Post About Proposed Changes

Other Areas Up for Revision Are:

+ Clarification of Current Practices

+ Advertising on Facebook

+ Improving the Quality of Facebook’s Ads

Posted in Access to Information, Social Media | No Comments »

New Report: Digitisation of special collections: Mapping, assessment, prioritisation

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From the Executive Summary:

Traditionally, digitisation has been led by supply rather than demand. While end users are seen as a priority they are not directly consulted about which collections they would like to have made available digitally or why. This can be seen in a wide range of policy documents throughout the cultural heritage sector, where users are positioned as central but where their preferences are assumed rather than solicited. Post-digitisation consultation with end users is equally rare. How are we to know that digitisation is serving the needs of the Higher Education community and is sustainable in the long-term?

[Snip]

Key Findings

+ The communities of both intermediary and end users are willing to express their view on prioritising digitisation of special collections; the participation in the project was a matter of good will and the good response (see p. 25) makes evident that there is definitely interest of the professional communities to express their opinion on the matter of digitisation needs. It should be noted here that the community of intermediaries sees collections on a finer level of granularity; end users often refer to super-collections such as the holdings of an institution

+ The top user-driven priority criteria that emerged from consultation with both intermediaries and end users are: Improve access; Enhance impact on research and/on studies; Enhance impact on teaching; Allow for collaboration; Improve access outside

+ The geographic and institutional boundaries of collections nominated for digitisation are wider – this study was aimed at the higher education institutions in the UK, but 14% of the nominated collections were from institutions outside of the higher education sector, and 6% were from overseas (see p. 27)

+ The complementarity of collections is strongly favoured by both users’ communities (see section 5)

+ The criteria for digitisation nominated by intermediary and end users include general criteria but also a number of criteria where metrics can be applied; thus allowing to establish a ranking mechanism (see p. 45

Access the Complete Report (62 pages; PDF)

Access the Final Report Appendices (94 pages; PDF)

Source: JISC, Research Information Network

Posted in Archives and Special Collections, Digitization Projects | No Comments »

Google Search Helps Uncover a Rare Photograph at the National Library at the National Library of Australia

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From a Brief Article in eNews (National Library of Australia)

A small, brown photograph recently uncovered at the Library has been confirmed as the world’s only known vintage print of the arrival of Roald Amundsen’s 1911 expedition at the South Pole.

The vintage print was brought to light when a Google search led the Curator of the Pictures Collection at the National Library of Norway, Harald Ostgaard Lund, to the National Library of Australia’s collection.

An iconic image in Norway, it is expected to go on loan to Norway in 2011 for a special exhibition to mark the 100th anniversary of Amundsen’s arrival at the South Pole.

You can view the photograph here.

Source: NLA

Posted in Libraries and Librarianship, Search News, Web Search | No Comments »

A Blog from the Education Team at the National Archives (NARA)

Friday, October 30th, 2009

In August, we posted about a blog named NARAtions from NARA (National Archives and Records Administration) that deals with “online public access to the records of the U.S. National Archives.”

Today, another blog from NARA. The title of this blog is Collaborate.

From the Blog:

Collaborate serves as the virtual meeting place for members of the National Archives education team in Washington, DC, and colleagues from schools, institutions, and organizations across the nation to share innovative ideas and best practices. These conversations will serve as a basis for an exciting new web site and will also offer important feedback and commentary on the site as it develops.

A Collaborate forum is also linked on the site and an RSS feed is available.

Source: DigitalVaults.org (A NARA Web Site)

Posted in Archives and Special Collections, Resources | No Comments »

Changes to the Internet: Group Approves Non-Latin-Script Web Addresses

Friday, October 30th, 2009

From the BBC News Article:

The board of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) voted at its annual meeting in Seoul to allow domain names in Arabic, Chinese and other scripts.

More than half of the 1.6 billion people who use the internet speak languages with non-Latin scripts.

It is being described as the biggest change to the way the internet works since it was created 40 years ago.

The first Internationalised Domain Names (IDNs) could be in use next year.

Source: BBC News

See Also: Official ICANN Media Release Announcing the News

“This is only the first step, but it is an incredibly big one and an historic move toward the internationalization of the Internet ,” said Rod Beckstrom, ICANN’s President and CEO. “The first countries that participate will not only be providing valuable information of the operation of IDNs in the domain name system, they are also going to help to bring the first of billions more people online – people who never use Roman characters in their daily lives.”

See Also: Video from ICANN About Internationalized Domain Names

Posted in Technology and Internet | No Comments »

Open Book Alliance Co-Founder Peter Brantley Visits Spain to Talk About the Alliance and Google Book Search

Friday, October 30th, 2009

Brantley is attending meetings in Spain and discussing the OBA and Google Book Search. He’s been interviewed by two newsapers, El Pais and Publico.es.

Here are links to both interviews in Spanish along with mechanically generated translations from two services.

1) “Google no ve libros, se limita a ver datos” (via El Pais)

+ Translation by Google: “Google does not see books, is limited to viewing data” (via El Pais)

+ Translation by Systran: “Google does not see books, is limited to see data” (via El Pais)

2) El bibliotecario que se enfrentó a Google (via Público.es)

+ Translation by Systran: “The Librarian Who Faced Google” (via Público.es)

+ Translation by Google: “The librarian who challenged Google” (via Público.es)

Posted in Digitization Projects, Information Industry, Intellectual Property | No Comments »

Co-Founder of Wikileaks Interviewed

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

From the Computerworld Interview:

Wikileaks has published more than 1.3 million documents in the three years since its founding, and over that time the organization has faced its own share of threats and lawsuits.

[Wikileaks co-founder Julian] Assange believes a vanguard of politicians and human rights lawyers sympathetic to its goals can shield the Web site to a certain degree. The group has won all its court cases to date, including several high-profile appearances.

Source: Computerworld

See Also: Access Wikileaks

See Also: Wikileaks Also Offers RSS (not working at time of posting) and Twitter Feeds

Posted in Access to Information, Social Media | No Comments »

Reading, Sending, and Searching Tweets Using Cable Television; Facebook Also Available

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

Gary here. Both Twitter and Facebook have been available via my tv for some time but never tried either one. Today, after reading about upgrade today on the Twitter portion of the service, I gave both services a try on my tv. Pretty coo and it’s also an example of things to come. We will see a lot of social media (computers and mobile devices) in non traditional places in the coming year(s). And what about other content sources like eBooks, eMagazines music? Being able to purchase them and then read/list to them on via your television is likely.

Who is making the service I am using available? My cable tv provider, Verizon FiOS. If your cable or satellite service offers social media and other non-traditional content I would love to learn about it and add the info to this post.

UPDATE: Xbox LIVE from Microsoft is running tests to offer access to Twitter and Facebook

What’s New With the Twitter of FiOS Upgrade

Via ITVT:

+ An easy way to toggle between tv programming and Twitter.
On a related note, default view for Twitter and Facebook divides the tv screen in half with the television picture on on one side of the screen and the Twitter/Facebook content on the other.

+ Tweets now auto refresh every 30 seconds.

Here’s what you can do with the FiOS Twitter Widget:

+ Login to your account, read tweets. It’s not possible to monitor multiple accounts at the same time

+ Set-up and monitor favorite topics using words and/or hashtags

+ View/Read trending topics

+ View/Read tweets on the current show your viewing (on the other half of the screen). Interesting idea.

+ Send tweets

+ Set-up a friends list

+ Review the tweets you’ve sent

It really works.

What Can You Do with the FiOS Facebook Widget?

Accessing the FiOS widget is easy. Login using the keyboard on the tv and your ready to go. Like Twitter the television screen is divided in half.

What can you do?

+ Switch between user accounts
You don’t have to erase and then enter logins and passwords for the whole family. Each Facebook user can access their info.

+ View Your Profile

+ Receive status updates from your friends

+ View photo albums

+ See a list of all your friends, click and read/review what info your friends have made public

+ Post to Facebook by selecting “What’s on Your Mind”

It will be interesting to see where these and other social media services can be accessed a year or two from now.

Note: For the geeks out there, of course, it’s possible (on some televisions) to view your computer screen on your tv and view Facebook and Twitter that way. The point of this post is that a cable tv service are making two social networking services available directly on the television screen.

Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

« Older Entries