From the Announcement:

Two of the oldest known copies of the Qur’an will be available to researchers and scholars across the world today (8 July 2009) – as part of a major project to digitise one of the richest collections of Eastern manuscripts.

The two Qur’ans, one of which may date from the 7th century A.D, are part of the priceless Mingana Collection, which is housed by the University of Birmingham.

The University’s Special Collections department has painstakingly digitised more than 10,000 pages from the collection. As well as the Qur’ans the documents now online include unique illustrated manuscripts from the 16th century and early Arabic poetry. The project has been generously supported by JISC and The Edward Cadbury Charitable Trust.

Access the Virtual Manuscript Room

Source: JISC

The Pacific Research Institute Releases Primer on Internet Privacy

The Pacific Research Institute (PRI) announced today the release of a new report on Internet privacy and security. Click Confidential: A Privacy Primer for the Social Web, authored by Daniel Ballon, Ph.D., PRI senior fellow in technology studies, outlines the detrimental affects of government regulated privacy policy on emerging online businesses. He also provides effective strategies for empowering consumers while promoting choice and competition.

+ Full Document (PDF; 8.2 MB)

Source: Pacific Research Institute

FY 2009 Grant Awards: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

The following nonprofit arts organizations are receiving grants to support the preservation of jobs that are threatened by declines in philanthropic and other support during the current economic downturn.

View alphabetically, by state, or by category.

Source: National Endowment for the Humanities

A slew of content is available online. Here are the titles of some (just a few) of the presentations that are available to read/view online. This conference took place in Milan, Italy at the beginning of June, 2009.

+ Connecting Readers with Open Access Resources: The CUFTS Free! Open Access Collections Group

+ Building a Digital Library with Learning Materials

+ Exploring the costs and benefits of alternative publishing models

+ Understanding how Students and Faculty REALLY use E-Books: The UK National E-Books Observatory

+ Self-Archiving in practice: What do the researchers say and is there any pain alleviation?

+ The PROBADO-Framework: Content-Based Queries for non-textual Documents

+ PLoS One: background, future development, and article-level metrics

+ Scientific publications on Web 3.0

+ Building a Semantic Digital Library for the Municipality of Milan

+ Digital Futures: Strategies for the Information Age

+ Social Tagging Workshop

+ Many other presentations, demonstrations and short papers.

Access these and other papers and presentations.

Not only can these new animated video guides be useful to archive users but they also might be worth a look for those libraries and archives considering offer video video “How to Use” resources.

Six Videos Were Recently Made Available:

+ How the records are arranged

+ The life of a document

+ Using the catalogue

+ Ordering documents

+ Preparing to research

+ Recording research results

Direct to Videos

Source: National Archives (UK)

The long rumored Google operating sytem is no longer a rumor. Danny Sullivan writes on Search Engine Land:

The company says that the OS will be released later this year (likely in the fall, I’m told) to developers, designed primarily for netbooks but not limited to them. Then in 2010, it expects it will be available to consumers (though no doubt, many enthusiasts will try it on their own machines).

Source: Search Engine Land

See Also: Google’s own blog post about the new OS.

Speed, simplicity and security are the key aspects of Google Chrome OS. We’re designing the OS to be fast and lightweight, to start up and get you onto the web in a few seconds. The user interface is minimal to stay out of your way, and most of the user experience takes place on the web. And as we did for the Google Chrome browser, we are going back to the basics and completely redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS so that users don’t have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates. It should just work.

From the Announcement:

The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) and OCLC announce the publication of a white paper on Streamlining Book Metadata Workflow, written by consultant Judy Luther (President, Informed Strategies), that analyzes the current state of metadata creation, exchange, and use throughout the book supply chain.

With the number of book formats multiplying and the amount of digital content growing rapidly, the metadata required to support the discovery, sale, and use of content by a global audience is increasing exponentially. At the same time, economic pressures on all stakeholders in the supply chain—from publishers to wholesalers to booksellers to metadata suppliers and to librarians—present greater challenges for providing quality and comprehensive metadata at every point in the cycle.

Through interviews with over 30 industry representatives, Luther has created a book metadata exchange map illustrating the workflow and metadata exchange and has identified opportunities for eliminating redundancies and making the entire process more economical.

Access the Complete White Paper (25 pages; PDF)

Source: OCLC/NISO

From the AP Story:

A woman who worked with her cousin to steal the identities of 13 unsuspecting Library of Congress employees was sentenced Monday to two and a half years in prison.

Source: AP (via Next Gov)

From the News Report:

Sage apologizes to board of political science journal for making leadership change without consulting academics — and signs deal to run sociology association’s scholarly publications.

Source: Inside Higher Ed

From the News Release:

The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) announce the release of a new publication, Partnership for a Nation of Learners: Joining Forces, Creating Value, which offers guidance on creating effective community collaborations. The publication is a product of IMLS and CPB’s Partnership for a Nation of Learners (PNL) project that united libraries, museums, and public broadcasters to address issues of central concern to their local communities.

“Museums, libraries, and public broadcasters share a common service mission, have complementary assets, and are trusted sources of information and ideas,” said Anne-Imelda Radice, IMLS Director. “I am gratified that the Partnership for a Nation of Learners project will live on through this publication, which spotlights exemplary community partnerships across the country and shares ‘how-to’ information on successful collaborations. In these challenging economic times, partnerships are more valuable than ever.”

Access the Full Publication (54 pages; PDF)

Source: Institute of Museum and Library Services

From a Blog Post:

In the works for nearly a year, Yahoo Search Pad is to formally launch tomorrow for all users. The feature is a nifty “notepad” service that allows users to collect information from search results into a single page for reference purposes.

[snip]

With Search Pad, you can collect listings from varous searches you do into a common page. You can also copy content from a page into Search Pad (up to 2,000 characters) and have Yahoo automatically find and attribute a link to where the information came from.

When launched, Search Pad will allow pages to be shared with others via a public URL, along with integration to share through Delicious, Twitter and Facebook.

Source: Search Engine Land

Update: Read the Search Pad FAQ & View an Intro Video

From the Announcement:

ProQuest is leveraging its extensive research of end-users, librarians and faculty search behaviors to drive the creation of an all-new platform that will redefine the search experience for library users around the world. Available in 2010, the new platform will transform the company’s highly-regarded platforms into one consolidated search experience, providing access to a broad range of resources, content, and services that only ProQuest offers. The ProQuest, CSA Illumina, and selected Chadwyck-Healey products will be available on the new platform at launch, and all ProQuest products will migrate to the new platform over time.

Learn More Here.

Source: ProQuest

From a Blog Post:

The 5 most popular items added to WorldCat in June were:

+ The Outlandish Adventures of Liberty Aimes, added by 2,137 WorldCat libraries.

+ Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa: Horse in the House, added by 1,943 WorldCat libraries.

+ The Frog Scientist, added by 1,904 WorldCat libraries.

+ Tricking the Tallyman, added by 1,882 WorldCat libraries.

+ Along for the ride, added by 1,801 WorldCat libraries.

More stats in the blog post.

Source: WorldCat Blog

+ U.K. Institutions: Most Prolific in History, 2004-08

+ Journals Ranked by Impact: Microbiology

+ What’s the Hot Paper in Physics

Source: Thomson Reuters

From the Announcement:

The American Library Association (ALA) today announced it has received a $2 million, three-year grant renewal from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to continue the Public Library Funding & Technology Access Study. ALA Office for Research & Statistics Director Denise Davis will remain as project director, and John Carlo Bertot, director of the University of Maryland (UMCP) Center for Library & Information Innovation, will continue to manage the Public Libraries and the Internet survey as part of the study.

The study assesses public access to computers, the Internet and Internet-related services in U.S. public libraries, as well as the impact of library funding changes on connectivity, technology deployment and sustainability. Through integrated quantitative and qualitative research methods, the study gathers information from libraries of all sizes and in every state and from state library agencies.

Source: American Library Foundation