Digital Library How-To 

The Digital Library Tool Kit by Dr. Peter Noerr

This document is designed to help those who are contemplating setting up a digital library. Whether this is a first time computerization effort or an extension of an existing library's services, there are questions to be answered, decisions to be made, and work to be done. This document covers all those stages and more.

You can request a hard copy or download the pdf.

Creating a Digital Preservation How-To 

Long-term Retention of Digital Research Materials

Libraries, archives, and museums face a unique set of challenges in preserving their digital collections. The range of standards, policies, and practice guidelines to be created demands significant energy and creativity to move toward multi-institution consensus and solutions. The Research Libraries Group's long-term retention initiative will develop a digital archiving model, fine-tuned for preserving RLG members' collections.

Selection, deposit, storage, maintenance, and access components of the archiving model will be examined and best practice guidelines created. Where such guidelines must evolve while the knowledge base expands, they will be identified and begun. Task groups and consultations will expand the range of what is known, and that knowledge will be consolidated in Web-based tools to provide guidance worldwide. [more]

Press and Archive Looking for Home 

Back in my days running BookLab, I had the opportunity on several occasions to bind small editions of books for Cheap Street Press. Jan O'Nale, the proprietor was a tough and demanding customer, but I believe she was always happy with BookLab's work. It was a privilege to work for her, projects from demanding customer were always the most rewarding.

I got an email from Jan the other day, from which I quote, in part:

"We are retiring the Press after our current project and trying to find a home for the archives--even the Press equipment, type, and so on. We posted a notice with the librarian's "Ex Libris" and did get some response, but not as much as we'd hoped. Any chance you could suggest other places to make the announcement and ask for interest?

Please contact Jan O'Nale (btypress@earthlink.net) if you are interested or can give her a lead.

Thanks,
Craig Jensen, AcmeBook Webmaster.

OCLC announces ALA Midwinter pre-conference 

Knowledge Access Management Tools and Concepts for Next-Generation Catalogers

Descriptions This 1 day pre-conference seminar provides a practical understanding of cataloging Internet resources through examining key USMARC fields and AACR2 rules. An introduction to metadata, focusing on the Dublin Core and other alternative description methods, including TEI, EAD and GILS. A guided lab provides an opportunity to interact with leading-edge concepts and systems such as automated classification and metadata record creation. Facilitated small-group discussions enable participants to assess the impact of their learning and begin the process of transforming knowledge into action.

Intended audience Head of cataloging, chief cataloger, cataloging team leaders, digital cataloging principals, special format catalogers, electronic resource librarians, digital librarians, metadata librarians, Internet resource librarians

Who owns the internet? 

The Internet Under Siege by Lawrence Lessig

Who owns the Internet? Until recently, nobody. That's because, although the Internet was "Made in the U.S.A.," its unique design transformed it into a resource for innovation that anyone in the world could use. Today, however, courts and corporations are attempting to wall off portions of cyberspace. In so doing, they are destroying the Internet's potential to foster democracy and economic growth worldwide. [read more]

Books return home 

Kafka's work goes back to Prague

The personal library of author Franz Kafka is to be returned to his native Prague.

The manuscripts, including some of the first editions of his work, had been owned by car giant Porsche.

The German auto manufacturer said it had acquired his library from an antiquarian book dealer in Stuttgart with a view to handing it over to the Franz Kafka Society in the Czech Republic.[read more]

Nine Lives? 

How a Librarian Can Live Nine Lives in a Knowledge-Based Economy by Bunella Longo

"Like cats moving through their fabled nine lives, I think that teachers and librarians should redefine their own roles beyond the confines of their respective traditions." [read more]

What happens when...? 

What happens when a library removes a formerly available print journal and replaces it with an electronically accessed version? From October 2001 through September 2002, University of California libraries are conducting a grant funded study to find out. Collection Management Initiative

The Future 

Technology 101: What Do We Need To Know About the Future We're Creating? by Howard Rheingold

Are we awake to the world we're building, or are we, as an old Sufi saying goes, merely asleep in life's waiting room?

The petroleum economy, nuclear power, biotechnology, artificial intelligence, lasers, organ translants, telephone and television and personal computer networks -- today's technologies have put staggering amounts of power into the hands of billions of people. More power is on its way in the next several decades, as present scientific knowledge drives future technological capability. Do we know what to do with the powers over matter, mind, and life that tomorrow's technologies will grant us?

If we don't already know the answers to these questions, what do we need to know to design, deploy, control, and live humanely with the tools we are creating? [read more]