Miscellaneous Library Links & comments

I haven't posted library stuff in a bit. With my new work schedule, I get up before dawn and drive through the dawn (actually, these days, dawn happens while I am still getting ready) to Baton Rouge, hitting the heavy in-bound traffic around 7:30. After a day at work (no blogging there, please) , I hit the road, and the traffic, at about 4:30. If I am lucky, I get back home by 6:15 or so. Then it is dinner and catching up, and bed fairly early -- 9 pm most nights. So, hence the lacunae.

I have been adding tabs to my Firefox windows both at home and work. It is time to clean them up in a miscellaneous post.

Four new search engines to keep an eye on.

ARRA funds for libraries This is an interesting post from Jeff Scott which focuses more on broadband funding in the Recovery Act. He has done some good work here.

Libraries need more Internet speed. Related to the link above, here is the ALA press release about the need for more speed.

Smartphones versus handsets. This is an interesting article on sales trends. I have a feeling reading articles like this that I am not making full use of what is available on my current device (which I HATE!)

Books born digital. Interesting LJ article about trends in book publishing and the trends that librarians need to follow.

Kindle2 and speech software. This is an interesting take on the Kindle debate and the Authors Guild' successful push to get Amazon to disable the speech abilities of the Kindle. If you know someone who is blind, but computer proficient you may well wonder, as I do, what the big deal is. Speech software is nowhere near the same as a book read by a person. (And since I am now a huge listener, I do know!)

For fun. This is from a local public library blog which has a link to a web site which has a video for each of the elements in the periodic table. I love it!

Library leadership and changes. Stephen Abram of Sirsi/Dynix picked this up on his travels. It is a great article which I suggest you click through and save the PDF. Stephen does a great job. The seven imperatives of library leadership may yet get a full post from me.

In library news:

Stupid Library Tricks. This is a great story of bureaucracy run amok! [Thanks again, Stephen.]

Bad news about salaries. I know that library administrators sometimes take a beating on salaries. This LJ article notes both the flatness of the library organization in Seattle, and our cost effectiveness compared with other departments.

The Law of Unintended Consequences, Oprah and KFC. My friend Jessamyn does a great summary here. Last Saturday (May 16, ten days after Jessamyn wrote), I was in a local KFC where they were STILL handing out rain checks for the grilled chicken. (I am glad I wasn't planning on eating grilled chicken!)

Twitter and Libraries. There is a great, link-rich post about how to effectively use Twitter.

Extreme Customer Service. Great article by David Lee King about a library that I knew fairly well in Connecticut. I haven't been there in a number of years, but the philosophy of extreme customer service is one that Library Director Louise Berry has espoused for many years.

Google Books Settlement. I forget where I picked up this link, and I have read a some about the settlement. This is an interesting article about Internet Archive and its view.

That's the wrap-up for now. [And I started this post two days ago, and it took until today to get it up.]