http://ref-notes.blogspot.com/
The Reference Notes blog is devoted to providing profiles of significant or substantive developments and news of potential interest to Reference and Research Librarians worldwide.
Friday, November 21, 2008
LIFe magazine photo archive freely available
Search millions of photographs from the LIFE photo archive, stretching from the 1750s to today. Most were never published and are now available for the first time through the joint work of LIFE and Google.
Some amazing photos here
Some amazing photos here
Europeana - the European Union's new digital library launched
from: http://en.kioskea.net/actualites/massive-eu-online-library-looks-to-compete-with-google-10965-actualite.php3
Inspired by ancient Alexandria's attempt to collect the world's knowledge, the EU launches on Thursday its Europeana digital library, an online digest of Europe's cultural heritage.
Using the latest technologies, the European Union aims to draw together millions of digital objects, ranging from film, photographs, paintings, sound files, maps, manuscripts, newspapers, documents and, of course, books.
From its opening, users will be able to find major literary works like Dante's Divine Comedy, or masterpieces such as Vermeer's Girl With A Pearl Earring or the manuscripts of composers including Beethoven. The Internet and digitalisation techniques will "enable a Czech student to browse the British library without going to London, or an Irish art lover to get close to the Mona Lisa without queueing at the Louvre," said Viviane Reding, EU commissioner responsible for new technologies.
Europeana is a chance to "give greater visibility to all the treasures hidden deep in our libraries, museums and archives," said Reding, and "compare masterpieces until now spread around the four corners of the globe."
With 14 staff members and at an annual cost put at around EUR2,5-million, Europeana is set for humble beginnings.
The prototype to be launched on Thursday will contain around two million digital items, all of them already in the public domain, as the most recent items are plagued by problems linked to copyright and their use online.
By 2010, the date when Europeana is due to be fully operational, the aim is to have 10 million works available, an impressive number yet a mere drop in the ocean compared to the 2,5 billion books in Europe's more common libraries.
The process of digitalisation is a massive undertaking.
Around one percent of the books in the EU's national libraries are now available in digital form, with that figure expected to grow to four percent in 2012. And even when they are digitalised, they still have to be put online.
The size of the task proved daunting even for Internet giant Microsoft.
The US computer firm launched its own online library project at the end of 2006, but abandoned it 18 months later after having digitalised about 750 000 works.
Google, one of the pioneers in this domain on the other hand, claims to have seven million books available for its "Google Book Search" project, which saw the light of day at the end of 2004.
Indeed Europeana was first seen as the 27-nation bloc's response to Google. Based on a proposal from France, several nations came together in 2005 to call for the creation of such a library at EU level.
A first attempt, with a few thousand works from France, Hungary and Portugal, was put online in March 2007 by France's national library, which has its own digital section, Gallica, launched in 1996.
Adding to the degree of difficulty, the EU project also aims to operate in 21 languages, although three - English, French and German - will be most prevalent early on.
In parallel with Europeana, Brussels will invest a total of about EUR120-million in 2009 and 2010 to develop digital technology, and put another 40 million into multilingualism techniques, like automatic translation. But it hopes the private sector will also invest and help speed up the work.
Inspired by ancient Alexandria's attempt to collect the world's knowledge, the EU launches on Thursday its Europeana digital library, an online digest of Europe's cultural heritage.
Using the latest technologies, the European Union aims to draw together millions of digital objects, ranging from film, photographs, paintings, sound files, maps, manuscripts, newspapers, documents and, of course, books.
From its opening, users will be able to find major literary works like Dante's Divine Comedy, or masterpieces such as Vermeer's Girl With A Pearl Earring or the manuscripts of composers including Beethoven. The Internet and digitalisation techniques will "enable a Czech student to browse the British library without going to London, or an Irish art lover to get close to the Mona Lisa without queueing at the Louvre," said Viviane Reding, EU commissioner responsible for new technologies.
Europeana is a chance to "give greater visibility to all the treasures hidden deep in our libraries, museums and archives," said Reding, and "compare masterpieces until now spread around the four corners of the globe."
With 14 staff members and at an annual cost put at around EUR2,5-million, Europeana is set for humble beginnings.
The prototype to be launched on Thursday will contain around two million digital items, all of them already in the public domain, as the most recent items are plagued by problems linked to copyright and their use online.
By 2010, the date when Europeana is due to be fully operational, the aim is to have 10 million works available, an impressive number yet a mere drop in the ocean compared to the 2,5 billion books in Europe's more common libraries.
The process of digitalisation is a massive undertaking.
Around one percent of the books in the EU's national libraries are now available in digital form, with that figure expected to grow to four percent in 2012. And even when they are digitalised, they still have to be put online.
The size of the task proved daunting even for Internet giant Microsoft.
The US computer firm launched its own online library project at the end of 2006, but abandoned it 18 months later after having digitalised about 750 000 works.
Google, one of the pioneers in this domain on the other hand, claims to have seven million books available for its "Google Book Search" project, which saw the light of day at the end of 2004.
Indeed Europeana was first seen as the 27-nation bloc's response to Google. Based on a proposal from France, several nations came together in 2005 to call for the creation of such a library at EU level.
A first attempt, with a few thousand works from France, Hungary and Portugal, was put online in March 2007 by France's national library, which has its own digital section, Gallica, launched in 1996.
Adding to the degree of difficulty, the EU project also aims to operate in 21 languages, although three - English, French and German - will be most prevalent early on.
In parallel with Europeana, Brussels will invest a total of about EUR120-million in 2009 and 2010 to develop digital technology, and put another 40 million into multilingualism techniques, like automatic translation. But it hopes the private sector will also invest and help speed up the work.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
Subject Guides (LibGuides)
We now have theses Depts - Anthro, Chem, Ecos, Fine Art and Psycho - completed. Also Evaluated Websites, Virtual Reference and Newspapers
Please let Info Services have you suggestions and comments
Please let Info Services have you suggestions and comments
Minnesota Press & Amazon revive out of print books
http://chronicle.com/daily/2008/11/7572n.htm?utm_source=at&utm_medi
(user name: rulibrary ; password: ru2007)
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
University Press, With Amazon, Revives and Sells Out-of-Print Books
By JENNIFER HOWARD
Like homesteaders sitting on land with untapped oil reserves, many university presses possess a rich but underused resource: out-of-print titles. The challenge has been how best to drill into that resource—how to let readers know about books that have been out of print for years or decades, and then make it easy for them to buy a copy.
Many presses have been testing out print-on-demand and other ways of delivering old books to new readers. On Thursday, the University of Minnesota Press will formally announce a new program to put almost every book it has ever published back in print and make them readily available. The program, Minnesota Archive Editions, comes out of a partnership with Amazon.com, Google, and the Minneapolis-based company BookMobile, and is notable for its scope and how it outsources much of the heavy lifting to commercial partners.
Under the arrangement, Amazon has agreed to digitize the files of the press's out-of-print books; the full texts will be browsable using Google Book Search. If a reader comes across one online and likes what he sees, he can click through to Amazon.com and order a copy to be printed and shipped to him using Amazon's BookSurge publishing program. Or he can click over to the press's Web site and place an order, which Minnesota's distributor, the Chicago Distribution Center, will forward to BookMobile for printing and delivery. That option may be more appealing to library and bookstore clients who have specific warehousing and distribution accounts.
Either way suits the press just fine, says its director, Douglas Armato. The point is to get as many books as possible out there, and at very little cost to the press. It paid no money upfront to Amazon; the online book seller will recoup the cost of digitizing as copies are sold.
About 660 books are already available through the program, and Mr. Armato expects that number to reach a thousand. From the press's perspective, the hardest part has been researching the rights to everything it has published since it opened its doors in 1925. Contracts had to be unearthed, and living authors or heirs had to be contacted and informed about the plan. "It has familiarized us in a remarkable way with our backlist," Mr. Armato said. "It really amounted to an archaeological dig."
Most authors have been happy to hear that their work will be back in print, he said, but "they do have questions"—most involving what kinds of royalties might be involved.
That, of course, depends on sales and on the original contracts. Mr. Armato isn't expecting Minnesota Archive Editions to leave the press's coffers overflowing, but he already has evidence that a market exists for at least some of those books.
Without any publicity, the program has already generated sales through Amazon: about 200 units so far, with the highest concentrations in history and philosophy, where a classic is perhaps more likely to remain a classic than in more newfangled fields. A modest Minnesota Archive Editions best seller has even emerged: Essays in Ancient Philosophy, a 1987 collection by the late Michael Frede, who taught philosophy at the University of California at Berkeley, has sold 12 copies.
The most surprising sale to date? One copy of a 1949 volume, Therapeutic Group Work With Children.
Copyright © 2008 by The Chronicle of Higher Education
(user name: rulibrary ; password: ru2007)
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
University Press, With Amazon, Revives and Sells Out-of-Print Books
By JENNIFER HOWARD
Like homesteaders sitting on land with untapped oil reserves, many university presses possess a rich but underused resource: out-of-print titles. The challenge has been how best to drill into that resource—how to let readers know about books that have been out of print for years or decades, and then make it easy for them to buy a copy.
Many presses have been testing out print-on-demand and other ways of delivering old books to new readers. On Thursday, the University of Minnesota Press will formally announce a new program to put almost every book it has ever published back in print and make them readily available. The program, Minnesota Archive Editions, comes out of a partnership with Amazon.com, Google, and the Minneapolis-based company BookMobile, and is notable for its scope and how it outsources much of the heavy lifting to commercial partners.
Under the arrangement, Amazon has agreed to digitize the files of the press's out-of-print books; the full texts will be browsable using Google Book Search. If a reader comes across one online and likes what he sees, he can click through to Amazon.com and order a copy to be printed and shipped to him using Amazon's BookSurge publishing program. Or he can click over to the press's Web site and place an order, which Minnesota's distributor, the Chicago Distribution Center, will forward to BookMobile for printing and delivery. That option may be more appealing to library and bookstore clients who have specific warehousing and distribution accounts.
Either way suits the press just fine, says its director, Douglas Armato. The point is to get as many books as possible out there, and at very little cost to the press. It paid no money upfront to Amazon; the online book seller will recoup the cost of digitizing as copies are sold.
About 660 books are already available through the program, and Mr. Armato expects that number to reach a thousand. From the press's perspective, the hardest part has been researching the rights to everything it has published since it opened its doors in 1925. Contracts had to be unearthed, and living authors or heirs had to be contacted and informed about the plan. "It has familiarized us in a remarkable way with our backlist," Mr. Armato said. "It really amounted to an archaeological dig."
Most authors have been happy to hear that their work will be back in print, he said, but "they do have questions"—most involving what kinds of royalties might be involved.
That, of course, depends on sales and on the original contracts. Mr. Armato isn't expecting Minnesota Archive Editions to leave the press's coffers overflowing, but he already has evidence that a market exists for at least some of those books.
Without any publicity, the program has already generated sales through Amazon: about 200 units so far, with the highest concentrations in history and philosophy, where a classic is perhaps more likely to remain a classic than in more newfangled fields. A modest Minnesota Archive Editions best seller has even emerged: Essays in Ancient Philosophy, a 1987 collection by the late Michael Frede, who taught philosophy at the University of California at Berkeley, has sold 12 copies.
The most surprising sale to date? One copy of a 1949 volume, Therapeutic Group Work With Children.
Copyright © 2008 by The Chronicle of Higher Education
Monday, November 17, 2008
HeinOnline Wiki
The HeinOnline Wiki is HeinOnline's "Help Center" that contains various how-to's, FAQs, search examples, and more! The Wiki contains a dedicated page for specific HeinOnline Libraries that outlines how to navigate and understand the library, as well as how to search for a word, phrase or other term, and each page includes links to videos and training guides when applicable. In addition to library specific help pages, the Wiki also contains all HeinOnline User Guides which includes Quick Reference Guides, feature specific guides, searching guides, and more! It also provides links to each of the video tutorials that have been created for using HeinOnline.
The HeinOnline wiki is available at http://heinonline.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page or can be accessed from the Resources tab in any HeinOnline library.
The HeinOnline wiki is available at http://heinonline.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page or can be accessed from the Resources tab in any HeinOnline library.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
New book on teaching Info Lit.
Off last week's display: 028.7 BUR
Great for those wanting to get an idea of what Info Lit is all about.
Tied to the ACRL IL Competency Standards for HE - with exercises
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Monday, November 3, 2008
Interesting article about weeding
Weeding: facing the fears by Eleonora Dubicki
Collection Building (2008) v 27 (4) p 132-135
http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/01604950810913689
Collection Building (2008) v 27 (4) p 132-135
http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/01604950810913689
Library Quarterly added to JSTOR
The Library Quarterly (Arts & Sciences VI)
Release Content:
Vol. 2, No. 1 (January, 1932) – Vol. 72, No. 2 (April, 2002)
Moving Wall: 5 years
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISSN: 0024-2519
Since 1931, The Library Quarterly has maintained its commitment to scholarly research in all areas of librarianship–historical, sociological, cultural, evaluative, statistical, bibliographic, managerial, and educational. Through unique and innovative approaches, LQ seeks to publish research that provides insights into libraries and librarianship for the library, research, and other communities involved with the collection of, access to, and dissemination of information.
Release Content:
Vol. 2, No. 1 (January, 1932) – Vol. 72, No. 2 (April, 2002)
Moving Wall: 5 years
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISSN: 0024-2519
Since 1931, The Library Quarterly has maintained its commitment to scholarly research in all areas of librarianship–historical, sociological, cultural, evaluative, statistical, bibliographic, managerial, and educational. Through unique and innovative approaches, LQ seeks to publish research that provides insights into libraries and librarianship for the library, research, and other communities involved with the collection of, access to, and dissemination of information.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Visual Dictionary Online
How cool is this!
A dictionary with a new point of view
that catches the eye and enriches the mind.
20,000 terms with contextual definitions,developed by terminology experts;
6,000 full-color images of a wide variety of objectsfrom all aspects of life
See: http://visual.merriam-webster.com/society/education/library.php for a library pic!
A dictionary with a new point of view
that catches the eye and enriches the mind.
20,000 terms with contextual definitions,developed by terminology experts;
6,000 full-color images of a wide variety of objectsfrom all aspects of life
See: http://visual.merriam-webster.com/society/education/library.php for a library pic!
Blogs by college and academic librarians
http://www.academicblogs.org/wiki/index.php/University_Librarians
Blogs by college and academic librarians
Blogs by college and academic librarians
Thursday, October 30, 2008
The plausibility of computing the h-index of scholarly productivity and impact using reference-enhanced databases
I have linked up 4 references to articles by Peter Jacso, that focus on the pros and cons of the three largest cited-reference-enhanced databases (Google Scholar, Scopus, and Web of Science) for determining the h-index.
You can access them in the "h-index" folder on RefShare at the url below:
http://www.refworks.com/refshare/?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/h-index
You can access them in the "h-index" folder on RefShare at the url below:
http://www.refworks.com/refshare/?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/h-index
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Boxes for books!
'BOOK NERD' BUILDS BOXES FOR BROWN'S RAREST VOLUMES:
At Brown U.'s library, one staff member busies herself with making boxes -- beautifully wrought, one-of-a-kind boxes -- to protect the books in storage.
user name: ru library
password: ru2007
At Brown U.'s library, one staff member busies herself with making boxes -- beautifully wrought, one-of-a-kind boxes -- to protect the books in storage.
user name: ru library
password: ru2007
SETTLEMENT REACHED IN GOOGLE BOOK-SCANNING LAWSUIT:
Under the terms of the deal, Google will pay $125-million to establish a Book
Rights Registry, to compensate authors and publishers whose
copyrighted books have already been scanned, and to cover legal
costs.
New RUL webpage Subject Guide link
You may have noticed the new Subject Guides link under Resources on the Library webpage This replaces the previous link which was a sub-link under Databases.
The new link presently leads to our old Subject Gateways. The links are gradually being replaced with links to our new (LibGuide) Subject Guides. As they are linked Anne Moon is marking them with a "NEW' icon. Once all the Subject Guides are completed we will change the link to lead to the new Subject Guide page where users will be able to select their subject/tag from the main page.
The new link presently leads to our old Subject Gateways. The links are gradually being replaced with links to our new (LibGuide) Subject Guides. As they are linked Anne Moon is marking them with a "NEW' icon. Once all the Subject Guides are completed we will change the link to lead to the new Subject Guide page where users will be able to select their subject/tag from the main page.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
SAOUG Conference 2008
I have attached the PDF version of a conference report that appeared in vol. 25 no. 6 of Library Hi Tech News.
You can access it in the RefShare SAOUG_Conference-2008 folder at: http://www.refworks.com/refshare?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/SAOUG_Conference-2008
ABSTRACT:
The purpose of this paper is to report on papers presented at the ninth annual Southern African online user group conference on 3-5 June 2008 in Pretoria.
The focus was very much on the changes facing librarians daily, changes in users as well as in technology. This was addressed in subthemes such as the Google generation, news alerting services, institutional repositories and end-user training.
The new research information management system (RIMS) was also discussed.
You can access it in the RefShare SAOUG_Conference-2008 folder at: http://www.refworks.com/refshare?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/SAOUG_Conference-2008
ABSTRACT:
The purpose of this paper is to report on papers presented at the ninth annual Southern African online user group conference on 3-5 June 2008 in Pretoria.
The focus was very much on the changes facing librarians daily, changes in users as well as in technology. This was addressed in subthemes such as the Google generation, news alerting services, institutional repositories and end-user training.
The new research information management system (RIMS) was also discussed.
Zotero versus RefWorks
The little I could find about Zotero on the Web was pretty uncomplimentary ...
See, for example, the below:
Zotero Bibliographic Software at MIT: MIT Libraries
"There are still some kinks to be worked out of the software, so you may not want to use Zotero for writing your thesis or for creating complex bibliographies..."
http://libraries.mit.edu/help/zotero/
MIT Libraries uses Zotero in addition to RefWorks and EndNote - They've created a very informative table comparing Zotero with RefWorks and EndNote. It can be accessed at: http://libraries.mit.edu/help/bibliography/comparison.html
I also found an FAQs page about this Firefox extension at: http://www.zotero.org/documentation/#faq_and_troubleshooting (Here it is confirmed that Zotero works only with Firefox).
See, for example, the below:
Zotero Bibliographic Software at MIT: MIT Libraries
"There are still some kinks to be worked out of the software, so you may not want to use Zotero for writing your thesis or for creating complex bibliographies..."
http://libraries.mit.edu/help/zotero/
MIT Libraries uses Zotero in addition to RefWorks and EndNote - They've created a very informative table comparing Zotero with RefWorks and EndNote. It can be accessed at: http://libraries.mit.edu/help/bibliography/comparison.html
I also found an FAQs page about this Firefox extension at: http://www.zotero.org/documentation/#faq_and_troubleshooting (Here it is confirmed that Zotero works only with Firefox).
Monday, October 27, 2008
E-Books on Rhodes RefShare Folder
Some recent references to e-books articles have been added to the RefShare Folder at the url below:
http://www.refworks.com/refshare?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/E-Books
You should be able to access the shared E-books Folder from within your RefWorks account by following the steps below:
http://www.refworks.com/refshare?site=037931147244400000/RWWS1A1306351/E-Books
You should be able to access the shared E-books Folder from within your RefWorks account by following the steps below:
- Go to the View menu in your Refworks account. (It is on the top horizontal menu bar).
- You will see “RefWorks Shared Area” at the bottom of this drop-down menu. Click on this.
- Now click on the hyperlink under “E-Books”. The references should now be displayed.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
New Subject Guides (LibGuides)
The first 3 new Subject Guides (using our new LibGuides software) are now linked under
http://oldwww.ru.ac.za/library/electronic_resources/dept/
They are: Chemistry, Economics and Psychology
http://oldwww.ru.ac.za/library/electronic_resources/dept/
They are: Chemistry, Economics and Psychology
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)