The Gaol House Blog

del.icio.us

2008-07-18T04:55:00.000-07:00

I've been shamed into writing a blog by a recent digital workshop. Whilst setting up my own del.icio.us and dutifully adding the Gaol House blog to my list I was shocked to see it had been saved by 396 others.

So I promise there will be a bit more activity on here from now on, and if any of those del.icio.us users fancy sharing links, that would be great.

25 Years of Gadgets

2008-03-07T07:58:00.000-08:00

. . . Were presented to us by Mr Rusbridger himself. Exciting new developments include e-books, and the portable journalist kit (which allows the reported to attach their mobile phone to a collapsible keyboard and a recording device). Rusbridger continued to explain that technological developments were leading to a new breed of reporter, as comfortable with pod-casting and blogging as they are writing articles. This vision of a new, multi-tasking model of journalism included researching skills, traditionally the preserve of the library. The talk proved a timely reminder of the increasing incursion of Google into the researcher's domain, and the importance of remaining relevant in a changing environment.

Lies, damn lies and statistics.

2007-12-03T03:26:00.000-08:00

The Royal Statistical Society organised a half day workshop on the use of statistics in reporting. A number of speakers were allocated 15 minute slots to give us a quick run down on the basics of their trade. Topics covered included: statistical terminology, data collection methods, league tables, rankings and statistical modelling.

Wading through the maths-speak (standard deviation, confidence intervals, regression to the mean, standard errors and distributions) the talks brought up a number of interesting points. The key message of the morning was the need to approach all statistics with caution, and to never accept as given what they appear to prove. The workshop was peppered with examples of numerical misrepresentations: such as the dangers of believing surveys of people's drinking habits (which only account for 50% of total alcohol sales) and the high levels of inaccuracy in ranking systems (which fail to factor in bad/good luck)

The programme was intensive, technical, but ultimately rewarding; I will certainly be more careful when passing on figures in the future.

In a follow up email I was informed that they are considering preparing some resources for their web pages to cover:
basic explanations of statistical terms, principles and methods
and 'plain English’ versions of the above suitable for use in reporting
. . . Which should prove very handy.

Press Events Calendar

2007-11-12T09:35:00.000-08:00

Is Islam good for London? I really don't know, but I now know there's going to be a discussion about it, courtesy of Roy Greenslade's blog. His newly launched Press Events calendar aims to be as comprehensive a guide as possible to all manner of conferences, debates, lectures and speeches, in Britain and elsewhere, that touch on journalism. Looks like a great resource - just wish I had the time to go to all the events.

The perils of the sandwich.

2007-11-12T02:23:00.000-08:00

So it's all change at Alton Towers. Roger is off and
into his shoes will step John Mulholland, current deputy
editor of the Observer.

Mulholland once wrote for the Guardian's media pages,
before leaving to edit the Sporting Life, the turf bible beloved
of the late, Queen Mother. However, Mullholland's tenure at the
Sporting Life was brief. Having nipped out for a sandwich one
lunch time, he returned - with sandwich - only to learn that
his bosses had sacked him.

The advice, then, is simple : always get your sarnies
from the trolley.

2007-11-09T02:44:00.000-08:00

A recent trip down under revealed that the image of the librarian is once again under the spotlight. A new ABC sitcom, 'The Librarians' hit Australian tv screens last month, introducing an ecletic mix of fictional information professions which tick all the politically correct boxes - there's a muslim, a wheelchair user, a homosexual, even a bit of dyslexic eye candy for the head librarian to ogle . Apparently the show's creators did their research, visiting a number of public libraries around Melbourne and to get real librarians interested in tuning in, they sent out a short video, reassuring librarians of their respect for the profession. Their solemn promise - no 'shooshing' and no cardigans seems to have been kept; the tanorexic, drug dealing children's librarian in the pick mini-dress certainly sends the twinset and pearls scuttling back to the charity shop. Interest from the Australian library community has hit fever pitch, even the Australian Library and Information Association has set up a blog dedicated to the show. The show's creators were recently interviewed by the in Sydney Morning Herald. Time for a UK comedic take on our esteemed profession?

On this day . . .

2007-10-02T08:35:00.000-07:00

Been having a bit of a hunt on the web for new "on this day" resources. Here's some gooduns:

British library Lots of historical events and pretty pictures too.

BBC: On this day Events taken from the BBC news archive since 1950.

The New York Times: On this day Historical events from an American perspective

Biography channel: born on this day For the birthdays of historical figures.

Facebook and the media librarian

2007-09-27T06:55:00.000-07:00

There's been an awful lot of column inches of late dedicated to the "valuable business tool" that is Facebook, but does anyone genuinely believe its anything more than an enjoyable exercise in time-wasting/stalking? What use, if any, can it be put to in the context of media librarianship?

There's a school of thought that we should be on Facebook simply because its there, and that to fail to keep abreast of the latest developments in Web 2.0 is to risk becoming outdated and irrelevant. But to adopt this argument is to encourage the blind adoption of whatever latest intetnet craze the "kids" are talking about. Without relevant application there's little or no point to that shiny new pod cast, RSS Feed or (cough cough) blog.

So what practical use can Facebook be put to?

Its important to remember that Facebook is fundamentally a social networking tool: its natural territory is the embarassing drunken photograph, the "witty" wall post and the ever popular "poke". However this format also lends itself to the exchange of ideas and the accumulation of contacts. To give one example, I used my status to ask about popular news-blogs, and within an hour I'd been sent an extensive list of favourites from friends and acquaintances I'd never have thought of asking in person.

Also, it shouldn't be underestimated just how many journalists are falling for their own hype: Guardian News and Media and the British Broadcasting Corporation both have their own Facebook networks, as do numerous American media associations. These networks provide us with a link to our users, and effective social networking can lend us a heightened profile amongst them.

Another useful tool offered by Facebook is the ability to form groups centred around common interests. "media librarians and proud of it" could prove a useful forum, as could "Librarians and Facebook."

In short, Facebook could prove an important tool in networking, sharing information and promoting our services. These opportunities should not be overlooked.

Fancy a new job

2007-07-23T03:31:00.000-07:00

Here's details of a job that has just come up for an information officer/librarian . . . in Kabul.

Mahalo

2007-06-19T05:27:00.000-07:00

Talking of the CIG discussion, Euan Semple mentioned Mahalo, a human powered search service (note, as Phil Bradley points out on his blog, that it's not a search engine). Apparently Mahalo's guides spend their days searching, filtering out spam, and hand-crafting the best search results possible. I did a couple of searches and was quite impressed with the quality of the results - all good links.

They’ve now launched Mahalo Greenhouse , a place where the public can build search results that, if accepted by the guides, will be included in the Mahalo search index. Naturally the question is who are these guides and what qualifies them to make such decisions…

Will technology replace the research centre?

2007-06-19T04:37:00.000-07:00

Will technology replace the research centre? How will the corporate librarian's role evolve? was the title of a City Information Group (CIG) panel discussion last Tuesday. The room was packed so it's certainly something that a lot of information professionals are worried about. Whether people left any more enlightened though is open to question. The two panelists, Euan Semple and Mike Angle had plenty to say but judging from the questions asked and the occasional raised eyebrow, many hadn't moved on from the old, Wikipedia is written by unreliable idiots/ blogs are for the sad and lonely, way of thinking. As Semple and Angle explained, these tools complement traditional reference sources. Also, it isn't an option to ignore Web 2.0, dismissing it as something for the young people. Perhaps the debate could have been given a bit more structure with the chair, Mark Chillingworth , editor of Information World Review, preferring to stay in the background. Still, a worthwhile exercise although whether it was worth £30 is a moot point. How does the CIG get away with it?

On this day . . .

2007-05-29T07:11:00.000-07:00

Kakophone is a clever site from the US that aggregates information from a given day in history. Tells you what was number one, gives the covers of Time Magazine and Rolling Stone, how much a dozen eggs would have cost and a few bits more.

Library Laugh

2007-05-23T07:19:00.000-07:00

A funny Mercedes ad set in a library, courtesy of Youtube.

World Wide Web (nearly) Invented in 1977

2007-05-16T17:25:00.000-07:00

Tim Berners-Lee takes all the credit for inventing the World Wide Web and actually coined the phrase in 1990. But 23 years earlier the phrase was nearly coined by an unknown sub-editor at the Daily Mail. Thursday May 19 1997 front page headline reads: WORLD-WIDE BRIBERY WEB BY LEYLAND.

Welcome to the future

2007-05-16T15:11:00.000-07:00

Steve Blow from the Dallas Morning News tells in this article how he's decided that he no longer needs to keep a cuttings book of his bylines. He gets a bit mushy as he welcomes the news that digital archives mean the world no longer needs "morgues", "clip files", "pica poles" and "stringbooks".

Wednesday moan

2007-05-09T07:57:00.000-07:00

Spent 20 minutes trying to find a transcript from UK parliamentary site Hansard. I had the exact date of the testimony. I had the exact name of the witness. I even had a verbatim quote from the witness. Every possible combination of I information I pumped in to the search engine. And what did it return? Nish. Nada. Nil. Zero hits. So, what the hell, I'll give google a go. I typed in "richard evans defence select committee" and it comes in at hit number three. Google. Don't knock it. Ever.

Gettting the Editor's Ear

2007-04-30T10:36:00.000-07:00

More history. I thought I'd read every that's been said about news libraries until I came across Getting the Editor's Ear: The Manchester Guardian Library in the 1950s by Geoffrey Whatmore. Whatmore was the MG's first chief librarian and the article is full of details about the characters who inhabited the famous Cross Street building. I was drawn though to the penultimate paragraph which could have been written today:

'On the way home late at night one of the best things was to open tomorrow's first edition and find it in paragraphs due entirely to the library's efforts. Library contributions are notoriously difficult to evaluate. Because it did its job, some articles and some leaders, carried more information, some were richer in content and perhaps more readable, some news more accurate.'

We occasionaly mock the old days of cutting and filing but this proves that news librarians have been providing an invaluable service for years. Talking of Whatmore, I've met people who saw him as the founder of modern media librarianship, bringing a certain amount of discipline to the profession whilst others claim he was clueless and wrecked their library. After leaving the Guardian he worked at the Daily Mirror and the BBC.

Those were the days.

2007-04-27T02:59:00.000-07:00

Doing a bit of microfilm research and came across a job advert for a library assistant at the Guardian, dated March 12 1969. Doesn't ask for a library qualification but applicants should be able to type and know how to use reference books. Oh, and the remuneration? A solid £18 7s 6d. In modern money that's around £236.30 or £12,287 a year.

Film Noir Librarian

2007-04-26T10:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm not even sure what film noir is but I think it's got something to do with being shot moodily in black and white. That being so, check this posting on youtube. It's not great, but if you need to kill 4 mins 10 seconds, then it's worth visiting.

2007-04-25T03:40:00.000-07:00

Don't know if there are any places left but the BBC and Yahoo! are hosting a joint Hack Day at Ally Pally on June 16/17, allowing full access to their interfaces and feeds in a bid to foster new ideas. Sign up here.

2007-04-25T03:39:00.000-07:00

Went to a really interesting AUKML panel discussion last Thursday on advancements in film and video research. More will follow on the evening itself, but one of the sites that was discussed was the BBC Backstage network, designed to "encourage innovation and support new talent". Really opened my eyes to the diversity of the library industry.

2007-04-25T03:36:00.000-07:00

The National Library of Scotland is trying to raise £5m to secure the John Murray Archive of literary papers. The collection, gathered over seven generations by the Edinburgh publishers, includes items from Lord Byron, Jane Austen, Benjamin Disraeli and Charles Darwin. Go here to help out.

TimeSearch

2007-03-19T05:24:00.000-07:00

Only a week late but just before leaving for work last Monday, I caught a bit of Start the Week where Bamber Gascoigne was talking about TimeSearch, his new search engine. Despite Andrew Marr's rather inaccurate introduction that this is a rival to Google, it sounds like a welcome addition to the researcher's armoury of tools. TimeSearch is a search engine that presents a timeline as the basis for your investigation. Pick a theme or area, enter a year, and you get a timeline with relevant links. There are already 10,000 events listed and it's growing fast. Naturally Bamber was very excited about his new product but what was most interesting was his enthusiasm for Wikipedia and all things Web 2.0. In the future the plan is for people to start adding their own timelines.

Spelling Tales

2007-03-16T07:41:00.000-07:00

If a suicide bomber is to go down in history it's helpful if the media can agree on how to spell his name. Here's the tale of one 7/7 bomber and the many spellings as used in the Guardian:

mohammed siddique khan = 12 hits (latest 09/01/07)
mohammad siddique khan = 3 hits (07/07/07)
mohammad sidique khan = 121 hits (16/12/06)
mohammed sidique khan = 33 hits (09/02/07)

The Official Intelligence and Security Committee Report into the London Terrorist Attacks on 7 July 2005 (published) May 2006, has its version of the name as

mohammed siddeque khan

And hits in the Guardian for this variation = 0

Iraq National Library

2007-02-19T06:20:00.000-08:00

The British Library are hosting the Diary of Saad Eskander, Director of the Iraq National Library. A journal that makes other library blogs (this one included) seem somewhat frivolous. It has caught the attention of The Guardian and Reuters among others.

Some days in this library nearly reduce me to tears, but at least the end of week work return never has to read: "I spent the rest of the week trying to advise a number of my employees what to do, as they got death threats." Five of his staff members have been killed in the last year and more than a dozen have been abducted by gunmen.

Hi mum! I'm on the telly (review page)

2007-02-12T08:17:00.000-08:00

A reference librarian gets quoted in a Nancy Banks Smith television column in the Guardian today. She writes: "He seems," said our reference library, doubtfully, "to write about cheese."

Missing file

2007-02-09T09:52:00.000-08:00

This week's edition of Property Week features a large piece about the Guardian's move from its current home in London's Farringdon Road to Kings Place in 2008. There's lots of interesting stuff about how the paper's move to Clerkenwell in 1976 started the area's regeneration (although claims that 'sleazy shops with fringed curtains' being boarded up are a bit premature as table dancing clubs seem to be springing up all along Farringdon Road), and how there may be a similar effect at Kings Cross. Christine Eade, a former Guardian journalist, also writes about life in the paper's former home on Gray's Inn Road during the early 1970s. All good stuff but two thirds of the way down is this little gem:

'Ken Murphy, the librarian, retrieved information quicker than Google from the tiny library where thousands of newspaper cuttings were filed. Ken was too gentlemanly to remonstrate when I lost the Dr Christian Barnard file. If The Guardian archive is relocated with no information on the first heart translplant surgeon, I take full responsibility.'

Not to worry as my spies at Farringdon Road have confirmed that the file is still there.

Courting wikipedia.

2007-01-31T05:38:00.000-08:00

Have noticed a growing reliance of wikipedia in the media over the last year. The Guardian reports on how the courts in the US have now taken to using the collaborative encyclopedia these days as well.

We're all gonna die!

2007-01-31T05:00:00.000-08:00

Do you think that as a librarian you'll be redundant in a few years time? Well here's an article that might give you 33 reasons to hope otherwise.

Though I'm not sure: "Eliminating libraries would cut short an important process of cultural evolution" would wash with the downsizers when they hit your department . . .

What did we do before the web?

2007-01-19T09:51:00.000-08:00

"Write a box on feral children," the editor said. Where on earth do you start with a query like that? So I put "feral children" into Google on the off chance, and voila! FeralChildren.com lists cases of children who have been raised by animals going back hundreds of years. Sometimes I love the web.

Bright eyes and books

2007-01-15T04:28:00.000-08:00

It seems Art Garfunkel is something of a librarian at heart: he's been keeping a record of every book he's read since June 1968. Intriguing. And incredibly prolific - in February 1969 alone he got through eight books, including Catch 22, The Great Gatsby and Voltaire's Candide.

According to a profile in the Telegraph a few years ago, "his library includes hundreds of well-thumbed volumes of serious literature, each wrapped in protective plastic and arranged in the order in which he has read them".

I'm going to check Art's list for a few dodgy tomes - he's got to be editing it if there isn't at least one suspect biography and a bit of pulp fiction.

Bohemian bibliotekaries

2007-01-04T03:53:00.000-08:00

Vice, the free glossy magazine based in New York City covering "contemporary independent arts and youth culture" this month turns its spotlight on matters of the book. The Fiction Issue continues the publication's trend of tackling controversial issues while maintaining its stance of ironic detachment. So how did this bohemian bible pay homage to our esteemed profession? A 6 page fashion spread starring some Swedish librarians. It seems the lot of a librarian in Stockholm isn't all that bad. According to Linda from the Karolinska Institutet, "The wage isn't great but if you compare it to a journalist it's ok" while Sarah tells us "Working at the library I get guys hit on me quite a lot." While I get in touch with CILIP's Swedish branch to investigate job opportunites I'll leave you with a charming sentiment from another of the Scandinavian stunners, "Libraries have a magical ambiance." In Sweden at least...

My temporary escape

2006-12-19T10:11:00.000-08:00

Nearly everything we do these days involves sitting at a computer (it's the future!) so it's nice when you get to do some proper old-fashioned research. The Family Records Centre in London provides access to birth, death and marriage certificates and, while you can order over the web or by phone, you can only get a next-day service by going in person and searching though the indexes yourself. And it's an excuse to escape the office.

Where we've all been going wrong . . .

2006-12-19T10:02:00.000-08:00

Came across "A Librarian's guide to Etiquette", a blog from a US librarian. Includes tips on answering the phone and how librarians should dress up for Halloween.

Google was around in the 60s shock

2006-12-19T09:54:00.000-08:00

Came across this, which shows how Google still managed to cater for our searching needs even before the web was invented.

Head over heels for librarians

2006-12-15T06:06:00.000-08:00

One from the archives - check out Tears for Fears showing their love for the librarian in their Head Over Heels video (not sure where the chimp comes in...).

Continuing Professional Development

2006-12-13T07:25:00.000-08:00

Sue Hill talked about professionalism in the info industry at Online Information a few weeks ago. It's all about attitude and work ethic, apparently - have integrity, try to excel at every opportuity and engage in Continuing Professional Development (courses, mentoring, joining a professional body). Some practical tips - be aware of 'hot' skills in the industry (think web 2.0 at the moment), write a skills list to focus on your strengths and highlight areas you need to develop, and formulate an action plan to see how you can advance your career.

Read about the conference on the Information Today blog.

People who work in the information industry

2006-12-13T05:27:00.000-08:00

Listened to a Today programme debate on Radio 4 this morning about the serial killings in Ipswich. The debate (between Roy Greenslade and Tina Sanders) centred around whether the victims should be constantly referred to as prostitutes. The presenter said that it's an inescapable fact that the victims are all prostitutes, and that if all the victims had been (and here there was a slight pause, perhaps trying hard to find a diametric opposite) say, librarians we would all be calling them librarians. I came away thinking at least we now know what the exact opposite of a librarian is, even if we're not sure whether to call them "prostitutes" or "women who work in the sex industry".

All New Adventures of Librarian Flynn

2006-12-11T08:50:00.000-08:00

This month heralded the eagerly awaited sequel to The Librarian: Quest for the Spear. In this installment our hero Flynn Carson attempts to uncover the secrets of King Solomon's Mines. The typically American over the top trailer is worth checking out just for the immortal last line: "You never what you'll find in the library." Unfortunately the New York Times is less than impressed by Carson's new adventure which is broadcast on the US channel TNT. Look out for another upcoming US mini-series starring Peter Krause of Six Feet Under fame. It seems Peter is ready to take on aliens in The Lost Room but is not yet ready to challenge the demon that is the librarian stereotype

The oldest profession in the 21st Century

2006-12-11T08:30:00.000-08:00

In the interests of journalism I spent an hour this lunchtime browsing the punternet website looking for contact details for Ipswich prostitutes. Other than a couple of sideways glances from colleagues as I filtered through the sites of 40something BBWs (Big Beautiful Women) I didn't encounter any problems.

I was a little surprised that I could surf this sort of thing at work without anyone questioning it (though maybe the editor will pull me aside for a little word later), but it's a good thing professionally that my company doesn't block sites and stop me from doing my job. I bet librarians in the filter-obsessed US would struggle - most of the sites would be blocked by NetNanny or CyberPatrol.
See here for earlier discussion of filtering software.

Party season

2006-12-08T06:35:00.000-08:00

Sore heads in the office today courtesy of the AUKML 20th birthday party last night. I'll post something a bit more serious later on but one interesting little fact is that 56 bottles of bubbly (not to mention all the other stuff) were consumed by around 70 people.

Trexy

2006-12-04T07:48:00.000-08:00

There was an interesting talk from Nigel Hamilton, CEO of trexy.com, at Online Information last week. Trexy is a way of saving your 'search trails', so you can access them again without having to rerun the search, and stores all trails in a database so you can check whether anyone else has done the search before you. It allows you to search any site that has a search engine built in (4,381 at the last count). And there's a goat involved somewhere (though not this festive one, under threat from arsonists). You can read more on the trexy blog.

From modems to mash-ups

2006-12-01T09:53:00.000-08:00

Here is a great potted history of newspaper libraries in general and the one at the Guardian in particular. From World Reporter to Intranets and modems to mash-ups and integrated content. Appeared in December's Cilip Update

Information Professionals' Christmas Party

2006-11-29T10:17:00.000-08:00

And so to the Information Professionals' Christmas Party, the event that always seems like a Guinness Book of Records attempt to cram as many weird acronyms (Biall anyone?) on to one invite. Anyway, last Monday, on the kind of balmy November evening that gets one in just the right mood for misletoe and Santa, I trotted along to the Science museum to enjoy the festivities. Champagne was served and the reception was all rather jolly. There was the usual photo session for the scores of sponsors and the now infamous 'raffle' that seems to be restricted to five people. Nice prizes if you can get them. It was then hiking boots on for the long march to where the food was being served. After last year's bread bun debacle, it was a pleasant surprise to be served Thai curry and coq au vin. However, as I chewed on the tasty bird fIesh the presence of a crashed aeroplane exhibit reminded me of those poor chappies in the film Alive. Very tasty.

Suitably stuffed, the information professionals moved on to the serious business of partying. The only downside of the magnificent venue was that its sheer size meant that the party was a bit spead out thus making networking/chatting /pulling difficult. Still there was always the dance floor. Now as someone who rarely dances I realise I'm being a tad hypocritical here. However, as an observer I feel duty bound to report the unbelievable scenes at the Science Museum discoteque. To the strains of Michael Jackson's Thriller, I witnessed a line of at least four IPs doing that funny zombie/arms up like a kangaroo dance that Michael and his chums do in the video. Thankfully someone recorded it. See you at next year's party?

Wikipedia rated by experts

2006-11-29T09:06:00.000-08:00

The debate continues . . . A recent piece of research by "First Monday" (a peer reviewed journal on the internet) found that experts found Wikipedia’s articles to be more credible than the non–experts. The report goes on to say: "This suggests that the accuracy of Wikipedia is high. However, the results should not be seen as support for Wikipedia as a totally reliable resource as, according to the experts, 13 percent of the articles contain mistakes."

A viable alternative to Wikipedia

2006-11-27T10:08:00.000-08:00

uncyclopedia is a wiki that has been designed to challenge the growing power of Wikipedia. However, the difference is that while Wikipedia tries (hard) not to get its facts wrong, Uncyclopedia goes all out to subvert the truth. It's an ambitious parody project and like the site it is lampooning anyone can add or edit any of its existing (150,000) entries. The only guideline from the creators is "please be funny and not just stupid". An example entry on Australia states: "Australia is a minimum security prison turned British colony that is either part of South East Asia, a British colony, or America Jr. depending on whose opinion you ask." Given the growing use of Wikipedia in the profession, I can't wait for a journalist to get their wikis in a twist . . .

Arrghhh! We're all gonna die!

2006-11-27T08:31:00.000-08:00

Yep, it's Monday. Happened upon a list of what your chances of dying a certain way are. The National Safety Council in the US have produced a long list and a WAYS TO GO simple chart. They released the info in response to constantly being asked by journalists what the odds of dying of "x" are. Given that I've got a mere 193 to 1 chance of dying from accidental poisoning by exposure to noxious substances I think I'll cancel my 14 million to 1 national lottery subscription.

AmbientLibrarian

2006-11-23T05:44:00.000-08:00

Great idea it might be, but unfortunatley AmbientLibrarian is not a site for all things Brian Eno. Instead it's a wiki dedicated to helping information professionals learn more about available web technologies, with Library 2.0 as its main focus. If anything's going to explain what it's all about, this it. Well worth a visit.

The Librarian: Seen the film? Now read the comic.

2006-11-22T08:10:00.000-08:00

With a sequel to The Librarian about to be aired in the US, the brand has extended to a soon-to-be-released comic book. Get an 8-page sneak preview here. For the uninitiated, it has been described as "if Indiana Jones were a librarian . . " You have been warned.

Is it safe?

2006-11-22T07:45:00.000-08:00

It's what we're all supposed to be good at, but how exactly do you go about assessing the quality and validity of information? A useful list of Top 10 Tips, compiled at the end of TFPL worshop, can be found at Karen Blakeman's blog.

Morgue Mama rides again

2006-11-22T07:16:00.000-08:00

Just finished Dig, by CR Corwin, the second Morgue Mama book starring Hannawa Herald-Union librarian Maddy Sprowls. This time she's investigating the murder of Gordon Sweet, university professor of garbology and fellow college beatnik in the Fifties - does it involve illegal dumping at the local tip, a campus murder in 1957 or a 40-year argument over Jack Kerouac's burger of choice?

Maddy's definitely old school (she has a stash of old cuttings files in her basement and refuses to use a computer - she wouldn't last two minutes in a news library these days), and catchphrases like, "Good gravy!" wear thin quickly, but it's hard not to like her. It feels authentic; when a junior reporter describes Maddy as a "desk-bound gnome who watches over the morgue", you just know the author has worked at a newspaper (Rob Levandoski, who uses the pen-name, was a reporter for several years). There are a few unnecessary subplots, but the story rolls along at a reasonable pace and it's nice to read a novel where the librarian is the central character, even if there are a few clichés thrown in.

Dig, as well as the first book, The Cross Kisses Back, are published by Poisoned Pen Press.

Random library blog of the month

2006-11-22T06:57:00.000-08:00

Red Tape, the blog for Government Documents Librarians of Michigan. Discover why Michigan needs a new state constitution and whether organic apple farming is viable there.

Another random(ish) blog yours truly gets a mention at the Global Journalist, and its list of blogs.

The truth isn't out there, for the moment.

2006-11-22T06:52:00.000-08:00

The Operation Iraqi Freedom Document Portal, which we wrote about a few weeks ago, is still down, but that hasn't stopped The Garlic from speculating what else might be on there.

Blocked sites

2006-11-21T10:28:00.000-08:00

A library in Washington state is facing a lawsuit against an over-zealous CIPA (Children's Internet Protection Act)computer filtering system. Under the act, implemented by the US government in 2004, public libraries that receive E-rate computer funding must block web images that are deemed sexually explicit and therefore inappropriate for children.

If a library refuses to use the filtering software there's a limit to the funding they receive. Filtering software isn't that discriminating, though, and many programs block innocent images too - including health education pages and technology news site The Register. Some even block filter advocate and House Majority Leader Dick Armey's official site, for obvious reasons.

The American Libraries Association brought a successful suit in 2002, arguing that the ruling broke the First Amendment, but the Supreme Court overturned the decision in 2003 and CIPA still stands. The new suit is being brought by adults who can't remove the filters for their own internet use.

It's unlikely to be successful though - Congress suggested last month that social networking sites like MySpace and Bebo should be added to the list of blocked sites as well. I know there's a risk of kids being approached by paedophiles masquerading as 13-year-old girls, but surely the US government has a better method of stopping paedophiles than banning kids from the web?

Info Island

2006-11-17T09:48:00.000-08:00

Just in case you haven't heard about it, Second Life is an online digital world being built by its residents. Currently there are over 1.3 million people creating virtual businesses, bars, parks and of course libraries. Read all about it at the Second Life Library 2.0 blog. They're providing real services to SL residents, answering reference questions, doing training and providing books. The question is though, will there be a need for news librarians in this new world? Reminds me of the "If Media Libraries didn't exist, would we have to invent them", discussion at the AUKML York Conference. Not surprisingly the conclusion was yes but SL offers the chance to put the theory into practice. Any takers?

2006?

2006-11-16T08:16:00.000-08:00

You may recall (who am I kidding?) a post this time last year on women and binge drinking. Well, the festive season is upon us again and, true to form, women are in the firing line. Last month, the Independent on Sunday ran a special report on Women and Drink. Now we're told that three quarters of rape cases thought to involve date-rape drug rohypnol are apparently just down to the woman drinking too much. That's ok then. Surely it won't be long before someone suggests they were asking for it. Behold! BBC Online have beaten us to it. Nice to see they're using the same old photo to trail the story on the front page, too. She should start charging commission.

Articles in UK nationals (not FT) in the past year:

women and alcohol: 176
Women and binge drinking: 34
Men and alcohol: 138
Men and alcohol and violence: 4

Planet of the AP researchers.

2006-11-16T04:53:00.000-08:00

If you're having an 'I hate this job, nobody appreciates me' day and need inspiration, read the article on Associated Press's research centre in the autumn issue of News Library News. A research team that actually has equal footing with reporters! Can I have a job please?

Worldometer

2006-11-15T07:30:00.000-08:00

At the time of writing there have been 93,209 deaths and 226, 622 births in the world today. A quick look at worldometers, world statistics updated in real time, will show what the figures are now. Lots of other useful stats too.

Association of UK Media Librarians

2006-11-13T04:48:00.000-08:00

The Association of UK Media Librarians was 20 years old yesterday. Discover more about the past couple of decades here.

A blow for freedom of information?

2006-11-03T04:05:00.000-08:00

According to the New York Times, a US government website giving the public access to documents relating to the invasion of Iraq has inadvertently provided details of how to make an atom bomb. Oops. The same site posted documents on how to make chemical weapons earlier this year. The site has been taken down while the authorities investigate. The US director of national intelligence opposed the site from the start, but hopefully it will return, minus the incriminating documents, shortly.

Citizens of the web unite!

2006-11-02T06:09:00.000-08:00

Wikipedia founder Larry Sanger is taking the next step in the "can we trust Wikipedia?" debate, by launching a rival, Citizendium. Sanger left Wikipedia shortly after it was launched, concerned that he had no editorial control over postings.
Though it will initially be a fork of Wikipedia, using the same core of articles, Citizendium differs because it bars anonymous editing, so any spurious facts can be traced. It will also employ editors to monitor posts and settle disputes, and 'constables' to block troublesome posters (see Sanger's explanation for more details).
Whether the editing will extend to fact-checking, and whether the site will take off at all when freedom is the main draw of Wikipedia, remains to be seen.

Mis-information Management

2006-10-20T04:20:00.000-07:00

Article in today's Washington Post talks about a US government website that aims at answering conspiracy theories and mis-information. Subjects tackled include: 9/11 was an inside job, US is using organs from dead Iraqis and AIDS was invented in a Pentagon lab.

Brits are better searchers

2006-10-20T03:58:00.000-07:00

This article highlights research that suggests internet searchers in the UK are better than those in the US. It appears that we search less but are better at finding what we want quicker.

Drug testing the librarians

2006-10-19T10:00:00.000-07:00

News from the US is that librarians at public libraries in Levy County, Florida are being tested to see if they've consumed any illegal substances. Whether they're looking for signs of recreational or performance enhancing drugs in the urine samples is not clear . . .

Citizen media

2006-10-19T07:43:00.000-07:00

A weighty article by a cone head called Milverton Wallace on how the web is socialising journalism. Addresses the differences between old and new media, and the response traditional media needs to make to the new wave of amateur reporters.
It seems likely that newspapers will have to adapt if they are to survive - Rupert Murdoch and the Telegraph have already started to integrate.

Your mum

2006-10-13T07:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry, but this has absolutely nothing to do with media libraries but what the heck, it's Friday. From the BBC, a video that reminds us all that you should never let your mum help you launch a political party. Ever.

YouTube

2006-10-11T04:51:00.000-07:00

So YouTube has been bought by Google for £883 million. So what? So you can continue to watch stuff like this . . .

Map resource

2006-10-11T04:43:00.000-07:00

Stumbled across this blogpost of cool/useful map mashups. Worth a bookmark - you never know when you might get asked for a map of the hotspots in Lebanon.

Web libraries

2006-10-06T06:40:00.000-07:00

LibraryThing is a beta site that allows members to catalogue their books online, for free. The beauty of it, aside from the chance to utilise free cataloguing software, is that the site also networks members, so you can link to other libraries containing similar items, or browse content. A search for the tag 'librarians', for example, comes up with some intriguing titles.
Organisations can also hold accounts, paying a minimal fee for anything over 100 books. There's even a blog widget, so readers can browse your library - we'll get back to you when we've weeded out all the embarrassing titles...

Who do you trust?

2006-10-05T04:20:00.000-07:00

A survey by LexisNexis has found that people trust traditional news sources more than blogs and other online media. LN says the "future of trust" lies in mainstream media such as newspapers, magazines, television and radio. Well, I suppose they would say that but the survey did find that more than half of those quizzed (52%) rely on traditional sources for news that significantly affects their lives, while 13% do rely mostly on emerging media, such as citizen journalists, blogs and podcasts.

Very interesting, however, a study by the Newspaper Association of America reveals that monthly visitors to US newspaper websites rose by nearly a third in the first half of 2006 while print readership went on falling. According to Nielsen/NetRatings , the average number of unique visitors to online newspaper sites was more than 55.5m a month compared with 42.2m a year earlier. Alarming for some but it does show that people still turn to mainstream media for news, only in its new media guise.

Dream job in the Caribbean?

2006-10-03T03:44:00.000-07:00

Sounds pretty easy too. Based on a user requirements you can catalogue books under K for Koran although the A-Z of Torture might be a suggested acquisition. If you are interested check out Lisjobs.com

More on web 2.0

2006-09-26T10:42:00.000-07:00

Speaking of YouTube, Media Week this week reports that the site has a 59.9% market share among video-sharing sites; it's nearest rival, Google Video, stands at 16.6%. Not bad for a service that only launched a year and a half ago. YouTube is a useful tool for researchers as well as a chance to laugh at people (see previous post), with up-to-the-minute news broadcasts, particularly from the US - check out Keith Olbermann's defence of Clinton, aired yesterday on MSNBC, for starters.

The good old days

2006-09-26T08:04:00.000-07:00

Also, check out this presentation of how news and broadcast librarians in the 1980s went about their daily tasks. It was prepared and produced by the SLA News Division with photos contributed from over a dozen news media libraries. Younger readers might like to note that it was made before the advent of the World Wide Web.

Librarians become stars of the web (2.0)

2006-09-26T06:33:00.000-07:00

During the recent AUKML conference in Edinburgh speakers frequently referred to the phenomenon of Web 2.0; a world of wikis, blogs, RSS and other such revolutionising cyberspace inventions. In particular the video site Youtube has captured the attention of millions of users worldwide. It makes me proud to see fellow librarians utilising the medium to demonstrate their creativity and humour as well as their technical skills. A fine example is Adventures of Super Librarian and a special mention must go to St Joseph Public County Library for its interpretation of a Madonna classic. Less inspiring though is Marion the Librarian who needs to loosen her bun, ditch the twinset and get out more.

Banned books week

2006-09-25T09:09:00.000-07:00

Meanwhile, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) is celebrating Banned Books Week. The handbook includes a list of banned and challenged books with links to related articles, posters, and links to related sites.

AUKML conference

2006-09-25T09:06:00.000-07:00

It was the Association of UK Media Librarians (AUKML) annual conference over the weekend. Held in Edinburgh, it was the usual serious thinking/serious drinking fest with several delgates staggering around night and day. Links to talks will appear soon but one of the speakers, UKOLN's Brian Kelly, has bookmarked bits of his here. Some were slightly bemused to find the hotel in the midst of the city's red light district although it must be stressed that the social events were most definitely upmarket.

Internet could have been invented earlier

2006-09-13T08:18:00.000-07:00

I recently stumbled a across a yellowed cutting that fell out from a cuttings file on the actress Pauline Collins. The article (pictured left) taken from the now defunked national newspaper "The World Today", suggests that the internet could have been invented by the British Government in 1971. Instead the money was diverted to save a small needle factory in Devon.

Or alternatively, I had too much time on my hands and created the cutting myself using this

Traying off-message

2006-09-13T03:32:00.000-07:00

The undoubted success of New Labour's PR machine will warrant a fat chapter in media studies text books, long after Tony Blair leaves Downing Street. For those of us at the sharp end of spin culture it's easy to get a little jaded of politicians blurting out the party line. It's hardly surprising then, that news librarians, journalist and editors (in that order), long for well-drilled ministers to slip up or stray "off-message", some do it quite naturally, others are just unfortunate.

Pity then MP Caroline Flint's recent appearance on BBC's Newsnight. Tasked with having to defend the Government's relationship with troubled technology supplier ISoft, the Junior Health minister put in a performance Mr Tony would have been proud of.

Having survived a mauling by presenter Emily Matlis imagine Flint's horror then as she pressed play on the video later that evening. Although she maintained a fixed glare at the camera it was the tea lady in the office background who stole the show. Ghanaian born, Nana Amoatin , seemed unconcerned about such weighty matters as government bungling, choosing instead to carry out her tea duties, live broadcast or not. Admirable dedication you might think, but it was Mrs Amoatin's amazing techinque of carrying a full tray of mugs on her head that caught the eye of this librarian. Having passed on the sighting to the Guardian's diary columnist the item was published and sure enough a flurry of reader's emails lit up the editors inbox, eventually prompting the busy editor of BBC's Newsnight to pen an explanation for the programme's blog.

How to bribe the editors

2006-09-12T06:41:00.000-07:00

Just spotted nytimes.com column Ask the Newsroom. It's been running for a few months, giving readers an insight into what goes on behind the scenes at a major daily. This week, assistant managing editor Richard L Berke describes the daily editorial meetings; apparently chocolate is the way to get your story on the front page. Maybe I should try that next time I write a sidebar.

A peek into the Guardian news conference is availbe daily from the Comment is Free website.

Google News Archive (again)

2006-09-07T03:36:00.000-07:00

Over on ResourceShelf, Gary Price has some interesting things to
say about Google News Archive. Well worth a look.

Google News Archive Search

2006-09-06T04:08:00.000-07:00

You can access the archive here

Google living in the past.

2006-09-06T03:29:00.000-07:00

According to reports, Google is extending its news archive so that it goes back two hundred years! Having been a slave to expensive news databases such as Lexis Nexis for years I find it difficult to get much content going back earlier than the mid 90s (and that's the 1990s). One wonders how useful Google's freeNews Archive will actually be.

Shhhhhh!: comedy or tragedy?

2006-09-05T03:08:00.000-07:00

News International's much anticipated freesheet thelondonpaper launched last night. I admit it was an impressive debut; its 'Love' section recounting readers' "dates from hell" and the love columnist with advice for those "back on the market" was especially enticing. However the scoop which will surely secure thelondonpaper's lead in the battle of the freesheets is the revelation that Scottish comedy genius Armando Iannucci has produced a new library based sitcom with Father Ted writer Arthur Mathews called 'Shhhhh!'. An original title for what Mathews describes as a ‘a stupid narrative comedy set in a municipal library’. One can only hope that the show shatters the negative stereotypes us information professionals regularly suffer but I suspect there will be at least one hilarious character with a tight bun and a mothballed cardie. The sitcom will star Morwenna Banks, Rebecca Front, and Simon Greenhall, who played Geordie Michael in I'm Alan Partridge and the pilot is being taped this month.

At the end of the day

2006-09-04T09:18:00.000-07:00

"At the end of the day" was the most over-used cliche in British newspapers and websites between January and June 2006 , according to a new survey by Business news and information provider Factiva. There were 3,347 mentions, closely followed by "in the red" and "level playing field". The research found that financial turns of phrase were most popular, a pattern followed in most of the world's English speaking press. Biggest surprise though was the absence of "looks like a librarian" - must be a mistake. And if the survey was restricted to the library/ information management media, I'm sure that "thinking outside the box" would feature highly.

Here's an index of cliches with a slight US bias, where you can summon up a cliche quicker than shit goes through a goose.

Still alive in the morgues (2)

2006-08-31T07:10:00.000-07:00

Fallout from the Fletcher article continues with a READER COMMENT in Cilip's Gazette. Sadly, not online but below is the text of the article, which appeared in the August 25 2006 edition.

READER COMMENT

News of our death is greatly exaggerated

Journalist Kim Fletcher writing in Media Guardian on 31 July welcomed the demise of the newspaper library and newspaper librarians. He was reacting to the news that the Daily Mail is to ditch both its cuttings library and the librarians working in it. ‘I suspect many journalists,’ he wrote, ‘who denounce the move will struggle to remember the last time they used the cuttings library’. His comment piece reads like the last time he saw the inside of newspaper library was when he went to see Michael Frayn’s play Alphabetical Order in 1975. Things have changed a lot since then.

The image of the librarian is constantly besmirched in the media. This week alone a pop singer was described as a ‘frumpish librarian’, a boring football commentator sounded ‘like a librarian’ and an actor was lampooned for having ‘all the lusty charisma of a librarian’. We have all grown used to these rigid stereotypes and they are nothing to get our brown cardigans in a twist over. What is harder to accept are myths about the work we do.

The view that media libraries exist just to provide a cuttings service is at least five years out-of-date. At the Guardian and Observer Library (now the Research and Information Department) the last hard copy newspaper clipping was safely filed away in 2001. Since then the role of the library and its librarians has vastly changed. As well as fielding enquiries from scores of journalists, librarians are responsible for writing factboxes, cvs and chronologies for publication, compiling primary research and assembling profile packages for features writers. The department is responsible for uploading the newspaper onto electronic databases – a cuttings service without the scissors. It also edits its own intranet, a much-used resource and trains journalists on how to use online sources.

Media librarians were glad to see the back of long days cutting up newspapers (and chasing journalists who’d walked off with files). The fact that journalists now have access to newspapers on their desktops hasn’t made us redundant. Our core skills are still in demand. We’re still archiving and retrieving information, shelving books and doing the odd bit of looseleaf filing. But we’re also doing things that were unheard of for a librarian a decade ago. Some media librarians have morphed into quasi-journalists, producing bylined copy and co-ordinating projects with journalists such as Freedom of Information requests.

Librarians have never feared the future. It was journalists who were desperately clinging on to the cumbersome cuttings file while the ‘disparate’ librarians (as Kim Fletcher describes them) were leading the electronic revolution.

Alan Power, Assistant Librarian/Researcher, Guardian and Observer Newspapers

Still alive in the morgues

2006-08-31T07:02:00.000-07:00

Read Katharine Schopflin's great article in Cilip's UPDATE magazine on the past, present and future of media libraries here.

Love Libraries?

2006-08-24T05:09:00.000-07:00

Working in one every day it would be stretching it to say I love libraries but this campaign is trying to raise awareness of and improve public libraries.
"Love libraries is a campaign to get everyone excited about what public libraries can do for readers and how we can make them better!"
(That's their exclamation mark, not mine.)

Camping

2006-08-23T08:58:00.000-07:00

OK, this isn't about media libraries although I did come across the story as I flicked my way through the London Evening Standard on the way to the Media page. Takeover speculation is looming over outdoor shops group Blacks Leisure today after it issued a second profit warning in a month. Apparently the lack of a Glastonbury festival this year has hit sales badly at its Millets chain.

Now I don't doubt that some festival goers buy their camping stuff at Millets but it sounds a bit lame to be blaming the non-appearance of a three-day event in a field for falling profits. It may be a fallow year at Worthy Farm, but there have been more festivals this year than ever before. It's like blaming a drop in the number of dinner jackets being hired on, say, the non-appearance of the Information Christmas party.

What do librarians know about books, eh?

2006-08-23T05:29:00.000-07:00

Nominations for the Quills, the book awards whose shortlist is drawn up by librarians and booksellers in the US, have been announced. Stephen King, for novel Cells, and Al Gore, for his eco-warrior tome The Inconvenient Truth, head the list.
Critics of the awards say they're too populist, sticking to the lowest common denominator bestseller lists rather than honouring works of literary genius (last year's inaugural overall winner was JK Rowling). But good writing is good writing and surely it's better to honour an author who can captivate many readers rather than one whose books may be well-written but are also unfathomable and unreadable? There's also a sinister overtone that librarians aren't capable of selecting deserving works, which is nonsense - or how did EL Doctorow's The March and David Mitchell's Black Swan Green (favourite to win this year's Booker prize) make the cut? Click here to vote.

Dead or alive?

2006-08-17T05:33:00.000-07:00

If you've ever wondered if that famous actor or singer is still kicking around, check out the Who's Alive and Who's Dead site. Of course it's easy enough to find out by doing the usual sort of searches, but may prove to be useful for more obscure characters. By the way, I found it on the excellent Phil Bradley blog. I also came across Populair, a page listing 100 different sites that keep up with what is new today, what people are taking about etc.

To google: no longer a verb

2006-08-17T04:32:00.000-07:00

Google is trying to encourage people not to use the word Google as a verb in order to protect their brand, according to reports. Companies try to protect their brands by discouraging them from being used generically. So Google don't want you to say "I'll google that" when you mean "I'll search for that on the internet". But you are allowed to use it if you mean "I'll search for that using Google". It's a difficult job because dozens of brands have now lapsed because their use has become generic (eg: cashpoint and cellophane). An extensive list of generic and genericized trademarks courtesy of Wikipedia here.

Beyond the byline

2006-08-16T10:18:00.000-07:00

There's a good explanation of what exactly news librarians do in this month's American Journalism Review. Well worth a look.

Casualty Count

2006-08-16T04:35:00.000-07:00

As a news researcher it's often my job to do body counts. For example how many Israelis and Hezbollah have been killed in the recent conflict. And the next day it gets printed in the paper. One blogger has come up with the ultimate. Who has killed more? God or Satan? And the result is surprisingly surprising . . .

Newspaper librarians fight back

2006-08-07T06:10:00.000-07:00

The backlash from Kim Fletcher's article in the Media Guardian has started. Katherine Schopflin won "letter of week" in Press Gazette and this reply appeared a week later on the MG letters page:

Guardian Media Pages
Fletcher must move out of Memory Lane
7 August 2006
The Guardian

Kim Fletcher claims he is "eager to avoid meandering down Memory Lane" - a quest made difficult by the fact that he probably lives there permanently. (Letting go of libraries is a sad necessity, July 31).The Guardian library (now the Research and Information Department) cut its last newspaper clipping in 2001 and switched to electronic databases for its archived-newspaper needs - a practice typical at most newspapers.

Since the change, media librarians have not been sitting around with idle scissors in hand, they have adapted and diversified to work within the new technological environment. A typical week in the Guardian Research and Information Department sees "librarians" handling research inquiries from scores of journals, factchecking for subs and desk editors, interrogating specialist databases, writing 300 word factboxes and phoning various organisations compiling primary research.

And how does he think newspapers make it on to an electronic database? That'll be the librarians who put it there. Finally it's worth remembering that when newspapers took the decision to ditch hardcopy cuttings and rely solely on electronic archives it was invariably the journalists who resisted moving forward with the times. Had the journalists got their way I would still be wrapped up in "the important business of filing".

Alan Power, Guardian Research & Information Department

Good riddance to the newspaper library?

2006-08-03T03:11:00.000-07:00

Sad to see a column by Kim Fletcher in the Guardian welcoming the demise of the newspaper library. The writer's view of what a media library does and what media librarians do is at least five years out of date though. However, when he describes the librarians he's come across as "disparate", he may just have a point. Expect a backlash though. Librarians are a sensitive bunch.

Fight! Fight! Fight!

2006-07-21T04:42:00.000-07:00

Googlefight compares the popularity of searches on Google. So for example, put BBC News and Guardian Unlimited up against other and see who wins.

U R Hell

2006-07-20T10:29:00.000-07:00

Here's a list of unfortunate urls that need a bit of re-thinking. They include:

Need a therapist? Try Therapist Finder at
www.therapistfinder.com

and

A site called ‘Who Represents‘ where you can find the name of the agent that represents a celebrity. Their domain name… wait for it… is
www.whorepresents.com

Build your own search engine.

2006-07-14T07:41:00.000-07:00

Here's a bit of Friday fun. It may have taken many years, big brains and much cash to develop Google but in moments the whole search engine could be yours. You can change it so the Google banner is replaced with your name. Go here to give it a go.

How to become a librarian.

2006-07-13T07:59:00.000-07:00

The Times have produced a short article on how to become a librarian. It will be news to some journalists and lawyers that I've worked for that not only do you have to "have a degree to be a librarian!?!?" you also need a masters as well(?!!!).

Are you reading the news?

2006-07-11T08:22:00.000-07:00

Apparently news stories on the web are barely read by anyone 36 hours after they were posted. That's the message from a team of statistical physicists at the University of Notre Dame in the US and colleagues in Hungary who have analysed how people access information online. The short life of a news item implies that people could miss significant news by not visiting the site when a new document is first displayed, which is a good reason for publishers providing e-mail news alerts. The full story on physicsweb.