Battle of the smartphone operating systems
Jeffrey L. Wilson and William Fenton write: “Apple iOS 5 is here. Cupertino’s mobile operating system brings advanced, centralized notifications, cable-free setup, wireless iTunes syncing, and other enticing features to the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. It’s certainly attractive software, but it isn’t the only new smartphone OS packing a wealth of goodies: Android 2.3 Gingerbread, Windows Phone 7.5 Mango, and BlackBerry 7 OS are also very competent competitors. Here we’ve highlighted several of the iOS 5’s most exciting features and compared them to its rivals.”...
PC Magazine, Oct. 19

First look at Android’s Ice Cream Sandwich
Whitson Gordon writes: “Google just unveiled its new Galaxy Nexus phone, along with a preview of Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, coming to phones next year. Here’s a look at the creamy new update to the Android operating system. Most of what’s gone into Ice Cream Sandwich is polish, making Android slicker, easier to use, and (finally) more consistent across the board. This isn’t a comprehensive list; this is just what Google demoed at the October 18 event—so there’s probably even more to come.”...
Lifehacker, Oct. 18; Gizmodo, Oct. 18

Google releases updated Translate app
Google has just released a new version of its Google Translate application for Android. In January, Google launched Conversation Mode in the app, which allowed speech-to-speech, direct translations, and supported English and Spanish. Today, Google is chipping away at the language barrier further by expanding that feature to cover 14 languages. Google also allows you to correct your speech before translating it in the event that the app mishears you, and to add unrecognized or custom words to a personal dictionary. Watch the video (1:13)....
This Is My Next..., Oct. 13; YouTube, Oct. 13

The best damn point-and-shoot, period
Kyle VanHemert writes: “Though many point-and-shoot cameras are the province of the girl-who-obsessively-documented-every-party-in-college demographic, every so often there’s one that makes self-styled serious photographers stop and say ‘whoa.’ The Canon S90 was one of them, and its successor, the S95, is even better. It’s slim enough to actually fit in your pants pocket, but its bigger-than-usual image sensor makes for beautiful snapshots, even in low light.”...
The Wirecutter, Sept. 26

Number of Facebook friends linked to brain growth
Scientists funded by the Wellcome Trust have found a direct link between the number of Facebook friends a person has and the size of particular brain regions. In a study published October 18, researchers at University College London also showed that the more Facebook friends a person has, the more real-world friends they are likely to have. However, the researchers stress that they have found a correlation and not a cause; it is not possible to say whether having more Facebook friends makes the regions of the brain larger or whether some people are hard-wired to have more friends....
Wellcome Trust, Oct. 18

Toggl helps you discover where your time goes
Justin Pot writes: “If you’re like most people, your job requires that you focus on more than one task every day. It’s easy, under such circumstances, to have no idea which tasks are taking up most of your time—or, for that matter, which tasks are wasting your time. With a full-featured web client plus apps for Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android, Toggl can help you track your time anywhere you might be.”...
Mashable, Oct. 19

Bogus battery upgrade warnings on Android devices
Tom Spring writes: “Scareware has gone mobile: Users of Android devices are starting to see sleazy ads warning that they need to upgrade their device’s battery. The supposed battery-saver apps that those ads prod you to download, however, could endanger your privacy or siphon money from your wallet—and generally they’ll do nothing to improve your gadget’s battery life, security experts say.”...
PC World, June 5, Oct. 16

Amazon signs up authors directly
Amazon.com has taught readers that they do not need bookstores. Now it is encouraging writers to cast aside their publishers. Amazon will publish 122 books this fall in an array of genres, in both physical and ebook form. It is a striking acceleration of the retailer’s fledging publishing program that will place Amazon squarely in competition with the New York houses that are also its most prominent suppliers. Publishers say Amazon is aggressively wooing some of their top authors....
New York Times, Oct. 16

The economics of open access
T. Scott Plutchak writes: “Librarians have supported the open access movement for a variety of reasons, some of them more rational than others. The emotional motivators come from the frustration of feeling economically powerless in the face of ever-escalating subscription and licensing prices. But as David Crotty reports in The Scholarly Kitchen, PLoS achieved a 20% margin in 2010, and if the trends continue, could conceiveably surpass Elsevier’s margin for 2011. Springer claims double-digit profits from BioMed Central.”...
T. Scott, Oct. 14; The Scholarly Kitchen, Sept. 28

The shrinking orphan works problem
Joseph Esposito writes: “There are thousands or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands or millions of orphan works; no one really knows the number. But it’s getting smaller all the time. The number of orphan works is shrinking because books that could have been orphans are being researched and their copyright owners identified—or they are being found to be in the public domain. And the number of new books being sent to the orphanage is not growing and won’t grow, despite the fact that more books are being published than ever.”...
The Scholarly Kitchen, Oct. 18

Two authors, double the fun
Donna Seaman writes: “Step one, read Saul Bellow’s lengthy masterpiece, The Adventures of Augie March. That is this fall’s selection for One Book, One Chicago, the 10th anniversary of the Chicago Public Library program. The library invited two powerhouse YA writers, John Green and Benjamin Alire Sáenz, to talk with me about Augie March and their young adult characters and the entire endeavor of becoming who we are. I can’t rave enough about Ben Sáenz and John Green and their work. Invite them to your library. Recommend their books.”...
Booklist Online: Likely Stories, Oct. 18

The author school visit
YA author Jay Asher writes: “There was one aspect of being a YA author I was most nervous about: The School Visits. A lot of people think that in order to write a book like Thirteen Reasons Why, I must’ve had a horrible high school experience. While I was glad to leave my years of public education behind, I got through relatively unscarred. But, like many people, I was terrified of public speaking. Knowing about my fear, and of the importance in spreading the word about my debut novel, my agent arranged for me to speak at a school near where she worked.”...
YALSA The Hub, Oct. 17

33 scary stories you can read right now
Matthew Jackson writes: “A horror short story is a tight bullet of creepiness you can read in half an hour and then stay up all night thinking about. So it’s no coincidence that many of the greatest horror writers of all time are as famous for their short fiction as for their longer work. Few genres are better suited to the structure and pace of the short story than horror. Here are 33 stories from classic horror writers.”...
Blastr, Oct. 8

Bram Stoker’s notebook discovered
The private notebook of Bram Stoker (right) has been discovered in an attic on the Isle of Wight in the UK, offering cryptic clues into the origins of the author’s most famous work, Dracula. Providing a snapshot of Dublin between 1871 and 1881, as well as a window on the life of the very private Stoker, the notebook was found by the author’s great-grandson, Noel Dobbs. The Lost Journals of Bram Stoker, complete with annotations, is now lined up for publication by Robson Press next year, marking the centenary of Bram Stoker’s death in 1912....
The Guardian (U.K.), Oct. 18

Epic fantasy turns to gritty realism
Kelly Faircloth writes: “With the runaway success of George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice series, even epic fantasy has toned down the sword-and-sorcery, and ramped up the gritty realism. At New York Comic Con’s ‘Winter is Here’ panel, Brandan Sanderson, Peter V. Brett, and other authors offered their theories.”...
io9, Oct. 18

Bohemian books
Richard Davies writes: “Our latest feature is Bohemian books. We have selected books that reflect the Bohemian lifestyle that still resonates with creative types today. There is Bohemian-themed fiction, books written by über-Bohemians like Henry Miller and Robert Service, and nonfiction about Bohemianism itself. Many of our choices are vintage editions and we have not strayed into the Beat Generation or the Counterculture writing of the 1960s, even though both of these subgenres are linked to Bohemianism.”...
Reading Copy Book Blog, Oct. 17

Collecting celebrity yearbooks
Steven J. Gertz writes: “The celebrity school yearbook has always had a place in the rare book world. Whether acquiring volumes to complete collections of particular literary, Hollywood, sports, political, or other cultural icons, or collecting them as a genre, it’s a fascinating pastime for the fan and guilty pleasure for the jaded. I love going through celebrity high school and college yearbooks. They bring back such golden memories. Marilyn Monroe (above) and I went to the same high school in Los Angeles.”...
Booktryst, Oct. 17

The blank history of the blank book
Chela Metzger writes: “Blank books, or bound record-keeping structures, have always had separate traditions within the bookbinding craft. These traditions are not always well documented in histories of the book or in manuals of bookbinding. Examining the material culture of blank book bindings can reveal how manuscript traditions carried on far beyond the advent of print. Scholars have begun to look at how record-keeping traditions helped shape ways of thinking.” This video presentation (14:59) introduces the bibliography of the blank book and describes the sorts of questions blank books can answer....
YouTube, Oct. 14

Occupying librarians
In the metro Atlanta area, a group of activists have symbolically occupied Woodruff Park in the very heart of the city, at Five Points. Christine Fraser, a librarian and writer, gives her perspective on the Occupy Atlanta demonstrations in this video (3:11). She is an underemployed part-time library worker and she is “terrified” of her student loan payments, which will begin soon and require her to pay $600–$700 a month, and she wants politicians to care about people like her. Occupy Worcester’s Elizabeth Westie said she lost her full-time job as a middle school librarian four or five years ago. Westie is also worried that the next generation is saddled with school debt, can’t find high-paying jobs, and will never kick off that debt saddle....
YouTube, Oct. 16; Worcester (Mass.) Telegram and Gazette, Oct. 17

Libraries and open government
In recent years, government has increasingly embraced the proactive disclosure of information and created online tools to increase transparency. But how do Americans discover that information? Who helps them learn how to use complex government databases and tools? The answer may be a surprisingly familiar one: libraries....
OMB Watch, Oct. 12

Shutting down open resources
Libby A. Nelson writes: “It’s been less than a month since the U.S. Labor Department announced $500 million in grants for community colleges to develop job-training programs and make them free for other institutions to use, but the program is already facing a threat to its existence. A provision in the proposed House budget for fiscal year 2012 would stop the federal government from using grant programs to develop new courses, learning materials, or related projects unless the labor secretary verifies that similar programs are not already available for purchase or ‘under development.’ The move is a boon to publishers.”...
Inside Higher Ed, Sept. 27, 30, Oct. 18

New monthly newsletter for federal librarians
In August, the U.S. Government Printing Office published the first issue of a new newsletter, FDLP Connection, which highlights the goals, achievements, activities, and stories from throughout the Federal Depository Library Program. Help make FDLP Connection a success by contributing content and submitting suggestions on how to improve the service through askGPO. Back issues are viewable on the FDLP Desktop....
FDLP Desktop, Aug. 1

The power of blogs
John Dupuis writes: “I’ve long been a believer in the power of blogs to drive and aggregate conversations at every level. Frivolous, for sure. But also serious and scholarly. In librarianship, blogs are a powerful source of comment, theory, and practical advice. I’ve always thought that the practical side of the library world was ripe to be the first field to truly leave journals behind and embrace blogging as a kind of replacement. The kinds of discussions we see in the best of the library blogosphere are as good as anything we see in the formal literature.”...
Confessions of a Science Librarian, Oct. 19

How to fill in your Facebook Timeline
Amy-Mae Elliott writes: “After about one-third of Mashable readers expressed an interest in filling in at least a portion of their Facebook Timelines, we thought we’d demonstrate how to populate your Facebook history with content. Facebook has made adding events to your new Timeline quite easy, but there are a few different methods, and a few privacy-related points to note.”...
Mashable, Oct. 11

Is Google+ dying?
Chad Vander Veen writes: “Initially launched as invite-only, Google+ saw a meteoric rise in traffic, claiming nearly 120 million unique visitors. But since the invite-only period closed, traffic has plunged 60%, according to numbers released by data analytics firm Chitika. Chitika cites two reasons for Google+’s sudden descent. First, ‘the supply of users for social media sites is limited. To survive you must stand out and provide a service that others do not.’ Second, ‘features unique to your site must be just that—unique and difficult to duplicate—if they are not, the competitive advantage quickly disappears.’”...
Government Technology, Oct. 18; Chitika Insights, Oct. 7

Making search more secure
Evelyn Kao writes: “As search becomes an increasingly customized experience, we recognize the growing importance of protecting the personalized search results we deliver. As a result, we’re enhancing our default search experience for signed-in users. Over the next few weeks, many of you will find yourselves redirected to https://www.google.com (note the extra ‘s’) when you’re signed in to your Google Account. This change encrypts your search queries and Google’s results page.”...
Official Google Blog, Oct. 18

How libraries are doing more with less
Cat Johnson writes: “Do more with less. It’s a popular refrain these days, and one that libraries are all too familiar with. Retooling the ways that they share information and resources while simultaneously juggling financial issues, the challenges before libraries are significant. But with the support of their communities, libraries are moving into the future.”...
Shareable: Cities, Oct. 17

Are we in the DIY era?
Brian Mathews writes: “A core theme I see in LibQUAL+ data is that most libraries do pretty well in the service dimension, but when it comes to enabling users to help themselves, their perceptions are typically much lower. But is this changing? Over the past several months (years?) a common theme seems to popping up everywhere: self-service. Our challenge, as a profession, is going to be allowing ourselves to let users have more control over their library experiences.”...
Chronicle of Higher Education: The Ubiquitous Librarian, Oct. 13

Appalachian Prison Book Project seeks donations
The Appalachian Prison Book Project, a program that aims to rehabilitate inmates by giving them free books to read, has lost their funding and is looking for book donations. The most sought-after books from the program are dictionaries, auto repair manuals, psychology textbooks, and fiction. And for security purposes, all donations must be paperback. You can donate online....
GalleyCat, Oct. 18

A library is not . . .
Phil Bradley writes: “A library is not a building. Nor is it a collection of books or resources. Problems arise when the library and librarians are not seen as part of the backbone of a community. Once this happens, it becomes logical to think of cutting it. The decisions of councils and mayors with little brain are a total puzzlement, when viewed in the light of how we see libraries. They see them as a resource that isn’t part of a community. We have an insane situation where a community is apparently forced to choose between having a library and caring for its elderly and deprived.”...
Phil Bradley’s Weblog, Oct. 13; The Guardian: Patrick Butler’s Cuts Blog, Oct. 5

Seven more strategies for library job seekers
Ellyssa Kroski writes: “In September I wrote a post about ‘13 Resources and Tips for Library Job Seekers’ that was very popular with iLibrarian readers, so as a follow-up I thought I’d post some more tips and strategies that I’ve found helpful in the past. If you’re looking to land a library job in today’s competitive market, here are some recommendations to get you started.”...
iLibrarian, Sept. 30, Oct. 17

Five things you might not know about being a branch manager
An anonymous public librarian writes: “Three weeks ago I started a new job as a Librarian II at a branch of a big city library system in Texas. Since my branch’s manager position is currently vacant, I quickly found out that I’m in charge when our interim manager from another branch isn’t around, which is pretty much all the time. These are some things I have learned about managing in that time.”...
Letters to a Young Librarian, Oct. 14

Charles Bukowski on censorship
In 1985, following a complaint from a local reader, staff at the Public Library in Nijmegen, Netherlands, decided to remove Charles Bukowski’s book Tales of Ordinary Madness from the shelves while declaring it “very sadistic, occasionally fascist, and discriminatory against certain groups (including homosexuals).” In the following weeks, a local journalist by the name of Hans van den Broek wrote to Bukowski and asked for his opinion. His brilliant response can be read here....
Letters of Note, Oct. 18

Coworking at the public library
Phil Shapiro writes: “Coworking is a modern work innovation where people in various creative professions share a common work space, synergizing their talents and making best use of fixed-cost resources. Here is a portrait of how coworking might develop in public library spaces. Do you work as a computer programmer, writer, editor, animator, or graphic designer? Would you like a free desk to do work at your public library? What’s the catch? The catch is that you need to contribute 10% or 20% of your time to serving the public in some way.”...
PC World, Oct. 13

Invisible goalposts, support, and having a plan
Meredith Farkas writes: “Over the past five years or so, the requirements for librarians to get tenure at my institution have increased. One colleague told me that back in the day, if you got one peer-reviewed article published, you’d be fine. That is far from the reality now. We’ve been having conversations at the library about how to support people on the tenure track, because right now, the only benefit in terms of time that we have are five research days per year. Not exactly enough for the kind of scholarly productivity we’re expected to have.”...
Information Wants To Be Free, Oct. 17

The risks and rewards of collaboration
Jennifer Howard writes: “Big-scale collaborations and digital-era collection strategies took center stage at the Association of Research Libraries’ membership meeting, held in Washington, D.C., October 11–13. Those who attended heard from librarians about how they operate in a hybrid research environment that’s partly but not entirely digital. The meeting was followed by a forum—organized by ARL and the Coalition for Networked Information—that took up the theme of ‘21st-Century Collections and the Urgency of Collaborative Action.’ Think big but don’t overextend yourselves, and work together whenever you can: Those were the takeaways.”...
Chronicle of Higher Education: Wired Campus, Oct. 16

How librarians networked in the 1600s
Intense intellectual exchanges and joint work on projects over large distances happened as early as Habsburg times. The manuscripts of Court Librarian Peter Lambeck (1628–1680, right), head of Vienna’s Hofbibliothek (Imperial Library), show he was an expert in content management and social networking. Lambeck is considered one of the most significant, ambitious, and best-connected players in Austrian library history because he was a passionate correspondent and made use of his connections to Europe’s scientific network....
Science 2.0, Oct. 17

Bring Your Own Device: An ethical dilemma
Doug Johnson writes: “Long before the term BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) became popular, our school district permitted personally owned student devices on our wireless networks to give students internet access. We’ve never had a district-level policy banning phones, laptops, or other student technologies. And while our buildings and individual teachers certainly have rules guiding their use, students can use their own equipment on all our campuses. So an interesting thing happened on Tuesday that was at least partially enabled by this open-access policy.”...
The Blue Skunk Blog, Oct. 14

A closer look at subject access
Karen Coyle writes: “What I find odd today in libraries (mainly public libraries) is that we do not have an entry vocabulary for the Dewey classification. Libraries in the U.S. use the Library of Congress Subject Headings even when their classification scheme is Dewey. While LC subject headings will lead you to a catalog entry that has a classification number, they aren’t an index to that classification scheme. Another oddity is that we never explain these classification numbers to the users. It seems truly odd that we order the books on the shelf but do not tell users what the order means.”...
Coyle’s InFormation, Oct. 17

Bad boss behaviors
Will Manley writes: “While many aspiring supervisors learn their supervisory behaviors from bad bosses, a few insightful staffers watch the bad boss and learn the don’ts. Here is where, with your help, this blog can be a great resource for the library profession. Off the top of my head I am going to list some of the bad boss behaviors I witnessed in my working days. Hopefully this list will make the rounds and maybe we can change some bad behaviors. Although, I have to ironically admit that one of the defining characteristics of a bad boss is an unwillingness to admit faults. Oh well, let’s try it anyway.”...
Will Unwound, Oct. 18

Five challenges every librarian must face
Steve Matthews writes: “Nowhere is change more evident than in the library profession. We are seeing commercial competition for information access and delivery services arise routinely, making ineffective our attempts to serve young library customers whose needs we don’t understand. There are at least five major challenges that every librarian will face. Whether you overcome these challenges will determine whether you become a 21st-century librarian, and ultimately whether you, your library, and your profession survive.”...
21st Century Library Blog, Oct. 12

Monmouth University gets Bruce Springsteen
Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey, will be the new home for the Bruce Springsteen Special Collection, formerly housed at the Asbury Park Public Library, effective November 1. The collection, the most extensive of its kind, is comprised of books, concert programs, magazine and newspaper articles, and other printed ephemera dedicated to the careers of Jersey Shore rock legend Bruce Springsteen and members of his bands....
Monmouth University, Oct. 17

Stay healthy @ your library
Now is the time—with the onset of cold and flu season, as well as the commemoration of Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October—to remind your library users of all the healthy-living resources available at your library this fall, winter, and throughout their lives. Here are just a few examples of what libraries are doing to keep users healthy....
ALA Public Information Office, Oct. 18

Talk to your teens
Linda W. Braun writes: “One of the assignments I include in a library school class I teach is called Talk To Teens. Students can only complete (and succeed in) the assignment if they talk with teens about books, technology, libraries, and more. Sometimes students talk with teens face-to-face. Sometimes students talk using technology. And sometimes it’s a mixture of methods in which the conversations take place. Promoting technology in libraries doesn’t negate the power and necessity of talking with teens on a regular basis.”...
YALSA Blog, Oct. 15

Take time for teens
RoseMary Honnold writes: “Teens can be a bit leery of adults, sporting a well-earned paranoia that the adults are suspicious and watching them for misdeeds. So, finding ways that make it easy and comfortable for teens to talk with you is a big step to building relationships with them and making the library a more welcoming place. At the Coshocton (Ohio) Public Library, I posted a sign in the YA room that said, ‘Take Time to Talk to Your Librarian: This is no trick, you are in for a treat if you go say hello to RoseMary this week!’”...
YALSA Blog, Oct. 17

Build your own paper bookmobile
Illustrator Bob Staake created this print-and-cut-out paper bookmobile for schools, librarians, kids, adults, and bibliophiles—“because you can’t make this on an iPad or a Kindle.” He bills it as a relic of a bygone era, when “books were made of paper and libraries came with wheels.”...
Bob Staake, Oct. 18

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