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The ALA Intellectual Freedom Committee approved seven new privacy checklists at the 2017 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Atlanta to help libraries of all types and capacities take practical steps to protect patron privacy. The checklists complement the Library Privacy Guidelines approved by the IFC in 2016. The topics include checklists on ebook lending and digital content vendors, library management systems, public access computers, and students in K–12 schools....
Office for Intellectual Freedom, Feb. 7 |
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Gennie Gebhart writes: “As a school librarian at a small K–12 district in Illinois, Angela K. is at the center of a battle of extremes in educational technology and student privacy. In search of a middle ground that serves students, Angela is asking hard, fundamental questions like, ‘We can use technology to do this, but should we?’ School librarians are uniquely positioned to navigate this middle ground and advocate for privacy, both within the school library itself and in wider conversations about technology.”...
Electronic Frontier Foundation, Feb. 8; American Libraries, May 2, 2016 |
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Pew Research Center took on the unusual task of staying in touch with more than 2,000 US adults who get at least some news online over the course of a week. The study ran from February 24 to March 1, 2016. When asked how they arrived at news content, online news consumers were about equally likely to get news by going directly to a news website (36%, on average) as getting it through social media (35%). They were less likely to access news through emails, text messages, or search engines....
Pew Research Center, Feb. 9 |
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Paula Wilson writes: “In ‘Librarian Takes It Off in the Stacks; Goes Viral,’ I left some unanswered questions: How do public libraries teach information literacy? How do they incorporate it into their programming? In ‘Fighting Fake News,’ Marcus Banks spotlights an eight-week training course in community journalism for high school students hosted by the Dallas Public Library. Programs like this exist for college and high school students, but what about everyone else? How do public librarians reach the rest of the population?”...
Public Libraries Online, Jan. 9, Feb. 9; American Libraries, Dec. 27, 2016 |
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Natalya Sharina, a Ukrainian librarian held under house arrest in Russia since October 2015, has taken her case to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Since her arrest in 2015, the Russian authorities have extended the order for Sharina, director of the Ukrainian Literature Library in Moscow, to be detained at home repeatedly, despite calls for her release. Sharina went on trial in November 2016 for incitement by keeping books that Russia and labelled extremist and “anti-Russian propaganda.”...
The Guardian (UK), Feb. 9; Oct. 29, 2015 |
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Susan Musser writes: “From 1984 to 1988, OCLC held an annual contest asking librarians to submit slogans to be considered for printing on promotional buttons. They were handed out at library events. ‘Terminals of Endearment’ got me thinking about the first days of online, cooperative cataloging. The return of the OCLC Button Contest in 2017 gave us the opportunity to again ask librarians to submit quips, slogans, and puns that would reverberate throughout the community. The results we received did not disappoint.”...
OCLC Next, Feb. 2 |
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In celebration of Black History Month, on February 23 join author Cheryl Knott (Not Free, Not for All: Public Libraries in the Age of Jim Crow) and civil rights activist Geraldine Edwards Hollis (Back to Mississippi), along with artists Michael Crowell and Chapel Hill (N.C.) Public Library Director Susan Brown, for an engaging and educational conversation on the history of libraries and life in the Jim Crow South. The webinar is sponsored by the Freedom to Read Foundation....
Freedom to Read Foundation |
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Kelly Jensen writes: “It’s impossible to be a neutral space with the goal of reaching a community, be it the public or the academic or the special population the library serves. By inviting all in a community to be in a shared space, libraries embrace the idea of encouraging education, encouraging acceptance and tolerance, and on a much smaller scale, they create policies that ensure these very things happen in their spaces. Here’s a look at some of the recent actions taken by libraries of all shapes and sizes and specialties around the US.”...
Book Riot, Feb. 10
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Federal government statistics provide critical information to the country and serve a key role in a democracy. For decades, sample surveys with instruments carefully designed for particular data needs have been one of the primary methods for collecting data. However, costs have been increasing and response rates are declining. Innovations in Federal Statistics, published in 2017 by the National Academies Press, describes a paradigm shift in federal statistical programs that would use multiple data sources....
National Academies Press
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Megan Harris writes: “The Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh lends and tracks more than 8 million items all over Allegheny County. Tons of books, but also music, TV series, movies, baby dolls, air quality monitors, musical instruments, podcasting equipment, and more. Some of those materials are pretty new to the library. But the way it gets to Pittsburgh consumers is very, very old. Collection Coordinator Sarah Beasley’s team is constantly investigating books to decide how many of each title patrons might need.”...
WESA-FM, Pittsburgh, Pa., Feb. 9
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Monique O. Madan writes: “Virtual reality simulations, talking robots, and a magic school bus—this is what happens when a theme park company designs a library. Landmark Entertainment Group has partnered with the city of Homestead, Florida, to create the world’s first Cybrary. It will boast almost a dozen attractions including a massive circuit tree. Visitors will get the chance to take part in augmented reality experiences, where characters will climb out of books and come to life by way of goggles or a headset.”...
Miami Herald, Feb. 8
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Eric Griffith writes: “A brand-new Windows computer should be pristine out of the box. After all, you haven’t gummed it up yet with software, right? Leave that to the computer manufacturers. They’ll gum it up for you with ‘free’ software you don’t want. It goes by names like crapware, bloatware, or shovelware because computer makers shovel bloated nonsense by the barrelful onto new PCs.” Here are a few ways to get rid of unwanted programs....
PC Magazine, Feb. 10
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