Here’s my latest collection of news and opinion of interest regarding the library.
The World Almanac puts out a call for help to librarians (and includes links to even more librarian blogs than I already read). Having been a compulsive reader of The World Almanac since childhood, I stammer and drool when I hear my help is needed.
Lots of discussion regarding issues regarding the homeless in libraries (hey, the homeless are patrons too!):
- homeless and libraries and the high cost of perceived safety, by Jessamyn West on librarian.net
- How the Public Library Became Heartbreak Hotel, by Chip Ward in TomDispatch
- Discussion at MetaFilter: Don’t mind me, I’m dead
ACRLog debates the future of the Reference Desk. I’m all in favor of an hovering reference-o-matic platforms myself.
This doesn’t really have much to do with libraries, although it is a book that will be in libraries, and the coolest website around: No One Belongs Here More Than You: Stories by Miranda July.
I totally want to hang this flyer from Tinfoil + Raccoon in my library. I like the Spinal Tap reference especially.
Tame the Web reports on a Looking for a Good Book readers’ service at Williamsburg Regional Library. This warms the cockles of my heart since this once was my local public library and it’s good to see them at the forefront of technology. The two libraries in the system despite their small size have excellent collections. In fact, when I was in college I often found books I needed at Williamsburg Public Library that were checked out or otherwise unavailable at the college library.
Lorcan Dempsey’s weblog has a good tribute to the book, which in itself is an advanced form of technology. Makes sense, after all I have a degree in Library Science to deal with this technology.
As if I needed BBC news to tell me, LIBRARIANS SUFFER THE MOST STRESS!!!!. Circ and Serve has suggestions for how to manage your time and multi-task to help reduce that stress (none of which involve beer kegs at the circ desk).
That’s it for the cruelest month. There are many librarians a-tap-tap-tapping on their keyboards, so I’ll have more to share in the merry month of May.
Panorama of the Mountains 
More on the reference desk debate in The Chronicle of Higher Education: Are Reference Desks Dying Out? by Scott Carlson.
LikeLike
I wish my advice could include beer kegs at the circ desk. I have often said working the circ desk would be a lot more fun if we had bars in our offices.
LikeLike
The marble desktop at my library seems so suited to sliding beer mugs across.
LikeLike
See, they make them that way just to mess around with our heads.
LikeLike