Hi. I’ve returned from the scenic wonderfulness of New York City only to hit an all-day snowstorm here. I was pleasantly suprised that at least two of the films I got to review for the Media That Matters film festival mentioned libraries! If you’re a librarian, you might be interested in the ways you can use Media Rights’ films and videos as a resource for your library.
digital divide up close and personal
Check me out! There’s an article this week in my alternative weekly about my email class and technology in general in Vermont’s libraries.
[P]roviding free Internet access and tech support to patrons in a rural state is a real challenge; what Vermont libraries offer varies wildly from town to town. The kind of training users receive depends entirely on who’s behind the desk when they ask for help. And poorer communities — which need this access and support the most — are still often least likely to have it, despite grant funding
good and bad web design, let’s be honest here
Erica Olsen astutely and succinctly puts her finger on it. A lot of library web sites suck. If they’re not flat out ugly, they’re deficient in other ways like usability, accessibility, poorly customized templates or just plain old lack of updates. They ignore conventional widsom about web design standards and fail to use clear page titles, citeable URLs, coherent navigational structures and, amazingly, meta tags. They have bad, or severely lacking, search capabilities. I’m not sure why this is true, and libraries certainly aren’t the only profession so afflicted but we are one that should know better. Erica’s not all snark though, she also includes a list of examples of good design in a subsequent post.
USAPA town meeting in VT
I went to the town meeting that Trina Magi and Bernie Sanders hosted at Vermont Law School last week. It’s nice to know that a local news report about the meeting was entered into the Congressional Record.
One man asked how to best strike a balance between preserving civil liberties and vigilance against terrorist threats. Magi said it was something people would have to decide for themselves. “I think it’s really legitimate to be afraid of terrorists,” she said. “We can also be afraid of an overreaching government that stretches too far into our lives. There are plenty of examples of lives that were ruined by a government that was not restrained.” [thanks ej]
putting the RFID into aFRaID
Berkeley Public Library is going RFID in order to reduce theft and worker injuries. The outlay of cash comes at a time when the library can ill-afford it. From what I’ve been hearing, this will cost roughly 50 cents a book and has also been the impetus for a massive weeding campaign where books not deemed wirth a fifty cent RFID tag are being tossed.
The library has slashed its books and materials budget by 25 percent and has been scrambling to raise funds to recover about $300,000 for books by June. What’s more, 15 staff positions have been left vacant, and up to a dozen people could be laid off in the coming fiscal year, Griffin said. Additionally, library hours have been reduced by 16 hours weekly at the central library and 12 hours a week at the four branches.