jessamyn

maybe ALA just needs a minister of public blogs?

Karen shares her opinions about what ALA could be doing better with their web site, and with technology cluefulness in general. Her idea sounds like it might even be able to be implemented before the end of the year.

ALA just needs to be aware of and post to the existing meta-blogs. They need a Minister of Public Blogs to post, read, and interact with the blogging community (and maybe, just maybe maintain a blog). Then again, if we want to get big-picture about it, ALA needs to get clueful and a little lighter on their feet about new technologies. Not everything needs an Action Plan and a Vision Statement and a Matrix, plus a spring conference with the usual suited suspects jostling for eminence on something they barely understand.

wifi in practice

Posted on 30Aug04 by jessamyn

As far as my unofficial survey of libraries using WiFi, I only got a few responses. Most libraries said they disable their WiFi when the building itself isn’t open, citing security and bandwidth concerns. A few just leave their access point open and said they don’t care who is using it. A few have patron-only authentication. Some are part of campus-wide systems where the library is one of many nodes and they do nothing particular as “the library” as opposed to part of the WiFi network. It’s a whole new paradigm. Along those same lines, here’s a column about things to consider when securing WiFI in a public library

rss feed of library books

Posted on 30Aug04 by jessamyn

Creating an RSS feed of the books you have checked out of the library, a neat tool from Peter R. Steven thinks he should contact Dynix and other vendors to show this tool off. I’d love to see it integrated into an OPAC but with our Sirsi OPAC, I’m just hoping for Netscape 7.1 support.

anarchist librarian Chuck0 makes the big time

Posted on 30Aug04 by jessamyn

My pal — librarian Chuck Munson — has hit the big time and gives a small interview to the New York Times talking about anarchism and the RNC. Close readers will notice that he got his plane ticket to the RNC from getting bumped from a flight at ALA.

maybe what the ala web site needs is blogs?

Posted on 26Aug04 by jessamyn

Michael would like to see the ALA web site have blogs. I would just like to see the site have a well-functioning search engine, not say things like “the content should be here in mid-August” in late August, and not have pages like this or this or an organizational FAQ like this. If you’d like to know what progress is being made, you can check the ALA Website Advisory Committee Documents and their list of weighted priorities and of course, the status report.