March 18th, 2010 Brian Herzog
A couple years ago, Encyclopedia Britannica was on an anti-Wikipedia kick, fearing, I think, that this would be the fate of print encyclopedias:
I’m happy (and not surprised) to report this didn’t happen. I believe the same will prove true with the notion of ebooks making print books obsolete. This is a big world, and things have a way of finding their own niche. Radio lives on despite television (and movies and computers), pencils live on despite pens, candles live on despite electricity, bicycles live on despite cars, etc.
Many of the books I own are older than I am, and I’m sure they’ll still be around (and in use) after I’m gone.
via
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Posted under Books, Random | No Comments »
March 16th, 2010 Brian Herzog
I’ve had ebooks on the brain lately for a few reasons, so I thought I’d pull together some resources I’ve been bookmarking.
But first, my reasons:
- My consortium will soon be offering ebooks via Overdrive. This is good, as Overdrive ebooks are compatible with Sony Reader and the Nook, but will still include existing Overdrive drawbacks
- The IT Section of the New England Library Association is devoting our spring workshop to ebooks. Speakers will range from libraries already circulating ebooks and ereaders to a certain library that made waves by going digital to a book store that takes digitized books and makes them print again. It will be a great day, and I’ll post more details soon.
Ebooks are certainly in the cards for libraries, and hopefully not like these comic strips. In no particular order, here are a few ebook-related links worth reading:
Ebook Reader Reviews and Guides and Deconstruction
A nice introduction to ereaders and ebooks, “7 Things You Should Know About E-Readers,” from EDUCAUSE, focusing on teaching and learning:
Reviews of ereaders from various sources:
The eBook Buyer’s Guide to Privacy from the EFF talks about how each of the most popular ebook readers rate as far as privacy, tracking of purchases, sharing of information, etc.
I’ve seen a little discussion on the topic of “why digital,” and this is a good evaluation of how and when and why technology matches content:
Ebook Price Wars
This is worth watching, because low prices means lots of people purchased the hardware, but rising prices means people will be coming to the library for ebooks instead of purchasing the content themselves.
Ebooks for Downloading
A few places where people can download ebooks for free - please list additional resources in the comments.
Of course, as soon as I finish typing this post, I’m going to pick up the old-fashion made-of-paper book I’m reading and enjoy flipping through the pages.
Tags: book, Books, e-book, e-books, e-readers, ebook, ebooks, libraries, Library, non-print, public, readers See Also
Posted under Library, Technology | 6 Comments »
March 9th, 2010 Brian Herzog
CoverGuess was released last week, and the LibraryThing blog post explains the what and why better than I can:
What is CoverGuess?
CoverGuess is a sort of game. We give you covers, and you describe them in words. If you guess the same things as other players, you get points.
Why are you doing this?
The goal is to have fun, but also to build up a database of cover descriptions, to answer questions like “Do you have that book with bride on the bicycle?”
You have to have a LibraryThing account to play, but it’s worth a free account to get in on the action.
CoverGuess was inspired by one of my favorite internet timesinks, Google’s Image Labeler. Both of these make the internet a better place, but CoverGuess could actually help in answering reference questions. I’ll be keeping watch for when the search component is released, but for now, racking up tagging points is fun.
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February 11th, 2010 Brian Herzog
Librarians are social creatures, right? Despite dowdy stereotypes, many of us are out there Web 2.0′ing it up - among other things, we like sharing our photos on flickr and our books on LibraryThing.
So, I thought a fun meme would be to combine the two - show photos of our personal books and bookshelves. I spied one of Jessamyn’s, and uploaded photos of all my bookshelves.* I’m curious to see how other people organize books in their own space.
| My Bookshelves (click for descriptions) |
Non-fiction
 |
Reference
 |
Fiction
 |
And since timing is everything, this is doubly fun considering LibraryThing’s announcement this week about expanding LT’s photo capabilities.
So upload photos of your own shelves (librarians and non-librarians) to flickr or LibraryThing or somewhere and share your personal organizational system.
*I didn’t photograph all the books in places other than shelves: coffee table, bedside table, bathroom bench, car, piled on the floor, etc. I tell myself those are all “temporary shelving locations.”
Also: I can’t decide if “bookshelves” should be one word or two - so I use both.
Tags: book, Books, bookshelf, bookshelves, home, librarians, libraries, Library, organize, public, shelf, shelves See Also
Posted under Library, Personal | 8 Comments »
January 28th, 2010 Brian Herzog
Speaking of creative bookmarks, I love these combination custom book covers/bookmarks:
Similarly, last year our Children’s Librarian started pulling books that she felt were good, but had misleading or unexciting covers, and had kids design their own covers. That’s a great idea, and it’s fun to take great ideas just a little bit further.
Yay for activities that involves patrons and lets them take more ownership of their library use.
via LISNews
Tags: book, book covers, bookmark, bookmarks, Books, covers, custom, homemade, libraries, Library, public See Also
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