News
Once more we look back at the notable library happenings of the past year.
Memorable Stories
10. Timbuktu Library Rescue
In January, Islamic militants torched an archive that had contained many ancient manuscripts. Fortunately, prior to this, people had removed the materials from the city.
Walt Crawford is at in again. In a 140 character world he is busting out 34 pages of analysis and commentary.
Cites & Insights 13:12 (December 2013) available
The issue contains one essay:
Words: The Ebook Marketplace, Part 2 pp. 1-34
More on the last few years in the ebook marketplace, this time focusing on ebook pricing, ebook and ereader sales, software, the past and future, (intentional) humor, rights--not so much DRM as ebook readers' rights, and a few miscellaneous pieces.
JSTOR recently launched a direct subscription service called JPASS. Researchers wanting more content than their library provides can pay for access. Is this the future of aggregator publishing?
Unexpected breaking news on a late Monday afternoon right before markets close in New York City:
Washington Post to be sold to Amazon founder Jeff Bezos http://t.co/v84m9ImVy5
— Washington Post (@washingtonpost) August 5, 2013
Jeff Bezos To Buy Washington Post And Its Publishing Assets For $250 Million http://t.co/IFpwPuHEty
— zerohedge (@zerohedge) August 5, 2013
#BREAKING: Amazon's Bezos buys Washington Post for $250 mn
— Agence France-Presse (@AFP) August 5, 2013
Washington Post to be sold to http://t.co/EDD1mjvTV2 founder Jeff Bezos - @washingtonpost
— Breaking News (@BreakingNews) August 5, 2013
The @washingtonpost newspaper is being sold to Jeff Bezos, founder of online department store Amazon, for $250 million
— Radio Australia News (@RANews) August 5, 2013
Aaron Swartz, an advocate for open access to academic journals, committed suicide in January after being charged with hacking into MIT computers and illegally downloading nearly 5 million academic journal articles from JSTOR, one of the largest digital archives of scholarly journals in the world. At the time of Swartz's death, the 26-year-old faced 13 federal felony computer fraud charges — and the near certainty of jail time.
In a stunning demonstration of Poe's law, the American Historical Association has released a policy statement favoring the restriction digital theses ("with access being provided only on that campus") for fears that open access versions could be read. The basis for this argument is FUD about a tenure system that apparently cannot be changed.
A decade or so ago, ISI's EndNote bought out most of the competition, practically obtaining a monopoly on the reference manager business. In the early Library 2.0 boom, web-based products like Zotero and CSA's RefWorks became the norm. Thomson Reuters played catch up by introducing EndNote Web, and NoodleBib and other adware/freemium clones cropped up in what is now again a crowded marketplace.
Protest is taking a new form in Istanbul where I was fortunate enough to visit about a month ago. Individuals are standing in their beloved square and reading books of their choice.
Violent scenes are still occurring around Turkey, including in Istanbul once again this past weekend, but the Standing Man protests continue unabated.
Librarians Without Borders is recruiting Board members with non-profit management experience, to help us develop communications and fundraising strategies. Join our team! More information, including the application, can be found here.
In 2012, Martin Richard, the 8-year-old Dorchester boy who was killed in the marathon explosions, marched at Boston’s City Hall to call for peace.
Richard’s second-grade class was there to “express themselves in a positive manner and become more engaged in the politics of the city,” according to a Boston.com story about the march.