The Source: news about digital libraries and library innovations from around the web

Introducing The Source

The Future of the Book (Note: Podcast)

From the OCLC website

Print books or e-books? Uplift or download? Writers and readers or interactive interchange? What is your view on the way that changing technologies and life styles are affecting books, publishing, information and the way that we read? In November 2008, the network of Edinburgh-based libraries (ELISA) organised a panel discussion and open debate on this very subject as part of Edinburgh’s Festival of Libraries. A panel of five very well-informed people working at the cutting edge of their respective professions, presented and discussed the issues at stake from a wide range of perspectives.


Digital repository development (Note: Videos)

From the Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) video channel

Experts and advocates examine the state of the art in digital repositories. The video series was taped in November 2008 and underscores the central role of repositories across library services. Particular emphasis is placed on the added value they contribute to the institution and on the importance of funding repository development even in lean economic times. The clips feature three full-length plenary addresses plus seven short interviews with leading-edge repository implementers.


Information Seeking Behaviour and User Satisfaction of University Instructors: A Case Study (Note: PDF)

From the Library Philosophy and Practice (LPP) electronic journal

Information-seeking behaviour remains an important research area. Libraries and other information providers strive to understand users’ information needs and how they try to fulfil these needs. This understanding helps design and offer appropriate user-centred information systems/services. In the digital era, research on information-seeking behaviour has taken on even more importance worldwide.


Top Web 2.0 Security Threats (Note: PDF)

From the Secure Enterprise 2.0 Forum

This document outlines web application security threats unique or typical to Web 2.0 and should serve as a guideline for assessing risk in Web 2.0 applications.


Guidance on the Management of Controversial Material in Public Libraries

From the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) website

This publication provides support for public libraries in making difficult choices when managing books, information and internet content that may be deemed to be controversial. The publication addresses issues that may impact on the public library’s responsibility for the selection and provision of information by outlining current legislation on terrorism, local government, freedom of expression and human rights, race relations and equality.


What Today’s College Students Say about Conducting Research in the Digital Age (Note: PDF)

From the Project Information Literacy website

A report of preliminary findings and analysis from student discussion groups held on 7 U.S. campuses in Fall 2008, as part of Project Information Literacy. Qualitative data from discussions with higher education students across the country suggest that conducting research is particularly challenging. Students’ greatest challenges are related to their perceived inability to find desired materials. Students seek “contexts” as part of the research process. Our findings suggest that students create effective methods for conducting research by using traditional methods, such as libraries, and self-taught, creative workarounds, such as “presearch” and Wikipedia, in different ways.


Making a Library Catalogue Part of the Semantic Web (Note: PDF)

From the National Library of Sweden

Library catalogues contain an enormous amount of structured, high-quality data; however, this data is generally not made available to semantic web applications. In this paper we describe the tools and techniques used to make the Swedish Union Catalogue (LIBRIS) part of the Semantic Web and Linked Data. The focus is on links to and between resources and the mechanisms used to make data available, rather than perfect description of the individual resources. We also present a method of creating links between records of the same work.


Archiving the Web: Does Whole-of-Domain Archiving = Information Overload?

From the ALIA Information Online 2009 website

This paper, presented at Information Online 2009, presents a study comparing results of searching the whole of Australian domain harvest 2007 undertaken by the National Library of Australia in 2007 and selective archiving in the PANDORA web archive. The authors explore the question of the value of whole domain harvests compared to selective archiving.