When Andrew Keen meet Siva Vaidhyanatha

(Found here), Andrew Keen interviews Siva Vaidyanatha about Google, and the release of Siva's book. Worth watching if you could hear Siva.

Summer must Read list

I saw Alan Choo's reading list for the summer, and had read most of them, and therefore thought I would add a few more. Here we go then:-

1. Big Switch by Nicholas Carr. An insightful book into the history,economics and future of the internet and electricity, very similar to Tom Standage's Victorian Internet.

2. We-Think: Mass innovation, not mass production: Mass Innovation Not Mass by Charles Leadbetter. Looking at the impact of Web 2.0. Similar to Clay Shirky's Book.

3. Crowdsourcing: How the Power of the Crowd is Driving the Future of Business by Jeff Howe. Looking at how groups can work effectively within the internet age. Interesting social science/business book.

4. Infotopia by Cass Sunstein. Interesting book on how groups work and don't work in the modern world.

5. The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's Greatest Encyclopedia by Andrew Lih. The rise and rise of Wikipedia.

6. Library Mashups: Exploring New Ways to Deliver Library Data by Nicole C. Engard. Yet to be released, but waiting in bated breath.

Thats my list.

Wikipedia.......the rising headaches hitting 3million makes

The Guardian has an article entitled Wikipedia approaches its limits, which looks at the rising problems Wikipedia presently faces, with its editors either being 'Deletionism and inclusionism'. I had read about this previously in Andrew Lih's interesting book The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's Greatest Encyclopedia. Both worth a read.

100 library blogs to read

(Found via here), here is a FAIRLY good list of the top 100 best blogs for library science students. I did note that infotangle was there (even though its not been updated since 2007). There was one that was also in Arabic. Ummm, perhaps they should do there research properly.

Linked Data in London

(Found via Paul Miller's blog). On the afternoon and evening of Wednesday 9 September, there will be an informal Linked Data Meetup. Sounds interesting, especially as i'm on holiday and can go.

Facebook buys friendfeed

Facebook it seems has bought friend feed, says the FT. Om Malik's blog has a good review of why facebook has good explanation for this here.

What is an academic library?

Whilst meeting my mentor for my Cilip chartership we discussed the what my working role was and what is the role of an academic library and librarian?
Since then I have been thinking what is an academic library in the broadest sense? Via wikipedia it is:-

a library which serves an institution of higher learning, such as a college or a university — libraries in secondary and primary schools are called school libraries. These libraries serve two complementary purposes: to support the school's curriculum, and to support the research of the university faculty and students.

But every library has an individual approach to this. Where I work, te library is part of the University of London, and serves 22 London Universities. From tropical diseases to art. The academic library therefore has a large remit to cover. The mission statement of the library can be found here. The library therefore can at times be unwieldly with so many patrons to 'satisfy'. On top of this the Library is also being rewired, which means a three week closure, retraining and re-acquainting ourselves with re-opened area's.

I also feel academic libraries serve are what Tony Hirst recently wrote in a blog post:-

- students (i.e. people taking a course);

- lecturers (i.e. people creating or supporting a course);

- researchers;- folk off the web (i.e. people who Googled in who are none of the above).

Do we within an academic library fulfil our criteria for the 3 groups? I couldn't really discuss that here on my blog, but I do feel that things should be simplified for users. Anyhow, no more to add.

Cilip chartership event....at the British Museum

This evening I went to a Cilip event entitled Night at the Museum: Career Development Group (London & South East Divisions) Summer Social. Well, I went and had a great time on the hunt, with Susanne, Katherine and Lizzie (and a guy from Royal Holloway whose name I forget, but not the pint. Thanks).
The woman from Sue Hill and discussed there blog.
Unfortunately we did not win the hunt, even though we called ourselves 'the winners'. A very interesting evening for networking etc and I even meet a fellow library blogger, though they did now about my blog.

Ebooks and publishing

The Guardian has an article entitled For digital books, the story's just starting. Worth a look if you wish to see the failures of publishers to take it seriously on board.

50 Open courses for librarians

(Found via ilibrarian
) is a post entitled 50 Excellent Open Courses for Techie Librarians.