New & Noteworthy

Citation

(2007), "New & Noteworthy", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 24 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/lhtn.2007.23924bab.001

New & Noteworthy

OAIster Reaches 10 Million Records

OAIster's growth to 10 million records takes one step closer to the goal’of successful access to good information. Developed at the University of Michigan's Library, OAIster is a collection of digital scholarly resources. OAIster is also a service that continually gathers these digital resources to remain complete and fresh. OAIster's holdings grow as global digital repositories grow.

OAIster retrieves otherwise elusive resources by tapping directly into the collections of a variety of institutions using harvesting technology based on the Open Archives Initiative (OAI) Protocol for Metadata Harvesting. These can be images, academic papers, movies and audio files, technical reports, books, as well as preprints (unpublished works that have not yet been peer reviewed). By aggregating these resources, OAIster makes it possible to search across all of them and return the results of a thorough investigation of complete, up-to-date resources.

OAIster is good news for the digital archives that contribute material to open-access repositories. "[OAIster has demonstrated that]OAI interoperability can scale. This is good news for the technology, since the proliferation is bound to continue and even accelerate", says Peter Suber, author of the SPARC Open Access Newsletter. As open-access repositories proliferate, they will be supported by a single, well-managed, comprehensive, and useful tool.

OAIster currently harvests 730 repositories from 49 countries on 6 continents. In three years, it has more than quadrupled in size and increased from 6.2 million to 10 million in the past year. OAIster is a project of the University of Michigan Digital Library Production Service.

OAIster Project website www.oaister.org/

Markup Analysis Project: Text Encoding Initiative Survey, 2006-2007

A project led by researchers at the University of Sydney is investigating the use of the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) guidelines for the electronic encoding of text now taking place in e-text centers, humanities computing centers and cultural institutions globally.

The project has been designed to further understanding of the use of the TEI Guidelines in scholarly communication and electronic publishing. Although there are a large and growing number of TEI practitioners involved in digital library, e-publishing and scholarly communication projects, to date very few studies have focused on exploring and understanding electronic text encoding at an aggregate or shared level of experience for most practitioners. In this study, the researchers are aiming to obtain as high a participation rate from the TEI community as possible. By reporting back on their findings to the community, the researchers aim to support a wider understanding of practice.

In essence the study is a markup usage study. While the availability of software capable of parsing and interpreting encoded documents provides the opportunity to process a large amount of quantitative data quickly, studies that take this approach are likely to have only limited success in explaining the phenomena they witness. To understand how markup is being used, studies need to move beyond "counting tags" and towards an understanding of the context in which encoding takes place.

The researchers postulate that an investigation of markup usage, through identifiable stages of content preparation that account for these environmental influences, will help to achieve a better understanding of the digital text object and its properties at different stages of development.

The study combines a survey of practitioners (a self-administered questionnaire) with a content analysis of the documents that are encoded (by reporting on tag usage). The analysis will be followed by interviews of participants. The follow up interviews will allow the researchers to understand, verify and expand on findings from the first two components of the study with a descriptive account of practitioner text encoding.

The study does not report on issues associated with individual practice, productivity, or what might be considered to constitute good or bad practice, but is investigating only shared levels of experience. All data collected through the questionnaire and interviews will be aggregated and de-identified. All markup analysis and reports will result from aggregated comparisons of batches and will not identify individual texts, practitioners or institutions.

The survey findings will be published as part of the PhD thesis of Paul Scifleet, the project's research coordinator, made available through scholarly and practitioner based conferences and journals, and published at the project website.

It is envisioned that over time, the development of analytical methods for markup analysis will contribute to:

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  managing changing standards (e.g. identifying redundant and changing elements within documents);

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  comparing, synchronizing and merging different information sets;

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  educating and training users involved in the design and development of markup based systems; and

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  supporting research activities specific to organizational content or academic enquiry.

Markup Analysis Project website: http://ipprg.econ.usyd.edu.au/projects/map/

OJAX – Ajax-powered Metasearch Service – Now in Beta Release

OJAX federated search service is now in Beta release and ready for download. OJAX provides a highly dynamic AJAX based user interface to a federated search service for OAI-PMH compatible repository metadata. OJAX Version 0.7 is the first beta quality release and has improved performance, stability and user feedback, as well as additional features such as RSS/Atom feeds of saved searches.

OJAX illustrates how federated search services can respond to new user expectations raised by Web 2.0:

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  Rich, dynamic user experience. OJAX uses Ajax technology to provide immediate dynamic response to user input.

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  Intuitive interface. The OJAX interface provides the simplicity and familiarity of Google but with the power of advanced search.

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  Integration, interoperability and reuse. OJAX uses loosely coupled Web Services, OpenSearch format Atom feeds, thus allowing for integration with a range of virtual library environments, institutional repositories, course management systems and institutional portals.

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  Open source standards-compliance. OJAX supports best-practice open source standards and software, including OAI–PMH and Apache Lucene.

Features of OJAX include:

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  Auto-completion of search terms

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  Triggering of auto-searches

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  Dynamically scrollable search results – no more navigating between pages

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  Auto-expansion of search result details

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  Rapid sorting of results

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  Integrated with the Firefox 2/IE 7 search feature

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  Supports OpenSearch Discovery

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  RSS/Atom support (saved searches)

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  Includes an OAI–PMH harvester

Further information, demo and download: http://ojax.sourceforge.net/

EBSCO Facilitates Institutional Access to Live Search Academic Through Enhanced Linking Technologies

EBSCO Information Services announced in January 2007 that it has included Live Search Academic as one of the OpenURL-enabled sources for its LinkSource^TM link resolver; this allows EBSCO A-to-Z (A-to-Z) customers to activate their online resources through the Live Search Academic search engine. As a result, end users at participating schools who use Live Search Academic will see article-level links displayed for items in their institution's online collection. These links will lead to the library's LinkSource menu from which the user can access the appropriate copy of the article, bringing the licensed electronic full-text to just a click or two from the Live Search Academic search results. EBSCO provides this service at no additional charge to all A-to-Z customers.

More information on LinkSource: www.linkresolver.com/

More information on EBSCO A-to-Z: www.ebsco.com/atoz/default.asp

ebrary Launches New eBook Ordering Platform

ebrary announced in January 2007 the availability of eBook Ordering Platform (eBOP), its new online ordering platform. eBOP makes it easier for librarians to preview thousands of ebooks and other content, purchase and’subscribe to individual titles, or create a custom collection on-the-fly. Additionally, ebrary has integrated eBOP with YBP's GOBI online databases and Blackwell's Collection Manager, enabling librarians to acquire ebrary content within their existing workflow. eBOP and the ebrary platform may also be licensed by organizations that need to distribute and sell their own PDF content online.

The ebrary ordering platform features the following functionality:

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  Search through tens of thousands of ebooks and other documents from more than 260 publishers.

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  Preview titles in full text before making a purchasing decision.

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  Select a pricing model for each title. ebrary offers both subscription and ownership.

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  Choose an access model for each title – All subscription titles are simultaneous, multi-user access. ebrary offers both single and multi-user access for most purchased titles.

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  Instantly create a custom collection, mixing and matching payment and access models for each title.

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  Create a personalized portal that sores and manages selected titles.

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  View title recommendations across all eBOP selectors within an organization.

ebrary website: www.ebrary.com

Vocera Communications' Software Release 4.0 Boosts Performance, Reliability and Administration Capabilities

Designed to boost system performance and reliability for administrators and mobile workers, Vocera Communications has announced Release 4.0 of the Vocera System Software. With new administration tools, Vocera-designed high availability clustering architecture, and increased scalability, the software will’strengthen the system's ability to serve as an innovative method of exchanging critical, real-time information between mobile personnel in wireless environments.

In addition to the performance boosts made to the Vocera System Software, release 4.0 enhances the ability to integrate Vocera with other third-party applications by adding a new Vocera Administration Interface, a complement to the existing Vocera Messaging Interface. This enhanced integration capability will increase the Vocera ecosystem of development partners and further incorporate Vocera into the workflow of mobile enterprises.

In mid-2006 NACR (North American Communications Resource, Inc.) teamed with Vocera Communications to deploy a hands-free wireless voice communication system within the central branch of the Minneapolis Public Library (www.mplib.org). The library staff uses the Vocera System to improve client services throughout the city's new 325,000 sq. ft., high-tech facility, which opened in May 2006.

Vocera provides hands-free voice communications throughout any 802.11b networked building or campus. The solution is powered by software and a communication badge – a small (less than two ounces) wireless device that can be clipped to a shirt pocket or worn on a lanyard. With speech recognition, the system uses basic voice commands to place calls, enabling logged-in users to stay connected and perform their duties wherever they are within a large facility.

"Our employees use the Vocera System all the time", according to Sharon Kinsmith, IT Manager for the Minneapolis Public Library. "Whether they need to find a book, get an answer to a reference question, or request help from IT, security, or some other department, the system lets them place a call instantly, without having to remember a phone number or find the nearest telephone".

With the Vocera solution, the user simply says a name, and the call goes through from the Vocera badge. For privacy, staff can use a headset or transfer a call to a phone extension. Logged in users can even receive external calls that come into the library and are transferred to their badges or phone extension.

The Minneapolis Public Library got the idea when some staff members visited the Seattle Public Library and were impressed by its use of the Vocera System. "It made sense for our new building to have a state-of-the-art wireless network solution that would integrate with our Cisco infrastructure and Mitel IP voice platform", said Kinsmith.

That network grew as the building design evolved – eventually extending wireless Internet access throughout the facility rather than in a limited area as’originally planned. According to Kinsmith, "Locating the wireless access points correctly was challenging, given the size of the building, its multiple floors, its large cement columns, and the books themselves, which can block wireless signals".

The Vocera System is widely used in hospitals, libraries, hotels, and retail settings. As strategic partners, NACR and Vocera have performed more than six deployments in Minnesota alone.

Vocera website: www.vocera.com

SirsiDynix Acquired by Vista Equity Partners

SirsiDynix announced in December 2006 that it had signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by Vista Equity Partners, a $1 billion private equity firm focused solely on investing in software and technology-enabled businesses. SirsiDynix Chief Executive Officer Patrick Sommers indicated that SirsiDynix will continue its focus on product innovation and excellence in customer service. "Vista and the management team are excited about the library industry, SirsiDynix's position within it and the opportunities that lie ahead for both", Sommers said.

The deal was finalized in mid-January 2007 following a regulatory review. Terms of the agreement were not released.

SirsiDynix full press release: www.sirsidynix.com/Newsevents/Releases/2007/20070117_vista.pdf

Vista Equity Partners: www.vistaequitypartners.com

SirsiDynix Sponsors Two Main Info Islands on Second Life

SirsiDynix announced in January 2007 at the ALA Midwinter Meeting its sponsorship of the two main islands in the Alliance Library System/Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County partnership project on Second Life and Teen Second Life. Second Life is a 3D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents. Since opening to the public in 2003, it has grown rapidly and today is inhabited by more than 2.5 million people from around the globe. The two Second Life islands sponsored by SirsiDynix are Info Island and Teen Info Island, which is named "Eye4YouAlliance".

Alliance Library System, located in East Peoria, Ill. is the lead agency for Info Island, the adult library island in Second Life. The purpose of the Second Life Library 2.0 is to provide real library services to second Life residents. The Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, located in Charlotte, N.C., is the lead agency on Eye4You Alliance. The goal of Eye4You Alliance is to create an interactive and informative space for young adults within the Teen Second Life virtual world and to collaborate with other educators who serve youth and are already present in Teen Second Life and in real life.

Alliance Second Life library project blog: http://secondlifelibrary.blogspot.com and www.infoisland.org

Eye4You Alliance project blog: http://eye4youalliance.youthtech.info

ALA Washington Office in Second Life

On 9 January 2007, the American Library Association (ALA) Washington Office proudly announced the opening of its "virtual office" in the online environment Second Life. Second Life is an online world in which people from all over the globe can interact. There are myriad locations and users navigate through them via their "avatar" – or, digital version of themselves.

The Washington Office is located in Cybrary City next to several other libraries. Cybrary City is one of several islands that librarians are using on Second Life to provide services to the users of this community. Traditional library services – such as collection building, reference, and community gathering – have all been incorporated into this virtual world. More information on activities can be found at www.infoisland.org.

To visit the virtual Washington Office, simply visit the Second Life URL (SLURL):

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Cybrary%20City/35/36/24/?img=http%3A//www.ala.org/Images/Wash_Off/washofftxt.gif&title=ALA%20Washington%20Office&msg=Welcome%20to%20the%20ALA%20Washington%20Office%21

At present, you can find the following items in the virtual office:

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  An introduction to the Washington Office;

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  Information on upcoming activities at Midwinter and National Library Legislation Day;

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  An interactive computer that will point users to ALA Washington online resources, including the District Dispatch podcast and blog;

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  A slideshow of office and staff.

Second Life website: www.secondlife.com

ECAR Releases Study on Undergrad Students and Information Technology, 2006

Since the EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research (ECAR) conducted its first study in 2004, the ECAR study of undergraduates and IT has become mature. In 2004, 13 universities participated in this study of freshman and senior students. In 2005, the number swelled to 63 colleges and universities, and in 2006, 96 two-year and four-year institutions participated, with 28,724 students responding to the 2006 ECAR survey.

The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2006 unearths literally hundreds of interesting findings large and small. Some of the most important findings:

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  Overall, undergraduates like IT and use it in their social, recreational, working, and academic lives. Mobility is perhaps and enabler of this integration of social, recreational, and instrumental integration of IT.

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  The Net Gen characterization of technophile students born in the Internet era applies to a substantial minority of undergraduates but not to the whole. In fact, an important minority of undergraduates do not appear enamored of IT, and some appear even to avoid it. Understanding the needs of leading-edge and trailing-edge undergraduate IT users is important for higher education administrators.

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  College or university is a place where people mature as IT users as well as in other ways. While younger students can boast an arsenal of IT skills to underpin their social lives (such as e-mail, instant messaging, and social networking) and their recreational lives (such as computer gaming), they are less skilled or confident users of instrumentally useful technologies. The undergraduate's choice of and progress toward an academic major are closely associated with his or her preferences for, use and ownership of, and outcomes with IT.

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  Respondents – across the spectrum of demographic or user profile – agree with a series of positive outcome statements about IT. These responses suggest that IT is helping students communicate, collaborate, learn, engage, conduct research, gain academic feedback, and control their course activities.

ECAR has made the full study, as well as key findings and roadmap, publicly available to all at: www.educause.edu/LibraryDetailPage/666?ID=ERS0607

Assessment Finds Students Lack Technological Literacy

Despite the assumption that today's college students are tech savvy and ICT (information and communication technology) literate, preliminary research released by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) shows that many students lack the critical thinking skills to perform the kinds of information management and research tasks necessary for academic success. ETS reached these conclusions after evaluating the responses of 6,300 students who took the company's ICT Literacy Assessment in 2006.

The ICT Literacy Assessment measures a student's ability to use critical thinking to define, access, manage, integrate, evaluate, create and communicate information in a technological environment. Test takers are asked to perform 15 information management tasks – such as extracting information from a database, developing a spreadsheet, or composing an e-mail summary of research findings – in a simulated online testing environment.

Some of the most surprising preliminary research findings are that only 52 per cent of test takers could correctly judge the objectivity of a Web site, and only 65 per cent could correctly judge the site's authoritativeness. In a Web search task, only 40 per cent entered multiple search terms to narrow the results. And when selecting a research statement for a class assignment, only 44 per cent identified a statement that captured the demands of the assignment.

"The results may be surprising to the general public because there is an assumption that because students have grown up with computers, they are ICT literate," says Irvin R. Katz, Senior Research Scientist at ETS. "Those in academia have long suspected that while college-age students can use technology, they don't necessarily know what to do with the content the technology provides. Our preliminary findings show that, in large part, those suspicions are well founded."

Alexius Macklin, Associate Professor of Library Science at Purdue University, said that the preliminary research findings illustrate that most students do not have the ICT literacy skills needed to complete college-level assignments efficiently. "The reality is that when you give students a research assignment, they go straight to Google^TM without any thought to their actual research question or the information need", Macklin says. "They draw information from questionable resources because they don't know the difference between information they find from an ad or a biased source, and that which they find on an authoritative, timely, objective site. The preliminary research from ETS shows us that a majority of our students are not ICT literate enough to succeed academically they do not currently have the skills to analyze and synthesize information into something manageable and useful for their needs."

The findings were compiled from students who took two versions of the company's ICT Literacy Assessment, which is used voluntarily by higher education institutions and high schools that want to assess their students' ICT literacy skills. The Core level of the assessment is designed for high school seniors and first-year students at community colleges and four-year institutions. The Advanced level is designed for rising juniors at four-year institutions and students transitioning from community colleges to four-year institutions.

While the initial snapshot of students' ICT literacy skills is bleak, Macklin says, the good news is that it is possible to teach these skills. "The preliminary findings from ETS show us that institutions need to consider how to better integrate ICT literacy skills into and across the curricula. It may require initiating an ICT literacy initiative or allocating resources differently. It's important to help our students better evaluate, manage and communicate information so that they can succeed in school, at work and in life. And now we know that the results are measurable."

Additional findings are available at: www.ets.org/ictliteracy/prelimfindings.html (PDF)

More information about the ICT Literacy Assessment: www.ets.org/ictliteracy

Best of Technology Writing 2006 from digitalculturebooks

The University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library have announced the publication of The Best of Technology Writing 2006, an innovative collection of writing that covers the world of technology from multiple angles. Whether touching on sushi prepared on an inkjet printer, the future of e-books, or the ups and downs of jetpacks, The Best of Tech serves up a broad array of issues and topics, from the odd to the everyday, the playful to the profound, which illuminate the technological landscape of today and tomorrow.

Taking a cue from the open source movement, the essays in Best of Tech were selected through an open, online nominating process. The nominations were then reviewed by a small panel of judges, and the final selections were made by this year's Guest Editor, Brendan I. Koerner. Koerner is a contributing editor for Wired, a columnist for both the New York Times and Slate, and a fellow at the New America Foundation. The result is a diverse collection of important, timely, and just plain readable writing from publications including the New Yorker, Wired, Salon, Slate, The Columbia Journalism Review, and Japan Today. The Guest Editor for The Best of Technology Writing 2007 will be Steven Levy. Levy is a Senior Editor at Newsweek, where he writes "The Technologist" column, and the author of six books on technology and culture, including the recently published The Perfect Thing: How the iPod Shuffles Culture, Commerce and Coolness.

The Best of Technology Writing 2006 is published by digitalculturebooks, an imprint of the University of Michigan Press and the Scholarly Publishing Office of the University of Michigan Library dedicated to publishing innovative and accessible work about the social, cultural, and political impact of new media. Digitalculturebooks is an experimental publishing strategy with a strong research component. By making its content available in print and online, digitalculturebooks intends to:

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  develop an open and participatory publishing model that adheres to the highest scholarly standards of review and documentation;

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  study the economics of Open Access publishing;

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  collect data about how reading habits and preferences vary across communities and genres;

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  build community around its content by fostering new modes of collaboration in which the traditional relationship between reader and writer breaks down in creative and productive ways.

The print version of The Best of Technology Writing 2006 is available from retail stores and from the Press directly. The online version is available, FREE, at: www.digitalculture.org.

Gowers Review of Intellectual Property and The British Library Response

The Gowers Review of Intellectual Property, sponsored by the UK Chancellor of the Exchequer and issued in December 2006, was charged with examining all the elements of the UK's IP system. While the Review concludes that the UK has a fundamentally strong IP system, it sets out important targeted reforms. The reforms aim to:

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  strengthen enforcement of IP rights to protect the UK's creative industries from piracy and counterfeiting;

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  provide additional support for British businesses using IP in the UK and abroad; and

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  strike the right balance to encourage firms and individuals to innovate and invest in new ideas while ensuring that markets remain competitive and that future innovation is not impeded.

Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library, broadly welcomed publication of the Gowers Review. The British Library contributed extensively to the Gowers Review and published an IP Manifesto in September 2006 setting out its stance on a number of key issues.

Brindley said, "Striking the right balance on IP in the digital age is essential to support an innovative knowledge economy. Libraries have two roles essential to the IP balance: archiving the national memory and allowing the public and research community to access it.

We are particularly pleased that the Gowers Review recommends allowing private copying for research and copying for preservation reasons by libraries to cover all forms of content. It has also made positive recommendations around dealing with orphan works. And we look forward to playing a key role in the Strategic Advisory Board for IP policy (SABIP). However we would have liked to see more specific recommendations about how researchers can make the most of the opportunities afforded by the digital age.

The British Library's key concerns on IP were listed in a six point manifesto in September. The Library's response to specific recommendations in the Gowers Review is as follows:

1. 1.

   Digital is not different – Gowers Recommendation 9: The British Library welcomes recommendation 9 of the Gowers Review to allow private copying for research to cover all forms of content.

2. 2.

   Fair Dealing – Gowers Recommendations 15-17: in a comprehensive report, we note that there are very few specific recommendations about how fair dealing exceptions should be carried forward in the digital age. We are delighted that the Gowers Review recommends a simplified complaints procedure in regard to DRMs, but we are however concerned that the issue of contracts undermining copyright law has not been specifically addressed and look forward to engaging further on this issue with Government.

3. 3.

   "Right to archive" – Gowers Recommendations 10a and 10b: unless research libraries are granted the ability to preserve the nation's intellectual and cultural output – regardless of the medium – we risk losing a large proportion of our recorded heritage. The Gowers Review's digital specific recommendations on extending the rights of research institutions to archive the nation's intellectual output are a welcome step forward.

4. 4.

   Term of copyright – Gowers Recommendation 3: The Gowers Review has clearly performed a thorough analysis of evidence on the costs and benefits of term extension. The British Library holds the nation's sound archive which we have built up over many years through mutual co-operation with the music industry. The British Library gave no view on the precise length of copyright term in our Gowers submission. Rather, we stated that any change to our existing copyright law needs to be based in evidence and this view appears to have been taken on board.

5. 5.

   Orphan Works – Gowers Recommendations 13, 14a and 14b: the Library welcomes the Review's recommendation that a process be created to facilitate access by private and public interests to so-called Orphan Works. We look forward to studying the report in more detail on dealing with orphan works. As stated in our IP Manifesto, the Library recommends a "light-touch" system, modeled on the one currently being proposed by the US Copyright Office.

6. 6.

   Unpublished Works: the Gowers Review makes no reference to "unpublished works". The British Library's IP Manifesto recommends the length of copyright term for unpublished works should be retrospectively brought in line with other terms – life plus 70 years.Gowers review: www.hmtreasury.gov.uk/media/583/91/pbr06_gowers_ report_755.pdf British Library IP Manifesto: www.bl.uk/news/pdf/ipmanifesto.pdf

"Rights in the PREMIS Data Model": PREMIS Editorial Committee Releases Study

The report, "Rights in the PREMIS Data Model," was written by Karen Coyle and commissioned by the Library of Congress' Network Development and MARC Standards Office as part of the The Preservation Metadata: Implementation Strategies (PREMIS) maintenance activity. The study examines how rights information needed for digital preservation activities is handled in the PREMIS data dictionary.

PREMIS Working Group developed the Data Dictionary for Preservation Metadata, which is a specification containing a set of "core" preservation metadata elements that has broad applicability within the digital preservation community. It constructed a data model that defined entities involved in the preservation process and their relationships. One of the entities in this data model is rights statements, which specify terms and conditions for using the objects in a preservation repository. The PREMIS Working Group chose to consider only rights required for preservation activities in scope for its work, rather than rights for access. Because of the ambiguity of the laws concerning intellectual property rights and the complexity in the roles that institutions play in digital preservation in relation to access, it was difficult for the Working Group to thoroughly cover all information needed about rights to preserve in the data dictionary.

The Library of Congress, as part of the PREMIS maintenance activity, commissioned Karen Coyle to provide this study to assist the newly established PREMIS Editorial Committee, in consultation with the PREMIS Implementers Group, with its first revision of the data dictionary and schemas. The intention is to improve the specification so that institutions trying to assess their rights to preserve materials in digital formats will be able to provide enough information in their digital repositories to make such assessments about their materials over time. In this study, Karen Coyle reviews the landscape of digital rights, analyzes various preservation rights scenarios and the sorts of preservation actions that digital repositories might take, relates copyright law to preservation actions, and provides recommendations for revision where the data dictionary needs expansion.

"Rights in the PREMIS Data Model": www.loc.gov/standards/premis/Rights-in-the-PREMIS-Data-Model.pdf

PREMIS Maintenance Activity: www.loc.gov/standards/premis/

Portico Continues to Add Journals to the Archive

Portico announced that all the electronic content from the American Mathematical Society (AMS) – one of Portico's first publisher partners – has been preserved in the Portico archive. AMS has chosen Portico as the archive for the current electronic content of eleven journals (including the entirety of its three e-only titles). From these eleven titles, Portico has fully preserved all the bibliographic data, PDF page content, and supplemental files of over 10,000 articles published between 1995 and the present and will preserve new content from each of these eleven journals as it is published.

Through its archiving agreement with Portico the AMS continues its strong commitment to preservation of its publications. Since 1996, AMS has been archiving its four flagship print publications with JSTOR and by archiving its electronic current content with Portico, the AMS has assured the future availability of the complete publication run of these four titles for future scholars, practitioners, researchers, and students.

In addition to supplying journal content, AMS has agreed to make an annual financial contribution to Portico and has designated the Archive as an official delivery platform for post-cancellation access claims.

Additionally, Portico announced the signing of an agreement with IEEE to preserve the organization's periodicals and conference proceedings. The IEEE is the world's leading professional association for the advancement of technology. Through this agreement with Portico, IEEE has committed 137 periodicals (journals, transactions, magazines, newsletters) and 163 conference proceedings for long term preservation. In addition to supplying content, IEEE has agreed to make an annual financial contribution to Portico.

With the inclusion of IEEE publications and the AMS journal publications, over 375,000 articles and over 6,000 titles have been preserved within the Portico archive. The complete list of journal titles committed to the archive is available at www.portico.org/about/committed_titles_alpha.html and a list of participating publishers is available at www.portico.org/about/part_publishers.html.

Visit the Portico website to view a current list of participating libraries: www.portico.org/about/participating_libraries.html

Library of Congress Implements RSS Feeds for News and Updates

The Library of Congress has launched a series of news feeds using the RSS (Really Simple Syndication) technology. The RSS service was launched in response to public requests for alerts on additions to the Library's digital collections, updates of events at the Library's public venues in Washington and news of the institution. Library feeds consist of a headline, a brief summary and a link that leads back to the Library's Web site for more information.

The Library's RSS service has launched with the following feeds:

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  News, a bulletin service of the latest news from LC

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  Upcoming Events, a listing of the dozens of free concerts, lectures, exhibitions, symposia, films and other special programs

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  New on the Web, updates on new collections, features, reference materials and other services available on the Library's Web site

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  New Webcasts, the latest webcasts and podcasts of lectures and events sponsored by the Library

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  News from the John W. Kluge Center, featuring updates on lectures, presentations and other news from this center for scholars within the Library of Congress

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  And What's New in Science Reference, new products and services on the subject of science and technology from the Library's Science, Technology & Business Division.

These feeds join four existing RSS feeds from the US. Copyright Office in the Library of Congress on current copyright related legislation; announcements, rules, proposed rules and other notices published in the Federal Register; NewsNet (alerts on hearings, deadlines for comments, new and proposed regulations and new publications); and updates to the Copyright Web site at www.copyright.gov.

The Library will launch additional feeds in specific content and subject matter areas in the coming months. All new RSS feeds will be available from key content pages within the Library's extensive Web site, as well as from a central RSS Web page at www.loc.gov/rss/.

Library Director Resigns Because of WiFi

Rebekah Zablud Azen, former library director at Southwestern College in Santa Fe, New Mexico, has issued a press release to several library mail lists, quoted here in part:

A Library Director at a college in Santa Fe, NM left her position due to wireless internet (WiFi) in the library. Rebekah Zablud Azen, MLIS, resigned from her position at Quimby Memorial Library, Southwestern College, on December 16th, 2006 after administrators refused to discuss the issue. Azen is not the first librarian to express opposition or leave her position because of WiFi. In Santa Fe, four librarians recently signed a petition against WiFi in the public libraries.

B. Blake Levitt, a medical journalist who has been researching the biological affects of nonionizing radiation since the late "70"s, and author of: Electromagnetic Fields: A Consumer's Guide to the Issues and How to Protect Ourselves, and Cell Towers: Wireless Convenience? or Environmental Hazard? wrote, "Once considered safe environments/professions, librarians and teachers are now in high risk professions."

Among the many scientists, organizations, government agencies and medical societies issuing bans or precautions, Lakehead University, in Canada, prohibits WiFi on its campus; the Public Health Department in Salzburg, Austria advises against WiFi in schools; the Schools Department in Frankfurt, Germany prohibits WiFi in schools; and the Austrian Medical Association warns against wireless technologies, including WiFi. The Benevento Resolution is the most recent and comprehensive pronouncement by 31 scientists internationally.

The Benevento Resolution (http://www.icems.eu/docs/Benevento_press_release.pdf) states, "Based on our review of the science, biological effects can occur from exposures to both Extremely Low Frequency Electromagnetic Fields (ELF EMF) and Radiofrequency fields (RF EMF). More evidence has accumulated that there are adverse health effects from occupational and public exposure to electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields, or EMF at current exposure levels." The resolution also specifically warns against exposure to WiFi systems.

Azen is also opposed to WiFi in libraries because it creates barriers to access for people with disabilities. People with certain types of heart disease, epilepsy, and others with electromagnetic sensitivity react with pain, confusion, and neurological or cardiac symptoms and are effectively denied access to libraries with WiFi. In California alone, a 1998 survey by the California Dept. of Health Services found that 120,000 Californians were unable to work due to electromagnetic radiation.

Discussion of the issues raised by Azen's posting ensued on various mail lists and blogs.