The Information Professional
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Librarians and Archivists in a fast-changing digital lanscape
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How to kill a library, By Kitty Pope

How to kill a library, By Kitty Pope | The Information Professional | Scoop.it

"[...]there are more than a few ways to kill a library.

For example:

√ Stop believing in the libraries mission. Do we really believe in the freedom to read, learn and discover?

√ Spend less time with the board. The ideal public library board would meet 4 times per year and agrees with everything the CEO recommended.

√ Stop talking to your customers. What do they know any way? And on the same topic, stop consulting staff. It is a huge time waster.

√ Don’t worry about the future and how you will get there. Sustainability is not an issue with which libraries need to be concerned. After all, we’ve have survived for hundreds of years.

√ Stop telling the library story. Everyone has heard our story.

√ Accept that the library building is old and you don’t need to keep renovating, painting, and updating it. It is what it is.

√ Accept that just like instant coffee killed the coffee bean, the e-book will kill the printed book.

√ Stop promoting the product; everyone knows about literacy and lifelong learning.

√ Stop empowering staff, and stop training them. They should come to us fully trained.

√ Stop all this talk about innovation. It just makes for more work.

√ And, for heaven’s sake, stop changing the rules and our traditions. It’s annoying!"

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British Library tracks rise and fall of file formats, by Simon Sharwood

British Library tracks rise and fall of file formats, by Simon Sharwood | The Information Professional | Scoop.it
RT @dhgermany: British Library tracks rise and fall of file formats http://t.co/mKz4Qhyk via @regvulture...

 

By Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor 


"File formats and the software capable of reading them are living longer than previously thought, according to a British Library and UK Web Archive study.

Formats over Time: Exploring UK Web History (PDF, slides as PDF) considers 2.5 billion files author Andrew N Jackson retrieved with the help of the Internet Archive and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). All the files come from “the UK web domain” and come from the period between 1996 and 2010."

 

"Our initial analysis supports Rosenthal's position; that most formats last much longer than five years, that network effects to appear to stabilise formats, and that new formats appear at a modest, manageable rate.

But he also warns that “a number of formats and versions that are fading from use, and these should be studied closely in order to understand the process of obsolescence.” ®"

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British Library launches iPhone and Android apps for new exhibition ...

British Library launches iPhone and Android apps for new exhibition ... | The Information Professional | Scoop.it

From IntoMobile: In an effort that seems designed to reach modern smartphone users, British Library is launching mobile apps for iOS and Android devices for the exhibition titled “Royal Manuscripts: The Genius of Illumination,” it shows illuminated manuscripts collected by the kings and queens of England between the 9th and 16th centuries.

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British Library's early newspaper archive goes online

British Library's early newspaper archive goes online | The Information Professional | Scoop.it

"More than 4m pages, mostly from 19th-century newspapers, reveal that press intrusion and celebrity gossip are nothing new (British Library's early newspaper archive goes online http://t.co/VOyZmNJP...)"

 

"More than 4m pages, drawn mainly from 19th-century regional newspapers, previously kept in decent obscurity at the library's newspaper archive in Colindale, north London, will now be available for historians and family researchers to browse for a small fee, or free if they visit the central library in King's Cross. All human life, not to say all the news fit to print, is certainly there, albeit written up in florid Victorian prose – great events, horrible murders reported in exhaustive detail, celebrity gossip, as well as the occasional intrusion into private grief."

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