Category: 2006

Michelle Frisque, ALA WAC chair, will no doubt have far more fulsome coverage of this meeting later on, but as a WAC member, I wanted to share that we said our piece to Jim Rettig, ALA Executive Board member and WAC liasion, regarding the importance of ensuring that the ALA dues increase would support ALA’s technology infrastructure, and Jim strongly underscored that funding IT for ALA was indeed a priority. I buttonholed Keith Fiels on the same topic after our ALA-APA Council meeting this morning, and Keith pointed out that 25% of the strategic plan is technology-related. The real question boils down to whether ALA members can give up three lattes next year to help ALA catch up after a decade of no dues increases. Many of us have informally voiced our concern that ALA needs to make a strong case for what we won’t be able to afford if…

To our shame, Clara and I completely forgot to ask anyone to blog the BIGWIG meeting, let alone take pictures of your smiling faces. Not only that, we’ve been on rollerskates since then and have had one hurried meeting where we bumped our meeting notes and worked on one small joint task. So this is just a preliminary note to say how excited we were by the turnout (when people have to keep dragging chairs in the room, that’s a good sign) and that we’re proposing a program for ALA Annual on creating and maintaining a professional blog. Not for 2007–2006. All they can say is no. Hey, they said yes! Thanks for all the great ideas, and don’t let time pass before you blog your notes from varied venues. If you’re interested in presenting at the program, call one of us or comment on this post.

In the second Sunday session of MARBI, the agenda order of the discussion papers was reversed.

The meeting started out with an update on RDA by Jennifer Bowen and the beginning of a slightly scary discussion about how MARC might need to respond to the [r]evolution in content description and access.

This was my first meeting as a member of the LITA Membership Development Committee; I’ll be chairing it after Annual Conference, so I have a lot of interest in getting the word out about what we do, as well as seeking input about how to get more members and better retain the ones we have. See the end of the post for the attendees list — maybe you know someone on the committee you can give direct input to. Maybe you’ve got some ideas and you’d like to be on this committee — if so, contact me, Pat Ensor (ensorp@uhd.edu), or Bonnie Postlethwaite. Meeting notes: ALA Membership Committee did support a resolution in recognition of Gerald Hodges upon his death. It also voted in favor of the ALA dues raise. From August 2005 to November 2005, LITA membership is down 1.55%. ALA overall is up, as are PLA and the…

A Picture Share! Originally uploaded by pix4lita. As a third-term Councilor, I’ve spent a lot of time observing ALA ED Keith Fiels interacting with people. I really admire his patience, his listening skills, and his sense of humor. He’s also helped push ALA–the Queen Mary of slow-moving barges–toward newer technologies.

A Picture Share! Originally uploaded by pix4lita. A blog person bracelet, courtesy of OCLC.

The MFIG meeting, as is its custom, was focused on a particular issue for its meeting: “Authorities: What’s the Future?” The speaker, Mary Mastraccio, Cataloging and Authorities Manager, MARCIVE, Inc., approached her topic with the assumption that her audience was varied, and aimed at the middle of the range.

Here we all sit, the MARBIes at the big horseshoe table arrangement, the Peanut Gallery ranged along each long side, preparing for yet another round of stimulating conversation about MARC.