2008

LITA National Forum '08: Portals to Learning: What librarians can learn from video game design

Presented by Nicholas Schiller, Washington State University and Carole L. Svensson, University of Washington Session description from the conference program: “If they are not already, video games are becoming as ubiquitous a media as television. Librarians will be better equipped to engage students in the practice of scholarly research if we understand the culture of gaming and what it means to say that our students are gamers. What should we make of this new and rapidly evolving media? What can we learn from the best examples of game design and development? What do players learn from games? What forms does this learning take? Are there useful pedagogies librarians can borrow from game designers? This presentation will focus on the instructional character of video games and how librarians can learn from the teaching that video game designers build into their craft. The conversation will focus on the video and computer game…

2008

2008 National Forum: IT Management: There is Too Much Stuff

This past Spring, our library ‘completed’ what was a fairly significant reorganization. The library formalized relationships with several strategic partners which had been residing in our building. One of the outcomes included bringing together three independent IT departments, which I have been responsible for pulling together. Needless to say, the 2008 LITA Forum session entitled “Re-swizzling the IT Enterprise for the Next Generation: Creating a Strategic and Organizational Model for Effective IT Management,” presented by Maurice York, Head, Information Technology North Carolina State University Libraries, caught my attention. Maurice described the evolution of IT services at NCSU Libraries, which, by the audience reaction, was one which many other libraries experienced (Maurice: everything does go on the home page, doesn’t it?….) In summary, the current state of IT management is that ”there is too much stuff.” He outlined the various IT Business Models that his organization has used at one time…

2008

Do They Really Know What They Need?

User-Centered Design for Humanities Collections within a Digital Library – LITA Forum 2008 Mark Phillips and Kathleen Murray, University of North Texas presented jointly on the challenges, goals and outcomes of user-centered design for humanities collections within a digital library. A link to their presentation is here. Mark is the Head of the Digital Projects Unit and has been involved with software development and digital content creation for the Portal to Texas History. Kathleen is a postdoctoral research associate working in the Digital Projects Unit at the University of North Texas Libraries. She has been involved in state-wide and national digital library projects and has presented at major library and information science conferences in the areas of needs assessment, digital libraries, and web archiving. Mark and Kathleen took turns presenting the challenges. Mark started by giving the technical background of the IOGENE project. They had to take this in three…

2008

LITA National Forum 2008: Tim Spalding: "Library 2.0 is in Danger"

The 2008 LITA National Forum opened Friday afternoon with a general opening session remarks by Tim Spalding, founder and developer, of LibraryThing.com. Tim presented What is Social Cataloging and Why Should You Care? (Blogging relatively ‘Live’ thanks to spotty ‘free’ wireless, a wired connection in my room, and a charged battery.) I have to admit that I played around with LibraryThing a bit when it first went online, but not much since. My take is that for individuals it is essentially Facebook for book readers. For libraries, however, it can provide a fresh discovery layer for legacy catalog systems. There are seven libraries using LibraryThing for Libraries, including the High Plains Library District. Tim started out with some updated statistics. LibraryThing now catalogs over 32 million books and is larger than the Library of Congress. Users can search for books using Amazon and 690 libraries. While at it’s core LibraryThing remains a personal cataloging…

2008

2008 National Forum: Civil Rights Digital Library

P. Toby Graham presented an overview of the structure and holdings of the Civil Rights Digital Library, the most comprehensive effort so far to provide digitized material on the civil rights movement. There is a video archive, a learning objects component that provides curricular support, and the portal. The library is based in the University of Georgia Libraries and was launched in the spring of 2008. Graham began by showing some video from the digital library, specifically from the Albany movement. This montage of video contained such material as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. exhorti ng the African-American community to remain nonviolent after the brutal beating of a pregnant young woman holding a child. Graham interspersed the clip montage with explanation of what was happening. The video is impressively clear, and the sound is quite good, allowing users to not only learn about but feel the singing and prayers in…

2008

LibX – Enhancing User Access to Library Resources

LibX – Enhancing User Access to Library Resources Annette Bailey, Virginia Tech LibX – A Browser Plugin for Libraries Annette reviewed the history of LibX and the initial motivation behind creating this tool: users were increasingly bypassing the library and using search engines and other online search tools. LibX, as a browser plugin, puts the library back into the research process by guiding the user to library resources no matter where they are online. Edition Builder Study The LibX team conducted a study of Edition Builder, a LibX feature that allows libraries to create LibX editions for their particular library. Through analyzying their user logs, and a user survey that included 139 participants, they asked three questions about Edition Builder: Is the interaface easy to learn and use? (yes) How successful are edition maintainers in creating LibX editions? (successful) Is the auto-discovery feature effective? (yes) According to self-reports, the majority…

2008

Don't miss out on the LITA National Forum

Online registration is still available for the LITA National Forum, October 16 – 19, 2008 at the Hilton Netherland Plaza Hotel, Cincinnati, OH. http://www.lita.org/forum2008 Keynote sessions will feature Tim Spalding, founder and developer of LibraryThing.com, Michael Porter of WebJunction (be sure to check out http://libraryman.com/blog/ for details on his presentation), and R. David Lankes of the Information Institute of Syracuse University. New this Year: Open Gaming Night on Saturday LITA’s Opening Gaming Night is your chance to experience the thrills, chills, and occasional spills that are part of gaming @ the library. If video games intrigue you, try your hand at tennis, learn to sing and dance like a rock star, or drive a high octane race car. Board games are your chance to show off your strategy skills, demonstrate your dexterity, and finally to outwit your colleagues. Visit http://www.lita.org/forum2008 for more information on sessions, preconferences, and hotel accommodations.

2008

Official Call for Volunteer Bloggers at Forum 2008

The LITA National Forum will be held October 16 – 19, 2008 in Cincinnati, Ohio. The LITA Blog will, of course, be there to report on the happenings — sharing as much of the fun and learning as possible with those who cannot attend this year. But, as always, we need your help! Do you like to write? Looking for new ways to get involved? Take this opportunity to become a LITA Blogger! The blog schedule for Forum has been posted and will be updated as we receive volunteers. There are many sessions to be covered on a variety of topics, so your help is needed more than ever. If you are interested, please email Michele Mizejewski and let her know what session(s) you would like to cover and if you are new to LITA Blog. We will be taking volunteers up to and during the conference.

2008

Still time to register for the National Forum

Online registration will be available until September 30; if you have already registered, consider adding a preconference to your existing registration by faxing the printable form to the LITA Office. The 2008 LITA National Forum will be held October 16 – 19, 2008 at the Hilton Netherland Plaza Hotel, Cincinnati, OH. In addition to keynote sessions, there are over 30 concurrent sessions, poster sessions, and networking opportunities planned where you’re sure to find practical advice, new ideas, and tested solutions to technological issues you encounter every day. Hope to see you in Cincinnati!

2008

hi-fi sci-fi library at the LITA National Forum

Michael Porter has posted the music video and story “behind the music” of Hi-Fi Sci-Fi Library on his blog, Libraryman. Porter will be presenting his keynote session of the same name at the 2008 LITA National Forum in Cincinnati, October 16-19. There is still time to register for the Forum; don’t miss out on Michael Porter’s session or the other keynotes, concurrent sessions, poster sessions, and networking opportunities planned. Be sure to check out the Forum Wiki to network with attendees and get local information on Cincinnati.