Bring Out Your Dead
Posted On Nov 3 2008Yes, I am still here. I have plenty of good excuses for not blogging lately, but not many good reasons. 3 trips in 2 weeks, including one to Germany Near obsessive-compulsive You-tube and election coverage watching in what was left of my spare time Actual time spent reading what others are writing In that last category of what others are writing, I could not help but notice the gem that appeared in Wired Magazine declaring that blogs are now dead. Thinking about launching your own blog? Here’s some friendly advice: Don’t. And if you’ve already got one, pull the plug. …
Library Bailout
Posted On Oct 7 2008It’s always fun to hear a story about libraries on NPR, and the latest one is no exception. But I was a bit puzzled by the title: “Libraries Shine in Tough Economic Times.” First of all, libraries shine all the time. It’s just that some people don’t notice it until $40 seems like too much to pay for a book club meeting where you barely discuss the book. Secondly, the bustling business that libraries do in harder economic times is usually followed by harder economic times for libraries themselves. This boom of library demand is likely to be followed (sometimes …
What have you done for me lately?
Posted On Sep 22 2008About 3 or 4 years ago, I stood before a panel of library automation CEOs at the annual RMG session hosted by Rob McGee. The discussion had taken a typical turn–why do we pay so much for these systems? I’ve never really accepted that premise. I always thought that libraries were paying what was required of them for vendors to do what was being asked–incremental changes to legacy systems are expensive and time-consuming. I have put this in another more pejorative and accusatory way: vendors squandered our money doing exactly what libraries asked them to do. But in that RMG …