Library news

• OCLC Awarded Two-Year, $1 Million Mellon Foundation Grant For Shared Print Data Infrastructure Project

  25-06-2018 00:45 via infodocket.com
  From OCLC:
  OCLC, working closely with the Center for Research Libraries (CRL), has been awarded an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation grant to enhance the underlying infrastructure of the OCLC WorldCat database and CRL’s Print Archives Preservation Registry (PAPR) to accommodate and make accessible actionable data for shared print serials management.
  The two-year grant, for $1,001,000, will support a joint OCLC and CRL Shared Print Data Infrastructure project. The initiative w
  
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• US Government Publushing Office (GPO) Makes Available New Statutes at Large Dating Back to 1789 via GovInfo

  16-04-2024 19:03 via infodocket.com
  From the US GPO:The U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) has added historical volumes of the United States Statutes at Large (Statutes at Large) to GovInfo, the one-stop site for authentic, published information for all three branches of the Federal Government.
  The newly added Volumes 1–64 (1789–1950) date back to 1789 and include the text of the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, amendments to the Constitution, treaties with Indian
  
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• Delta Think: “Total Value of Scholarly Journals Market”

  16-04-2024 18:52 via infodocket.com
  From a Delta Think Post by Dan Pollock and Heather Staines: In 2022, we estimated it [ the scholarly journals market] to be $10.7bn, rising to $10.8bn in 2023. We estimate the long-term average growth of the market to be 2.3% per year. The years following COVID saw above-average growth, and the lower growth in 2023 likely represents a correction back to long-term averages. Our estimate for 2024 is based on mathematically projecting prior year’s data.
  Conclusion
  The executive summary is tha
  
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• Washington Post: “Red States Threaten Librarians With Prison — as Blue States Work to Protect Them”

  16-04-2024 18:37 via infodocket.com
  From The Washington Post:
  The bill in Connecticut, pending before an education committee, is one of a raft of measures advancing nationwide that seek to do things like prohibit book bans or forbid the harassment of school and public librarians — the first such wave in the country, said John Chrastka, director of library advocacy group EveryLibrary. Legislators in 22 mostly blue states have proposed 57 such bills so far this year, and two have become law, according to a Washington Post anal
  
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• Funding: NEH Announces $26.2 Million for 238 Humanities Projects Nationwide

  16-04-2024 15:45 via infodocket.com
  From the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH):
  The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) today announced $26.2 million in grants for 238 humanities projects across the country.
  Grants awarded today will underwrite a new permanent exhibition at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh on how the Nile River shaped ancient Egyptians’ ideas of life and death; provide for treatment and digitization of photo collections at Appalshop documenting Appalachia’s so
  
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• Barcelona Declaration on Open Research Information: “Researchers Need ‘Open’ Bibliographic Databases, New Declaration Says”

  16-04-2024 14:14 via infodocket.com
  From Science:
  Some of the best known databases, such as the Web of Science and Scopus, are proprietary and offer pay-to-access data and services supporting these and other metrics, including university rankings and journal impact factors. But in a declaration posted today, more than 30 research and funding organizations call for the community to commit to platforms that instead are free for all, more transparent about their methods, and without restrictions about how the data can be used.
  &
  
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• Library of Congress: 2024 National Recording Registry Selections Include Recordings by ABBA, Bill Withers, Blondie, Green Day, Jefferson Airplane, Kronos Quartet, Patti Page, The Cars, and The Notorious B.I.G

  16-04-2024 13:44 via infodocket.com
  From The Library of Congress:ABBA’s “Dancing Queen,” Blondie’s era-defining “Parallel Lines,” The Notorious B.I.G.’s landmark “Ready to Die,” Green Day’s “Dookie,” The Chicks’ “Wide Open Spaces” and Lily Tomlin’s comedy have been selected as some of the defining sounds of history and culture that will join the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress.
  Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden
  
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• Library of Congress: 2024 National Recording Registry Recording Selections Include Recordings by ABBA, Bill Withers, Blondie, Green Day, Jefferson Airplane, Kronos Quartet, Patti Page, The Cars, and The Notorious B.I.G

  16-04-2024 13:44 via infodocket.com
  From The Library of Congress:ABBA’s “Dancing Queen,” Blondie’s era-defining “Parallel Lines,” The Notorious B.I.G.’s landmark “Ready to Die,” Green Day’s “Dookie,” The Chicks’ “Wide Open Spaces” and Lily Tomlin’s comedy have been selected as some of the defining sounds of history and culture that will join the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress.
  Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden
  
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• New Report From PEN America Looks at an “Unprecedented Surge in School Books Bans, Number of Individual Books Banned by Schools is Soaring to a Record Level”

  16-04-2024 13:09 via infodocket.com
  From PEN America:Source: PEN America
  The number of individual books banned by schools is soaring to a record level, according to a new PEN America report Banned in the USA: Narrating the Crisis. The report documents over 4,000 instances of book banning during the first half of the current school year – more than in the entire previous 2022-2023 school year.The report, which examines book bans from July to December 2023, details book bans in 52 public school districts across 23 st
  
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• Stanford HAI Releases 2024 Artificial Intelligence Index Report

  15-04-2024 20:36 via infodocket.com
  From a Stanford University Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) Post:A decade ago, the world’s best AI systems were incapable of classifying images at a human level. They could not understand language, struggled with visual reasoning, and flunked the most basic reading comprehension tests. Today, AI systems routinely exceed human performance on standard benchmarks.
  This is just one of the new findings of the 2024 AI Index, an annual study of trends in AI from the Stanford
  
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• BookNet Canada Shares Data About “Canadian Book Borrowers in 2023”

  15-04-2024 16:40 via infodocket.com
  From a BookNet Canada Post:In 2023, Canadian library book borrowers visited the library online and in-person more than ever before.
  Since 2020, the percentage of Canadian book borrowers who visited the library online at least one a month has increased 72% from 50% in 2020 to 86% in 2023. The percentage of book borrowers who visited the library in-person also increased 24% from 59% in 2020 to 73% in 2023, shown in the graph below.Learn More, Read the Complete Post, View Five Charts (About 1000 wo
  
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• Tennessee: Democrats Oppose Bill to Have Books Removed From School Libraries; North Carolina: Durham County Main Library Evacuated Because Of Bomb Threat Before LGBTQ Story Hour; & More News Headlines

  15-04-2024 06:01 via infodocket.com
  AIGoogle’s New Technique Gives LLMs Infinite Context (via Venture Beat)AR/VRMeta Wants to Put Students and Teachers in Quest VR Headsets (via Axios) ||| Official Meta Blog PostNorth CarolinaDurham County Main Library Evacuated Because Of Bomb Threat Before LGBTQ Story HourOklahomaNorman Public Library Central to Remain Closed Indefinitely (via Norman Transcript)TennesseeDemocrats Oppose Bill to Have Books Removed From School Libraries (via WSMV)
  
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• New Article: “Journalistic Interventions Matter: Understanding How Americans Perceive Fact-Checking Labels”

  14-04-2024 16:46 via infodocket.com
  The article linked below was recently published by the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review.
  Title
  Journalistic Interventions Matter: Understanding How Americans Perceive Fact-Checking Labels
  Authors
  Chenyan JiaNortheastern University
  Taeyoung LeeUniversity of Houston
  Source
  Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Misinformation Review
  DOI: 10.37016/mr-2020-138
  Essay Summary
  To examine how people perceive the efficacy of different types of fact-checking labels, we conducted a national survey
  
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• NARA: National Archives Unveils New Mass Digitization Center in College Park

  13-04-2024 15:55 via infodocket.com
  From a National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) Post:A new state-of-the-art digitization center at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in College Park, Maryland, is allowing the agency to provide greater public access to the country’s most important historical federal government records faster than ever before. Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen, Representative Steny Hoyer, and Representative Glenn Ivey joined Archivist of the United States Dr. Colleen Shogan
  
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• IFLA Releases “Open Access Vocabulary” Reference Guide

  12-04-2024 17:11 via infodocket.com
  From the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA):A shared understanding of the key terminology used in Open Access across regions and languages is essential for awareness raising within the profession and communication with stakeholders. The purpose of IFLA’s Open Access vocabulary is to collate the most widely used terms and definitions, with reference to official statements or other documents where these terms are defined. It is intended to be an easy-to-
  
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• PBS NewsHour: “Attempts to Ban Books are at an All-Time High. These Librarians Are Fighting Back”

  12-04-2024 14:02 via infodocket.com
  From PBS NewsHour:Librarians are often caught in the middle of these campaigns and state legislative attempts to censor library materials. They’ve faced criminalization and harassment and in some cases have been fired after refusing to move or remove books.
  The PBS NewsHour spoke to six librarians about what they’ve experienced:Suzette Baker lost her job as a librarian in Llano County, Texas
  Brooky Parks in Colorado won a $250,000 settlement with her former employer, High P
  
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• CHORUS Forum: 12 Best Practices for Research Data Sharing – Event Summary, Comments; What is the Cost of Ransomware Attack on Toronto Library?; & More Headlines

  12-04-2024 06:01 via infodocket.com
  Alabama
  NPR: Why Aren’t Some Librarians In Alabama in a Celebratory Mood?
  CHORUS
  CHORUS Forum: 12 Best Practices for Research Data Sharing – Event Summary, Comments ||| Slides & Video
  Toronto Public Library
  What is the Cost of Ransomware Attack on Toronto Library? (via Spacing Toronto)
  
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• Research Tools: A New Resource to Explore Library of Congress Transcription Datasets

  11-04-2024 16:31 via infodocket.com
  From The Library of Congress:As a reader of the Signal, you may already be familiar with By the People, the Library of Congress’s crowdsourcing program that allows volunteers to transcribe, review, and tag digitized pages from the Library’s collections. Further, you may already know that, once completed, those transcriptions are released to the Library’s website, where they help make items more accessible and discoverable. However, were you aware that in addition
  
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• Massachusetts: “The Power of Books Behind Bars: Local Librarian Transforms Jail Library”

  11-04-2024 13:36 via infodocket.com
  From Hear & Now/WBUR:
  Some incarcerated people at a jail on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, are avid readers. But their library fell into disarray during the pandemic when they lost their jail librarian. WBUR’s Simón Rios tells us why a local librarian stepped in to revamp the shelves.Source
  
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• New Data From Open Syllabus: “OER Adoption Update: 2023”

  11-04-2024 13:09 via infodocket.com
  From an Open Syllabus Blog Post (about 1500 words):
  With the release of version 2.11 of the OS dataset, we can update our reporting on adoption rates for open educational resources (OERs) — specifically, open textbooks and ‘open access’ monographs.
  [Clip]
  We track OER adoption via the appearance of titles on syllabi — the point of use rather than the point of sale or distribution.
  [Clip]
  In 2013, OER textbooks were barely on the scene and used in only around 1 in 400 clas
  
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• James Patterson Speaks Out on $500 Bonuses to Bookstores, Librarians; Seattle Public Library Resorting to Rolling Branch Closures & More Headlines

  11-04-2024 06:01 via infodocket.com
  AII Tested 4 Different AI Image Detectors: Here’s How Accurate They Were (Make Use Of)AuthorsJames Patterson Speaks Out on $500 Bonuses to Bookstores, Librarians (via ABC News)WashingtonSeattle Public Library Resorting to Rolling Branch Closures (via The Seattle Times) & The Seattle Public Library to Implement Scheduled Branch Closures Through June 4 (via SPL)
  
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• New Report: “In Their Own Words. Youth Voices on Books Unbanned.”

  11-04-2024 02:43 via infodocket.com
  From The Seattle Times:
  Book censorship, bans and restrictions remain a pressing challenge for youth across the country, according to a Books Unbanned report released Wednesday by the Seattle Public Library and Brooklyn Public Library.
  [Clip]
  BPL founded the Books Unbanned program in 2022 to combat that censorship by expanding digital access to its collections to U.S. youth. Since SPL joined the program in 2023, more than 8,000 young people across the United States signed up for a
  
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• The Respectful Terminology Platform Project Receives Prestigious Grant from the Mellon Foundation

  10-04-2024 19:44 via infodocket.com
  Here’s the Full Text of the Announcement From the National Indigenous Knowledge and Language Alliance (NIKLA):
  The Respectful Terminology Platform Project (RTPP), an Indigenous-led initiative under the NIKLA-ANCLA umbrella, is honoured to announce that the project has been awarded a two-year grant for a total of $1.4M USD from the Mellon Foundation. Led by RTPP Co-Principal Investigators Camille Callison (Tāłtān Nation, University of the Fraser Valley) and Dr. Stacy Allison-
  
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• Sir Roly Keating to Step Down as Chief Executive of the British Library in April 2025

  10-04-2024 19:27 via infodocket.com
  From a British Library Announcement:Sir Roly Keating (Image Source: BL)
  After 12 years as Chief Executive, Sir Roly Keating has announced that he will step down from the role in April next year.
  Sir Roly said: “When I took on this role in 2012 it was always my hope to serve for 12 years and I will reach that milestone in September this year. Being at the helm of the British Library has been – and continues to be – the greatest privilege of my life. The Library is an extrao
  
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• SF Public Library Workers Rally For More Workplace Security; Knowledge Unlatched Announces Results of 2023 Pledging,  About 269 Books Will Be Made Available OA in 2024; & More Headlines

  10-04-2024 15:36 via infodocket.com
  AIGenerative AI Can Turn Your Most Pecious Memories Into Photos That Never Existed (via Technology Review)Alberta
  Calgary Public Library to Extend Availability of Wellness Desks, Support For Mental Health
  CaliforniaSF Public Library Workers Rally For More Workplace Security (via KRON) & San Francisco Library Workers Call on City to Hire More Security (via NBC Bay Area)Open AccessKnowledge Unlatched Announces Results of 2023 Pledging,  About 269 Books Will Be Made Available OA in 2024
  
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• AP Report: “Librarians Fear New Penalties, Even Prison, as Activists Challenge Books”

  09-04-2024 16:07 via infodocket.com
  From the Associated Press:
  Across the country, book challenges and bans have soared to the highest levels in decades. Public and school-based libraries have been inundated with complaints from community members and conservative organizations such as as Moms for Liberty. Increasingly, lawmakers are considering new punishments — crippling lawsuits, hefty fines, and even imprisonment — for distributing books some regard as inappropriate.
  [Clip]
  Already this year, lawmakers in
  
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• Brad Warren Elected ACRL Vice-President/President-Elect; Dr. Brandy McNeil Named Public Library Association (PLA) 2025-2026 President & More News Headlines

  09-04-2024 06:01 via infodocket.com
  AII Tested 4 Different AI Image Detectors: Here’s How Accurate They Were (Make Use Of)American Library Association (ALA)Brad Warren Elected ACRL Vice-President/President-Elect (via ACRL)
  Dr. Brandy McNeil Named Public Library Association (PLA) 2025-2026 President (via ALA)New HampshireExploring New Hampshire Newspapers in Chronicling America (via LOC)
  
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• Pun Wins 2025-2026 ALA presidency 

  08-04-2024 20:25 via infodocket.com
  Congrats Ray!
  Here’s the Full Text of Today’s ALA Announcement:Raymond Pun (Image Source: ALA)
  Raymond Pun, Academic and Research Librarian at the Alder Graduate School of Education in California has been elected 2024-2025 president-elect of the American Library Association (ALA).
  Pun received 5,611 votes, while his opponent, Sam Helmick, Community & Access Services Coordinator at Iowa City Public Library, received 2,778 votes.
  Upon learning the outcome of the election, Pun said,
  
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• American Library Association (ALA) Releases The State of America’s Libraries 2024

  08-04-2024 16:38 via infodocket.com
  From an Introduction to the Report (18 pages; PDF)  by ALA’s Interim Director, Leslie Burger:
  Library workers never cease to amaze me, and that’s saying something because I’ve been in the field for quite some time. Toward the end of 2023, I joined the American Library Association (ALA) in a new capacity, as interim executive director, at a time when book bans were plaguing school and public libraries and when library workers were being threatened and attacked for defending
  
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• American Library Association (ALA) Releases List of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2023

  08-04-2024 12:28 via infodocket.com
  From ALA:
  The American Library Association (ALA) launched National Library Week with today’s release of its highly anticipated annual list of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2023 and the State of America’s Libraries Report, which highlights the ways libraries and library workers have taken action to address community needs with innovative and critical services, as well as the challenges brought on by censorship attempts.
  The number of unique titles target
  
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