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Friday, June 04, 2004
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Information Retrieval On ResourceShelfPLUS: A New Compilation of Recently Awarded Search-Related Patents & Patent Apps The May compilation of selected search-related patents and patent apps is now available on ResourceShelfPLUS. A few highlights: + Two new patents for Yahoo + Google has patent application published dealing with advertising + More patents and patent apps for IBM and Xerox + NEC Research gets a patent for the technology used at ResearchIndex and SmealSearch + Collaboration and personalizaton mentioned in several patents and patent apps + A couple of patent applications of interest to the SEO community and while we're on the subject of patents... + "Google, Yahoo face off in suit" (via SJ Mercury News)
Information Visualization--anacubis anacubis and Thomson Announce Alliance to "Visualize" Textbook Material From the announcement, "anacubis, a provider of visual research and analysis software that enables discovery and extraction of key intelligence from multiple information sources, today announced a strategic alliance agreement with Thomson South-Western, a part of The Thomson Corporation...Under the terms of the agreement, Thomson South-Western will incorporate the anacubis visualization technology into its re-ACT (Relational Education - Associating Concepts and Topics) learning system. The re-ACT system allows the student to RE-organize available tools and ACT on their learning needs, moving from a linear learning model where chapters are studied in order to a relational/associative learning model that focuses on concepts and how they relate to each other." The announcement also notes that technology will be first used for accounting and law content. See Also: Several Demos of the anacubis software are available. We really like the demo the Hoover's demo. + Hoover's Company Search Visualization Demo (Cool and Useful!) + Google Visualization Demo + Open Patent Service Visualization Demo See Also: More Anacubis Info/Links from ResourceShelf (4/04)
Reference Shelf Specialized Databases Fagan Finder Launches New Section: Quotations and Proverbs Search The always interesting, creative and useful work of Michael Fagan continues with the release of a new section on his Fagan Finder tool box. Quotations and Proverbs Search allows you to search more than 50 web databases from a single interface. Fagan describes the site this way, "[An] attempt to collect the largest sources of quotations and related items (proverbs, sayings, maxims, amorphisms, slogans, clichés, etc.). Many of the websites included here also include things such as full text of speeches, author biographies, and quotes of the day. All search tools and links on this page have longer descriptions, which you can read by holding your mouse over their names." See Also: Direct to Fagan Finder Home Page See Also: Last August, ResourceShelf Introduced You to Fagan's Translation Wizard (A MUST See!)
Professional Reading Shelf Books--United States--Statistics Source: Bowker U.S. Book Production Soars to 175,000 New Titles in 2003; Trade Up, University Presses Down From the news release, "R.R. Bowker [has released] statistics on U.S. book publishing compiled from its Books In Print® database. Based on preliminary figures, Bowker is projecting that U.S. title output in 2003 increased a staggering 19% to 175,000 new titles and editions, the highest total ever recorded. According to Bowker, the number of new titles released by the largest trade houses increased a modest 2.4%, to 22,914, while total output for university presses declined 2.2%, to 12,003. Since 1994, new titles have increased 50.8%, for all U.S. publishers, 24.4% for the largest trade houses, and 14.4% for university presses." -- Libarians--Australia Source: ALIA Now Available, Salaries for Australian librarians and library technicians 2004 "New standards for fair payment of Australian librarians and library technicians have now been set. Check the latest ALIA salaries for Australian librarians and library technicians."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Public Libraries--United States--Databases Source: National Center for Education Statistics New Database, Search for Public Libraries "Search for information about public libraries throughout the United States through this new data tool. The types of information you can retrieve about a public library system include: identifying information, organizational characteristics, staff, income and expenditures, size of library collection, library services offered, and electronic measures. The data currently available is for Fiscal Year 2002." -- Child Welfare--United States--Statistics Source: Annie E. Casey Foundation Just Released, 2004 KIDS COUNT Data Book "Our 15th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book provides a state-by-state statistical portrait of the educational, health, and economic conditions of American children. This year's essay focuses on the increasing number of 'disconnected' youth without degrees or employment who face a tough transition to adulthood." The online database allows you to "generate custom graphs, maps, ranked lists, and state-by-state profiles," or you can "download the entire data set as delimited text files." You can also order a free copy of the Data Book. -- Business--Technical Reports and Working Papers Economics--Technical Reports and Working Papers Grey Literature Source: Business Reference Service, The Library of Congress New Compilation, Technical Reports and Working Papers in Business and Economics From the site, "To increase awareness of and access to valuable grey literature in business and economics, the Library of Congress provides online access both through its catalog and through these web pages to a growing number of working papers and technical reports in the social sciences placed online by institutions responsible for creating the reports." Many thanks to J.B. for the info. -- Business--United States--Statistics Source: BEA New BEA Web Site Feature Makes It Easier To Get Big Picture Of U.S. Economy From the announcement, "The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) announced a new feature on its Web site called the "Enhanced Overview of the U.S. Economy". This new feature will provide a summary of the Nation?s economy with easy to read highlights and graphs of major economic statistics, making them more accessible to even casual data users.The overview also includes news releases and articles that summarize gross domestic product, personal income, balance of payments and other economic indicators. Using color-coding, the new format makes data tables more accessible than before and provides easier downloading and printing from the Web site." -- Business-Research Guides New/Updated Research Guide: Source: Baker Library, Harvard Business School Operations & Supply Chain Management -- Cancer--United States--Statistics Source: National Cancer Institute Just Released, Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, 1975-2001 From the press release: "The 'Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, 1975-2001' finds overall observed cancer incidence rates dropped 0.5 percent per year from 1991 to 2001, while death rates from all cancers combined dropped 1.1 percent per year from 1993 to 2001. According to the report's authors, the new data reflect progress in prevention, early detection, and treatment; however, not all segments of the U.S. population have benefited equally from the advances." View full report online in the journal Cancer. (Note, this is via Wiley InterScience and takes awhile to load.) Questions and Answers about the report -- International Conflict International Crisis Group "The International Crisis Group (ICG) is an independent, non-profit, multinational organisation, with over 100 staff members on five continents, working through field-based analysis and high-level advocacy to prevent and resolve deadly conflict." Resources here include: + CrisisWatch -- "(A) 12-page monthly bulletin designed to provide busy readers in the policy community, media, business and interested general public with a succinct regular update on the state of play in all the most significant situations of conflict or potential conflict around the world." Searchable archive available. + Large collection of reports and briefings that are browsable by region or by date, or searchable by keyword. Sign up to receive free e-mail notification of new reports and briefings. + Articles, op-eds and transcripts of speeches by ICG researchers and officials. -- File Sharing--United States Copyright--United States Source: GAO Full Text Report, Released Today, File Sharing: Selected Universities Report Taking Action to Reduce Copyright Infringement Summary ||| Direct to Full Text Thursday, June 03, 2004
Resource of the Week A ResourceShelf Interview: 20 Questions with Gary Flake, Head of Yahoo Research Labs An interview in the ROTW space this time around. Dr. Gary Flake, Principal Scientist & Head of Yahoo! Research Labs, was kind enough to answer 20 questions for this email interview. This is a "must read" for those of you interested in web search and online information retrieval. The interview is posted in two parts. Part I begins below. Part II of the interview is NOW AVAILABLE on ResourceShelfPLUS. ResourceShelf: Dr. Flake, can you tell ResourceShelf about your background in IR and web search? Gary Flake: Like a lot of people in this industry, my background is in machine learning. In the late 80s, I was working on what can now be best termed as "toy" problems relative to today's scales. In the early 90s, I started working on larger data mining problems (at first from the biomedical domain, and then later on in industrial processes). Things seemed to get much more interesting with more data, so it was natural for me to switch to the Web and IR because that was where some of the most interesting data could be found. RS: How many people do you have on your team at Yahoo Research? How do you decide on what new products or services to work on? What's a typical day like? GF: We have a couple dozen full-time members of Yahoo! Research Labs (YRL), and a significantly larger number when you consider the extended R&D; family within Yahoo! that includes folks from the individual business units (BUs). While those two sets of researchers collaborate as often as possible, the focus of the full-time members of YRL is on areas that can impact the whole of the company, while the BU scientists focus more on problems specific to a BU. How we pick what activities to pursue is a long story (and partially a function of my own history within industrial R&D;), so please tolerate the longish answer to this question. In general, YRL's mission is to produce reusable R&D; results, explore areas that fall between the cracks (i.e., between BUs), and look for -- or perhaps produce -- R&D; results that could disrupt the industry. Steering the activities of a group with this sort of mission requires that one take a very holistic view of R&D; and see the value of diversity. By this, I mean we explicitly choose to do a lot of things in vastly different ways. We work on short, medium, and long term projects. We have activities initiated by a scientist or engineer, but we also have some efforts which are done in response to an executive goal. We work on fundamental algorithms (occasionally producing deep theoretical results), but also ground our efforts to business problems. We also work on individual products, infrastructure improvements, or even business strategy. The point of all this is that we mix it up. Done incorrectly, prioritizing all of these seemingly conflicting objectives could produce mediocrity. However, with the right blend, one often finds that there is a subtle interplay among these objectives that often yields something wonderful. My job is to keep the mix as interesting as possible, which requires that I look for what's missing. If activities within YRL are chaotic, I'll wear my dictator hat until things become less chaotic. If activities seem too focused or top-down, I'll encourage some short-term anarchy. That's the philosophical answer that ignores the content of R&D.; If we consider the content of the work, then my own preference is to look for activities that are eminently reusable (i.e., applicable to multiple BUs, so that we get more bang for the buck). I also believe that all of our efforts have to be interesting on either a scientific, mathematical, engineering, product, or strategic yardstick. The very best activities will be significant along all of those dimensions. For example, machine learning and data mining are both off the chart because both have high value no matter how they are evaluated, and a single result may be applicable to multiple BUs. Typical day? I haven't had one of those in a long time. In a typical week, I'll make a trip or two, dissect code, brainstorm with product and business teams, indulge in some discussions with YRL members (which is like oxygen to me), read as much as possible, receive hundreds of emails (and write a few too), all while trying to balance and prioritize the team's efforts in a rational way. The balancing part is perhaps the most subtle and important. RS: What's wrong with web search today? GF: It's easier for me to point to what web search should be and then highlight the differences. If web search were perfect, then it would produce an answer to every query that would be as good -- or better -- than if the smartest people in the world had as much time, data, and contextual information (about the user) required to fulfill the query; and it would do all of this in a split second. In other words, the search engine would be an artificial intelligence (AI) so smart that if a correct answer could be found in theory with close to infinite resources, then it would find it. If a correct answer did not exist, then the search engine would give you the next best thing: an approximation, or perhaps even an explanation as to why your query has no perfect result. (And by the way, if we realized all of the above within my lifetime, I would consider myself lucky. That should give you an idea of what sort of time frame I am talking about.) Alternative interfaces, like cell phones, voice, and snazzy graphical results are all nice, but in the end they represent relatively easy technology problems when compared to the challenges involved in realizing our hypothetical search engine. What really matters is what is under the hood. Today, search engines have almost no understanding of words or language in any significant way. They exploit the statistical properties of words and links, but in no way is there anything going on akin to understanding. Search engines don't recognize user intent, can't distinguish goal-oriented search from browsing search, and are completely ignorant of the subtleties of how different concepts relate to one another. Moreover, they completely lack wisdom -- i.e., they are very poor at distinguishing between trivia and something profound. RS: Do you still see a need for targeted crawlers and focused databases? GF: Certainly. Different types of data have different notions of timeliness. Moreover, besides structured and unstructured data, there is a whole universe of data best characterized as semi-structured. As long as those two observations hold, niche tools will always fill a niche, to coin a tautology. I don't think a huge monolithic database will ever subsume all other databases. Instead, what we think of as a search engine will gradually evolve into a more subtle meta-search engine, blending its own data with other sources. RS: How can Yahoo Research Labs make search better? GF: Getting at the heart of user intent is very important to us and to the overall search team, with whom we work on a daily basis. I think this is how we will make the most impact in the short to medium term. I also think that current search engines have only scratched the surface on what can be done with link data. The commoditization of 64-bit hardware will also change the search engine landscape, and we intend to push on this front as well. Our long-term goal is to get as close as possible to what I described earlier as a perfect search engine. We are far, far from that goal. But that's okay, too, because we know some of the next key steps towards realizing the larger goal. RS: What's your feeling about trying to place structured data like a library catalog/bibliographic record or an indexed article into an unstructured database? Asked another way, what's the role of structured data in an unstructured web world? How can we bring both types of resources together and still allow users to take advantage of all of the additional access points that a structured database and its retrieval mechanism make available? GF: The beautiful thing about a relational database is that its structure tells you a lot about what is important. Database designers have been brilliant at optimizing databases (both the organization of the information as well as the algorithms) to best exploit this regularity. When you flatten out a database, those paths towards optimization often aren't available. A middle ground -- which is not perfect, but adds a lot of utility -- is to convert structured into a semi-structured form. Today, we treat documents as a big bag of words and index those words. In this semi-structured approach, we take structured information (say, the value of specific fields) and synthesize fake words that represent the fact that "document X has field Y with value Z.? Now, clearly I can't run a SQL query on this representation; but at least I can search for documents with specific field:value pairs. I'd like to tell you that we will be able to make an unstructured database as powerful as a structured database; but that simply is not the case. Nonetheless, the fusion of structured and unstructured data and approaches will add a lot of utility to the lives of most users. In parallel to the above, we have started on a different approach through the launch of our Content Acquisition Program, working with such partners as NPR and the Library of Congress, as well as with universities such as Northwestern, UCLA and University of Michigan -- all so we can bring their structured data to a larger audience. Gary Flake ANSWERS 14 more questions in Part II of the the interview. You can find it on ResourceShelfPLUS.
Professional Reading Shelf Reference Reviews Peter's Digital Reference Shelf, June 2004 is Now Online In his latest set of reviews, Dr Jacso look at: + The CrossRef Search Pilot with Google Strong comments about this project. He writes, "High-quality scholarly content from nine big-name publishers deserves much better treatment by Google, or rather by some other company that has demonstrated expertise in bringing the best out of millions of high-quality, consistently structured and tagged Web pages with excellent metadata." We posted comments about this service on 4/28. & + ResourceShelf Yes, this month Dr. J. reviews our web site. A big thank you to Peter for the VERY KIND words. -- Web Resources The June Issue of Roddy MacLeod's Internet Resources Newsletter is Now Available Eric Lease Morgan's DOAJI Search [Directory of Open Access Journals] is this month's "Nice Site." -- Scholarly Publishing Source: The Guardian Reed allows academics free web access From the article: "Reed Elsevier is allowing academics to put papers that have been accepted for publication in its print and online journals on to the internet, breaking with years of tradition and reigniting the debate over open access to academic thinking. Until now the world's largest academic publisher has been a staunch opponent of open access, saying it poses a threat to the quality of academic research. But it is now letting academics put a text version of their accepted articles on to their own websites, or sites operated by their institutions." -- Cybersecurity Source: IEEE Security & Privacy New, Exclusive Interview with Former U.S. Cybersecurity Czar Richard Clarke Available Online NOTE: This interview might be of special interest to those of you attending the ALA Annual Conference. Clarke will provide the keynote address at the ALA Opening General Session on June 26th. -- Science & Technology Librarianship The Spring 2004 issue of STS Signal , newsletter of the Science & Technology Section of ACRL, is now available. (PDF; 220 KB). -- SLA Annual Conference--Weblog Live From Nashville: Blogging SLA Source: Information Today "The Live from Nashville blog (http://www.infotodayblog.com) will cover as many aspects of the conference as the bloggers can handle. That would include association business meetings, conference sessions, the exhibit floor, and social events. Plus, we?ll have backup from some editors not in Nashville."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Housing--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Just Published, 2003 American Housing Survey (AHS) Highlights ||| Direct to Full Text -- Portals--Wales Source: News Wales New Welsh web portal From the article: "Seeking information and services relating to Wales has been made easier with the development of a revamped website- Wales on the Web: the All Wales Portal- the primary access point for Wales-related information and services on the web. The portal contains over 3500 quality websites that have been hand picked and validated by Wales on the Web staff, who are based at the National Library of Wales. It is fully bilingual online guide to high-quality, validated websites offering dependable information relating to Wales and all aspects of Welsh life." -- Web Tools The following item was discovered via the Infomine "What's New" Newsletter Data Conversion Online Iconv provides free file converters for instant online data conversion. This site allows the user to easily convert a variety of data. Sample conversions include: creating Palm Pilot document from text, XML documents, metric conversions, Excel to CSV, ASCII to EBCDIC, Unix to Dos, Dos to Unix, Mac to Unix, PDF to text, audio converters, as well as delimited text converters. The converted file is renamed by the user and can be saved in their preferred location. -- Health Source: World Health Organization Full Text Report, Just Released, Health Behaviour in School-aged Children Study "The Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study is collaborative cross-national research supported by WHO/Europe. It is conducted by a multi-disciplinary network of researchers from 36 countries and regions in the WHO European Region and North America, and coordinated by the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom. The number of countries involved is rising. The study seeks new insight into adolescents' health, health behaviour and lifestyles in the social context. It examines young people aged 11, 13 and 15 years."
Information Dissemination Collaboration Two stories for you. 1) Weblogs--Plogs Source: Clickz Amazon Testing "Plogs" From the Article: "First Amazon.com recommended products that it thought its customers would find interesting. Now it's taking advantage of the blogging phenomenon by topping its home page with a personalized "Plog," a blog-style feature that links to recommended products and provides relevant information. Your Amazon.com Plog is a diary of events that will enhance your shopping experience, helping you discover products that have just been released, track changes to your orders, and many other things," the company says on its site. "Just like a blog, your Plog is sorted in reverse chronological order. When we think we have something interesting or important to tell you, we'll post it to your Plog. The Plog feature is still in beta testing, according to Amazon's site." -- 2) Wikis Source: BusinessWeek Online Wikis' Winning Ways "Web sites that allow members to share info and collaborate are catching on fast. Here's a tour of key examples." Wednesday, June 02, 2004
Professional Reading Shelf Online Research Source: Factiva Full Text, White Paper, Just Updated, Free, Fee-Based and Value-Added Information Services "Considers the quality, availability and value of information on free Web sites, fee-based Web sites and value-added information services, such as Factiva." The paper (registration required) was written by online search expert and librarian Mary Ellen Bates. -- How About a Few Interviews? + The Internet Archive Source: OpenP2P.com Brewster Kahle on the Internet Archive and People's Technology + Local Search Source: Web Pro News What Lies Ahead For Local Search Engine Technology From the article: "InfoSpace is best known for its search engine brands like Dogpile.com and Webcrawler.com, but the company is building a reputation for itself as a provider of local search results, while at the same time building useful applications for the mobile user. As part of Andy Beal's continuing look at 'the future of search technology', Andy had a chance to ask Arnaud Fischer, previously AltaVista product manager from 1999-2001 and currently leading search product planning for InfoSpace's Search & Directory division, some questions about how local search will develop in the future." -- Internet Filtering Source: Colorado State Library New, Colorado State Library's Filtering Clearinghouse From a Library Journal article, " The Colorado State Library has created the Colorado Filtering Clearinghouse, which aims to provide helpful resources for libraries wanting to learn more about filtering Internet content. The site contains reasons libraries may or may not want to filter, sections on filtering technologies, the costs of filters, the Children's Internet Protection Act (CIPA), and links to point-of-view resources in the filtering discussion."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Small Business--United States--List & Rankings Source: Entrepreneur Magazine New, Entrepreneur and D&B;'s 10th Annual Hot 100 "Which new businesses are on the fast track to success? The companies in Entrepreneur and D&B;'s 10th Annual Hot 100 listing are blazing their way to the top." -- Public Records--United States Source: California Voter Foundation Just Released, Full Text, "Voter Privacy in the Digital Age" Summary ||| Direct to Full Text "... a state-by-state study of voter registration data gathering and privacy practices, to call attention to voter privacy issues and to provide states with information and recommendations they can use as they implement the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA)." -- Education--United States Source: NCES New, Website on State Education Reforms Now Available "This website, which draws primarily on data collected by organizations other than NCES, serves as a general resource on State Education Reforms, describing major developments in state-level education policies. First based on the Overview and Inventory of State Education Reforms: 1990 to 2000, this site is updated periodically to incorporate new data. Currently, this site generally reflects information collected through 2002, and more recent data, before state implementation of the federal No Child Left Behind Act. Future updates to this site will reflect state implementation of that Act's requirements." -- Terrorism--Nonprofits Source(s): Independent Sector; InterAction; Council on Foundations; Day, Berry & Howard Foundation Handbook on Counter-Terrorism Measures: What U.S. Nonprofits and Grantmakers Need to Know (PDF; 660 KB) "A plain-language guide to Executive Order 13224, the Patriot Act, embargoes and sanctions, IRS rules, Treasury Department voluntary guidelines, and USAID requirements."
Military History--United Kingdom Source: The National Archives (United Kingdom) D-DAY Heroes Go Online From the announcement, "The names of up to 12,000 soldiers who were granted awards for gallantry in North West Europe between 5 and 6 June 1944 and 7 May 1945 will soon be searchable on The Catalogue. The names of nearly 600 soldiers and officers are now available on The National Archives catalogue, making it much easier for researchers to locate the recommendation they are looking for. The National Archives hope to complete the project by May 2005 in time for the anniversary of the end of the war. The records contain personal details and descriptions of many incredibly valiant acts, such as 19-year-old Private Thompson who, on his first duty, repeatedly fired at a sniper in order to let his comrades get through a gap. He stayed behind, and then managed to guide another soldier to safety, after the rest of his group had left."
Citation Analysis Scholarly Publishing Source: ISI + Switzerland Rankings for Switzerland among the 148 top-performing countries in all fields and all countries. + Iceland Rankings for Iceland among the 149 top-performing countries in all fields and all countries. + Science in Italy, 1999-2003 + Mechanical Engineering: High-Impact U.S. Universities, 1999-2003 + Journals Ranked by Impact: Sociology Tuesday, June 01, 2004
Information Industry--ProQuest Pay Per View Access: ProQuest And NYTimes.Com To Provide New York Times Archive Back To 1851 This database has been available via the NYTimes.com site for several months. ProQuest is now making the official announcement. Very cool! From the news release, "ProQuest Information and Learning and NYTimes.com [have] announced an agreement to offer directly to the consumer market a historical digital archive (full text) of The New York Times newspaper dating back to 1851, when The Times was first published. The Archive will be available on NYTimes.com, the Web site of The New York Times, on a pay-per-view basis." That's right, every page of every issue back to 1851 (including advertisements) is now searchable and viewable online. NOTE: Many libraries (especially academic) offer free access to the complete database. Make sure you're not paying for content that you already have access to for free. Search fields available at http://www.nytimes.com/1851archive allow you to search full-text, words in the headline, and/or author name. The full interface (available to subscribers of the product) offers many more searchable fields. See Also: Learn More About the ProQuest Historical Newspaper Collection
Reference--Phone Directories - Cell Phones Privacy--United States Source: The Rocky Mountain News Cell-phone directory stirs concern From the article: "For the first time, a national database of wireless telephone numbers is being compiled by the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association. The directory, expected to be generally available late this year, will contain about 75 percent of the nation's 175 million cell phone numbers. But will customers have the choice of keeping their names out of the new directory? The answer still has lots of static in it."
Web Search--Microsoft Answer Engines Source: eWeek MSN Investing In More Than Just Search From the article, "Overall, 'our view of the search market, based on consumer research, is that one out of every two search queries doesn't get an answer,' [Yusuf] Mehdi said. 'People go online looking for something. They don't get an answer. When they do get an answer they get a list of Web links, not necessarily the data they want. And the opportunity to solve that problem is something that we're going after directly and tackling.'"
Professional Reading Shelf National Libraries--Europe Source: ManagingInformation.com The European Library Team Appointed From the article, "The European Library (TEL) project was finished successfully on January 31, 2004. The key aim of TEL was to investigate the feasibility of establishing a new Pan-European service which would ultimately give access to the combined resources of the national libraries of Europe...The results of the project build the basis for The European Library Service which will be established under the aegis of the CENL by The European Library Office, hosted by the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, the National Library of the Netherlands in The Hague. The day-to-day work will be done by a small team which is responsible for the management, the marketing, the implementation and maintenance of the website and the portal as well as for the technical support of the participants. The team members are appointed now and will start to transfer the project results into an operational service, including the parts of the current European national libraries' webservice Gabriel which are of public interest." See Also: The European Library Web Site -- Digitization Projects--New Zealand National Libraries--New Zealand National Library to capture New Zealand's digital heritage From the announcement, "$24 million funding from the latest budget will allow New Zealand to ward off 'digital amnesia', and protect New Zealand's documentary heritage." -- Scholarly Publishing Source: California Digital Library California Digital Library Develops Written Policy For Cataloging Open Access Journals -- Licensing BBC Creative Archive Licensing to Be Based on Creative Commons Source: Digital-Lifestyles.info "By applying a CC-type license to the content, the BBC will enable individuals in the UK to download released content to their computers, share it, edit it and create new content. Commercial reuse of the content will not be allowed." See Also: Announcing (and explaining) our new 2.0 licenses (Creative Commons weblog)
Free Database Trial This Month Only: Ovid Offers a Free Trial of FROSTI From the description, "FROSTI is the most comprehensive and up-to-date databases of published information in the fields of food science and technology. All aspects of food science and technology are covered, including food processing, ingredients technology, packaging and nutrition together with other subjects of interest to the food industry, such as environmental issues and biotechnology." See Also: Learn More About the FROSTI Database
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents The following item was discovered via the Infomine "What's New" Newsletter Science--Biography Eric Weisstein's World of Biography From the Infomine description, "Eric Weisstein's World of Biography provides very brief biographies for over 1,000 figures in science (or the history of science). It has categories (below) and is also keyword-searchable. Entries may include figures and links out to external resources." + Branch of science; + Gender/Minority status; + Historical periods (dating back BC); + Nationality; + Prize winners: mathematics or Nobel prize-winners; + Alphabetical index. -- Energy--Specialized Databases Jacso Updates PolySearch Energy Peter Jacso, who launched his PolySearch Energy "module" in March 2003, has just informed us that the service has been updated with several new sources. PolySearch Energy will now simultaneously run your search in a maximum of 20 specialized databases. "Modules" are also available for biogaphical and dictionary databases in English and Spanish. -- Canadian History Source: Confederation Center Art Gallery New, Telling Stories: Narratives of Nationhood From the Colophon: "The main purpose of Telling Stories is to address the growing need for the awareness of a diversity of aspects of Canadian history and culture, to increase visual and media literacy, as well as to encourage critical thinking and self-expression. Complementing 4000 works of art with 400 lesson plans generated by a team of educators, the program uses the Confederation Centre Art Gallery collection and works of art from gallery collections across Canada to explore the symbols and icons that are used in the art to tell stories about the geographical, historical, and cultural make-up of Canada. Presenting history and heritage to students and the public in an enriching, dynamic fashion, the project foregrounds the role art plays in a society and its potential in interpreting and responding to important ideas and issues." See Also - Additional Details in News Release. -- Contractors--U.S. Government Source: Project on Government Oversight Federal Contractor Misconduct Database "This database is not a legal document. Although some legal terminology is used, this database is only a compilation of instances of misconduct and alleged misconduct committed by government contractors. Sources used to compile this information came primarily from government documents, and in each case the source(s) is cited. This is a compilation of misconduct and alleged misconduct occurring between 1990 and 2002; alleged misconduct is cited prior to 1990 if the case is still pending." See also: Full Text Report: Federal Contractor Misconduct: Failures of the Suspension and Debarment System -- Online Journalism Source: 5th International Symposium on Online Journalism Symposium Research Papers Research papers presented at the symposium, held mid-April at the University of Texas, Austin. Sample titles (PDFs): + When the Audience is the Producer: The Art of the Collaborative Weblog + Wikipedia as Participatory Journalism: Reliable Sources? Metrics for evaluating collaborative media as a news resource + Examining the media agenda: How traditional and online media presented the 2000 and 2004 presidential primaries Also available: Presentations from panel discussions (PowerPoint), a photo slideshow (Flash) and materials from previous symposiums, back to 1999.
Web Search--Yahoo Yahoo Briefs And the Search Shortcuts Keep Coming at Yahoo! They're going wild with these things. Today, an official announcement containing news of a shortcut offering direct links to gas price info (U.S. Cities only). For example: + gas prices 60093 or gas prices Seattle offers links to GasBuddy.com and GasPriceWatch.com. Last Friday, we offered a list of other new search shortcuts. in other Yahoo News... Yahoo Japan Now Using Yahoo Database, No More Google Word that Yahoo Japan has stopped using the Google database as the provider of search results on this country site. Of course, this was expected. On a related note, Yahoo Japan is now using Overture as its sole provider of sponsored search results. Previously, results rotated between Overture and other services. Monday, May 31, 2004
Search Engines--Google Source: The Scotsman Zero tolerance as Googol plans to take Google to court From the article: "A dispute over a very large number of zeroes is threatening to distract attention from a $2.7 billion stock sale by the internet search engine Google. News of the deal has brought a threat of legal action from the family of Professor Edward Kasner, who invented the word "googol" in the 1930s to describe a very big number. He wrote about the concept in a 1940 book, describing a googol as the number one followed by a hundred zeroes. Kasner's great-niece, Peri Fleisher, now insists that the US-based company has gained financially at the expense of the family. She said: "If we do have a legal right, we're certainly going to exercise that. And now is the time." However, experts in intellectual property said that bringing a successful legal action would be problematic. "It would be an uphill struggle to try to assert any legitimate claim," said David Gourlay, a senior associate at the Dundas and Wilson Technology Group."
Professional Reading Shelf Archives Source: Library and Archives Canada Just Released, Full Text Report, Evaluation of the Canadian Archival Information Network (CAIN)
Search Engines - Ask Jeeves Another Search Shortcut at Jeeves It seems that there is yet another shortcut at Jeeves (part of their Smart Search program) among the many that have been mentioned in the past. If you enter a stock symbol you get the latest prices. See Also: A Complete List of Ask Jeeves Smart Search Options
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Health Information New/Updated Topic Pages/Compilations from MEDLINEplus + Muscular dystrophy, Duchenne and Becker types + Primary pulmonary hypertension -- Intellectual Property Source: Parliamentary Library, Australia New Report, Full Text, Intellectual property rights and the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement -- Government Regulation--United States Source: AEI-Brookings Joint Center Is Regulation Good For You? "Will all federal regulations soon pass a benefit-cost test? If the OMB's 2003 report is any indicator, the answer may be yes--at least for some categories of regulations.... We argue that OMB's numbers are plausible, given the methodology that OMB uses. Whether they are reasonable is less clear." Full Report (PDF; 444 KB) Sunday, May 30, 2004
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Development Source: UCTAD Just Released, Full Text, Least Developed Countries Report 2004 The report includes a 49-page statistical annex. -- Data Mining--United States Source: GAO New Report, Full Text, Data Mining: Federal Efforts Cover a Wide Range of Uses Summary ||| Direct to Full Text -- Hurricanes Source: Colorado State University Tropical Meteorology Project 2004 Atlantic Seasonal Hurricane Forecast "The recent upturn in Atlantic basin hurricane activity which began in 1995 is expected to continue in 2004. We anticipate an above-average number of Atlantic basin tropical cyclones and an above-average probability of U.S. hurricane landfall." Annual forecast by Dr. William Gray. -- Beaches--United States Source: Dr. Stephen P. Leatherman, Florida International University America's Best Beaches 2004 Annual list by "Dr. Beach." Photos of the top ten are available for download.
Professional Reading Shelf Libraries and Librarians Source: Council on Library and Information Resources The May/June Issue of CLIR Notes is Now Online Articles includes: + Library Periodicals Expenses: Comparison of Nonsubscription Costs of Print and Electronic Formats on a Life-Cycle Basis + A New Blueprint for the Library? -- Libraries Source: The Daily Star (Bangladesh) Libraries in Search of a Future "As the non-existence of a viable public library movement shows, Bangladesh faces formidable or -- perhaps more accurately -- overwhelming challenges to providing adequate library services. Consider that, there is no automation, no climate controls, no security procedures to protect against the theft of library materials, no adequate salaries to attract quality recruits to the library profession, no electronic databases and no adequate funding. In short, Bangladesh has one of the world's most underdeveloped library systems." Saturday, May 29, 2004
RSS Rocket News Updates Its RSS Reader with New Features Rocket launched their Java based RSS reader a couple of months ago. Here's our post from 3/9/04. Yesterday, the Canadian company announced a couple of new features. What's New + Rocket RSS Channl Directory - The company has developed a Directory of RSS Channels and has been busy categorizing and organizing thousands of RSS & Atom newsfeeds. Using the Rocket RSS Channels Directory is simple - click on the Channels button on the top toolbar and navigate through the categories to find & add interesting feeds to your account. + Enhanced Channel Search Functionality - You can also Search for RSS feeds using the Rocket RSS Reader. Click on the Search button on the top toolbar and enter your search terms in the text box to find RSS channels (from the 70,000+ sources in the database) that include your search terms in the channel name, channel URL or channel description. + Create RocketNews RSS Channels - Click on the Create button on the top toolbar to build your own RSS Channel with search results from the award-winning RocketNews current news search engine. Btw, the Rocket News database now aggregates (and makes searchable) content from more than 11,000 sources. Google News searches about 4500 sources. Yahoo News about 7000.
Professional Reading Shelf Fugitive Documents? Source: Houston Business Journal Desert Paper Trail Leads to Shell Oil File this one under how NOT to archive your documents.... "A buried 'treasure' could come back to haunt Houston-based Shell Oil. A total of 190 boxes full of documents have been dug up in the New Mexico desert near a pipeline formerly owned by a Shell subsidiary, the Texas-New Mexico Pipeline Co. The documents apparently pertain to operation of the pipeline and to environmental damage caused by an oil spill in the early 1990s." -- Libraries Wi-Fi--Open Access Source: Wi-Fi Planet An Open Source Wi-Fi Roundup "(T)here are a number of freely available tools that will enable you to create and manage a public access hotspot. There are three projects in particular that are under community development and in use today that are deserving of mention: Sesame Wi-Fi, ZoneCD from Public IP and the Less Networks Hotspots Server (popularized by the Austin Wireless City Project in Texas)."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Military Intelligence--United States Source: U.S. Army (via FAS/Secrecy News) Full Text, Just Released (Unclassified), U.S. Army Field Manual on Intelligence Secrecy News (compiled and edited by Steven Aftergood), has obtained a copy of this new document. From his newsletter, "The U.S. Army has issued a new Field Manual on intelligence that sets forth in detail the roles and functions of intelligence in Army and joint military operations. The new Field Manual (FM) 2-0 is 'the Army's keystone document for military intelligence doctrine.' With conceptual rigor, the manual proceeds from "the fundamentals of intelligence operations" to 'intelligence considerations in strategic readiness" and beyond.'" The document is a 3.2MB PDF; 211 pages. -- U.S. Army--Iraq Source: Center for Army Lessons Learned Full Text, Just Released, On Point: The United States Army in Operation Iraqi Freedom "On Point tells the compelling story of America's Army in OIF, and is of interest to a broad audience. However, it aims at a specific audience -- soldiers and defense professionals. Within the Army, On Point has two specific goals: to educate soldiers on the conduct of combat operations in OIF and to suggest some preliminary implications for the Army's continued transformation." Friday, May 28, 2004
Web Search--Yahoo Even More Yahoo! Search Shortcuts They keep coming! You can find a complete list here and a few comments in our 4/21/04 post. + Area Codes: "To find the area code for a city or see what cities are within an area code, search on the area code or city name and 'area code.'" Example: area code seattle) + Calculator: "Use Yahoo! Search to do basic mathematical calculations. You can add (+), subtract (-), multiply (*) and divide (/)." Example: 4*(12-6/3) + Exchange Rates: "To find the exchange rate for a unit of currency or convert one currency to another, search on "convert" and the currency or currencies you would like to convert." Example: convert yen dollar + Time Zones: "To get the current time or determine the time zone for a location search on 'time' or 'time zone' and the location." Example: time in paris + Weights and Measures: "To convert any number of metric or Imperial/English units in whole or decimal form, search on 'convert' and the units you would like to convert. Use * to indicate degrees." Example: convert miles to km + Zip Codes: "To find the area code for a city or see what cities are within a zip code, search on the city name and 'zip code.'" Example: zip code austin See: Yahoo! Search Shortcuts Cheat Sheet See Also: Help Using the Yahoo Calculator and while we're on the Yahoo! Beat... ResearchBuzz Has Info on Yahoo's Linkdomain: Syntax
Search Engines Source: BBC News Search Business Turns Serious From the article: "Although the web has given the person in the street access to more information than ever before and Google has made it easy to search through that vast pile to find what you want, typically business users need even more. So argues Clare Hart, boss of search firm Factiva which was formed in 1999 from Dow Jones Interactive and Reuters Business Briefing. When you do a search you're not interested in quantity," said Ms Hart, "you want relevant research and quick access to relevant results. I think people get very frustrated by Google results," she said. "The lack of quality results and the fact that they have to register with more and more websites." A great story for the librarians to mention to their patrons who think that Research = Google.
Professional Reading Shelf Books Source: BBC News Books Get Interactive Makeover "New Zealand researchers have developed a way to overlay detailed animations and images on textbooks, children's picture books and any other title that uses illustrations." -- Information Source: internetnews.com Report: 25% of Critical Data is Flawed "Many major companies are making crucial business decisions based on flawed data, according to a new study from Gartner Inc. More than 25 percent of critical data within Fortune 1,000 companies is incomplete and inaccurate, say analysts from Gartner, a major industry research firm based in Stamford, Conn. Although many executives aren't even aware that they're working with flawed data, the ones that do often reach for the wrong technology to fix the situation, reports Ted Friedman, principal analyst for Gartner." -- Information Systems Source: IMS Global Learning Consortium and the Coalition for Networked Information New Report (White Paper), Just Released: Interoperability between Library Information Services and Learning Environments - Bridging the Gaps -- Digitization Projects--Canada Source: Heritage Canada Full Text, Virtual Museum of Canada: The Next Generation A paper by Steve Dietz, Howard Besser, Ann Borda and Kati Gerber (with Pierre Lévy). "This Study Paper was produced in the context of the redevelopment of the Virtual Museum of Canada (VMC). The VMC has been a great success since its launch in March 2001. Since then, it has evolved in response to information technologies and the needs of the Network?s members. In order to help us make choices and prepare the ground for further innovation, a group of internal and external experts was mandated to produce a study paper that would stimulate exchanges and debates within the museum and heritage community."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Computer Security Source: CSO and CERT Just Released, 2004 E-CRIME Watch Survey Summary ||| Direct to Full Text -- Health Information--Australia Source: Parliamentary Library, Australia New Report, Healthy measures - key health statistics Thursday, May 27, 2004
Resources of the Week Three selections this week. 1) Employment--United States Source: Wall Street Journal CareerJournal.com: Salary and Hiring Information As far as juicy information goes, salary data is among the juiciest. Who makes what? How do you stack up against your peers? If you relocate to a city in a different part of the country, can you expect to earn what you earn now? What's a good ballpark figure to hold in your head when you've been called back for that second interview? Or maybe you need hard data to prove to your boss that you are, in fact, underpaid. There's a real good chance you'll find just the numbers you need on this page, specifically, from the scroll menu in the blue box at the top of the right column. Let's choose...uh, Librarians. Highlight it and click "GO" at the bottom of the box. In the center column, up pops an article about hiring trends for corporate librarians. Beneath the blue box on the right, you'll see another blue box labeled "Salary Tables." Here's the good stuff, folks. For Librarians, you'll find links to five different salary tables -- Library Department Heads, Librarians by Experience, Top Research Librarians, Librarians at Nonprofits in the Washington, D.C., Metro Area, and the decidedly generic...Librarians. For each table, the source/data is indicated in italics at the bottom. Go ahead...satisfy your curiosity now. Other fishing holes for salary data: + Bureau of Labor Statistics: Weekly Earnings Data (See especially the table Median weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers by detailed occupation and sex.) + GovExec.com: Salary and Benefits (federal employee pay schedules, etc.) + JobStar: Salary Info Index + Occupational Outlook Handbook + Portico's collection of salary guides (resources for "advancement professionals") + Salary Guides and Guidance (The Riley Guide) + Salary.com -- 2) Economics Source: Economic History Association EH.Net "EH.Net operates the Economic History Services fileserver and several electronic discussion lists to provide resources and promote communication among scholars in economic history and related fields." What's here: + Abstracts in Economic History: "AEH is a service designed to assist economic historians in sharing information about their work. Abstracts are welcome for all types of work in the field, including dissertations, working papers, conference presentations, journal articles, and contributions to anthologies." + Ask the Professor: "Professors who have done research in Economic History are volunteering to assist others interested in learning more about the field." Searchable archive of previous questions and answers. + Book Reviews + Course Syllabi + Database Directory: "EH.Net provides an on-line location for researchers in economic history to make their data series available to other professionals and interested scholars. Several data series have been given to EH.Net and are available as downloadable files, while many other titles may be accessed through our Database Registry." + Economic History in the Popular Press: Selected recent articles of interest. + Encyclopedia: "EH.Net Encyclopedia of Economic and Business History is designed to provide students and laymen with high quality reference articles in the field. Articles for the Online Encyclopedia are written by experts, screened by a group of authorities, and carefully edited." + How Much Is That?: "Have you ever wondered what the value of a dollar was in 1895? Or what the GDP was in 1929? Here is a place where you can ask questions of comparative value covering purchasing power, exchange rates, and other variables between the past and today." Includes data for the UK, gold prices, "the relative cost of unskilled labor," some exchange rates. + Membership Directory: "(C)ontains a complete list of the members of the Business History Conference, The Cliometric Society, and the Economic History Association." + Related Websites: "The materials listed here are primarily WWW sites with information of use to economic historians. Because there is presently a great deal more on the Internet in economics than in history, that discipline is more heavily represented, but over time the distribution will even out." -- 3) Naval Studies NOSI: Naval Open Source Intelligence "NOSI is a digital library of world naval operational news curated from open source intelligence. Links to naval operational news stories are posted daily after scanning over 100 international news sources...NOSI is curated by Michael P. D'Alessandro, M.D. Dr. D'Alessandro has been a member of the U.S. Naval Institute since 1981.... Dr. D'Alessandro's research is in the field of digital libraries; he established the Virtual Hospital digital health sciences library as the 250th Web site on the Internet in 1993." See Also: GlobalSecurity.org Another excellent source of open source security, intelligence, and related material.
Multimedia Search New Resource: CampaignSearch.com We've mentioned many multimedia search tools on ResourceShelf. Today, in a News.com article, word of a new one. Say hello to CampaignSearch.com. This site uses voice recognition technology from StreamSage. From the site, "CampaignSearch.com has gathered campaign-related video and audio files from a number of Web sites: George Bush's and John Kerry's campaign Web sites, C-SPAN, PBS, NPR and more. CampaignSearch.com uses complex spoken-language-analysis software created by StreamSage to automatically identify the sections of audio/video news and speeches that are relevant to a voter's interests." More info about the technology here. Here are some other multimedia search tools that we've featured on ResourceShelf. + Virage demos from PBS, keyword search segments from several PBS programs + Speechbot, keyword search (voice recognition technology) over 17,000 hours of radio programming + NPR Audio Archives Search, keyword search abstracts of program segments back to 1996 + ShadowTV.Com, fee-based, keyword search (real-time) major news networks + The Feedroom Browse or search (abstracts), and view news segments from various television stations.
Professional Reading (and Viewing) Shelf Information Architecture Usability Source: The Library of Congress (Video Lecture) Krug and Rosenfeld on loc.gov: An Interactive Evaluation From the site, "Usability guru Steve Krug and information architecture expert Lou Rosenfeld bring their expertise to bear as they perform a live review of the Library of Congress Web site. The presentation runs 101 minutes. This Luminary Lecture took place on May 4, 2004. See Also: Direct to Video -- Digital Preservation Source: GCN Library starts digital preservation research program From the article, "The Library of Congress is launching a research program to develop digital preservation technologies, announced William LeFurgy, digital project manager for the Library of Congress. The Digital Archiving and Long Term Preservation Research Program will ultimately provide new tools for the Library of Congress? $175 million National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program, a congressionally mandated initiative to preserve the rapidly increasing number of culturally significant digital materials. The National Science Foundation will administer the program." -- Government Documents--United States Source: The Memory Hole Government Documents Pulled Out of Public Circulation Russ Kick of the The Memory Hole comments and offers a list.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents National World War II Memorial--United States--Databases Registry Database Available on the National World War II Memorial Web Site The National World War II Memorial will be dedicated in Washington, DC, on Saturday. The web site contains construction facts, images, and design info. It also contains an online database. From the site, ""he Registry combines four distinct databases that can be searched for names of those whose service and sacrifice helped win the Second World War. The Registry includes the names of Americans who are: + Buried in American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) overseas military cemeteries + Memorialized on ABMC Tablets of the Missing + Listed on official War and Navy Department Killed in Service rosters now held by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) + Honored by public enrollment in the Registry of Remembrances." Search by name and State/Territory. An advanced interface is also available. -- United Nations--Directories Official Website Locator for the UN System of Organizations "This site serves as a portal to web sites of the United Nations, its funds and programmes, and specialized agencies. It also includes links to key projects and initiatives and to various joint programmes of the UN System." Browse alphabetically or click the "Thematic Index" link in the navigation bar on the left-hand side to see a dropdown menu that allows you to browse sites by subject area. Fairly straightforward way of navigating the sometimes byzantine collection of UN websites. See also: United Nations System Organization Chart (PDF; 96 KB) -- Playwrights eO'Neill.com "An electronic Eugene O'Neill Archive," which offers: + Audio Archive: "Complete broadcasts of O'Neill's plays in RealAudio format" + Library: "Online texts, including complete plays, Travis Bogard's Contour in Time, an archive of essays by O'Neill scholars, and The Eugene O'Neill Newsletter" + Production Archive: "Artifacts from theatrical, film, television, and radio productions of O'Neill's plays, including programs, cast listings, photographs, reviews, and more" + Reference Catalog: Annotated bibliography "of resources relating to O'Neill and the theatre" Also includes reviews of productions of O'Neill's plays, curriculum materials, a theatre guide (upcoming productions of O'Neill's plays around the world), online discussion forum, links to related resources. Site is keyword searchable.
Web Search--Yahoo! Source: CNET Yahoo Embraces Antispyware From the article: "Yahoo on Thursday is expected to release an upgrade for its downloadable toolbar to help people detect and remove spyware, or malicious files, on their PCs. For now, the Web portal will be testing the technology, which has been supplied by antispyware company PestPatrol. It will offer the toolbar upgrade only to a select number of people at beta.toolbar.yahoo.com, Yahoo spokeswoman Stephanie Iwamasa said. The software can perform a high-level scan of files on a PC to detect viruses or other applications that were installed surreptitiously and are used to spy on computer behavior." See Also - Yahoo Press Release via Business Wire See Also - Yahoo Antispyware Community (NEW)
Web Search--Microsoft Source: AP Microsoft turns its might to growing field of search From the article, "Microsoft Corp. is looking beyond Internet searches, heading into its battle with Google Inc. with technology designed to allow people to scour their e-mails, personal computers and even hefty databases for information...The search system will give consumers 'an end-to-end system for searching across any data type,' Yusuf Mehdi, head of Microsoft's MSN division, told analysts at a Goldman Sachs Internet conference Wednesday in Las Vegas. The technology is designed as a major search improvement for users trying to grapple with an increasing amount of digital information, offering a single hunting system instead of several different search engines, file management systems or other tools." See Also: Another Recent AP Article About MS Search See Also: News.Com Interview with Yusuf Mehdi Wednesday, May 26, 2004
Web Search--Google More Recently Registered "Google-Based" Domain Names On 5/3 we posted a list of domain names that include the word Google and were registered in April. I know many of you found the list interesting. Others used the word fascinating to describe it. Some even found it useful. So, let's do it again! Here's a page with more than 500 Google-based domain names registered since early this month. Although I wasn't able to review each and every one, I highlighted a few that show Google Inc. as the owner. I also tossed in a recently registered Yahoo Inc. domain.
Professional Reading (and Listening) Shelf Data Mining Source: The Kojo Nnamdi Show/WAMU Radio Program Discusses Data Mining (RealAudio) From the description, "Data mining searches large databases for unexpected patterns of data - and it's used by everyone from Amazon to political campaigns to government and law resources. But some say the technology crosses the lines of public versus private information." Guests: + Usama Fayyad, Founder and president, DMX Group, a business and technology consulting group + Lee Strickland, Visiting Professor and Director, Center for Information Policy, University of Maryland, College Park + Nick Gillespie, Editor-in-Chief, Reason magazine + Angelique Waller, artist, author "Data Mining the Amazon" The program was broadcast on WAMU, a public radio station in Washington, DC, and runs about one hour. -- Scholarly Communication Source: C&RL; News New Article, Information Access Alliance: Challenging anticompetitive behavior in academic publishing This intro to the IAA was written by Mary M. Case, Director of the Office of Scholarly Communication at the Association of Research Libraries.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Women--United States Source: Harvard University Library Open Collections Program Women Working, 1870-1930 "The Open Collections Program has chosen the subject Women Working from 1870 to 1930 as its first topic to demonstrate the feasibility of bringing together books, manuscripts, and images from across the Harvard Libraries and Museums and integrating them into a digital collection using the Web as a primary access tool." + Browse by topic. + Browse by dates and events + Search full text. -- U.S. Military Source: U.S. DoD Office of Force Transformation New, Full-Text Report, National Military Strategy of the United States of America 2004 (PDF; 460 KB) From Richard B. Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: "The 'National Military Strategy' conveys my message to the Joint Force on the strategic direction the Armed Forces of the United States should follow to support the National Security and Defense Strategies in this time of war. This document describes the ways and means to protect the United States, prevent conflict and surprise attack and prevail against adversaries who threaten our homeland, deployed forces, allies and friends." Focuses on three priorities: Winning the war on terrorism, enhancing joint warfighting and transforming the armed forces for the future. -- United States Census + Census of Population and Housing (1790-2000) See Also: Selected Editions of the Statistical Abstract (1878-2001) See Also: Mini Historical Statistics Files available in pdf or xls formats. -- Environment--United States--Database Source: EPA Updated, UV Index Search by zip code or city name. -- United States--History Presidents--United States Source: National Archives and Records Administration (U.S.) Released Today, National Archives Releases New Materials Related to the Nixon Presidency From the overview, "The National Archives and Records Administration will release approximately 20,000 pages of transcripts of Dr. Henry Kissinger's telephone conversations during his tenure as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (1969-74) and Secretary of State (1973-74) during the Nixon Administration. These telephone calls, which took place at various locations, were recorded between January 21, 1969-August 8, 1974. The National Archives will also release approximately 7,000 pages of materials from the "White House Central Files: Subject Files," including Pardon Files from 1973; and 1,600 pages of "White House Central Files: Name Files," including a small amount of material relating to John Kerry and Roger Ailes. See Also: Addional Info in this AP Report
Briefly + Solcara and LexisNexis Launch News Monitoring Tool (via ManagingInformation.com) & LexisNexis Expands Presence in China -- -- + Vivisimo Continues Rolling Along with Six New Biopharma Clients The company launched their ClusterMed product at the end of March. -- + 9/11 Panel Chooses Publisher for Report (via NY Times) "[W.W] Norton has announced plans to publish 500,000 copies of the report and sell them for $10 each, which competitors acknowledge is a relatively low retail price for a book expected to be hundreds of pages long. The federal government's printing agency, the Government Printing Office, is expected to sell its own version within several days of the report's release."
Search Engines--Legal Issues Source: Findlaw Why You Can't Sue Google From the column by Julie Hilden: "As Google prepares for its Initial Public Offering, it's worth reflecting on a special advantage the law gives to it, and to other, similar search sites: Such sites are, in effect, immune from much of the liability risk a traditional publisher of news and other factual information faces. For publishers of books, magazines, newspapers and the like, publishing, or even re-publishing, a false statement can trigger defamation liability. But, for reasons I will explain, the same is not true for search sites like Google. Search sites can provide access to information that may be false, without worrying about the risk of a defamation suit. (No wonder, then, that Google's stock may turn out to be valuable; some of the value it will have doubtless comes from this special legal bonus.)" Tuesday, May 25, 2004
Professional Reading Shelf Source: ACM Queue From IR to Search and Beyond This article was written by Ramana Rao, CTO at Inxight Software. He writes, "searching has come a long way since the 60s, but have we only just begun?" See Also: More Search Articles from ACM Queue -- Enterprise Search Source: Intelligent Enterprise/Intelligent Portals Consumer and Enterprise Search: Not an Exact Match
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full Text Documents Privacy--United States Source: The Technology and Privacy Advisory Committee Full Text Report, Recently Released, Safeguarding Privacy in the Fight Against Terrorism From a FCW article, "The 140-page document resulted from Congress canceling the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency's controversial Terrorism Information Awareness program in 2003. TAPAC officials concluded that TIA represented "a flawed effort to achieve worthwhile ends." The report runs 140 pages. -- Congressional Research Service Source: FPC/CRS Two Recently Released CRS Reports + Greece: Threat of Terrorism and Security of the Olympics + Terrorist Identification, Screening, and Tracking Under Homeland Security Presidential Directive 6 -- Housing--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census New, Housing Data Between the Censuses: The American Housing Survey -- Taxes--Australia Source: Parliamentary Library, Australia New Full Text Report, Less tax or more social spending: twenty years of opinion polling -- e-Government--United States Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project Use of E-government Increases 50% from 2002 to 2003, but Citizens Want Multiple Channels Available to Contact Government "New research by the Pew Internet & American Life Project shows that 97 million adult Americans, or 77% of Internet users, took advantage of e-gov in 2003, whether that meant going to government Web sites or emailing government officials. This represented a growth of 50% from 2002. At the same time, citizens who contact government said they are more likely to turn to traditional means either the telephone or in-person visits rather than the Web or email to deal with government." Download full report, by sections or just a summary of the findings.
Web Search Update Web Search--Yahoo Source: San Jose Mercury News + Plaxo,Yahoo make deal on search From the article, "Today Plaxo integrates Yahoo's search engine directly into the Outlook e-mail program. Under the deal with Yahoo, Plaxo will get paid for channeling people to Yahoo's search engine. The search box will be placed beside a Plaxo icon that sits atop Outlook. Plaxo will eventually make Web searching possible from individual e-mails, according to Masonis. Ultimately, he wants Plaxo to search individual words within the e-mails. You would click on the word and Plaxo would do a Web search through Yahoo." Thanks to Searchblog for the tip. J.B. also comments on the deal. See Also: Direct to Plaxo -- Web Search Source: SearchDay Search Engine User Attitudes D.S. and C.S. with a thorough overview of some recently released numbers from iProspect. Here are a few points that caught my eye. + "What do people do when they can't find the information they're looking for? 26 percent said they'd give up on a search and try again if they didn't find a match in the first two pages of results, more than any other choice. This was followed by 23 percent who said they'd review only the first few matches on the first page, then 19 percent who said they'd review only the entire first page of results. 15 percent said they'd give up after reviewing three pages. The remainder said they'd look at more than three pages." + "Nearly half of those surveyed -- 49 percent -- said they use one or more search toolbars. This is based on the fact that respondents were asked to answer which toolbar they had installed: Google, Yahoo, MSN or None Of The Above. Yahoo was ranked top among those choices, at 22 percent, followed by Google at 20 percent and MSN at 17 percent." + "In other findings, both men (65%) and women (57%) preferred natural results over paid listings, though the 43% of women who said they favored the paid listings suggest that the preference for organic results is not as strong in women as men." -- Web Search Source: News.com Study questions Google's long-term dominance A couple of comments: + The study points out that, "Google's results vary little from those found on other search sites." However, SearchDay recently noted that, " A new comparison tool shows that the major search engines have surprisingly little overlap, even for popular search terms. Search engine guru Greg Notess has long studied search engine overlap -- the number of pages found by more than one search engine. Greg's findings have consistently shown that there is very little overlap in the web page databases of the major search engines, meaning you'll likely get very different results depending on the engine." The article also says, "Google users searching for the leading cause of death for people between the ages of 25 and 34, found the information they were looking for 55 percent of the time. The company's rivals fell close behind with between 52 percent and 54 percent success rates, Vividence observed." So I guess the question is, what did the study participants consider a good result? Were those surveyed satisfied with whatever they found? Did time constraints come into play? What were the search terms? How many search terms were used? Those of us who use specialized info databases (free and fee-based) -- along with things called books (no kidding) -- realize that the web/web engines are just one of many research tools. However, I think the general public has little or no idea about "other" existing resources that could not only be helpful, but also SAVE them aggravation and effort. We also know that with a little effort, general web search tools like Google and Yahoo can become much more powerful and precise. This will become even more noticeable as these resources grow in size. I guess the most interesting news is that more and more users are realizing that general web search tools (other than Google) are useful. + "The company found that Google clearly remains consumers' favorite, largely because of the search engine's less-cluttered interface." I can't figure out why Yahoo doesn't spend some effort promoting the search.yahoo.com interface? Heck, you can even customize the tabs! I also think Teoma.com is far from cluttered, and it also gives refinement options not available at Google. Again, creating and purchasing an info resource is one thing, but getting people to use it is something else. Google does it very well (better than just about anyone); others, including traditional vendors and libraries, need to do better. + "Watkins said part of the reason why Google lags behind its competitors is the company's stringent practice of keeping ads well marked, while the other sites sometimes mix solicitations in with regular search results." Google deserves mega kudos for their work in labeling web results and making everyone else follow. That said, everyone else is better, and it's hard to find examples of where the other engines mentioned in the article don't clearly mark ads vs. organic results. + I'll conclude with two comments that I think are relevant. The first from our friend Tara Calishain, who said in a 8/03 AP article, "Google has a lot of smart people who have built a great search engine, but there are a lot of other smart people out there looking for ways to make search engines even better." The other comment is found in a 5/03 Forbes article, "Even Google's engineers admit FAST and Teoma deliver results comparable to theirs." Monday, May 24, 2004
Science--Specialized Search Tools Source: Info Today NewsBreaks More on Science.gov 2.0 On May 11th we mentioned that Science.gov 2.0 had just launched. Today, Paula Hane offers an excellent overview of the enhanced service and new technology. One weakness Paula doesn't mention in her column that I've found while testing Science.gov 2.0 is that direct links to citations found via this metasearch tool are not available. This could cause problems in trying to return to a citation or including it in a bibliography. An example, I ran a quick search for the phrase "global warming" and, as expected, got many results. When I clicked on an entry, I was unable to find a direct url to that specific entry. However, if I went directly to one of the underlying databases I was able to find a unique url.
Web Search Source: Wired And More Link Bombs I agree with Danny S. and have started to call these types of things "link bombs." The writer seems to have a problem understanding the differences between "bombs" and keyword advertising. He also doesn't mention that AltaVista, Lycos, and Yahoo all use the same underlying database. Oh well. I do find it worth noting that once again Jeeves and Teoma seem more resistant to link bombing and manipulation than other web engines.
Professional Reading Shelf Librarians Source: American Libraries Librarians Are Not Search Engines In his latest column (a must read), Dr. Joseph Janes writes, "Maybe it's just me, but I don't see the obvious comparisons between that [web search engines] and what a librarian does. To be sure, both are ways to get answers to questions; so in a sense both librarians and search engines are 'answerers.' It does seem an odd parallel, though; we never got ourselves compared (much less compared ourselves) to databases, catalogs, reference books, or the like. I think I know where this notion comes from: Some librarians, not without justification, might see search engines as competition. It's not at all difficult to look at the rise of free and easy Internet searching and the simultaneous and sometimes precipitous drop in reference statistics and put two and two together. And that may well be a big part of what's going on. So why not portray ourselves as the preferred alternative, in the same ballpark? Because it's dangerous, that's why. Sure, you can get an answer out of Vivisimo or Teoma, and you can also get an answer out of one of your local public library's telephone reference service. The answer from Vivísimo might even be faster. (It might even be right.) But it'll also be mindless. And unconcerned with quality, evaluation, instruction, or meeting your specific needs. There's also a good chance it'd be a good answer to a question you weren't really asking." I would add to Dr. Janes' comments that we also see the idea of the open web as the world's largest library mentioned in many articles. I can understand where this comes from (large amounts of info in one "virtual" location), but it's a real stretch. A library is a controlled, well-maintained, selective and organized collection of resources. We all know that the open web is not close to this idea. This doesn't mean that some of the massive amounts of material found via web engines is not valuable -- it ABSOLUTELY IS -- but this alone doesn't make a general web engine a library. That said, I think the general web engines (Yahoo, Google, Ask, etc.) could work more with the library community to solicit our thoughts on how to make their products more valuable tools for all users (including many librarians).
Web Browsers Source: News.com Start-up Looks to Add Pluck to Browsers From the article, "Start-up Pluck on Monday launched its first product, a set of tools designed to help people add capabilities to Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browsing software. Pluck's self-titled package of browser add-ons promises to affix a range of extensions to IE, including expanded Web searching capabilities, live content folder sharing and a so-called rich site summary (RSS) reader. The product also includes an online community aspect, as it lets people exchange information saved in documents or folders." See Also: Pluck Press Release See Also: Netcaptor, another browser that's been described as "IE on steroids."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Television--Database Source: Yahoo (Info supplied by Tribune Media Services/Zap2it.com) TV Show Database A browsable database containing basic directory info (premiere date, description, stars, brief history) for hundreds of television programs new and old. Browsing by category is not a good idea since these categories contain only a few of the many entries available if you browse by title. See Also: The Encyclopedia of Television (Full-Text) From the site,"...includes more than 1,000 original essays from more than 250 contributors and examines specific programs and people, historic moments and trends, major policy disputes and such topics as violence, tabloid television and the quiz show scandal. It also includes histories of major television networks as well as broadcasting systems around the world and is complemented by resource materials, photos and bibliographical information. The book is not searchable but does contain hyperlinked cross-references. -- Webliographies Source: Science, Technology, and Business Division, The Library of Congress New Research Guides + Wedding Industry Research - Selected Internet Resources + 17-Year Periodical Cicadas (2004) - Selected Internet Resources + Ricin (Toxic Substance) -- R&D--United; States--Statistics Source: NSF New Info Brief, Largest Single-Year Decline in U.S. Industrial R&D; Expenditures Reported for 2002 This InfoBrief will focus on statistics from the 2002 Survey of Industrial Research and Development. It announces the availability of survey results on the World Wide Web (WWW) and the publication of the forthcoming annual detailed statistical tables (DST) and methodology reports; presents statistics on levels and sources of industrial R&D; support, sales, and employment for manufacturing and nonmanufacturing industries; highlights the funding of R&D; from companies' own resources and from the Federal government; and details R&D; spending per R&D; scientist and engineer by R&D-performing; companies. -- Maps Source: U.S. Military Academy Department of History Department Maps "In 1938, the predecessors of what is today The Department of History at the United States Military Academy began developing a series of campaign atlases to aid in teaching cadets a course entitled, 'History of the Military Art.' Since then, the Department has produced six atlases and nearly one thousand maps, encompassing not only America's wars but global conflicts as well. In keeping abreast with today's technology, the Department of History is providing these maps on the World Wide Web. The maps were created by the United States Military Academy's Department of History and are the digital versions from the atlases printed by the United States Defense Printing Agency." Direct to Atlases -- Taxes--United States Source: U.S. Census Bureau New, State Government Tax Collections Up 2.4 Percent; Biggest Increase in Tobacco Taxes "According to data from the 2003 Annual Survey of State Government Tax Collections, general sales taxes were up 2.8 percent to $185 billion and taxes on individual income declined overall by 1.5 percent to $182 billion. These taxes made up more than two-thirds of all state tax collections. Among other major taxes, levies on tobacco products increased the most (29 percent), followed by severance taxes (24 percent) and documentary and stock transfer taxes (23 percent)." See Also: 2003 Annual Survey of State Government Tax Collections -- Traffic Information--United Kingdom Relaunched, Highways Agency Web Site From Kablenet.com, "The site was launched on 24 May 2004. It has been designed to be easier to navigate than its predecessor, and incorporates four new services to help drivers plan their journeys. Visitors to the site can get real time traffic information from the National Traffic Control Centre. The site provides regional maps that include icons at points where there are roadworks and accidents, and a click of the mouse will provide details and forecasts of any delays. They will also be able to get traffic flow forecasts, information on future roadworks from an online database, and a stream of updated information on the road network."
Briefly Ohio Libraries Launch e-Book Service -- Kathleen de la Peña McCook Named Inaugural Recipient of Achievement in Library Diversity Research Award Sunday, May 23, 2004
Professional Reading Shelf Weblogs Source: BBC News Gates Backs Blogs for Businesses "In a speech to an audience of chief executives, Mr Gates said the regularly updated journals, or blogs, could be a good way for firms to tell customers, staff and partners what they are doing." Here's the actual quote from Bill Gates: "Another new phenomenon that connects into this is one that started outside of the business space, more in the corporate or technical enthusiast space, a thing called blogging. And a standard around that that notifies you that something has changed called RSS." The full text of his speech along with his PowerPoint slides are also available online. -- Web Design Source: Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox Guidelines for Visualizing Links "Textual links should be colored and underlined to achieve the best perceived affordance of clickability, though there are a few exceptions to these guidelines." -- Digital Libraries Source: OCLC Distinguished Seminar Series: Jim Gray on Digital Libraries "Jim Gray's presentation provides an overview of his work with the World-Wide Telescope effort from the perspective of a digital library, focusing on metadata, schema, curation, and preservation issues." Slides are in PPT format. Audio is in MP3 format. The seminar took place on May 17, 2004 in Dublin, Ohio. See Also: Materials from Other DSS Presentations
Library Briefs + North Carolina...NC Live Databases Receive Press Attention (via Kinston Free Press) -- + Texas... School libraries dig in to keep providing resources (via Midland Reporter-Telegram) -- + Illinois...Library stands by controversial book (via UPI)
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Iraq Source: Export-Import Bank of the United States Useful Links for Exporting to Iraq Collection of links organized by headings: United States Government, United States Government Commercial Information, Information on Iraqi Businesses and Organizations, Contracting Opportunities, International Organizations. -- History of Medicine--Gateways Source: The Wellcome Trust (UK) MedHist "MedHist is a gateway to evaluated, quality Internet resources relating to the history of medicine and allied sciences, covering all aspects of the history of health and development of medical knowledge." Saturday, May 22, 2004
Metadata Source: NISO Workshop Presentations: Metadata Practices on the Cutting Edge Workshop The NISO workshop took place in DC yesterday. Here's a list of the presentations. All presentations are in PowerPoint format. + Metadata Practice and Direction: a Community Perspective, Lorcan Dempsey, OCLC + RSS: Really Simple Syndication - A Publisher's Perspective by Howard Ratner, Nature Publishing Group + New Developments Relating to Linking Metadata, Chuck Koscher, CrossRef + Metadata Standards for Managing and Discovering Image Collections, Oya Rieger, Cornell University Libraries + Addressing Metadata in the MPEG-21 and PDF-A ISO Standards, William G. LeFurgy, Library of Congress + Using MODS (Metadata Object Description Schema) for Rich Descriptive Data, Rebecca Guenther, Library of Congress + The Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard (METS), Morgan Cundiff, Library of Congress + ONIX for Serials and the NISO/EDItEUR Joint Working Party for the Exchange of Serials Subscription Information Nathan Robertson, Johns Hopkins University Libraries + Metadata Interaction, Integration, and Interoperability, William Moen, University of North Texas + DSpace SIMILE: using semantic web technology for metadata support, MacKenzie Smith, MIT Libraries + Beyond Parsing: Metadata Quality Management, Bruce Rosenblum, Inera, Inc.
Professional Reading Shelf Citation Indexing Information Industry--Elsevier Source: Access Scopus to challenge Web of Science? From the article, "Elsevier is developing a bibliographic database called Scopus, which several industry observers believe will compete with ISI's Web of Science for library dollars. At the heart of Scopus is the world's largest abstracts database of over 12,900 journal titles from 4,000 publishers providing access to over 25 million abstracts going back to 1966 and 5 years of reference back years, building up to 10 years by 2005."
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Military--Multimedia Resources Military Clip-Art & Multimedia Source: Dudley Knox Library, Naval Postgraduate School Briefly annotated collection of links to graphics and audio/video resources for all branches of the military. See Also: The Air War College Also Offers an Excellent Collection of Links -- The following two items were culled from the Infomine What's New Newsletter -- Ornithology Source: Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology All About Birds Everything you wanted to know about birds and birding, including where to go, how to identify different species, choosing and using binoculars/spotting scopes, attracting birds to your yard, studying birds and conservation. -- Politics Source: Georgetown University Political Database of the Americas "The Political Database of the Americas is a non-governmental Internet-based project that provides reference materials, primary documents, comparative studies and statistical data for countries in the Western Hemisphere." Available in English, Spanish, French and Portugese.
Update Alibris Ends Plans for IPO Five weeks ago we mentioned that online used book marketplace Alibris had filed to go public. Well, things change. The company has withdrawn the IPO. Nevertheless, the S-1 filing offers some interesting info about the used book industry. Thanks to Tara C. for the news tip. Friday, May 21, 2004
Web Search Source: Microsoft Watch Search Titans Talk Futures "Microsoft is known to be prepping new search technologies that are expected to allow users to search seamlessly across their local machines, corporate networks and the Internet. The new MSN Search part of the equation is expected to debut later this year or early next. A first version of the WinFS file-system subsystem will be integrated into Longhorn when it ships in 2006+. And A9 recently unveiled a beta version of a new search site that builds on top of Google." Report on World Wide Web Conference on presentations by Rick Rashid, senior VP in charge of Microsoft Research, and Udi Manber, CEO of Amazon.com's A9 subsidiary. See Also: ResourceShelfPLUS Has a Compilation Containing Links to Many of the Papers Presented at This Week's World Wide Web Conference See Also: Udi Manber the head of a9 spoke at the University of Washington in November. You can watch an archived version of his lecture here. It's titled, "The World's Information at Everyone's Fingertips."
Web Search--Ask Jeeves A New Smart Search Feature from Jeeves: Movie Info In April, we ran an item about Ask Jeeves launching Famous People Search. I just noticed that a new Smart Search feature is available and, like the others, can potentially save the searcher time and effort. If you search for a new movie you'll find a box at the top of the page containing movie plot info and DIRECT links to the trailer, the official site, reviews (via RottenTomatoes.com), showtime info and more. Hopefully, they'll continue to add more film info and include entries for older films. No special syntax is required to trigger this feature. I also noticed that you will find info for some films released in the past year. You can find more Ask.com SmartSearch shortcuts here.
Web Search--Vivisimo Source: Pittsburgh Tribune-Review More Press for Vivisimo From the article, "At the same time Google's founding duo began their journey to fame and fortune as researchers at Stanford University, a group of Carnegie Mellon University computer scientists initiated their own project in the summer of 1998 to tackle the problem of information overload. 'The only way to address the problem is to let users see a lot more of what's out there, but with less effort,' said Raul Valdes-Perez, 47, who led the CMU effort [now CEO of Vivisimo]." I've mentioned several times that Vivisimo calls this idea "selective ignorance." It's explained in this paper.
Web Search--Google Source: The Wall Street Journal A Contest to Manipulate Google Results (registration required) From the article, "An online ad company and a search-themed Web site are sponsoring a contest that shows how easy search results can be manipulated. The winners: sites that rank highest in Google searches on June 7 and July 7 for the "invented" term (actually a play on Dark Blue Sea Ltd., an Australian company that is a contest sponsor)." The apparent ease that some people have manipulating Google (and other web engines) is not good news for the company, web search and most importantly the typical searcher who enters 2.5 terms and clicks the search button." Library Stuff's Steven Cohen was kind enought to share a couple of comments with ResourceShelf. He writes, "While this article shows the public an important lesson on the ability to manipulate results in Google, it also displays what librarians have been teaching our patrons for years. That what is found on the first ten hits can lead the searcher to results that may not be the best for the particular issue at hand. In fact, we also preach the use of numerous other resources to gain quality results (LII, etc). Google does not equal quality research, as this article implicitly demonstrates." See Also: Andy Beal points out that the report is incorrect in stating that "cheating" is not allowed.
Information Architecture Information Access Peter Morville Launches Findability.org Guru, President of Semantic Studios, and co-author of what for many people is the bible of web info architecture has a new site. It's loaded with reading, links, and discussion. Findability.org is, "dedicated to findability and the design of findable objects." I'll be spending plenty of time here.
Professional Reading Shelf Public Libraries Source: The New Yorker High Tech Bibliophilia Paul Goldenberger, The New Yorker's architecture critic, calls Seattle's new Central Library, designed by Rem Koolhaas, "the most important new library to be built in a generation, and the most exhilarating." See Also: Libraries dust off stuffy image -- Libraries Inclusion of Library Ets Haim in Memory of the World Register Celebrated in Amsterdam "The Library Ets Haim, a unique collection of Judaica held in the Portuguese Synagogue complex in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, became officially part of UNESCO's Memory of the World Register, when the Memory of the World Certificate was handed over by UNESCO's Elisabeth Longworth to the President of the Board of Governors of the Library during a ceremony yesterday evening in Amsterdam." -- Institutional Repositories ARCHIMEDE : A Canadian software solution for institutional repositories From the announcement, "Laval University Library recently launched the third component of its institutional repository. Called « Archimede (http://archimede.bibl.ulaval.ca), this component covers e-prints, pre-prints, post-prints and other research publications from faculty members and research communities."
Federal Government--United States--Databases Source: FCW FedBizOpps Up for Bids From the article, "The General Services Administration has issued a solicitation for a new contractor to take over FedBizOpps, a Web site that gives contractors and agencies access to information about federal contracting opportunities." The article includes highlights from the RFP.
Resources, Reports, Tools, Lists, and Full-Text Documents Business--United States--Statistics Source: U.S. Census Just Released, 2002 Economic Census: Advance Nonemployer Statistics Summary ||| Direct to Full Text -- Population--United States Source: U.S. Census New, Fact Sheet: Facts About the Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander Population in the United States -- Health--Statistics--United States Source: CDC Fact Sheet: Facts about Prevalence of Arthritis--U.S., 2004 -- Labor--Statistics Source: BLS Just Released, International Comparisons of Hourly Compensation Costs for Production Workers in Manufacturing, revised data for 2002 -- Legal Resources--United States Source: National Center for State Courts CourTopics "Over 100 NCSC topic folders contain overviews, research reports, information about programs and services, frequently asked questions, best practices, and publications." Topics covered include everything from Acquiring Technology to Workload and Resource Assessment. Most (but not all) topics an overview, FAQ and resource guide (PDFs); some include additional related NCSC documents. The resource guides are basically extensive bibilographies. Some of the topics are likely to be of interest to consumers, such as Adoption, Custody and Support, Impaired Driving, Mental Health, Traffic Offenses. Also available at this site: Court Statistics Project + Examining the Work of State Courts + State Court Caseload Statistics + Caseload Highlights
Briefly + Major Site Redesign Released: PubMed Central + New URL, Updated Site: The Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions + Information Today, Inc. Acquires Faulkner Information Services x |
