The librarians in your library have.

Image credit: Crossref.org - All rights reserved - copyright 2008

The digital academic library meshes seamless electronic connections between distant points worldwide, and the end result provides our students, clinicians, faculty and staff with remote or on-campus access to library subscription materials, whether they are working at UCHC, from their homes or a different clinical location.

Librarians and technologists have spent many years creating these networks. Our essential work allows the process of pursuing research to seem easy; users are provided with a wide choice of health science databases and collections..

..

Image credit: Exlibris.com - All rights reserved - copyright 2008

Link out buttons are liberally spread throughout database pages, allowing users to click through to full-text subscriptions in seconds. A library of articles can be created by our users in a short amount of time. Many library users attend hands-on classes (taught by reference librarians) in order to learn to manage their collection of research articles using bibliographic management software such as EndNote or RefWorks.

Image credit: ISI and ThomsonReuters.com - All rights reserved - copyright 2008

And the next part is the best part: Our library users can then choose when and where to read, print, save or email their lists. Read it today, save it for next week, download it at home, print it or paper (or read it online and never print it at all).

Librarians are in the service profession, and convenience is King. (That makes Good Service... Queen!?)

All of these endeavors are standard, daily events in academic or health science libraries, which is why I bring up what the library profession refers to as the Front End and Back End (or the public face of the library, and the back-office technical stuff).

The Front End is what the librarians and technical systems staff refer to as the physical and digital front-door of the library from the perspective of the end user (people who use our library, services and collections), and the staff who work in public services, the human face of the library.

The Front End works seamlessly (on most days) because of the large cast of employees maintaining the Back End, watching over the myriad electronic connections and interconnected pathways, keeping them up and running 24x7x365.

Because the Back End staff aren't visible in the public areas of the library and because the Back End works so well... many of the users who generate our most-active statistics counts - faculty, researchers, graduate students- no longer need to physically step into the (real) building. Those who do walk into the actual library may only come to know the (Front End) reference or circulation staff who provide public services.

Because of these coordinated efforts, thousands of subscription journals are accessible online, MEDLINE or other subscription resources can be searched and linked digitally to full-text article(s)... and any of us can read, save or download these research materials if we are sitting on-site (or using a proxy connection when off-site).

At times, the system goes down. Then who ya gonna call? The library staff. Who does the library staff then call? The publishers and the gateway sites... for example, Karger is a science & technology publisher and HighWire or ScienceDirect are journal gateway sites.

Image credit: ScienceDirect.com - All rights reserved - copyright 2008

That is where CrossRef comes in, as the role it plays represents an integral piece in keeping both Front End and Back End in the library functional.

There are several levels of explanations to describe all that a non-profit, independent membership association such as CrossRef.org does for scholarly and academic publishers (and library users). Following are several excerpts from the CrossRef "About" page:

" CrossRef.org is a not-for-profit independent membership association, founded and directed by publishers... with a mandate to make reference linking throughout online scholarly literature efficient and reliable. As such, it is an infrastructure for linking citations across publishers, and the only full-scale implementation of the Digital Object Identifier (or DOI) System to date. CrossRef’s mandate is to connect users to primary research content, by enabling publishers to work collectively. "

" CrossRef is also the official DOI® link registration agency for scholarly and professional publications. It operates a cross-publisher citation linking system that allows a researcher to click on a reference citation on one publisher’s platform and link directly to the cited content on another publisher’s platform, subject to the target publisher’s access control practices. Our citation-linking network today covers millions of articles and other content items from several hundred scholarly and professional publishers.... CrossRef is a collaborative membership network, and not a product for purchase. "

" DOI is an alphanumeric name that identifies digital content, such as a book or journal article. The DOI is paired with the object's electronic address, or URL, in an updateable central directory, and is published in place of the URL in order to avoid broken links while allowing the content to move as needed. DOIs are distributed by publishers and by CrossRef, and there is no end-user charge associated with their use. As an identifier, the DOI can be incorporated into many different systems and databases. (For more information, see www.doi.org.) "

Now you, the reader, may be thinking "Why is the librarian taking up my time, writing about this CrossRef stuff? What does CrossRef have to do with evidence based medicine and health science literature? Why should I be concerned about a librarian thing?"

Answer: CrossRef is one of the many pieces of the network which allows all the linking required to bring that article to your desktop to be downloaded.

And if you are concerned about scholarly plagiarism, then please read this press release (June 19 2008 ) from CrossRef.org, announcing the introduction of a product designed for publishers' use for detecting plagiarism of manuscripts submitted to editors of scholarly or professional publications. The product is called CrossCheck. This software is only available by paid subscription to editors or peer-reviewers, and not to individuals. Read more about it here. Twelve major publishers have begun using CrossCheck.

Think of CrossCheck as a sort of Turnitin® for academics and researchers. In fact, the company which created Turnitin® is iParadigms which also developed the software for CrossCheck.

.

Editors Note: Note: CrossRef® and CrossRef.org® are registered trademarks and the CrossRef logo is a trademark of PILA (Publishers International Linking Association). Turnitin® is a registered trademark of iParadigms.com.

]]> http://northerninsights.wordpress.com/?p=172 Mon, 23 Jun 2008 18:57:49 +0000 Ruth http://northerninsights.wordpress.com/?p=172 23 Things on a Stick is well into the Round 2 phase. New participatns (or participants who began in Round 1 and wish to continue) have until Sept 15 to register their blog and work through this interesting, exciting, and rewarding "personal learning experience". Learn about blogs, RSS feeds, Twitter, Zoho, and many more tools.  View the participants Newsletter (vol 2no1 - June 19) and read the new blogs posted by NLLN participants.   

For the past 5 months, Minnesota residents have been able to freely access all these resources if they were using a Minnesota internet service provider (ISP). Due to contractractual agreements with EBSCO, the portal has been slightly modified. To access the EBSCO resources it will be necessary to have a public library card. This change will not affect other ELM resources -- only EBSCO . All of ELM will still be  accessible in the regular way in your academic, public, and school libraries, as well as on the MnLINK gateway.

Be sure to use your Electronic Library for Minnesota for your information needs!

While the journal will specialize in articles by professionals, paraprofessionals and students debating various sides of issues within the library field, it also welcomes poetry, short stories, and other writings on the matter. The publishers expect to publish 4 times a year (January, April, July and October). Entries are welcome in both Spanish and English.

The first issues is already in the works, but people who wish to contribute and who already have an article that might interest the journal are encouraged to submit their work. (I didn’t find an obvious link where to submit your work, but I guess you can contact one of the organizers.)

Zapopan Martín Muela-Meza - zapopanmuela@gmail.com

José Antonio Torres Reyes - joantreyes@gmail.com

You can expect the first issues here.

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Understanding the relationship of Social Software and Knowledge Sharing;

An Auspicious state of affairs for Academic Libraries

Abstract:

Purpose: This paper’s aim is to give a short overview of the present developments and ideas concerning knowledge sharing in social software and the prospects as well as the opportunties it entails for academic libraries. Hence in general, this paper also, as one of many information studies, attempt to provide information for students or researchers who are studying implementation of social software in libraries.

Design/Methodology/Approach: This paper presents a review based on literatures findings including definitions of social software and knowledge sharing also instances of implementation of social software in academic libraries.

Findings: Self-efficacy, as ability, together with ties and capabilities in human network can be seen as factors that motivate people to sharing their knowledge. Social software is a web technology which mediated people to share their knowledge hence building online identities. Thus relation between social software and knowledge sharing is clear. By having motivation factors people are more eager to enhance their knowledge by sharing each other through social software nevertheless social software create desire for people to be more motivate in terms of knowledge sharing. Academic libraries are one of many institutions which can take advantages from this process.

Originality/value: The study reveals relationship between social software and what motivated people to share their knowledge through this advance of web technology. Its highlights some efforts from academic libraries to implement social software thus being more connect to their users.

Keyword: Social software, Knowledge sharing, Academic library

Paper Type: Literature review

Selanjutnya...

Artikel Social Software and Knowledge

Piux XII Memorial Library

St Louis University

Definition of podcasting

Definition of vodcasting

What’s the buzz? Stats about tech savvy users, 1^st qrtr of 2007 iPod sales reached 100 millionth rank

Oct 2007 14% of adults age 18-29 have downloaded a podcast

35% of 677 profs say podcasts are an important communication tool

Rise in pop of online videos  hula.com

Uses of podcasting at other libs:

Bellevue community college life science center

Valdosta University Library - Plagiarism video

Moaine Valley Community College Library – promote lib events, record speakers

Morton College Library – national library week – blip.tv

March of the Librarians – ALA Midwinter 2007

Duke University Medical Center – orientation, tour

Winona State University Library – Orientation

Sheridan Libraries – John Hopkins University – promote services

Fairfield Uni – promotion of services, Laguna Beach type of video

Planning your first project

Choose theme – think small, choose a purpose

Write script and/or storyboard

Check for copyright issues

Recording – record audio in one take, remember for every 5 min of video you’ll need 30 min of footage, you can edit out mistakes

Be aware of time issues, patrons get bored fast, break longer projects in to sections

Find people that share your excitement

Be flexible or creative

Issues to consider

Impact on visually and hearing impaired users – transcript for audio files, video should have subtitles or post script

Intellectual property – check with institution

Copyright issues with music

Very complicated

Mozart might be in public domain, but performer and producer might not be in public domain

Ascap – can buy license from them

Magnatune.com – free creative commons license

Ccmixter.org

Space is the biggest issue

Server space

Storage space

Mental space

Time – so much time to edit, much more than recording

Examples of podcasts and videos

They do podcasts and videos under 4 minutes

Questions –

Do they keep stats? - yes

Do students have issues with streaming? – embedded require adobe flash

What editing software are they using? Adobe premiere elements $125, adobe premiere, can also use windows movie maker, iMovies,

Do you know how many hits you get on the old style tutorials?

How many hits are the director’s talks getting?

Libraries.slu.edu/podcasts/presentations/transcripts/podcasting101.pdf 

Lately, I have been looking to renew my career accomplishments by taking on new interests, projects, and even considering a change of environment. So, I began reviewing library job ads and bench marking my skills with the job market. The prospect of interviewing is a great way to keep yourself abreast what is happening in your profession.

As I browse through article after article about library issues, trends, future, etc., noting the various dates. I found myself humming the chorus of an old Elvis Presley song - “You Are Always on My Mind”.

Go ahead, laugh, but that really summs it up. If you want to remain competitive in the job market, you've got to keep professional trends on “your mind”.

Incidentally, I also noticed that two issues that made the list no matter what year (or decade) it was compiled. Can you guess which?

Technology and Budget! But don't take my word for it, here's a list of readings that covers the last 20 years:

• Farley, T, J. Broady-Preston, et al. "Academic libraries, people and change: a case study of the 1990s". OCLC Systems & Services, 14:4 (1998), pp. 151-164.

• Jackson, Frederick H. "The Future of Academic Libraries: The Inevitability of Change." College Board Review, n117 (Fall 1980),pp. 6-9.

• Hisle, W. Lee. "Top Issues Facing Academic Libraries". C&RL News. 63:10 (November, 2002).

• Mullins, James L., et al. "Top ten assumptions for the future of academic libraries and librarians: a report from the ACRL research committee". C&RL News, 68:4 (April, 2007)

You can read OCLCs press release on the matter here.