Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Reference Works, From Idea To Reality, Sue Polanka

University Libraries' Staff Publications

I've been reviewing reference books and databases for more than 10 years now, cracking the bindings on new titles, test-driving the interface features, and summarizing my impressions for reference librarians wanting the latest opinion on the newest content. I can't say that I spent much of that period processing the amount of time, effort, money, and personnel involved in bringing a multi-volume encyclopedia or online product" to fruition. At the 2010 ALA Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., however, I got a chance to stop and think about that, thanks to the program sponsored by Reference Books Bulletin.

Tales From The Field: The Right Mix Of Theory, Practice, And Soft Skills For Educating Digital Library Leaders, Cory K. Lampert, Krystyna Matusiak

Library Faculty Presentations

Technology skills have entered the LIS curriculum, but an overlooked variable in employability is often the perception of graduates’ soft skills. Communication skills, consensus-building and strategic thinking are critical to employers and by integrating coursework, internship experience, and networking opportunities as part of the core educational experience new graduates can set themselves apart as they enter the workforce. Research shows that programs that most effectively prepare future digital librarians are those that complement theory with interdisciplinary practice by developing partnerships and offer mentoring opportunities. This paper presents two perspectives identifying strategies to help develop leadership skills for the digital library …

Credo's Topic Pages, Sue Polanka

University Libraries' Staff Publications

"Where do I start?" This is often a question that students ask when beginning their research. It's a question that Credo Reference wants to answer with its new product, Topic Pages. Topic Pages offers an all-in-one starting point for more than 10,000 popular research topics. The pages are designed to offer context and vocabulary, subject orientation, and pathways to further exploration. They include simple definitions, encyclopedia entries, tag clouds showing the vocabulary of the topic, images, and a tide list of the most common references from subject encyclopedia articles. Content is drawn from Credo Reference and beyond.

Designing The Born-Digital Archive, Michelle Light

Library Faculty Presentations

Light spoke generally about the major issues facing archivists who manage born digital records and how the UCI Libraries responded when providing access to the Richard Rorty papers. She discussed the challenges, such as dealing with rapid technological change, ensure present and future accessibility of legacy files, managing privacy and copyrights, guaranteeing the authenticity and integrity of files, preventing loss and destruction, and selecting the most important material for preservation. She also discussed numerous decisions archivists make that impact the future archive, such as emulation or preservation of the original computing environment, the organization of files, the migration of materials …

Exploring Open Access E-Textbooks, Sue Polanka

University Libraries' Staff Publications

In previous columns I've explored reference e-book platforms, distributors, and aggregators. This month I want to step out a bit further and explore open-access digital textbooks. I learned a lot about digital textbooks in February when I attended the O'Reilly Tools of Change (TOC) Conference. This conference discusses issues in publishing; one of these issues happened to be digital textbooks. The first question that often comes to mind when discussing open-access digital textbooks is, what are they? They share several characteristics: they are protected by the creative commons license by which content may be copied, shared, or changed so long …

Oral History On The Web, Tom D. Sommer

Library Faculty Presentations

This session will examine how oral history is increasing its relevance in a changing digital landscape. This session will not only showcase a few oral history collections currently online, but how oral historians can place them there. Further, this session will explain the basic steps to uploading your interviews (audio, video and transcriptions) to the Web with some practical tools. This session will also showcase a new method of access for oral history researchers. This new method is the digital collection. For example, the University Libraries at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas has created the digital collection entitled, “Nevada …

Interactive Online Reference, Sue Polanka

University Libraries' Staff Publications

Last November I attended the 2009 Charleston Conference: "Issues in Book and Serial Acquisitions." E-content, licensing, business models, and a host of other issues were discussed. There were several presentations on reference, one in particular titled "Interactive Reference," presented by Tom Beyer, director of publishing at iFactory, and myself Part of the RDW Group, iFactory designs and engineers a variety of online products, including Sage Reference Online, Rosen's Teen Health 6-Wellness, and multiple Oxford products. During the presentation, Beyer discussed the state of online reference and the variety of interactive features that could be useful in the next-generation products. Beyer …

Digital Archival Collections Hosted On Flickr: Institutional Experience Outside Of The Commons, Erin Lemelin

Faculty Publications and Presentations

This study describes an online survey of institutions which host digital archival collections on Flickr outside of the Flickr Commons. The survey was conducted to determine the experience of these institutions with Flickr in terms of usage statistics, user interaction, and assessment. The results from the survey were also used to determine factors which contribute to the success of a Flickr collection.

The majority of the eighty-nine institutions which responded to the survey reported satisfaction with Flickr and stated that they had achieved their goals. However, many respondents reported low usage or did not know the usage, which indicates weak …