Why does Technorati seem to hate this blog? I've had problems before, which I tried to pin on Feedburner, but I'm convinced that Technorati just hates me. It tries to tell me that Open Stacks hasn't updated in thirty days. No amount of pinging seems to change that. Anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

Forgot to mention that Open Stacks turned three years old last week. If you would like to help commemorate this milestone, please submit something to this week's Carnival. Thank you. ;-)

I want to make special mention of the efforts of local (to me) librarian E.G. Yarnetsky, who has done an amazing job singlehandedly redesigning the Madison-Jefferson County Public Library website. The whole site is built around a Wordpress Textpattern (thanks Jerr) installation and includes a nifty Library Buzz blog. There's a blog feed and a separate feed for library events.

The new site is something of an event itself around these parts. It was worthy of a front page newspaper article, as well as a mention at Syndication for Higher Education. Great job, Jerr!

In trying to catch up on my feeds, I saw that the DIY Librarian listed Open Stacks as one of her Top 5 Library Blogs of 2005. I greatly appreciate the acknowledgement, but that's not why I'm writing presently. This was the part of her post that caught my attention: "I have not been reading Open Stacks as much since the focus has turned to podcasting"

Now I'm taking that statement completely out of context, but it got me wondering: Does it bug you, gentle reader, that I only blog about podcasting these days? There really is a reason for it.

When I started recording the show, I reserved any general LIS comments for that environment. Quite frankly, I found it easier to share my thoughts verbally. The blog became mostly a support mechanism for the show.

Then, a surprising thing happened. The "podcasting librarian" somehow became the "librarian with expertise in podcasting." This has meant not only numerous opportunities to share my knowledge, but an impetus to maintain the currency of my knowledge. Thus, even though life has made it near-to-impossible to get back to actually producing the show, I feel compelled to keep current in the one area I'm considered to have some level of specialized knowledge. So blogging is now the mechanism by which I maintain my expertise in the topic of podcasting. Of course, if you have no interest in the topic, the blog is of limited value. So be it. For what it's worth, I enjoy having a niche that beats a slightly different drum.

Hugs and kisses to everyone who has stuck with me through the "life trumps blogging/podcasting" stage. I am quite anxious to get back to the show. I have some new equipment to try out.

In a year full of joy and surprises, I am quite stunned to have been nominated for an Edublog Award. I can't imagine who would have nominated me, but I genuinely appreciate it. That said, there are five other excellent candidates for Best Library/Librarian Blog and I can heartily endorse all of them as worthy recipients. Voting is open until December 17 (my 30th birthday, yikes! - that's worth a vote, right?) and here's a link to the ballot.

As promised, here is a guide to the Carnival of the Infosciences. I'm basing my model on the excellent Carnival of Personal Finance, so I will be co-opting (and indeed plagiarizing) its guidelines as appropriate. The following is subject to change as I get a better idea of what we need to be doing to make it work.

The Carnival of the Infosciences will be a weekly weblog post that endeavors to showcase the best posts in the blogosphere about topics related to the wide world of Library and Information Science.

Most carnivals are based primarily on submissions by the blog post authors themselves, fleshed out with the submissions of readers and the host. I hope to generate enough author interest to be able to follow this model, but who knows. If you write something that you'd like more people to see (or write a blog that you wish more people visited), this is a way to get your stuff out there.

Guidelines for Submission

If you are a blogger, publish your entries as you normally would, but submit the link to the article via the comment form. Submissions sent through the form will be forwarded to the current host, as the location for the Carnival travels from one site to another (just like a meatspace carnival).

If you would, please include the following in the email:

* The title of your entry.
* The URI (address) of your entry.
* A description or summary of the entry.
* Your name or other moniker by which you wish to be referenced.

The Carnival will be posted every Monday, so please submit before 6 PM Eastern Time on the Sunday prior.

The purpose of this is to showcase the panoply of great writing within the LIS blogosphere and to expose the world to as many LIS blogs as possible, so let's limit submissions to one per weblog per week. Naturally, we're looking for submissions containing original thought and opinions, rather than regurgitation and reiteration.

The week's host has editorial control over what is included or not included, although I encourage a general atmosphere of inclusivity and diversity, where practicable.

In order to grow this concept, once the post goes up, I'll be asking y'all to link back to it. That's how we draw attention to it and give the idea legs.

Guidelines for Hosting

Here's the one ground rule for hosting: in order to be a host, you must submit one post for inclusion. It's that simple; submit once, permanent hosting qualification.

I will coordinate the hosting calendar. If you would like to host and have submitted an article at any point, then drop me a line via the contact form and I'll add your site to the hosting list. If you've hosted and would like to host again, you simply go to the back of the line.

Here's how I envision the hosting process. One week before your hosting date, you post to your blog soliciting submissions. You close submissions by 6 PM Sunday evening to give yourself time to put the post together. It is posted sometime on Monday (your hosting date). Your post includes not only the selected posts of the week, but a link to the next host. At that point, the next host opens the floor for submissions on his/her blog and the process continues.

The host has editorial control and can present links in whatever fashion preferred, but hosts should add some commentary to the links to encourage readers to follow the links. If you feel short on content, dig around on your own for some additional entries to include.

That should do for now. If you have questions or suggestions, please contact me.

I've recently encountered a blogging phenomenon known as the Blog Carnival.* If you are aware of bentley's wonderful This Week in LibraryBlogland series, then you are already familiar with the essential concept - an aggregation/roundup of the most interesting posts over a period of time, usually centering on a certain theme. What typically makes the Blog Carnival different from bentley's approach is that the Carnival closes up shop and moves to a new blog location every week. The host blog's author becomes the editor of the Carnival for that week. The advantages of this are:

a) it takes the burden off of a single person
b) new host means new setting and often a fresh editorial perspective
c) willing hosts get great exposure for their blogs and willing readers similarly get exposed to blog authors they may not have encountered previously

My first encounter with a Blog Carnival was the Carnival of Personal Finance, which was most recently hosted at Smart Money Daily and will be moving to I Will Teach You To Be Rich on Monday. [Sidenote: I've been obsessed with personal finance lately. Observe the crop of new related blogs in my blogroll.]

On further research, I discovered what appears to be the "Original Carnival" (or at least longest-running): Carnival of the Vanities, the most recent of which can be found at Wallo World. There is even an entire site devoted to helping readers find the various manifestations of the Blog Carnival.

I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this. I think now might be a great time to initiate a Carnival of our own. Our little chunk of the blogoscape is growing at a high rate and it would be nice to present something to the world that conveys the dynamic and collective power of LIS bloggery (Presence, baby, presence). Plus, I think it'd be kinda fun.

The guidelines for this kind of thing can vary widely. Some Carnivals do not relocate regularly (what's the fun in that?). Some Carnivals are based primarily on submission by blog post authors, while others are based on reader submissions and still others are more like bentley's editor-driven approach. The point is to highlight the best of the week, so I propose that such decisions be left to the host of the week, who would post guidelines and according article solicitation in the week leading up to their actual hosting gig.

As for determining the hosts, we would need some basic guidelines, but mostly it would be whoever was interested - first come, first serve. I would be happy to coordinate that process on an ongoing basis. The guidelines at the Carnival of Personal Finance dictate that:

"Any blogger who participates by submitting an article to any Carnival of Personal Finance is eligible to host. Bloggers whose articles are selected by the host without a specific submission are also eligible.
Bloggers are added to the hosting list in the order the request is received...
Bloggers who are currently on the list to host must wait until the date of their hosting before being added to the end of the list again. This allows any new participants to have a chance."

Seems reasonable enough to use as ground rules.

I have two central concerns at the outset, about which I'd like to get your feedback:

1. I don't want to step on bentley's toes or in any way obviate her efforts. She does an excellent, excellent recap of the previous week's posts. From my own experience, it takes a lot of effort to do such a thing on an ongoing basis. This would be a sort of distributed model for that kind of potentially labor-intensive aggregation. (bentley, if you're reading this, let me know what you think!)
2. Are we already so incestuous that this sort of "celebration" is totally unnecessary and offers little value for the work involved?

What do you think? Please, please send me your feedback, even if it's just a "I'd host one" or "Doesn't seem necessary." Again, I argue that this would be an avenue to establish some presence for the LIS blogosphere as a collective entity. If I get some positive comments, I'll move forward in the next week or two and we'll get this carnival rolling. Oh, and if you have a better name, I'm certainly open to that as well.

* David Faucheux also recently encountered the Blog Carnival. He put up an audio post on the topic earlier today.

So there's this post that will be all over the LIS blogosphere tomorrow entitled Primitivist OR Luddite AND Librarian. In a nutshell, it's a condemnation of the "tech-savvy" librarian. I had some very quick initial reactions that, in the event they do not clear the author's comment moderation, I've listed here for reference.

A few quick thoughts:

3. Writing a sentence such as "Tehc will chane everything, they tell us" lends little credence to your arguments about literacy.

Because that's how Library Journal has generously characterized me in this little piece of "breaking news." But why, oh why, would the blurb's author link to a category archive rather than link to the specific post?

I just noticed that yesterday was the two-year anniversary of the existence of Open Stacks (originally entitled Planet Neutral). It's amazing how much has happened since then. I've been invited to write articles and speak at conferences. I've made friends and acquaintances that I value highly both on an emotional and intellectual level. The library blogosphere has exploded. It's been a great ride so far, and with the development of the show, new horizons await. Thanks for being a part of the journey.

I just wanted to make sure everyone has unsubscribed from any feeds that were generated by lisblogsource.net. We let the domain registration expire and it has been scooped up by a Stephane Grenier, who apparently is the president of LandlordMax. What the plan for this domain is, I couldn't say, but I'm sure it has nothing to do with the initial subject matter. Flee while you still can. You have been warned.

Well, my great experiment in keyword tagging seems to have been a failure. I've contacted Technorati support twice this week with nary a peep, although I thank Dave Sifry for getting in touch with me and connecting me with Dick Costolo at FeedBurner. Dick tried his hardest to pinpoint the problem, but to no apparent avail. So here I am in an awkward position of having advocated for tagging that I can't even make work on my own (Flickr still rules - cil2005 tag all the way!!!). So much for early adoption. If anyone is successfully using Movable Type and Technorati tagging, please, please contact me as soon as possible. Thank you.

OK, after some digging, I've discovered that Feedburner was giving me a variety of problems, not the least of which was disabling any functionality of the Technorati tagging. It was also not updating very efficiently, even after pinging. Therefore, I have made the quick decision to delete that feed and resume regular syndication via the old RSS 2.0 and RSS 1.0 feeds. I truly apologize to anyone who made the transition already on my request. This post is yet another attempt at getting the Technorati tagging plugin to work.

Update 3/10/05: Since publishing this post, I've been contacted by both Dave Sifry of Technorati and Dick Costolo of FeedBurner. Both expressed deep concern about my user experience and have been helpful in trying to sort out my issues. At this point, I'm not going to ask you to switch feeds again, but I want to assure you that FeedBurner provides a quality service that I can safely recommend to those who will find value in its features (particularly the Blogger-using podcasters who can take advantage of SmartCast). Responsiveness always plays a role in my assessment of tech companies and Dick get a big thumbs-up from me. Sadly, the tagging issue remains unresolved, but I'm starting to think the issue is related to either the invalidity of my RSS feed or some problem with my pinging mechanism. Stay tuned...

I've decided to test out FeedBurner as part of my endeavor to keep better track of the number of subscribers to my feeds. So the new and preferred feed is here. It's based on the old 2.0 feed, so it handles enclosures if you're using a podcast aggregator, but will work just great for text in your regular old RSS reader. If you'd consider switching your current feed over to this new one, I'd be much obliged. If you don't, that's OK too. I anticipate no change in the functionality of any of the current feed offerings.

I had exactly one response to my request for feedback on a consensus tag to be used for the Computers in Libraries conference next week. Sad as that is, the one respondent voted for cil2005 and I concur, so allow our majority of two compel you to use cil2005 for any Technorati, del.icio.us or Flickr tagging you do in relation to the conference.

When I first designed the button, it read Blog People. On Karen Schneider's suggestion, I ended up going with Blog Person. But when I saw Blake's cobbled-together version of a Blog People button on LISNews, I figured I may as well offer up the original design for those who'd prefer it.

So here it is:

Michael Stephens had a great idea today. He suggested distribution of buttons that say "Blog People". And while I'd certainly buy a physical button, I immediately thought "Why not a virtual button?"

So here's my go at it:

I encourage you not only to display it on your site (let your geek flag fly!), but also to link it to the Gorman piece at least until someone gives me a better idea. It'd be great if you could host the image on your own server, but if you have to leech onto this one, I'll survive.

Update: Better ideas abound. The majority seems to be linking to the great Revenge of the Codex People over at It's All Good. David King suggested "a page/post with all the relevant links". If only I had the time to put such a page together...

I mentioned in Open Stacks #4 that my old Webjunction article was in the process of being updated. That update is complete, online and with links that now lead to actual living blogs. Enjoy.

I'll be talking more about "the Gorman piece" in the next show, but in the meantime, I thought you might like to read Gorman's response.

Here's a fun quote: "I am surprised that people who attack an article as mine (LAtimes, Dec. 17th 2004) has been attacked should be as thin-skinned as some appear to be." Do I even really need to comment on this? No!

Updated 9:52 AM: You might enjoy the Slashdot take on the Gorman piece. Comments abound. You'll particularly like this one (noted by Steve Bollinger on Web4Lib).

It seems that Google no longer likes any of my sites that contain the openstacks.net domain. I could really use some help troubleshooting the problem, so if anyone has some experience with this, please contact me. Thanks. In the meantime, please choose another search engine.

Comments are no longer an option here due to the spam nuisance factor. Feel free to email me at greg [at] lishost [dot] com. Sorry for the inconvenience.

I was leaving a comment on Library Stuff, when I decided I should just air my opinions in my own forum, created specifically for the purpose. There's a comment from Alan, the author of Blue Hole:

"It's fine to point to a blog, but if you know a person's full name and it's not revealed on their blog, wouldn't it be wrong to use that person's full name in your pointer? I think yes."

Now I think it's clear that something personal prompted Alan to write this. If I'm wrong about that, then I'm a poor judge of tone in writing. Anyway, I tried to think back to any posts that we may have made with Alan's full name in it. Couldn't think of nor find any. Then I figured I would check the other place where I tend to list blogs: dmoz.org. Sure enough, Alan's full name is sitting there in all its glory.

So looking through Alan's blog, I tried to figure out how I knew his last name to include it in the listing. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I go through no great effort to identify blog authors, but if the info is there for the taking, I'm gonna grab it. Well, I looked back at the editing logs for his category and sure enough, when it was first listed back in June, his last name was the domain name!! Doesn't take a researcher to pull that information out of the magic hat.

So here are my points:

1. If you want anonymity on your blog, don't do things like pepper your name onto the site. Don't place an anonymous journal in a subdirectory of a site where you freely use your name (myprofessionalsite.com/blog). Don't link to your resume. Don't link to your organization that has a staff directory on its website, after you've just posted about how awful your life is as the Metadata Librarian for your organization. You get the idea.

2. If you are going to take steps towards limiting your exposure via your blog, consider letting the people who link to you know about it. In the case of dmoz, you would use the "update URL" link that's available from the category page where your site is listed. Some people have done this and I believe they have found me to be quite amenable to such requests.

To answer back to Alan's original question, I think it comes down to how you interpret "revealed." Speaking only for myself, I peruse any information I'm given: the about page, colophon, resumes, first posts, links to the author's other sites, etc. If your name is sitting in any of those places, that's "revealed" in my mind. On the other hand, I'm not about to do a WHOIS search on domain names (even though that information is freely available).

See the difference? My goal is never to suss the author out; it's to give the author as complete a listing as he/she makes possible. Most welcome the publicity and recognition. Some take exception to their own apparent vulnerability. Perhaps it's better that a third party such as myself highlights the chink in one's anonymity armor, so that steps can be taken to repair it before someone who counts notices. But again, if you take those steps, tell the highlighter!

Now that I've gone on entirely too long about that, here's a bonus treat for those of you who've read this far - a picture of the house that we are seemingly about to purchase. Our third offer was agreed to today (actually yesterday, gosh it's getting late) and so I thought I'd share our elation with the blogosphere. Perhaps tomorrow, I'll show you the lake view from that deck coming off the right side of the house.

It gives me a modest amount of pleasure (and relief) to announce the triumphant return of LIS Blogsource. Of course, new install means new feed. I've transferred all the relevant stuff posted here in the past three plus weeks over there, so you can ignore most of those posts and start with the welcome back post.

Steven just passed along this one:

Western Plains Library System Community Blog (Clinton, OK) - "Serving People in Custer, Dewey, Roger Mills, Washita Counties" (RSS feed)

The content on their front page also incorporates the bloggy convention of posting new content links at the top of the page.

This one has not officially launched yet, but since they're live (and I was able to locate it without really looking), I can't help but point it out. You can just feel the potential oozing from it:

i4i : Eye (I) for an Eye (I): Information for Information Professionals - "An Information and Library Science Weblog" (RSS feed - not linked from the site, I just took an educated guess; bet ya I'm the first subscriber!)

From what I can gather, this is a project eminating from folks at the Pratt SILS. One of the coordinators is Michael, who authors the eGov Weblog I mentioned on Wednesday.

The author of Voice of Reason (RSS feed) just "took a job with the government documents division of Hauser Library today."

Jenny's got a good one, but you've probably already seen it, haven't you?

Our Journey to Innovative - "The Addison Public's Library journey to a new computer system!" (no feed)

From the iowa librarian:

Sarah loves pop culture (RSS feed)

Rumblings Under Oscar's Porch - "Take off your coat, and stay awhile. Feel free to leave comments, or just a hello when you've visited." (no feed)

From the proof of librarianship post: "I would also like to publicly (I already thanked him in person) acknowledge the wonderfulness of the principal. It's teacher appreciation week, a week much dreaded by myself as it never ends up being LIBRARIAN APPRECIATION week or day (except for the flowers from the History teacher this Christmas). THIS year, the new principal has included me in all his little efforts at thanking the staff. Yesterday we all got a little thank you for your efforts and special contributions card with a lottery ticket (we got one at Christmas too), today was a tiny box of two EXQUISITE chocolates, and who knows what we're getting tomorrow. It's AWESOME! Also, the cafeteria lady has been sending us food. Yesterday there was a GIANT salad for everyone, and an equally giant platter of homemade cookies, and today was a cheese and fruit platter. YAY! "

This from the "old, but as of yet unnoticed" file:

eGov Weblog - "I'm an Information and Library Science Masters student. I believe that information is a public utility to be shared, used, and, yes, regulated. My areas of research are Government Documents, work flow / knowledge management, and the uses of technology to aid information transfer." (RSS feed)

I just love this:

Schoolhouse Rock - "Playlists and discussion topics from a weekly radio show on WSCB 89.9 FM, Springfield College, Springfield, MA, hosted by reference librarians Emily Alling and James Miller." (no feed)

Sadly, the radio station doesn't stream, but check out the playlist from their first week:

Sam Cooke, Having a Party
Belle & Sebastian, Wrapped Up In Books
Rolling Stones, You Can't Always Get What You Want
Smiths, Bigmouth Strikes Again
Led Zeppelin, The Girl I Love, She Got Long Black Wavy Hair
Internet Gem of the Week: Howard Dean, Remixed (http://deangoesnuts.com)
Ben Folds, The Luckiest
Modern Lovers, Girlfriend
Lauryn Hill, Can't Take My Eyes Off You

Plus, discussion of Boolean logic.

Anyone who can blend Belle and Sebastian, Ben Folds and logical operators scores big points in my book.

The Rest of Us Will Be Forgotten, Never Judy - "Garland + Libraries = FUN!" (no feed)

I've mentioned the blogs of the Pullen Library at Georgia State before, but I wanted to share two more subject-specific blogs that the library's subject specialists are producing:

Issues in Scholarly Communication - "A library weblog covering the Issues of Scholarly Communication for the faculty and students at Georgia State University." (RSS feed)

Social Sciences News - "A weblog featuring library related news, events, and resources for the Social Sciences at Georgia State University." (RSS feed)

As seen on EdBlogger Praxis, the Hunterdon Central High School (NJ) Library's web site now features a weblog. (RSS feed)

I believe this is the second blog using this title:

Digital Librarian - "A knowledgebase of tips, tricks, and ideas for the librarians of digital age" (no feed)

Mr. Standfast (no feed)

The author, Robert M. Spencer, is the Assistant Reference Librarian at the Glickman Library, University of Southern Maine.

The text I have about this blog is from a ODP submission (but we only accept English language sites in the LIS Weblogs category; however misguided the policy may be, other languages fall under the World blanket).

danesh-shenasi - "about library and information science and librarianship an information retrieval and searching information" (I honestly don't know whether there's a feed, but I couldn't find any)

Speaking of the Open Directory, indications from the ODP Weblog are that Google may be dropping dmoz.org entries as part of its search results. I can see why. Lots of online directories make use of ODP data, which means loads of redundant search results reflecting the same information. Although Google's use of ODP data has been great for the Open Directory, gaining lots of critical exposure and helping to recruit numerous editors to the cause, the time seems right for a change. Here's a screenshot of the directory-less Google (note lack of Directory tab) and an article discussing the relationship.

Something to occupy my time... - "Nothing worth while, nothing too boring... it's a perfect blend..." (no feed)

An excerpt: "Well, isn't this just fantastic? I'm officially a loser. Yes, my name is Jill, and I have finally stooped to the lowest form of boredness ever imagined. HA!
I'm actually 'working' right now. If you call sitting on my bum at the campus library a job, I'm set for life! The people are really nice though, and I get paid to do my homework. Oh YES!"

Aesthetik Musings - "and other slightly insane diatribes..." (RSS feed)

The author Rebecca is a graduate student in the University of Rhode Island's Masters in Library Science and Information Studies program.

From Steven's comments, we learn that Mikko Saari is a librarian-to-be, also using del.icio.us. And Mikko has a blog:

www.melankolia.net - "Life and opinions of Mikko Saari" (RSS feed)

BTW, with Mikko, BentleyBlog and icontemplate, I count 10 del.icio.us library bloggers.

Ooh, ooh, and the inseasonlibrarian, who may very well be Linda of The In Season Christian Librarian. But then again, maybe not.

Oh look, and jessamyn too.

The Leddy Library Weblog relaunched a little while back with a new URL.

LibrarianInBlack reports that the Marin County Free Library Blog has a new feed.

The Gospel According to Library Dave - "Don't take my word for it...okay, do." (no feed)

Chuc Mung Nam Moi (no apparent feed)

Daynah is a Programmer Analyst II for the University of California Riverside Library System.

Library Diva - "Am I really a librarian?" (RSS feed)

Marian the Librarian is Dead - "The trials and tribulations of a library administrator/interesting person." (no feed)

...as if you needed any. But I like giving the occasional glimpse into the late-night inner workings of a LIS blog hunter.

So Steven talks about library bloggers who use del.icio.us. He counts four. I immediately think of five and begin to write a comment to that effect.* But I quickly start to wonder whether there are others to be found lurking within the social bookmarking latticework. Working through a series of possible bookmark categories, including libraries, library and librarianship. I note the user names of the people bookmarking in these categories. And by following the user name links, I come across the following, another library blogger using del.icio.us:

Easy Librarian - Musing on Digital Library,Topicmap,Knowledge Organization System" (RSS feed)

So that makes six (seven if you count Karl Siewert, occasional contributor to memepool). This same obsessive behavior leads me to wonder if jlm has or will have a library blog for us to share with you.

*[The five user names are librarystuff, planetneutral, tangognat, simanoff and mamamusings. The individual pages are at http://del.icio.us/user_name]

Well, I've received two comments on consecutive days from someone named moreno, who strongly desires to promote the "biggest librarians blog in brazil." Admittedly, the blog looks interesting, but the transition in tone from the first to second comment is quite off-putting.

To my regular readers, please excuse the following rant:

[rant]
1. Please don't tell me what I "need to publish." I appreciate all suggestions and regard them as such. Suggestions, not obligations. Coercion is unwelcome.

2. Give me a chance. I do have a day job after all. Immediately following up a friendly, legitimate request the next day with seemingly condescending remarks about my linguistic faculties and/or cultural bias does not move you up the priority list.

3. There's an email address to the right (hasn't been there long), so please use that for suggestions of this variety. That way, I won't feel compelled to use this forum to air my grievances.
[/rant]

Of course, I can relate to the over-enthusiasm of a student and respect the pitfalls of cross-cultural text-based communication via blog commenting. And I really like the phrase "We have feed." So having said my piece, I offer the following:

Bibliotecários sem fronteiras - "ação, formação e informação" (RSS feed)

Alles drin! (RSS feed)

A sample: "Wer denkt das Bibliothekare langweilige Menschen sind der hat zwar zu 99% recht aber dafür ist das eine Prozent um so wilder. "

Oikothen oikade - "Being the Ramblings of a Classical Scholar Manque" (no feed)

Lee's recent experience reminds me of the trends I saw while in grad school: "When I told my advisor in the library science program that I wanted to go into old/rare book & manuscript library work, he simply said, 'Well, we don't have anything like that.'"

Since my life is more than shoes... - "I thought I'd share it with you" (no feed)

A little confusing as the posts say Andy, when the author is reallly Janet, except for the most recent post, which is actually Andy. Anyhow, it's Janet who just started work at the NC State library.

and i write a letter from a one-way train "welcome to the blogtacular world of a quirkyalone, 20 something female who likes poetry....music....arguing...and crushes. in fact, i may have a crush on you." (no feed)

From the "proof of library employment post":

"I was in the worst mood this morning. can anyone raise their hand and tell me why? no? i really can't either. i slept a little late, there was snow, traffic was crapolicious, and then i got to work, missed the campus bus by 1 minute and had to walk the 10 minutes in freezing wind to the med school to then walk inside for another 5 minutes to get to la biblioteca.

i've been working at the library for over a year now and it hasn't been pleasant all the times, but i do indeed have fun making friends with all the med school kids and doctors."

Not sure how we missed this one:

The InfoMan's Blog - "Thoughts, directions, ideas, and concepts that came across the email inbox and mind of John Burke." (no feed)

Ask Nettie Day - "Library Sleuth! (alter ego of a student librarian)" (no RSS feed)

Carleen just started classes at the Oklahoma University SLIS:

Carleen and Michael Huxley (RSS feed)

The Land of Anne - "The Land of Anne is the realm in which I reside." (no feed)

Anne is a:

Librarian
Knitter
Rocker
Punk band guitarist/singer: Skatey-Eight
Zinester: Adventures in AnneLand
Owner of two Boston Terriers

One New Thing - "Weblog of Lynette Reville, a new librarian in Australia, who is on a library-like quest to find One New Thing to learn every day." (RSS feed)

Librarian Levin - "Here you're sure to find the steamy adventures of Rachael Adele, live from library school in Boston." (no feed)

LS 500 blog - "summaries of articles read for LS 500" (no feed)

Update: There appear to be blogs for everyone in this class, as I came across another today: LS 500 Angelia Campbell's BLOG (no feed)

This feisty young college student and branch library employee is the author of two blogs:

The OGT Blog of Super Justice - "THE JUSTICE BUNNY PUNCHES ARE ABOUT TO BE DELIVERED" (RSS feed)

OGT's Happy Land of Turtles - "Tortoises stay out" (RSS feed)

A grad student who goes by the name of ladyblog produces the following:

From the everyday life of... (RSS feed)

A sample: "Bit by bit I find myself being drawn into the world of librarians. It's sinister and evil the way they draw you into their own little world with it's own language and mannerism."

Ook, She Said - "Don't Mess With The Librarian!" (RSS feed)

So I've been toying around with del.icio.us and am finding it so simple, effective and amusing that I'm making lifestyle changes to take advantage of it. If you're not familiar with del.icio.us at this point, it's basically a communal bookmark locator. If I see something that I want to mark as I'm surfing, reading, etc., I can use a bookmarklet to post it to my del.icio.us page. In this way, it is no different from how I used my Sideblog. The difference is that my bookmark becomes part of a huge bookmarking network. If other people linked to the same URL, a count will be shown. I can easily add category tags and, should I use the same terminology as others, our bookmarks will be collocated. (An exploration of comparative tag selection - deprived as we are of a controlled vocabulary - would certainly prove to be an interesting academic exercise for some enthusiastic grad student).

What I like is that this page of my bookmarks is easily added to from any computer where I can use a bookmarklet and accessible anywhere I go by both myself and any interested parties. It can replace both my Sideblog and my collection of links in my sidebar. By using a set of category tags consistently (hello controlled vocabulary), I can organize the links with a minimum of effort. I've been itching to do something different that would be easier to maintain and I think I have my answer. So if you're interested, feel free to check out my del.icio.us page and for updates as they happen, grab the feed.

If you aren't taking the time to read Marjorie's Catalog, I highly recommend starting from the beginning and soaking in every word. Marjorie, who is still looking for a publisher for her first novel, has the internship of her dreams in the NPR library and she's telling all. I find the whole experience fascinating and have learned a ton from the interesting questions and her approach to tackling them. Then, there's the whole job opening sub-plot...

Canuck Librarian - "Personal blog for a young information specialist" (no RSS feed)

Stephen Francouer, the Teaching Librarian, reports (on DIG_REF) that he has started a new blog:

Digital Reference - "Exploring the intersection of reference services, technology, and instruction." (RSS feed)

Note: I thought the blog seemed familiar and checking our archives, I found that I had discovered it back in August. But it looks like Stephen is finally ready to devote some energy to it, so it's worth re-directing your attention.

Today, I discovered the blog of one of my few good acquaintances here in Madison, IN - local reference assistant and soon-to-be-MLS-holding library employee, Jerry Yarnetsky. He can claim responsibility for introducing me to the potential of blogging, during my practicum last January. The library employs a staff blog that he started (I really should ask if he'd mind me sharing it with y'all) and I've been hooked ever since.

He also headed up the Harry Lemen Photo Collection, a major digitization project of a local historic photo archive. Well worth a look.

His blog:

Life on the River's Edge - "Fact and fiction of life in America's Most Beautiful Rivertown, Madison, Indiana." (no RSS feed)

Thinking Out Loud - "Librarian, reader, writer, video-gamer, amateur techno-geek." (no RSS feed)

Get It All Down - "I'm Writing as Fast as I Can" (no RSS feed)

Steven passed this along, which I suppose confirms that Open Stacks will be the temporary home of Blogsource-worthy posting.

Kristina Wright - "Writer, Rock Star, Library Assistant, Grad Student, Princess" (RSS feed)

Also, I'd like to congratulate John Hubbard on recently celebrating his one-year anniversary of running Library Link of the Day.

Chronicles of Bean - "Musings by me, a librarian by education and a techie by passion. Why do you care?" (no RSS feed)

Well, it wasn't my intention to become the de facto Blogsource, but I'm finding it impossible to not share the good stuff I'm finding.

SHUSH - "a website for the conservative librarian" (no feed)

I'm fascinated by the author's notions of good, bad and ugly, but will let you pass judgment for yourself.

GoddessLibrarian - "Reading, Writing and whatever else I want." (no feed)

About the author: "FYI--I used to be Jen Rice. But then I got married. So now I'm Jen McIntosh.

After having many jobs in many different libraries in the Capital District, I am proud to say I have finally gotten my dream job (well, except for the freelance writing for Sports Illustrated. That hasn't happened yet). I am currently a YA Librarian at the East Greenbush Community Library in East Greenbush, New York, just east of Albany. Right where I want to be!"

A section of this post was deleted on January 26, 2007 by request of the section's subject.

The author of this third blog was working as a library assistant, but is now doing temp office work:

Reading Nation - "The things I learn by reading, writing and driving in Southern California" (no feed)

I'm intrigued by this implementation of aggregation, especially as it has gone undetected by me up to this point.

Aggy - Pulling SLIS Together :) - "Aggregator blog for Indiana University SLIS" (RSS feed)

Seems a little thin on sources, but I very much like the idea and am curious to know if the SLISer behind it has a blog of his/her own.

Update: I haven't even posted yet, but slisblogs.com is owned by a mysterious character named elw, who can be found posting to Geek-Guides.com.

Also, one of the sources is the blog of a doctoral student at SLIS, who also is part of the Blog Research on Genre (BROG) team:

Professional-Lurker - "Comments by an academic in cyberspace" (RSS feed)

So perhaps you've been wondering why LIS Blogsource has been so quiet lately. Well, we're in transition. More on that when it happens. We (being Steven and I) had hoped to hold off posting blog stuff until said transition was complete, but I need to point out how nicely the blogosphere has taken up the cause in our stead. And there's just too much going on to hold out any longer, so here are some highlights.

1. Waterboro points out a new blog:

On The Shelf - "Peabody Institute Library news, book reviews, and other items of interest." (no feed)

2. Jenny points out the return of both Library Techlog and ...useless miscellany.

2A. She also points out that the Riverdale (IL) Public Library has initiated, in conjunction with other local agencies, an E-Newsletter for the Riverdale community. Very nice.

3. LibLab - "I work in a computer lab in a library where I teach computer classes and have the lab open to the public. Libraries can be strange and wonderful places, depending on the day." (no feed)

4. Waughblog, which Steven mentioned on December 16th, has relocated.

5. Kilted Librarian on Call (nee' Subterranean Homesick Blues) has been doing some nice refgrunting lately.

5A. Library Girl has a new reading journal in blog form entitled There's No Such Thing As Too Many Books (RSS feed).

6. Looks like we'll have a new librarian blog when the author of A Work Untitled makes her way to library school. Good luck!

7. Another individual on the Master's track:
Invisible Library - "The Blog of a Radical Librarian, in which there is no shushing." (no feed)

8. And finally the blog of Laurence (Larry) Sloma:

Arbitrary Content - "Asphalt Ramblers and Manglers of Foreign Tongues" (RSS feed)

I'm sure there's more that I'm forgetting, which is precisely why I just had to get this stuff out of my head. We'll be back up and running soon (for which my pathetic short term memory will be most thankful).

First, if you haven't made a habit of reading Walt Crawford's Cites & Insights on a "somewhat-monthly" basis, get crackin'!

Walt takes a look this month at the notion of the one-day wonder (blogs that are extremely short-lived) as it applies to the LIS blogosphere. I'm honored that Walt chose the dmoz listings as his focus group. He compares two different categories of weblogs, those listed under the general LIS Weblogs category and those listed as Personal Weblogs.

Walt looks at how recently each blog has been updated to gauge its "freshness" (my term, not his). The results are interesting, but not altogether surprising.

There are overall very few one-day wonders in the dmoz listings in either category. Blogs being considered for addition to dmoz are usually placed in an unreviewed queue for observation. I'll come back to them periodically to see if they are alive. If they are, I'll likely add them. If not, I'll either leave them in the queue or delete them. This is purely a judgment call on my part, so I usually try to be patient.

Many more of the personal blogs were fresh (about 85% had updated within the past three months) when compared to the general/topical blogs. However, general/topical blogs are more likely to be kept in the directory, even if they are not actively updated.

Why? Archival interest of the subject matter. Also, topical blogs are more likely to be continued after long absences than are personal blogs. I make that observation empirically, not from supposition. I won't waste your time trying to analyze why this may be so.

Overall, I do very little deleting from dmoz, which clearly skews freshness analysis. If freshness were the goal, than that would be reflected in Walt's results. But unless there is broken linkage or similar problems, I prefer to add rather than subtract. Part of a "the more, the merrier" mentality, I suppose.

It's great to see LIS students talking about blogs. I stumbled across an interesting article written by Blythe Summers, a first-year LIS student at the U. of Washington:
Dear Diary and Then Some:
Blogs as the New Form of Self-Expression

Sure, I'm linking to it because she mentions me, but I also want to direct your attention to a much longer paper entitled Planet Blog (Word doc) written by Betha Gutsche, another LIS student at UW. Both writings are worth a look.

I've been losing some steam lately in my blogging, but when I saw that Steven had mentioned Open Stacks in his recent presentation (slide 28 - in quite esteemed company, I might add), well, I panicked and realized I'd better step up my attention. Welcome SLSers and others who have found me by way of Steven's always generous linkage.

So I've been having lots of problems with comment spam lately, as have numerous other authors. Aaron suggested we pool resources and share IP addresses of comment spammers. It appears that Scott Johnson at Feedster has put the idea into action. He has a form where you can report the IP address and spammed links that appear in your comments. The blacklist is in OPML format for maximum flexibility. The list is pretty short, but I imagine it will grow quickly. I could add about 20 addresses myself, but unfortunately, I deleted all the spam comments, so I can't contribute the spammed links. I'm sure there'll be other opportunities. Anyway, nice work, Scott.

For the first time, I was fooled by a post linking to Marlee's blog. Aaron at Kennebunk had a "link via Open Stacks" and I foolishly thought to myself, "I don't remember linking to this." And right, I didn't. Of course, my confusion was abetted by the gracious link to this blog in the sidebar (Thank you!).

BTW, Aaron, I saw that you're offering New Books at KFL as a web page. Now tell me that isn't screaming blog format with accompanying RSS feed? Mmm, tasty.

Wow, I just read over at Blogsource that Humpday Havoc has been censored and will therefore cease to exist. I'm absolutely stunned and dying to know more. They've barely even gotten that ball rolling and have said little that could be called objectionable. Are they being stopped on the chance that they'll get out of line? It sets a pretty scary precedent. I would think my material is on the whole riskier (from an employer's perspective) than their's, wouldn't you? Am I next?

Earlier this month, I posted about another blog by the name of Open Stacks. At the time, the author (Marlee) was seemingly unaware of the duality. I'm pleased to announce that she is amongst us at last!

In response to her discovery, she has generously offered (not only in my comments, but on her own blog as well) to change the name of her blog. One comment from the original post noted that Marlee changed her name to Open Stacks on April 16, 2003 and that therefore, I came first. Actually I changed the name of this blog to Open Stacks on April 26, a full ten days later. So seniority remains Marlee's, but I am admittedly well-entrenched in the association.

In the end, I leave the naming decision to her, but appreciate the gesture as well as the kind words about the "professional" appearance of my little chunk of server space. As Steven pointed out, changing one's blog name will in fact merit a mention on LIS Blogsource. Should that qualify as incentive?

As a footnote to this, Marlee chose her name from McSweeney's Library Science Jargon That Sounds Dirty. If I were to pick a new name from the same list, there would be no contest: Access Point. In fact, it tempts me even now.

Make Marlee feel welcome and go visit her blog.

I have to admit I fancy this idea:

ISSN for Weblogs - You can apply for and use an International Standard Serial Number for your Weblog. Your blog will then officially exist in the worldwide standardized encyclopedia of periodicals.

I'm seriously considering putting in an application. Call it senseless vanity, but I may not be able to help myself.

Courtesy of Lockergnome

Well, I discovered today that a librarian named Marlee is also using the name Open Stacks for her blog. She has been active since last year, which gives her substantial seniority. At an earlier point, there would have been no question as to my response: I'd have thought of a new name. But now I'm not so sure. I think I'm sufficiently associated with the name that changing it now wouldn't be the most prudent decision, especially given my newly published article and recent addition to LISFeeds. Do you concur?

Inspyration - Everyday librarian-type ramblings.

They just keep comin':

Tiny Little Librarian - Musings of a too-short girl in the high-stacks game of librarianship... (via dmoz submission)

And have I mentioned this one already?:

diy librarian - Bringing DIY and librarianship together (spotted first at Angry Thoat)

The author of diy librarian, Tara Murray, has a great job title: Information Core Director (for the Population Research Institute at Penn State).

After a lovely hiatus in scenic East Dorset, VT, I return to bring you a new weblog courtesy of a dmoz submission (still not updated, aargh!):

Tuna Breath - Judith E Bush discusses the launch and analysis of RLG.org's RedLightGreen.com website -- recasting traditional bibliographic metadata for a world that believes everything should work like Google(tm).

And a correction: John Gist is not a librarian. His post came from Zogby Blog via the Libertarian Librarian, Melissa Zogby. I thank him for the correction and note that it's a good thing I take my time adding things to dmoz.

In further anticipation of my forthcoming article, an interesting discussion on LLRX.com: The Internet Roundtable #36: Branding, Part II: What Are Blogs and Why Is Everyone So Excited About Them.

Courtesy of BeSpacific.

Here's yet another article that does a nice job of discussing the relationship between libraries and blogs: Blogging and the U of M Libraries.

Shane Nackerud argues for blog hosting as a service of the University of Minnesota Libraries:

"As a library, we are already discussing ways that we can change the scholarly publishing paradigm, ways that we can create communities of interest, and ways that we can create a digital repository of scholarly output. Hosting blogs would give us an opportunity to investigate how this new medium can help us accomplish, or touch upon, all three of these goals."

"Hosting blogs would also make the University Libraries the center point for intellectual discussion on campus...Thousands of people would come to our site every day not just to look up a book, or find a full text article, but also to discuss important topics, read what other people are currently discussing, and possibly post their own opinions...Most importantly, hosting blogs would leverage the libraries' traditional role as a defender of intellectual freedom, and indirectly help our faculty, staff, and students participate in our democratic society."

Good points that deserve serious consideration by all academic libraries.

Courtesy of rawbrick.net.

So I had just submitted my article for editing, when I notice a comment from Guy Aron (of eprintblog) passing along a link to the blog he developed for the business info desk staff at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

It's called NEED2KNOW and it is awfully impressive - a true resource. If I worked there, it'd be my home page (and that's a serious endorsement, folks).

Might have to edit and resubmit, 'cause this is what blogging and libraries is all about. Great work, Guy, and thanks for the lead!

How's this for auto-discovery? Caught this one on its day of inception with only one post!

Notes to myself - Marlowe Crawford is "a law librarian by profession—and choice." (RSS? Yes, yes, yes.)

I'll say it again: "Thank you, Feedster!"

This one's been running since March?!?!

Tangognat - Blog of a reluctant librarian (yes, feed)

Say it with me now, "Thank you, Feedster."

We're you aware that Linda Absher, better known as the Lipstick Librarian, has a blog? I wasn't, but now we both are:

The Days & Nights of the Lipstick Librarian! - The diary of a library fashionista... (Yes, there's a RSS feed.)

A little taste from her first post:

Yes, the LL has capitulated and decided to join the endless chatter that is the web. Now you can learn the dishy details that make up the LL's life, such as

-did the cat run away because I switched from Tender Vittles to that generic dry crap?

Not twelve hours after posting about the article I'm writing for WebJunction, Michael has to come along and burst my bubble:

Blogging: Digital Davids In An Internet Goliath

Unfortunately for me, this article is well-written with the added bonus of quotations from LIS bloggery's own Shifted Librarian:

"There are two sides to blogging, both of which can help librarians," Levine said. "The first reason is that it helps with information overload and staying current. Fellow librarian (and non-librarian) bloggers can help filter the overwhelming mass of data blindsiding us day in and day out. The second reason is that blogging can help librarians disseminate their own ideas, thoughts, and information, at a personal level and at the institutional level."

Damn! Well said.

The good news is that the scope of the article is broad, focusing on the blogging phenomenon, whereas I hope to maintain Jenny's focus on blogs as a tool for libraries/librarians.

It looks like I'm going to be writing a little piece on blogging and libraries for WebJunction in the near future. One of my main topics will be an exploration of how blogs are used in libraries and how their use might be further expanded.

So I ask of you, my gentle readers, to consider ways in which the potential of blogging is not already being exploited by libraries and share your thoughts with me. Of course, appropriate credit will be given for worthy ideas. Feel free to tell me about creative ways you see blogs being used currently, as I'm sure I haven't seen it all. While you're at it, ask your colleagues (or your readers). Let's brainstorm together. Much obliged.

First off, SharpReader is simply the best RSS aggregator going. Luke has integrated both Technorati and Feedster support in the latest version.

Let me elaborate.

I click on a feed or a specific item... Ctrl-T...Bam! Instant Technorati Link Cosmos.

Type a term into the search box...Bam! Instant subscribable Feedster feed for that term.

Via my new Feedster feed for "librarian," I found epicrisis linked by our recently discovered compatriot Michael at Angry Thoat. In the words of the author, Laura:

I have no particular agenda for this blog, but I imagine that most of my posts will be about words and books and libraries.

Welcome aboard.

I was toying around with Chris' Sideblog tool on Planet Neutral, but I've noticed a few different ways to accomplish the same goal in Movable Type without external applications. The central benefit of this for me is the ability to use Zempt to easily post random links to Open Stacks, especially when I don't have anything in particular to say in connection with the links. So the sidebar has a new Sideblog. I'm not sure how much use it will get, but you RSS fans can follow the OS Sideblog via syndication.

Pulled this one of off nycbloggers while searching for new ideas for Indiana Blogs!:

Angry Thoat - A man likes Science Fiction. A man likes libraries. This man--this geek of a man--is me. And this is my Thoat. And it is Angry.

According to his resume, Michael Simanoff is a Librarian Trainee at NYPL "seeking Electronic Resources, Web Services, or Government Documents Librarian position at an exciting, innovative library or research institution."

Ah, aren't we all...

I constantly keep my eye out for LIS blogs that I haven't seen before and new ways to go about unearthing them. I don't why it took so long for me to come up with this approach, but Blogrolling offers a "Search the Blogrolls" feature that lets me see who has a particular site listed in their blogroll. By searching on some of the bigwigs of LIS bloggery (you know who you are), I've found some new contenders (new to me, at least, some are actually quite old):

Jane's Addiction - Written by Jean Ferguson, a student in UNC-Chapel Hill SLIS program, who also works in the reference department.

letting loose with the leptard - This comes from a gentleman named Brendan Duffy who works in the library at the National University of Ireland, Galway

debgpi - Debbie is a Chicago-area librarian/lawyer/bunch of other stuff, so her blog covers a lot of linky terrain.

Expect more as the day goes on...

Well I know I've made the blogging big show when Jenny, the Shifted Librarian is getting her news from me. Of course, I can't help but wonder if she's actually reading me or just getting the story from Steven, who happens to be very meticulous about properly citing his news sources. Either way, Jenny's post comes right on the heels of a discussion I had tonight about blogging as a form of ego stroking, so I'm feeling particularly satisfied.

One of the benefits of my new found employment is that I have an organization to list when I request information from vendors or, better yet, sign up for cool LIS portals like WebJunction.

In less than five minutes of browsing there, I stumbled on a new library blog for Texas' Whitewright Public Library. Chris, the author, is using the blog to advertise newly acquired materials and disseminate other library news. He's off to a great start.

And if you haven't already, pay WebJunction a visit.

In yet another victory for the Trackback-enabled, Libraryman has migrated to Movable Type. His layout is a sea of white for now, but that's sure to change quickly as he has assembled a quality team to advise, design and conquer.

Oh and Michael, don't forget to check out the design in 800x600 640x480 (!?!). Accessibility, baby, accessibility.

INFOZO again comes through with a weblog I hadn't seen yet:

The Creative Librarian - The Creative Librarian is a hub for matters important to librarians/information scientists of today. There is a definite lean towards electronic issues, however is isn't restricted to only those. Hopefully this site will also be useful for informing non-librarians on these issues as so many of them affect us all.

And this one came to me as a dmoz submission:

-=(In Between)=- - A weblog on scholarly online publishing, open access, and library related technology.

Update: Sorry, I had the wrong URL for The Creative Librarian. It's correct now.

Christine from the aforementioned class at Wisconsin wrote about her experience of perusing my dmoz LIS>Weblogs category (great choice, although, Christine, dmoz is much more than just a directory of blogs).

She was hoping to find in LIS blogs more cross-fertilization of ideas and interblogular (?) discusssion of pressing library issues, much like she has found on the listservs:

I briefly poked around clicking on varies sites and the trend seemed to be that public libraries are using them as in information bulletin board advertising the library’s current events. What I did not see, and what I was looking for was a dialog between librarians and how they were coping with challenges in the work place. For example, tips on fund raising for public libraries, suggests to on how to promote your special library or creative ways academic libraries are handling budget cuts. Perhaps given some more time library blogs will move towards these types of discussions.

Now of course a blog tied to an actual library has to be more discrete than to discuss the politics of library operations and "how we deal with our paltry budget." But that's no excuse for the rest of us. Maybe we could use an issues/discussion-based, rather than news-based LIS collaborative blog. Hmmmm......

That said, blogs and listservs are not the same and shouldn't be.

what I was looking for was a dialog between librarians and how they were coping with challenges in the work place

The main challenge for librarians is managing change, whether technological, political, financial, what have you. Keeping up with the LIS blogging community is particularly effective in coping with technological and political change. The important news comes down these pipelines long before it reaches the masses.

Blogs are both a currency tool and an advocacy tool. When enough of us write about CIPA and point to the SCOTUS decision, it shows up on Popdex and thousands more read it. Blogs also demonstrate the creativity, diversity and *individuality* of librarians in a way that is impossible on a listserv.

Listservs foster intense (sometimes unnecessarily so) discussion amongst our ranks; blogs open up that discussion to the world. Listservs are topically focused, while blogs are free, unfettered and therefore better equipped to view the LIS world cross-topically.

My point is that there is room, and in fact need, for both blogs and listservs in our domain. They are both undoubtedly professional tools, but it would be missing the point to hold them to the same expectations.

Since we're on the subject of TrackBack, I may as well unveil my newest pet project, which I am apparently calling Indiana Blogs!. There are two components:

1. Your ordinary Blogroll featuring blogs by authors stationed in Indiana.

2. The meat of the thing is an attempt to implement TrackBack to aggregate posts written by Indiana bloggers. By encouraging bloggers to ping the site whenever they post, I can display excerpts and hope to provide a nice cross-section of Hoosier blogging.

If you want to see a similar content aggregating project in action, check out Blogroots Blogpopuli, which collects posts about weblogs.

So if you know someone in Indiana who a) blogs or b) has some web design skills, send 'em my way: greg [at] lishost dot com.

Thanks to the power of Trackback, I discovered an entire class worth of thoughtful, interesting blogs crafted as part of a summer course at The School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison:

875: A course about the mass organization and retrieval of information on the web. On the web.

Yeah, baby, yeah! Just the course syllabus alone has me drooling with envy. Start with the instructor's blog, but don't neglect the fellow travelers (especially the clearly wise Toby).

Looks like someone goofed at Blogstreet this morning. The displayed site belongs to one of Blogstreet's developers, so it could be a genuine mistake, but I like to think it's a little retribution for not putting Open Stacks in their database.

Update: That didn't last long, as you may have figured. But my absence continues...

Acting in Steven's place while he enjoys his evening out, I was over at INFOZO today and noticed two links to weblogs I hadn't seen before:

The Library Monk - Things of interest to Dan Greene, other librarians and information professionals, and perhaps monks...
Anyone who uses Albrecht Dürer artwork in their site design gets my automatic seal of approval.

Not as new, but still new to me (and therefore dmoz.org):

either/or (dot) org - Matt Grayson, grad student of information science at the university of tennessee. this site is driven by the things that interest me - usually that would includes things like web design, information design, information architecture, web standards, and technology in general. but every now and then i'll pipe up on the news, culture or life in general.

Michael Stephens at Tame The Web reports the onset of a pilot blogging program at St. Joseph County Public Library in South Bend, IN. Two of his colleagues already have new blogs underway: Joe Sipocz's Book Blog and Julie Hill's Sights and Sounds Blog. Kudos to Michael for his initiative and well wishes for the project's success.

Just wanted to let everyone know what's been going on and why I haven't been posting lately. As I've mentioned before, I'm trying to move Open Stacks over to LISHost. It has not been as smooth a transition as Blake had predicted, but not for lack of trying. I think we're going to attempt a different approach, but Blake has been busy moving and with other life/work-oriented pursuits. So my blog is in a sort of limbo for the time-being. I might add that all of this effort should be seen as a strong endorsement of Blake's work and LISHost on the whole. He really has put a lot of time into sorting out the endless Movable Type complexities and apparently has learned much in the process. Glad I could help. Stay tuned.

That's right, I'm back in Madison, IN and can now be called - of all things - a Master of Science (in LIS, of course). It's nice to be home. Now that my new cable modem is operational, I can turn to getting the Movable Type version of Open Stacks properly hosted. The last "personal web server" approach could have been considered a violation of my ISP agreement. I've been in contact with Blake over at LISHost about getting some affordable librarian-friendly server space. So expect that to happen soon.

In other non-news, I'll probably begin looking at short-term non-LIS employment in the coming weeks. 5 months and three weeks until the loan payments begin.

I'll be breaking down and packing up my computer tomorrow, which means that you should expect a) infrequent updates to the Blogger incarnation of Open Stacks for a few weeks and b) my Movable Type version of this blog to be down until I have a new ISP set up. Thanks for your patience as I relocate and begin to pursue the job hunt full-time. For now, please stay tuned to the Blogger-based Open Stacks for new posts.

I was intrigued that Google has plans to create a separate search tool specifically for blogs. In reading the Register's article about it, I was led to this article by the same author from the April 3rd Register that essentially decries the ability of the blogging community, particularly the "A-list" tech bloggers, to transform the meaning of ideas in such a way that the original meaning is supplanted. Because of the incestuous linking amongst blogs, content from these authors takes precedent over other sources in Google's PageRank system, forcing the original sources into virtual invisibility (a process called Googlewashing). The implication is that this is a form of censoring the original idea by driving it into obscurity.

The author talks about how it took a million people to create the original meaning of the term "Second Superpower" and only a few people to take it away. This is utter nonsense. First, you know as well as I do that it only took one person to create the term and associate a meaning with it. Second, the Web (and Google in particular) is not the only tool of meme propagation and if the term had some legs in its original form, then it would have been picked up more widely. But it really didn't, mostly in my opinion because peace-seeking people don't really want to be seen as part of the Superpower paradigm, with all of the inherent combatativeness that it implies. Third, he bemoans that this happened in only 42 days. Well, let me suggest that those 42 days included the 41 days after the mainstream media forgot about it.

I think the real issue is the short-sightedness of the author. How can a thriving community that works to create new meaning through interactivity and collaboration be a bad thing? Rather than bemoaning the "power" of the tech community, why not learn something from it? The question shouldn't be why bloggers can make these transformations possible, but why more people aren't making use of this unharnessed potential. I'm not saying there aren't avenues for abuse, but the more participants, the more balanced the coverage will be.

I think I mostly resent the suggestion that bloggers are to blame for the loss of meaning, rather than celebrated for its creation and transformation. The author's perspective seems far too limited, much like the music industry's take on peer-to-peer. The one thing he did correctly was to repropagate the phrase's original meaning by writing about it in relationship to blogging. This article has be much-discussed and heavily linked (already replacing some of those top 30 Google listings that are the crux of his argument), which has provided more people with the origin of the term than any other media had up to that point. He should be thanking bloggers for the exposure.

It appears that my commenting system Enetation has gone down. I don't know if this is a long-term situation, but it has encouraged me to at least attempt an import into Movable Type. The new location of Open Stacks is at http://planetneutral.gotdns.com/openstacks. Please come check it out. I'll be adding categories and trackback soon, while avoiding my last grad school project (If you know anything about implementing Questionpoint, let me know). I'll plan on posting to both sites, until I've relocated my computer and established a new ISP. So for now, please leave any comments on the new site.

Update: Apparently, this was just a temporary problem, but the Movable Type transition will continue as planned.