ITHAKA S+R – Seeking a User-Centered Future for Academic Libraries – “The mission of academic and research libraries is expanding, and our work is transforming. Collections alone are no longer sufficient to articulate our new value proposition and establish ROI to our institutions. Our academic and research libraries are doing more than just managing collection-centric… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: January 2020
Use DuckDuckGo ‘Lite’ for Absurdly Fast Search Results
lifehacker – “Most folks probably think of DuckDuckGo as the more privacy-focused alternative to Google, but one of the lesser-discussed benefits ditching all that data tracking is increased search speed. The normal DuckDuckGo search eats up less data and requires fewer requests than Google, but there’s also a “Lite” version of the DuckDuckGo page that… Continue Reading
Automation in MS Outlook
Via LLRX – Automation in MS Outlook – This guide by legal tech expert Catherine (Sanders) Reach is a must-read for every Outlook user seeking to implement value added features and functions that are currently underused, or not used at all. Many of us spend a good portion of our day in Outlook, receiving and… Continue Reading
U.S. Media Polarization and the 2020 Election: A Nation Divided
Deep partisan divisions exist in the news sources Americans trust, distrust and rely on: “As the U.S. enters a heated 2020 presidential election year, a new Pew Research Center report finds that Republicans and Democrats place their trust in two nearly inverse news media environments. Overall, Republicans and Republican-leaning independents view many heavily relied on… Continue Reading
Coalition of states sue over rules that could allow 3D-printed gun blueprints to be posted on internet
AP via ABC7NY: “Attorneys general in 20 states and the District of Columbia filed a lawsuit Thursday challenging a federal regulation that could allow blueprints for making guns on 3D printers to be posted on the internet. New York Attorney General Tish James, who helped lead the coalition of state attorneys general, argued that posting… Continue Reading
Independent bookstores mount inclusive access lawsuit
Inside Higher Ed – Big textbook publishers and retailers are accused of squashing competition from independent college bookstores – “Inclusive access programs, where students are automatically billed for their course materials, are increasingly big business for leading textbook publishers and college bookstores. But for independent, off-campus bookstores, inclusive access programs could spell a death knell.… Continue Reading
The environmental cost of keeping mail and files online keeps rising
Bloomberg via Japan Times / no paywall: “Everyone has seen warnings at the end of email saying, “Please consider the environment before printing.” But for those who care about global warming, you might want to consider not writing so many emails in the first place. More and more, people rely on their electronic mailbox as… Continue Reading
Leaked Documents Expose the Secretive Market for Your Web Browsing Data
Motherboard – An Avast antivirus subsidiary sells ‘Every search. Every click. Every buy. On every site.’ Its clients have included Home Depot, Google, Microsoft, Pepsi, and McKinsey. “An antivirus program used by hundreds of millions of people around the world is selling highly sensitive web browsing data to many of the world’s biggest companies, a… Continue Reading
10 US Cities You Need To Visit If You Love Books
BuzzFeedNews: “After sifting through cities with a population above 50,000 and “at least one retail bookstore, used or rare bookseller, public library or institutional library,” Apartment Guide released a list of the best cities in America for book lovers based on “the ratio of book-related establishments per 100,000 residents in each.” Here’s what they found… Continue Reading
Society of Municipal Arborists 2020 Urban Tree of the Year
Casey Trees: “Each fall, members of the Society of Municipal Arborists (SMA) nominate and vote for the SMA Urban Tree of the Year. This tradition dates to 1996 when the urban workhorse ‘Princeton Sentry’ Ginkgo was crowned. And for 2020 the Urban Tree of the Year is none other than the Celtis occidentalis or the… Continue Reading
Public Disability History
Presenting Disability Histories | Disability Histories for the Present – “Public Disability History is a blog journal and a forum for exchange between the diverse actors involved and invested in issues regarding disability. It’s a website to gather and provide resources for the history of disabilities. Furthermore, it offers a “fast track” publication mode for… Continue Reading
In U.S. Library Visits Outpaced Trips to Movies in 2019
Gallup – “Visiting the library remains the most common cultural activity Americans engage in, by far. The average 10.5 trips to the library U.S. adults report taking in 2019 exceeds their participation in eight other common leisure activities. Americans attend live music or theatrical events and visit national or historic parks roughly four times a… Continue Reading
