Daily Thoughts 11/27/2010 (Get Glue, LinkedIn, Social Media, Budget)

Interior View of the Astor Library, 1854

Daily Thoughts 11/27/2010 

Using Social Networks To Select Material.


I have two books that I placed on hold after reading Linked In; What Technology Wants by Kevin Kelley and Letting Go Of Words, Writing Web Content That Works.  Librarians often talk about the books they like on Linked In.  It is often career oriented material.  While I was on a thread in Linked In on LISCareers, they had a number of career books they were discussing.  The thread is called Best Books For Career Professional/Personal Development http://linkd.in/f0VYYT%20  Two books that caught my attention were First Break All The Rules: What TheWorlds Greatest Managers Do by Marcus Buckingham and Creating A Life Worth Living: A Practical Course In Career Design For Aspiring Writers, Artists, Filmmakers, Musicians, and Others Who Want to Make A Living From Their Creative Work by Carol Lloyd.

I also spent some time on Get Glue looking at different book lists.  I ended up picking out three books Rules For Revolutionaries by Guy Kawasaki who also is on Twitter, Dust of Dreams by Steven Erikson, and Paper Cities an Anthology Urban Fantasy, Edited by Ekaterina Sedia.  This is my list on Get Glue of books http://getglue.com/BookCalendar/books

I find looking through lists of books on social networks sometimes very interesting and useful.  There are a lot of people with computer backgrounds who have lists of new computer books which are often not available from standard review sources.  People also recommend a lot of book that are never reviewed in the standard review sources like Library Journal or Publishers Weekly.  I think only 1% of published books are reviewed professionally.  This leaves a vast array of books with little or no coverage.  They are often things like computer books, books on construction, textbooks, and other materials.

Also many social networks have lists where people give what they are currently reading.  These are sometimes curious to look at because they tend to have a wide cross section of books.

Budget and Politics

It is almost the end of the year.  I learned we have enough money to make it until the end of the year without layoffs.  This is a relief in a way.  I am waiting to hear about the finalization of people retiring.  On November 29, 2010 we are having a union meeting to discuss the budget with union representatives from the state. The mayor announced there would be no layoffs in the city.  However, our library is moving away from being part of the city, we are in the process of becoming a school district library at the request of the Board of Regents of the New York State Library.  This would put our budget up to vote in 2011.  It also means that the board of trustees would have to be elected as well.  It is very political.

I now know that there will not be any furloughs, it goes against the CSEA statewide union policy.  It is something I would have liked to consider.  It requires a lot of patience to think about these things.

In the city itself, there is some dissension, the city comptroller has announced that she is against the mayors budget.  This makes things even more complicated.  Right now in Westchester County, they are having budget hearings.  Funding for libraries in Westchester County are being considered.  The Westchester Library System which does some of our services is being cut.  They already have cut the bookmobile.  In our city, it went to the homes for the aged and the local armory.

It gets even more complicated, because the civil service has to work with the library if there are layoffs or a reduction in force.  They already did a reduction in force for our library on July 11, 2010 which was rescinded.  This makes them very careful.

In the surrounding area in the five boroughs of New York City, Mayor Bloomberg has suggested a $16.5 million dollar budget cut.  This would eliminate 404 librarians leaving a lot of librarians out of work with a limited amount of open positions.  Many of the open positions are for technically oriented positions, systems librarians, metadata specialists, digital image specialists, information architects, content specialists, and web technology specialists.

The whole profession is in a shift, much like the publishing industry is shifting to new technologies, libraries are slowly starting to do it as well.  It is a very disruptive time period.

It also is a very important time to learn how to advocate for your library and find advocates in the community.  Choices which are made now, will affect how or whether libraries will exist in the future.  In my personal opinion, reform is necessary, not elimination.

Daily Thoughts 12/6/2009

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Daily Thoughts 12/6/2009

Tomorrow, I will go through Library Journal's best books of 2009. This is another excellent list of books like the New York Times 100 Best Books. http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6707422.html?desc=topstory

I have been working on my Facebook, Twitter, and Linked in accounts. They are slowly growing. I still have a lot more to learn on how to use them properly. I learned that the maximum number of followers on Linked In is 30,000 people. I can't imagine the use of that many people in a personal social network unless you are a salesperson or a recruiter. It is an interesting number.

I read some more of Daniel Goleman, Social Intelligence at the laundromat today.

My Thoughts for 7/17/2009 (Spanish Language Books)

Benno Caspar Haurisius, Scriptores historiae romanae latini veteres, qui extant omnes, notis variis illustrati, Heidelberg: Haener, 1743

Daily Thoughts 7/17/2009

Library Journal is reviewing a number of titles from Criticas Magazine which specializes in Spanish language reviews. The magazine was recently restarted. There needs to be more review material which is easier to find for Spanish language titles as well as Portuguese language titles. http://www.libraryjournal.com/microsite/49055/Criticas+Spanish+Language+Authors+and+Book+Reviews.html

There used to be a bookstore in Manhattan called Libreria Lectorum. It closed a while ago. Now there is a website, http://www.lectorum.com/ . It is sad to see the old fashioned bookstores go. I used to walk past it when I was going to Roger's Time Machine to buy comics on 14th street. I would stop sometimes and look in the window.

I am thinking about what a friend said. He told me that once I bought an Iphone, I would never go back to using a regular phone. I should do it. He also asked me to open a Facebook account under my real name. I have a Linkedin account under my real name as well as an ALA Connect account. I am social networked.

I read some more of Say Everything on the train home. What I am reading about now is anonymous blogging. It reflects on my own experience writing this blog. I am in that semi-anonymous blogging zone. I learned about the most famous blogger who was "dooced" or fired for blogging about their job. I think my posts about my job are pretty uninflammatory. This book seems to also do a very nice job of touching on the different experiences prominent bloggers have. We just got a copyof this book at our library. The one I am reading now came through interlibrary loan.

I often request books through interlibrary loan because I am waiting for books as they come in for me. I can return and pick up books from the library very easily. It is one of the perks of the job. It is not that easy to run out of books to read, cds to listen to, or dvds to watch.

We put the express dvds in the new materials section today. A lot of them went out very quickly. I am also handing over my law responsibilities to my colleague.

I did a tour of the building for a new board member, going through many of the different areas in the building; reference, periodicals and newspapers, law, young adult collection, adult nonfiction, oversize adult nonfiction, large print, music cds, scores, dvd, audio, video, videogames, playaways, mezzanine (2 floors of closed stacks with many rare items), rotunda, job information center, computer lab, computer center, local history room, community room, childrens room, staff areas, maintenance, business offices, and administrative offices.

Daily Thoughts 5/4/2009

Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Book. This was one of my favorite books as a child.

Daily Thoughts 5/4/2009
Last night, I read Volumetrics. This morning on the train I started reading The Volumetrics Eating Plan by Barbara Rolls, Ph.D.. I am reading it not to create a specific meal plan, but to get a better idea on how to eat. It says some interesting things. If you eat a light salad before a meal, you tend to eat less calories during a meal. Also, soup tends to create more satiety when you eat it than other foods. Some of the ideas in the book are quite interesting.

There is a focus on low energy density foods, things like fat free milk, fat free yogurt, salad, soup, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean meats. It also suggests regular exercise. I just got a pedometer which measures the amount of steps you take each day. The book describes a process of weight loss of one to two pounds of weight a week over a long period of time, followed by a focus on weight maintenance. The book is fully illustrated with color photos of different foods and how to cook them with less fat, more vegetables, and leaner meats and cheeses. Hopefully, it will give me a better idea of how to choose foods which have less calories and maintain the same volume or weight of food.

I spent some time weeding the 700s today, put the current events display in order. I am putting books on display on disease and medicine right now. I also am working on the final touches for a graphic novels book mark. I put a couple public domain images from Wikimedia on the bookmark as well as our logo. I am starting to get the hang of Microsoft Publisher.

I also spent some more time on Linked In today. Some of the people on my twitter account are joining me on Linked In which is kind of interesting. I have 15 people who are linked to me right now. Apparently, the average executive has 29.

I am reading The Elements of Visual Style The Basics of Print Design For Every PC and Mac User by Robert W. Harris . This book reads like a practical textbook. It is not that exciting to read. The book is very basic. I have not learned a whole lot from reading this book. It is not worth reviewing.

Daily Thoughts 4/20/2009

1977 Stamp United States 4 Cents.

Daily Thoughts 4/20/2009

I decided to create a Linked In page. Linked In is a professional social network. It is mainly focused on making contacts for business and networking. I had a page before, but it was never fully filled in. I only have a few contacts right now. This will change rapidly, I think.

Today has been another long day. I have been pulling oversize books from the regular collection to be put in the oversize collection. This is making the shelves a bit more presentable and freeing up some space. Tomorrow, I will start shifting some of the older books in the 700s (art and music) section to the storage area.

I also went over ordering with one of our new librarians. We are ordering job books for the city; building inspector, fireman, account clerk, and payroll clerk. Civil service functions which keep the city running.

We are also reorganizing the cage for technical processing where the new books come in. The shelves are going to get new labels by dewey number or category, and the inside is going to be rearranged. Our first priority is getting all of the reference books done, then processing the books with current 2009 dates on them.

Last Saturday, a carpenter came to inspect the area where our new slat walls are going up for displaying the new books. It should be a big improvement in the way our library looks.

I read some more of Here comes Everybody. As I read and observe more about the idea of software based platforms that become organizations, I am recognizing some additional characteristics of these companies. They are global in scope, they can reach anywhere an internet connection exists, they are multilingual because either they will use translation programs or hire people or recruit volunteers to translate the platform, and they can rapidly gather people together over seemingly trivial activities.