First Snow of the Year

First Snow of the Year, originally uploaded by librarykatja.

It snowed! And then melted. But it was really pretty while it lasted.

 

I is workin. Wat u want?

I know I’m usually a grammar stickler, but I can’t resist the lolcat grammar. Also, the grammatical unorderliness is a mirror of my mind at the moment; my new job is fantastic and challenging and I’m learning a lot, but the result of all that learning is that when I do actually get home, I’m effectively brain-dead.

So, hopefully that will change soon, and my brain will adjust, and I’ll start rhapsodizing (coherently) in detail about various aspects of my job.

Until then, well, here’s a lolcat. Enjoy.

 

Questioning the utility of Library of Congress Subject Headings….hooray!

Library Journal has published several very interesting articles recently about the Library of Congress and bibliographic control. I swear, they’re fascinating. To me, anyway.

The most recent article, titled “Subject Headings or Keywords?: Google, Microsoft join LC Working Group on Bibliographic Control,” follows up on an LC-commissioned report that was critical of the “utility of longstanding professional practices.” Karen Calhoun, the author of the report, does not question that subject heading searches can produce superior results. The more important point is, as she says, that ”a large and growing group of students and scholars routinely bypass library catalogs in favor of other tools,” and, in order to turn the tide, ”change must be swift.”

 Reading that sentence alone made me want to stand up and cheer…but the truly wonderful outcome of this study is the partnering of the Library of Congress with Microsoft and Google. I doubt it will generate immediate results, but these are the kind of bridges the library community needs to begin to build if it has any hope of retaining relevance and serving its patrons as they wish to be served.

Huzzah!

 

Goodbye Blogger, hello WordPress!

My old site: informationatrix.blogspot.com

Hopefully my experience here will not:

1) cause my eyes to strain at the amount of pink.

2) constantly frustrate me by making it hard to make even miniscule changes to my layout.

3) irritate me with the constant presence of the “eBlogger” header that is completely out of place with the rest of the blog’s design template.

So, in conclusion…hopefully…yay!