E-Lert # 295 / Cyberavis no. 295
Friday September19, 2008 / le vendredi 19 septembre 2008
NEWS / NOUVELLES
Discussion paper on the development of the service strategy by
LAC Services Branch
Library and Archives Canada, Programs and Services Sector, Services Branch
[Note: LAC Services Branch is still seeking comments on
the July 14, 2008, public consultation paper.] Library and Archives Canada
is the steward of an immense and priceless collection of Canada's documentary
heritage. The purpose of this Paper is to stimulate discussion about LAC's
Services Branch's service direction over the next three years and to examine
specifically what services the Branch should provide. Clients are encouraged
to identify their expectations about services, where they feel gaps in service
exist, their service priorities, and suggested potential re-allocations
that might increase their client experience. Comments and suggestions can
be submitted to LAC Services Advisory Board at participation@lac-bac.gc.ca.
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/the-public/pcsab/005004-1002.6-e.html
McGill inaugure son nouveau Complexe des sciences de la vie
Jacinthe Tremblay
Le Devoir, 17 septembre 2008
L'université McGill inaugure officiellement demain son nouveau Complexe des sciences de la vie, construit au coût de 73 millions de dollars. Plus de 2500 chercheurs, scientifiques, techniciens et étudiants y sont réunis dans deux édifices neufs et deux pavillons rénovés. «Ce regroupement place Montréal et le Québec parmi les principaux leaders mondiaux de la recherche biomédicale», affirme le Dr Michel Tremblay, directeur du Centre de recherche sur le cancer de McGill.
33 Nobel laureates write to Congress in support of the NIH policy
Peter Suber
Open Access News, September 17, 2008
Thirty-three US Nobel laureates in science have written an open letter
to Congress defending the NIH policy against the Conyers bill (September
9, 2008). This is the third time that US Nobel laureates in science have
written to Congress in support of the NIH policy.
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2008/09/33-nobel-laureates-write-to-congress-in.html
After Hearing, Sweeping Anti-NIH Bill To Be Shelved—for Now
Library Journal, September 16, 2008
The bill itself, meanwhile, a broadly-written measure, was criticized by
copyright experts. “The bill is an odd duck because it would do far
more than simply end public access to NIH-funded research,” noted
Villanova law professor Michael Carroll on his blog. Carroll said that if
passed, the sweeping bill could “impliedly amend” other provisions
by which taxpayers procure services—and suggested there was a good
reason why Appropriations didn’t consult Conyers before passing the
mandate: because “assertions that the policy somehow diminishes copyrights
lacks any basis in law.”
http://www.libraryjournal.com/info/CA6596784.html?nid=2673#news1
New Social Network Hopes to Catalog All Researchers and Their Interests
Jeffrey R. Young
The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 16, 2008
Richard Price, a research fellow at the University of Oxford’s All
Souls College, is blasting an e-mail plea to every academic mailing list
and blog that he can find asking academics to sign up for his new online
directory of researchers worldwide. His goal is to create an online guide
to who’s doing what, and where, so scholars can share information
and collaborate. The site, Academia.edu, is the latest effort to create
a Facebook-like social network specifically designed for researchers. Others
include Graduate Junction and Labmeeting.
http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/index.php?id=3319&utm_source=wc&utm_medium=en
High textbook prices changing publisher habits
James Sawabini
The Chronicle [Duke University], September 16, 2008
Set to launch January 2009, Flat World Knowledge will commission leading
experts to write a new line of textbooks exclusively for the company. The
books will be available for free online. In addition, students will have
the option of ordering a print copy of their textbooks to be sent to them
for a fee of approximately $25 a book. All textbooks published by the company
will be copy-written through Creative Commons, a nonprofit organization
that grants licenses that allow for the free distribution of copyrighted
material.
http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/media/storage/paper884/news/2008/09/16/News/High-Textbook.Prices.Changing.Publisher.Habits-3433268.shtml
Warning sounded on web's future
Pallab Ghosh
BBC News, September 15, 2008
Talking to BBC News Sir Tim Berners-Lee said he was increasingly worried
about the way the web has been used to spread disinformation. Sir Tim spoke
prior to the unveiling of a Foundation he has co-created that aims to make
the web truly worldwide. It will also look at ways to help people decide
if sites are trustworthy and reliable sources of information.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7613201.stm
The Canadian Library Association/Association canadienne des bibliothèques
Announces New Executive Director
September 12, 2008
The Canadian Library Association/Association canadienne des bibliothèques
is pleased to announce the appointment of Kelly Moore to the position of
Executive Director. Kelly, a Canadian librarian, comes to the Canadian Library
Association/Association canadienne des bibliothèques from her position
as Membership Manager for the International Federation of Library Associations
in The Hague.
http://www.cla.ca/AM/Template.cfm?Section=News1&CONTENTID=5855&TEMPLATE=/CM/ContentDisplay.cfm
Copy-wrongs
Michael Ridley
The Ontarion, September 11, 2008
The Canadian government is turning you into a criminal. Not quite, but
if the proposed amendments to Canada's copyright laws (Bill C-61) come into
effect, it will make activities that you perform everyday illegal. At the
heart of the issue is that delicate dance between the rights of creators
and those of users. Copyright protection is intended to safeguard original
artistic creations from unlawful reproduction.
http://theontarion.ca/viewarticle.php?id_pag=1776
AUCC launches federal election advocacy website
September 10, 2008
The website details the many ways in which universities matter to Canada
and to Canadians, urges all political parties to address issues related
to higher education and university research, and relays to the media and
the public the parties’ positions and pronouncements relating to higher
education and research. The website is geared towards the university community,
political candidates and journalists as a “one-stop shop” for
information about the issues that matter to Canada's universities, for facts
and figures related to higher education and university research, and for
answers to a questionnaire AUCC will send to the five main party leaders
on higher education and research issues. The AUCC site will be active until
Election Day on October 14, 2008.
http://www.universitiesmatter.ca/
Better writing and more space needed online
Linda Cooper
Nature, Volume 455, September 3, 2008
The World-Wide Web is remarkable as a vehicle for communicating scientific
discoveries. Online journals unite distant researchers and inspire worldwide
collaborations. However, despite these advantages, there is a growing risk
that papers published today are less successful in meeting their objectives
than in the past. The scientific article in 2008 is on the cusp of change,
with one foot in the past and one in the future. Science journals should
shed the constraints of the old media and exploit the advantages of the
new, to offer readers easy and enjoyable access to the scientific literature.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v455/n7209/full/455026a.html
ARTICLES
Online Literacy Is a Lesser Kind: Slow reading counterbalances
Web skimming
Mark Bauerlein
The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 19, 2008
When Jakob Nielsen, a Web researcher, tested 232 people for how they read
pages on screens, a curious disposition emerged. Dubbed by The New York
Times "the guru of Web page 'usability,'" Nielsen has gauged user
habits and screen experiences for years, charting people's online navigations
and aims, using eye-tracking tools to map how vision moves and rests. In
this study, he found that people took in hundreds of pages "in a pattern
that's very different from what you learned in school."
http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i04/04b01001.htm
In Digital Age, Federal Files Blip Into Oblivion
Robert Pear
The New York Times, September 12, 2008
Countless [U.S.] federal records are being lost to posterity because federal
employees, grappling with a staggering growth in electronic records, do
not regularly preserve the documents they create on government computers,
send by e-mail and post on the Web. Federal agencies have rushed to embrace
the Internet and new information technology, but their record-keeping efforts
lag far behind. Moreover, federal investigators have found widespread violations
of federal record-keeping requirements.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/13/us/13records.html
Convenience Trumps Quality: How Digital Natives Use Information
Derek Law
FUMSI Magazine, June 2008
It has been seven years since Marc Prensky launched the concept of digital
natives (the post-www generations) and digital immigrants (everyone else!)
on the world. His definitions and terms have come in for scrutiny and debate
since then, but they are an undeniably powerful metaphor for the change
which all too evidently surrounds us. The most important point in his argument
is that we are not witnessing a simple ratcheting up of incremental change
but have reached a point of discontinuity marked by fundamental change.
Digital natives are, quite simply, different people.
http://web.fumsi.com/go/article/use/2971
The Future of Copyright
Rasmus Fleischer
Cato Unbound, June 9, 2008
How relevant is it to declare oneself to be “for” or “against”
copyright? Neither the stabilization nor the abolition of the copyright
system seems within reach. All we see is a seemingly endless assembly line
of new extensions to the law being proposed and enacted.
http://www.cato-unbound.org/2008/06/09/rasmus-fleischer/the-future-of-copyright/
RESOURCES / RESSOURCES
Observatoire international du numérique
Université du Québec à Montréal
Les nouveaux médias sont en transformation permanente tant sur la
scène locale qu’au niveau international. Les enjeux à
cet égard sont liés non seulement aux arts et aux technologies
numériques de communication, notamment interactives, mais aussi aux
problématiques art/science. L’Observatoire international du
numérique, dont le directeur fondateur est M. Hervé Fischer,
entend consolider des initiatives de collaboration internationale individuelles
existantes, mais dispersées, qui gagneront à être réunies.
http://oinm.org/index_fr.html
Webcast — New Media vs. New Censorship: The Authoritarian
Assault on Information
September 10, 2008
The increasing sophistication of web censorship by authoritarian governments
creates significant challenges to unleashing the Internet’s potential
for information freedom, according to panelists speaking at a [U.S.] Broadcasting
Board of Governors (BBG) workshop on Sept. 10, 2008. “The tactics
of those who seek to obstruct Internet freedom change as rapidly as Internet
technology itself,” said Under Secretary of State for Democracy and
Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky, who opened the program. The BBG workshop
also featured panel discussions on global trends in new media censorship
and case studies on Iran, China, and the Middle East.
http://www.bbg.gov/ondemand.cfm
EVENTS / ÉVÉNEMENTS
Data Audit Framework (DAF) and Digital Repository Audit Method
Based on Risk Assessment (DRAMBORA) Launch Event
London, U.K., British Academy Lecture Hall, October 1, 2008
In collaboration with DigitalPreservationEurope the Digital Curation Centre
(DCC) is pleased to announce the official launch of the Data Audit Framework
(DAF) and Digital Repository Audit Method Based on Risk Assessment (DRAMBORA)
Interactive Online tools. DAF provides organisations with the means to identify,
locate, describe and assess the management of research data assets. DRAMBORA
Interactive Online provides a method for self-assessment of digital curation
practices and performance by repositories.
http://www.dcc.ac.uk/events/daf-drambora-2008-london/
SPARC Announces International Speaker Roster for November Repositories
Meeting
Baltimore, Maryland, November 17 – 18, 2008
SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) has announced
a prominent slate of speakers for the SPARC Digital Repositories Meeting
2008 in Baltimore on November 17 and 18. The gathering, organized by SPARC
in cooperation with SPARC Europe and SPARC Japan (a Japan National Informatics
Institute initiative), will examine how open online archives may be enhanced
to further serve scholars, institutions, and the public.
Leaders, innovators, and practitioners from North America, Europe, and Asia
will explore new frontiers in building and supporting online open archives.
Four timely discussion tracks bring together speakers with far-reaching
experience.
http://www.arl.org/sparc/media/08-0911.shtml
