E-Lert # 366 / Cyberavis no. 366
Friday March 5, 2010 / le vendredi 5 mars 2010
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CARL COMMUNIQUÉ / COMMUNIQUÉ DE L'ABRC
CARL commends the support for research included in Budget 2010
The Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) commends
the additional $32 million per
year increase in funding for Canada’s research granting councils and
the $8 million increase for the Indirect
Costs Program that the federal government will be making through Budget
2010. PDF
/
L’Association des bibliothèques de recherche du Canada se réjouit
du soutien apporte à la recherche dans le Budget du 2010
L’Association des bibliothèques de recherche du Canada
(ABRC) félicite les $32 millions par année de subventionnement
additionnel pour les conseils de recherche du Canada ainsi que l’augmentation
de $8 millions pour le Programme des coûts indirects que le gouvernement
fédéral fera à travers le Budget du 2010. PDF
NEWS / NOUVELLES
Select press coverage of what’s in Budget 2010 for researchKaren Birchard, Canada's New Budget Holds Small Gains for Research, The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 4, 2010 HTML / Kenyon Wallace, Researchers disappointed by funding for innovation, National Post, March 5, 2010 HTML / Modest progress on innovation in 2010 budget, CBC News, March 4, 2010 HTML / Research Canada Gives Qualified Support for Budget 2010, Exchange, March 5, 2010 HTML
Clement on Copyright: A Made-in-Canada Approach
Michael Geist, March 4, 2010
In the immediate aftermath of yesterday's Speech
from the Throne, some copyright watchers suggested it foreshadowed the
return of a Canadian DMCA, pointing to language that promises to "strengthen
laws governing intellectual property and copyright." The return
of Bill C-61 is a possibility, however, comments
from Industry Minister Tony Clement immediately afterward suggest that he
is not a mirror image of his predecessor Jim Prentice.*
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/index.php
Library Copyright Alliance Releases Diagram Charting Many Ways
Forward For Google Books Settlement
March 4, 2010
The American Library Association (ALA), the Association of Research Libraries
(ARL), and the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) have
released the diagram entitled “GBS March Madness: Paths Forward for
the Google Books Settlement” which charts the many possible routes
and outcomes of the Google Books Settlement, including avenues into the
litigation and appeals process. As the diagram shows, Judge Chin’s
decision is only the next step in a very complex legal proceeding that could
take a dozen more turns before reaching resolution.*
http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/gbs-march-madness-diagram-final.pdf
Waterloo gears up to take advantage of strengths in digital media
technology
RE$EARCH MONEY, Volume 23, Number 3, March 3, 2010
Currently a hulking brick shell, the Lang Tanning building in downtown Kitchener
ON will be transformed into the key hub of the Canadian Digital Media Network
(CDMN). The massive structure is part of the historic Tannery District,
a largely abandoned manufacturing centre in transition and a highly visible
indicator of the growing know-ledge-based economy in the region. The $30-million
redevelopment of the 32,500-sq-m site by Toronto-based Cadan Inc has been
conceived as a convergence centre of artisans, professionals and technology,
with The Communitech Hub as its anchor tenant. Digital media is front and
centre in the Kitchener-Waterloo region in the growth of many of its high-tech
anchor firms, a growing number of start-ups and the aspirations of policy
makers.*
Statistics Canada strikes working group to improve key indicator
for higher ed R&D
RE$EARCH MONEY, Volume 23, Number 3, March 3, 2010
Statistics Canada has struck a working group to examine the accuracy and
inclusiveness of its higher education R&D (HERD) survey, the benchmark
indicator for R&D in post-secondary institutions. Revisions would mark
the first time in 10 years that the HERD indicator was the focus of a review
and revisions. Since the last review in 2000, the federal government and
other governments and organizations have introduced new programs to boost
post-secondary research spending, including Indirect Costs Program, the
recent Knowledge Infrastructure Program and the College and Community Innovation
Program of the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council.
British Library creates archive of defunct Web
Raphael G. Satter
Associated Press, March 1, 2010
The British Library is building an archive
of the country's defunct Web sites to preserve snapshots of the ever-changing
Internet for posterity. The library is already charged with keeping a copy
of every published work distributed in Britain and Ireland. That directive
was extended to electronic materials such as compact discs and online publications
in 2003. Library spokesman Jacob Lant said the purpose of the project is
to fill "a digital black hole in the nation's memory," noting,
for example, that the library had been unable to turn up any online evidence
of such events as the 1997 death of Princess Diana.*
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_TEC_TECHBIT_DEAD_WEB_SITES?SITE=VTBEN&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
European research funders throw weight behind UK open access repository
March 1, 2010
UKPMC
is a free-to-access digital archive of full-text, peer-reviewed biomedical
and life sciences research. It holds over 1.7 million full text articles.
The ambition of the repository is to become the information resource of
choice for the UK biomedical and health research communities and eventually
to expand to become 'Europe PubMed Central'.This aim takes a step closer
to fruition as four European research-funding organisations - the Health
Research Board Ireland and Science Foundation Ireland, Telethon Italy and
the Austrian Science Fund - have agreed to participate in UKPMC. The funders
will mandate that all biomedical research outputs that arise from their
funding are made freely available - typically within six months of publication
- from the UKPMC repository.*
http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/News/Media-office/Press-releases/2010/WTX058744.htm
SPARC Open Access Newsletter, issue #143
March 2, 2010
Peter Suber
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/03-02-10.htm
Open Wi-Fi 'outlawed' by Digital Economy Bill
David Meyer
ZD Net UK, February 26, 2010
The [UK] government will not exempt universities, libraries and small businesses
providing open Wi-Fi services from its Digital Economy Bill copyright crackdown.
This would leave many organizations open to the same penalties for copyright
infringement as individual subscribers, potentially including disconnection
from the internet.*
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/communications/0,1000000085,40057470,00.htm
Europe 'will not accept' three strikes in ACTA treaty
David Meyer
ZD Net UK, February 26, 2010
The assurance from the office of the trade commissioner, Karel De Gucht,
is the strongest statement on Acta (the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement)
to emerge from the
new Commission since it took office earlier in February. "We are
not supporting and will not accept that an eventual Acta agreement creates
an obligation to disconnect people from the internet because of illegal
downloads," John Clancy, De Gucht's spokesman, told ZDNet UK.
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/communications/0,1000000085,40057434,00.htm
Nouvelle interface graphique pour Gallica
22 février 2010
La bibliothèque numérique de la Bnf, Gallica, dispose d'une
nouvelle interface graphique. Elle compte plus de 1.000.000 de documents
mis à la disposition des internautes.
http://gallica.bnf.fr/
Waterloo region defies odds with growth of high-tech sector, focus
on digital media
RE$EARCH MONEY, Volume 24, Number 2, February 19, 2010
Iain Klugman, president of Communitech and unapologetic booster of all things high tech in the Waterloo region, remarks on the latter "The patient is healthy." With a handful of large, homegrown tech companies, the presence of several multinationals and a growing cadre of smaller firms, Waterloo's tech sector is on a steep growth curve, with an accent on digital media and benefitting from a remarkable collaboration between key players. Add to that already dynamic landscape the University of Waterloo's unique characteristics of inventor-owned intellectual property, prodigious engineering output and a long tradition of co-op placement, key applied and fundamental research institutes and a potent critical mass of angel investors, and the ingredients for achieving tech success are available in abundance.*
Création du Conseil National du Logiciel Libre (CNLL)
18 février 2010
« Le Conseil National du Logiciel Libre est l’instance
représentative, au niveau national, des associations et groupements
d’entreprises du logiciel libre en France. Le CNLL représente
10 associations et
groupements, et par leur intermédiaire plus de 200 entreprises
françaises spécialisées ou avec une activité
significative dans le logiciel libre. »
http://www.cnll.fr/
Digitizing the archives: the Wellcome Library approach
February 2, 2010
The Wellcome Library is currently planning to digitize vast quantities
of its unique holdings and provide remote access to the digitized content
over the Web. Among the many challenges that such plans present, perhaps
the most fundamental is deciding what to digitize and, with almost limitless
potential in the holdings but limited resources, what to prioritize.*
http://wellcomelibrary.blogspot.com/2010/02/digitising-archives-wellcome-library.html
Blue Ribbon Task Force Issues Final Report on Economics of Ensuring
Long-Term Access to Digital Information
CLIR Issues, Number 73, January / February 2010
Addressing one of the most urgent societal challenges of the Information
Age—ensuring access to valued digital information not just today,
but in the future—requires solutions that are as much economic and
social as technical, according to a new
report by the Blue Ribbon Task Force on Sustainable Digital
Preservation and Access. Preserving digital information—including
text, video, images, music, and sensor data generated throughout all areas
of our society—is a real challenge and it’s growing at an exponential
pace. A recent study by the International Data Corporation (IDC) found that
a total of 3,892,179,868,480,350,000,000 (that's roughly 3.9 trillion times
a trillion) new digital information bits were created in 2008. In the future,
the digital universe is expected to double in size every 18 months, according
to the IDC report.
http://www.clir.org/pubs/issues/issues73.html#blue
ARTICLES
L'illusion technologiquePauline Gravel
Le Devoir, 1 mars 2010
« Décideurs, ingénieurs et grand public s'emballent
unanimement pour les promesses mirifiques que l'on nous annonce pour toute
nouvelle technologie. Le journaliste français Nicolas Chevassus-au-Louis,
invité du Coeur de sciences de l'UQAM la semaine dernière,
nous fait voir les ratés du passé afin de nous sortir de cet
aveuglement naïf. Il insiste sur l'importance de toujours porter un
regard critique et historique, et ce, surtout quand il s'agit de régler
des problèmes aussi complexes que l'approvisionnement en eau douce
ou la faim dans le monde, «qui n'auront pas de solutions uniquement
techniques. La technique n'est qu'une partie de la solution», prévient-il. »
http://www.ledevoir.com/societe/science-et-technologie/284099/l-entrevue-l-illusion-technologique
Libraries lead the e-book revolution
Philip Harvey
Eureka Street, Volume 20, Number 4, March 1, 2010
We are seeing only the early technology of the e-book. In about five years,
according to Harvey, the e-book’s general look and feel will be very
different from its iPad and Kindle prototypes. He also suggests that libraries
are quietly ahead of everyone else.*
http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=19346
How Google’s Algorithm Rules the Web
Steven Levy
Wired Magazine, March 2010
Google holds a commanding 65 percent market share and is still the only
company whose name is synonymous with the verb search. But just as Google
isn’t ready to rest on its laurels, its competitors aren’t ready
to concede defeat either. For years, the Silicon Valley monolith has used
its mysterious, seemingly omniscient algorithm to, as its mission statement
puts it, “organize the world’s information.” Over the
past five years, a slew of companies have challenged Google’s central
premise: that a single search engine, through technological wizardry and
constant refinement, can satisfy any possible query. None of these upstarts
individually presents much of a threat, but together they hint at a wide-open,
messier future of search — one that isn’t dominated by a single
engine but rather incorporates a grab bag of services.
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/02/ff_google_algorithm/
Cloud Computing, Big Data, and Open Access at EDUCAUSE 2009
Carol Minton Morris
D-Lib Magazine, Volume 16, Number 1/2, January / February 2010
With a national climate of shrinking IT budgets and increasing needs at
institutions of higher education, many sessions and conversations were about
taking advantage of economies represented by new technologies such as cloud
computing and distributed communication tools. Higher education IT professionals
gathered at the Colorado Convention Center and simultaneously online to
uncover "the best thinking in higher education." Clifford Lynch
moderated Initiatives from the National Science Foundation's DataNet
Program: DataONE and the Data Conservancy. Lawrence Lessig in his talk
entitled It Is About Time: Getting Our Values Around Copyright Right
reviewed the progress of the open access movement in education. He called
for educators to finally resolve this issue in a way that enables the potential
of technology for education.*
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/january10/morris/01morris.html
[Note: The EDUCAUSE
2009 conference proceedings are available online. Online as well are
the sessions
recordings.]
CLIR and Stanford Inaugurate Global Digital Libraries Collaborative
CLIR Issues, Number 73, January / February 2010
In November 2009, CLIR and Stanford University co hosted an international
meeting of librarians and technologists to consider how institutions can
best integrate their digital collections with those of others in the global
library community in order to realize a truly integrated international library
cyberinfrastructure. A summary report of the discussions is available at
http://www.clir.org/globaldigitallibraries/.*
http://www.clir.org/pubs/issues/issues73.html#global
Math of Publishing Meets the E-Book
Motoko Rich
The New York Times, February 28, 2010
Many consumers assume it is only logical that publishers are saving vast
amounts with
e-books - not having to deal with printing, warehousing, and distribution
- leaving room to pass along those savings to their customers. However,
publishers say consumers exaggerate the savings and have developed unrealistic
expectations about how low the prices of e-books can go. Printing costs
may vanish, but a raft of expenses that apply to all books, like overhead,
marketing and royalties, are still in effect. All of which raises the question:
Just how much does it actually cost to produce a printed book versus a digital
one?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/01/business/media/01ebooks.html?pagewanted=1&emc=eta1
Is copyright getting in the way of us preserving our history?
Victor Keegan
The Guardian, February 26, 2010
Copyright is a global nightmare for anyone interested in digital preservation.
The problems that Google has encountered in its quest to digitize the world's
books are nothing compared to the problems of preserving documentary films.
The multiple permissions needed for each one from commercial interests will,
as
Lawrence Lessig describes in the New Republic, lead to a situation where
" the vast majority of documentary films from the 20th century will
be forever buried in a lawyer's thicket, inaccessible (legally) because
of a set of permissions built into these films at their creation".
Even if these legal problems are solved there are still others. Digital
files degrade much faster than paper and have to be upgraded, sometimes
as frequently as every 10 years. Keegan argues that most our “living”
history will be discarded in digital dustbins unless something is done about
it.*
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/feb/25/digital-copyright-british-library
Hill Times Policy Briefing: Technology
Hill Times, February 22, 2010
Some of the items in the Technology policy briefing: Minister Q&A – Minister of State, Science & Technology, Gary Goodyear says Canada could be a leader in the emerging digital economy. / Policy Vacuum (Marc Garneau, Liberal MP, Science & Technology Critic) – Canada does not have a science policy. It’s drifting and its competitors are overtaking it. / Research and Innovation (Heather Munroe-Blum, Principal & Vice-Chancellor, McGill University) – Canada has the fiscal capacity to decide on a course to take towards enhancing Canada’s competitive position, and laying the foundations for growth, health and prosperity.*
Canada needs to take innovation seriously
David Crane
RE$EARCH MONEY, Volume 24, Number 2, February 19, 2010
South Korea is a good example of a country that takes innovation seriously. Samsung, in a partnership with Korea Electric Power, recently landed a $7 billion initiative in Ontario to build 2500 megawatts of wind and solar power and establish four factories with 1,440 manufacturing jobs. Korea is far ahead of Canada in high-speed broadband and the use of the Internet. Canada has been working to improve its own performance, starting with the Chrétien government's major boost in S&T spending and creation of new institutions in 1995-2005. The Conservatives have continued this trend with their 2007 agenda, Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada's Advantage. While all of this is moving in the right direction, there remains inadequate funding along with gaps in program and priorities.*
The Hill Times' Top 100 Lobbyists 2010
Bea Vongdouangchanh
February 15, 2010
Government relations professionals build relationships, garner trust, anticipate pushback on any given issue and come up with a communications strategy, understand the machinery of government, have access to key decision-makers inside government, and are "sensitive to the 'politics' of decision making.” That's a lot.
eBooks: Tipping or Vanishing Point?
Emma Tonkin
Ariadne, Issue 62, January 2010
Due in large part to the appearance since mid-2006 of increasingly affordable
devices making use of e-Ink technology (a monochrome display supporting
a high-resolution image despite low battery use), the e-book has gone from
a somewhat limited market into a real, although presently still niche, contender.
http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue62/tonkin/
RESOURCES / RESSOURCES
HASTAC – Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology
Advanced Collaboratory
HASTAC ("haystack") is a network of individuals and institutions
inspired by the possibilities that new technologies offer to shape how we
learn, teach, communicate, create, and organize local and global communities.
The community of contributors is motivated by the conviction that the digital
era provides rich opportunities for informal and formal learning and for
collaborative, networked research that extends across traditional disciplines,
the boundaries of academe and community, the "two cultures" of
humanism and technology, the divide of thinking versus making, and social
strata and national borders. HASTAC is open to anyone. Members are academics
or others affiliated with universities at any stage of their careers, from
students to senior professors.*
http://www.hastac.org/
Project Bamboo
Bamboo
is a multi-institutional, interdisciplinary, and inter-organizational effort
that brings together researchers in arts and humanities, computer scientists,
information scientists, librarians, and campus information technologists
to tackle the question: How can we advance arts and humanities research
through the development of shared technology services?
http://projectbamboo.org/
Global Knowledge Exchange.Net (GKEN)
The Global Knowledge Exchange Network (GKEN) is a community of scholars
and practitioners who share an interest in exploring new ideas and emerging
trends related to scholarly research and everyday research practices. The
community is devoted to understanding the changing role of information –its
creation, management, dissemination and use– in scholarly research,
higher education and business practice. GKEN is sponsored jointly by the
Harvard Business School Knowledge and Library Services and the Copenhagen
Business School Library.*
http://www.globalknowledgeexchange.net/
The Researcher-Librarian Partnership: An IFLA Library Theory and
Research Section
Research Mentoring Program for New Professionals
Research skill and knowledge constitute an essential tool kit for ensuring
librarians continue to meet the evolving needs of the clients and communities
they serve. The Researcher-Librarian Partnership mentoring program will
provide new professionals the opportunity to develop and refine their skill,
knowledge and confidence in conducting research. The Partnership is supported
by the Library Theory and Research Section of IFLA.*
http://www.ifla.org/files/library-theory-and-research/ResearchLibPartInfolFINAL_doc.pdf
EVENTS / ÉVÉNEMENTS
Scholarly Writing for the LIS ProfessionMarch 16 - May 4, 2010
Online synchronous sessions Tuesdays 2:00 - 3:00 PM central time
[Note: The first session on March 16 will be held from 2:00 - 4:00 PM]
This course introduces students to the major genres of scholarly writing primarily through actual writing and editing assignments and discussion of essential elements and approaches to scholarly writing. An underlying assumption of the course is that writing is a social act, a way of knowing, and a way of thinking creatively and critically. Topics included are general introduction to scholarly writing and editing, practice with writing abstracts, reviews, editorials, columns and other opinion pieces, reporting the results of case studies, best practices, surveys and focus group research, and writing discipline focused scholarly articles. The book length work will not be covered.*
http://www.lis.illinois.edu/programs/cpd/sw.html
Research Data Access and Preservation Summit
Phoenix, Arizona, April 9-10, 2010
Researchers in all fields generate, collect and analyze enormous quantities
of digital data. In fields ranging throughout the sciences and humanities,
managing, preserving, and sharing these data require substantial capital
and human resources and new kinds of information professionals who are able
to integrate technology, content, and policy skills. This summit aims to
bring together leaders in data centers, laboratories, and libraries in different
organizational and disciplinary settings to share ideas and techniques for
managing, preserving, and sharing large-scale research data repositories
with an eye toward achieving access and stewardship.
http://www.asis.org/Conferences/IA10/ResearchDataAccessSummit2010.html
E-books and E-content 2010: Data as Content
University College London, 11 May 2010, 10.00 to 17.00
This year’s econtent meeting will consider the emerging and fundamental
role of data as content. Key issues are: how can such content be managed
to ensure its longevity through digital curation and systematic preservation;
the need for new standards to enable links with traditional formats and
the world of scholarly publishing; metadata and taxonomy; and perhaps of
most concern, issues of validity and accuracy. This conference will address
data in all its different formats, explore the key issues of storage, manipulation
and transfer and look also at the commercial possibilities of marketing
data. It will also address the emerging role of institutional repositories
in acting as a vehicle to manage data.*
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/infostudies/e-books/
Current Issues for Academic Librarians: Leadership and Opportunity - A CACUL
/ CARL Preconference
Canadian Library Association National Conference, Edmonton, AB
June 2nd, 2010, 9:00am - 5:00 pm
The program is designed to identify opportunities where Canadian academic
librarians at all levels and at all stages in their careers can lead change
at the local, provincial, national, and international level. Individual
sessions will serve as a call for both individual and collaborative action
on issues of vital importance in academic libraries. The featured sessions
will be: Google Books, the HathiTrust, and Providing Service with Digital
Collections, Developments in Library Scholarly Communication Services, Information
Policy and Librarian Participation, and Teaching and Learning: Emerging
Campus Partnerships Models.*
http://www.cla.ca/conference/2010/
Registration for the 76th IFLA World Library and Information Congress
now open
Gothenburg, Sweden, August 10-15, 2010
This year’s theme is Libraries driving access to knowledge. Registration
forms can be downloaded in pdf-format from the web-site: http://www.ifla.org/en/ifla76/registration.
Paper copies of the registration form can be requested by e-mail from: ifla2010reg@congrex.com.
Important dates:
- On or before 7 May, early registration fee deadline
- On or before 7 May, refund deadline for cancelled / altered registration
- 26 July, pre-registration closes
*Text adapted from source / Texte adapté de la source
