30 August 2005

Carnival of the Infosciences #4

Summer is ending, school is starting, and, like me, many of you may be wishing to spend these last few dog days sitting around and watching the river flow. But time stops for no one, and neither does the Carnival of the Infosciences, although it may this week be showing a few signs of wear and tear. The rides are still running, though, so step right up, grab yourself something from the concession stand, and enjoy the ride.

This week's carnival is small but meaty. Our first stop takes many of us far afield, or perhaps more accurately, far out to sea. Von Totanes, the Filipino Librarian, weighs in on the great digital divide debate in "Digital Divide: The Other Side." I've noted before that the world is not flat, and I hope we see more international voices in the Carnival to give us an idea of just how varied a world we live in.

Just in time for those of us who are going back to school, Joy Weese Moll of Wanderings of a Student Librarian comes out with some advice on "How to read a journal article".

Joy's advice is so good that it was recommended by Mark and followed up on by Angel. Mark also points us to another just in time for back to school post from Angel, the Gypsy Librarian. "What does Generation Y Want?" is a review of an article from portal: Libraries and the Academy which suggests that what Generation Y needs are just the kind of skills that Joy recommends. (Oh, the synchronicity!) Mark notes "it is one of the few things I have read that takes a pragmatic approach to serving this group versus just wanting to hand over the keys to the asylum to them."

And now for a few added Editor's Picks:

Since I've already stretched the rules of the Carnival a little by posting a day late, I'm going to stretch them just a tiny bit more so I can include "Codex Seriphanianus," by Nichole of nichole's auxiliary storage. It's a fascinating and beautifully illustrated piece about a librarian's worst nightmare: unwittingly buying a stolen book.

I am not a cataloger, but I live in awe of them, and two cataloging blogs this week have items of note. The first, "Lafof zobac (Ĉu vi parolas Dewey? 2.0, with added religious fervor)," comes from Jonathan Furner of the Dewey Blog and picks up on the international theme with a discussion of the Dewey Translators Meeting at IFLA's World Library and Information Congress. One important discussion dealt with the options in the 200s (where, as you may recall, Christianity takes up a bit more than its fair share of numbers in the world of religion).

In "Trackbacks," a post on Catalogablog, David Bigwood considers the possibilities of trackbacks, tagging, and other Internet classification tricks for libraries and library catalogs. The folksonomy vs. the taxonomy seems to be another one of those subjects where people tend to freak out and zealously guard their ground. There will be no tagging of our carefully controlled vocabulary! say the taxonomy people, while the folksonomy folks rant that taxonomies are dead, wooden, lifeless things (rather like taxidermy, which perhaps explains why I often have difficulty keeping the two terms straight). David points out that there's room for both.

Finally, Christine Borne, NexGen Librarian extraordinaire, has reemerged from a dormant period with several thoughtful posts about being a librarian, including this one, "More introspection." I like old people, too.

That's it for this week's carnival. I'll pack up the bags and send them on over to Christina's LIS Rant, the next stop on our virtual tour. Here are the general submission guidelines. And if you've missed any of the previous stops of this extravaganza, check them out:

Carnival of the Infosciences #1
Carnival of the Infosciences #2
Carnival of the Infosciences #3

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