If You’re Already Sick of Christmas Music…

… try these songs on for size! While I myself am NEVER sick of Christmas music, many out there (many whom work in retail) would rather saw their arm off with the metal part of pencil eraser (called a ferrule, actually) than have to listen to Christmas music anymore. Well to those who want a little something else, listen to these songs listed in this mixtape put out by FlavorWire.

10 Best Songs About Libraries and Librarians

A friend from library school wrote this blog about some projects we were assigned. It’s a good point to make about the pros and cons of certain styles of assignments. Let me know your thoughts!

HLS

Your task is to develop a persona, and make up a research question that persona might ask.  It can be anything you want.  Once you have a question, take it to a reference desk at a library/archive/historical society of your choosing. Then write a paper about the experience.

Sound familiar? No, it’s not a rejected subplot from Skyfall.  It’s an assignment I’ve encountered in two different classes this fall, which is my first semester of library school.  And from talking with other LIS students, it seems like this is a common assignment regardless of your school.  It’s the “secret shopper” theory of observation at work.  An anthropologist might call it “extreme participant observation.”  The theory says you’ll learn more about something if you immerse yourself in it, giving no impression that you’re REALLY doing research.  That the other participant doesn’t know they’re part of an experiment should make their…

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Bonfire, anyone?

Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

The mustachioed man himself.

Contrary to popular belief, he wasn’t a revolutionary looking to rid England of a supposedly tyrannical parliament, but was actually a super conservative Catholic who just hated on the Protestants and wanted to put the Catholic king back in place. Not exactly someone who represents liberation from an unjust system. But anyway, we still like V for Vendetta and bonfires (who doesn’t like bonfires besides Smokey the Bear?) so here is a post dedicated to Guy Fawkes, the crazy conservative with the stylish mustache.

 

 

Guy Fawkes’ Confession at the National Archives, UK
Cracked Article on what certain lauded Revolutionary figures actually stood for.

Guy Fawkes included.

Zombies and Librarians

I know Halloween is over, but the interest in (and threat of) a Zombie Apocalypse is ever present. But am I writing about zombies on my particular blog, you may ask? Well, for a class project we are currently working on we needed to  create an Annotated Bibliography for a reference need. Many groups in the class chose things such as a high school class that needs sources for a paper on American wars, or looking lessons for the new chef. However, being the coolest group (we planned the weekly library class happy hour, after all) we decided that a common reference need is to know how to survive a zombie-virus outbreak.

So  if you’re interested in Information Access/Reference projects, zombies, or librarians being chased by zombies in a library, check out this blog. But please keep in mind, it is still currently a work in progress, but it will be perfected and updated frequently. We also plan to continue it after the project/presentation is due.

ZOMBIE REFERENCE

As someone who loved to mix social media with the assumed dusty and ancient world of archiving and libraries, this article really hits home. It’s amazing how, in every way, big companies shut little companies out. If anything, this is a cyber version of what is going on in our country.

Agnostic, Maybe

If your library has a Facebook page and uses it for outreach, you need to read this article from the Dangerous Minds website. There really isn’t a good quote to pull out the meaning, so take a moment to go and read it. The basics revolve around Facebook monetizing page promotion while simultaneously throttling the amount of people who can see a post from a Facebook page. In short, if you want your page posts to reach your entire audience, you have to pay.

The free ride is over.

I can’t really fault Facebook for making a change like this; their investors want dividends and what drives that is revenue. The amount of things you can do with Facebook for free still makes it valuable for other purposes like keeping in touch with far away family members and friends. It does, however, feel slightly at odds with the ‘

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I don’t know why it’s called Library “Science” when it’s more of a guessing game

Illuminations

I’m Krystal Thomas, digital archivist with Special Collections at Florida State University. I am new in my position, just starting this past summer. I am not new to the world of digital collections, but as I have learned quickly in my new position, each institution has its own processes and procedures for handling its digital collections over time. As my days are still finding their rhythm, I thought it would be more useful on this the Day of Digital Archives to share some of my lessons learned on starting a new position and learning a new institution’s ups and downs with digital projects.

Florida State University has had active digital collections for a decade and more at this point. During that time, many people and departments have influenced and been involved in the development, publication, and preservation of digital items, which is wonderful and I am happy to see the…

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Desperate.

I am currently at my job at the Digitization Center in the Special Collections at one of my school’s libraries and I have not yet had any coffee today. In short, I am suffering. If there is anyone out there that can read this and deliver coffee, please do so soon… after all, this message may arrive too late.

WHEN I PROCESS ALL MORNING WITHOUT COFFEE

Emerging from the Depths of Archiving School

Contrary to popular belief, I have not been kidnapped by angry reference patrons nor have I fell onto the metro tracks during my weekly hustle to my internship.

I have returned with a new perspective into the life of a graduate student and what life is like when you live and breathe library-related ridiculousness. However, at this moment, I am do to walk to “class,” today which consists of touring the building in which I in fact work. Thrilling. Unfortunately, this is the most thrilling this particular class is going to get considering the professor has not worked in a archive related field since 1995, his “digitization” examples come from the 1970’s and he often speaks of the way things were in the National Archives when Reagan was president (who, for the record, was not in office during my life time).

Fret not, though. I have this little treat:

 

WHEN PEOPLE SAY, “OH SO YOU’RE A LIBRARIAN”