User involvement in information services is a contentious issue. This article explores the participation of patrons in libraries, archives and records centres. It reviews the causes of this change, and discusses the consequences for the information profession. The article notes the constants in information environments, and concludes by suggesting…

This paper examines the problems involved in subject retrieval from full-text databases of secondary materials in the humanities. Ten such databases were studied and their search functionality evaluated, focusing on factors such as Boolean operators, document surrogates, limiting by subject area, proximity operators, phrase searching, wildcards,…

Late last year, Ohio State University (OSU) library director Joseph Branin graciously invited this author to visit for an up-close look at the William Oxley Thompson library renovation and construction project underway on his campus. He eagerly accepted. Since 2001, when he first began reporting on the project, he has been amazed by the plan, its…

The International Children's Digital Library (ICDL) began as a research project funded primarily by the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and Microsoft Research and creates a digital library of outstanding children's books from all over the world (http://www. childrenslibrary.org). The project…

Hearing some fun facts about books and authors can bring books to life and help ignite students' interest in books and reading. Because most elementary school media centers and public libraries have many of the Newbery Medal books, students will have a better chance of finding books they decide they want to read once they hear about them. Reading…

This paper analyzes librarians' reactions to the Open OCLC WorldCat. A detailed survey was sent to ARL libraries to explore what, if anything, the libraries are currently doing to prepare for these changes and how they plan to cope with the probability of having all their records open to the whole world. Survey findings indicate that most of the…

Collecting and presenting children's literature takes on new meaning when the audience is comprised of students who are affluent and represent the dominant culture. As a school librarian, the author of this article believes that children's literature provides a means by which she can introduce the diversity of society into the classroom.…

Web 2.0 challenges libraries to change from their predominantly centralised service models with integrated library management systems at the hub. Implementation of Web 2.0 technologies and the accompanying attitudinal shifts will demand reconceptualisation of the nature of library and information service around a dynamic, ever changing, networked,…

The article relates how the Brooklyn Campus Library of Long Island University, despite limitations of physical distance and the varying conditions of the remote graduate campus at Westchester, makes every effort to face each challenge creatively with practical solutions for implementation. We share our findings and experiences--what worked and…

Social networking sites cast a wide net, not only in the sheer number of sites that exist on the Internet but also in terms of their application and usefulness. The last column, in "PSQ" v.4 (3), examined sites that could assist professionals with outreach, networking, and collaboration. In this second column dedicated to social networking sites,…

Many libraries use RSS to syndicate information about their collections to users. A survey of 65 academic libraries revealed their most common use for RSS is to disseminate information about library holdings, such as lists of new acquisitions. Even though typical RSS feeds are ill suited to the task of carrying rich bibliographic metadata, great…

Local records are the foundation on which social history is constructed. However, in an era when most historians categorize themselves as social historians, it is amazing to note how much these primary resources appear to be underutilized in scholarly works. This article attempts to understand why this is so by investigating how it is that…

Social networking tools have been getting quite a bit of press in libraryland for the past couple of years. It is considered to be one of the key aspects of a library joining what is referred to as the Library 2.0 movement. In this context, social networking is seen as a library service or library outreach mechanism that utilizes popular social…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe some of the problems and issues faced by online library catalogues. It aims to establish how libraries have undertaken the mission of developing the next generation catalogues and how they compare to new tools such as Amazon. Design/methodology/approach: An expert study was carried out in January…

In this article, the author describes how she was able to allow her students to talk with author Cynthia Leitich Smith through Skype, a free Internet telephony service. The author also describes how Skype can be used for recording podcasts and enhancing the reference services of libraries. Here, the author shares ideas on using Skype in libraries.