2009

Google Book settlement forum, July 21, 2009 at the Boston Public Library

 

A panel about what the Google Books settlement agreement means for the academic, library, and business communities.

Speakers:

  • Daniel Clancy, Engineering Director, Google Books
  • John Palfrey, Henry N. Ess III Professor of Law and Vice Dean for Library and Information Resources, Harvard Law School
  • Ann Wolpert, Director of Libraries, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
  • Hal Abelson, Class of 1922 Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Moderated by Maura Marx, Executive Director, Open Knowledge Commons.

Google Book Search is an ambitious project to digitize the world’s books. Six years, many million works, and two U.S. lawsuits later, the project is now set to change dramatically. Google has reached a settlement agreement with authors and publishers that, if approved by the court, will have sweeping implications for writers, readers, scholars, librarians, and the public at large.

The panel of speakers will explain and discuss the settlement. The panel will be followed by a question-and-answer session.
http://bpl.org/news/calendar.htm?trumbaEmbed=view%3Devent%26eventid%3D84588833

A Visual Dictionary

Graphic designers are always trying to think of ways to visually communicate to the public effectively. Hence when I stumbled across an article while reading the Huntington News this morning, I was intrigued. Lindley Warren, an Iowa native who currently resides in Amsterdam, thought up the idea of “The Photographic Dictionary”. On this site, people regularly send her photos of everything and anything that depict a word in the dictionary, ranging from colors to emotions to everyday objects. After browsing through many of the photographs, it is quite interesting to see what different people’s perceptions of the world are :). Interested? Here is the website: http://thephotographicdictionary.org/home.html

Welcome to Snell Snippets!

It is delightful to spread the word that Northeastern University Libraries now has a blog (you’ve got it, right here!), with a talented team of bloggers.  These bloggers aim to share with you insightful ponderings about information and society, digitial initiatives, leadership in libraries, research sources, reading picks, and much more.  We also want to hear from you!  Please join us in this online conversation.  So, watch this space! Be well and go well, Maria Carpenter, Northeastern University Libraries

How we get information

This is my first post.  So, hello.  I’m Ethan.  I work as an Administrative Assistant in the Dean’s Office of the Library.  When I’m not working, I am also a graduate student at the Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science.  Most of my blog posts will likely relate to what I am learning in school. The issue of how people receive and use information is a hot topic in the Library/Information Science community.  It is with this topic in mind that I stumbled upon a blog post from the New York Times culture blog ArtsBeat. It seems that the auction house Christie’s has created an iPhone app that allows users to browse their collections.  I won’t go into too much detail but I would recommend reading the article.  Fortunately, people now have access to Gucci hand bags, with a starting bid of $4,086, in the palm of their hand.