Library Meme

This American Life #441: When Patents Attack

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 15:40:00 -0500

Why would a company rent an office in a tiny town in East Texas, put a nameplate on the door, and leave it completely empty for a year? The answer involves a controversial billionaire physicist in Seattle, a 40 pound cookbook, and a war waging right now, all across the software and tech industries. (Transcript)

Drexel iSchool Open Notebook Science Talk

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:35:00 -0500

This talk covers Open Notebook Science from an information technology perspective. It was presented by Jean-Claude Bradley at the Drexel iSchool on November 11, 2008. Although solubility measurements and chemical reactions are mentioned the focus is more on how information is stored, retrieved and used using free and hosted services such as Blogger, GoogleDocs, Wikispaces, ChemSpider, CDD and others. The UsefulChem project and the Open Notebook Science Challenge are highlighted.

audio (mp3)
screencast
slides

Semantic Future for Libraries – Martin Malmsten Talks with Talis

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:54:00 -0500

Originally posted on August 19, 2008 in the Talis Panlibus blog.

Martin Malmsten is from the LIBRIS department of the Royal Library of Sweden – LIBRIS being the discovery interface for the library.

Since joining as a software developer has been absorbed in to the world of library search and discovery. He played a major part in the build and launch of the latest LIBRIS search interface which has introduced under the surface some Semantic Web and Linked Data features.

We discuss his career, the use of User Centered Design & Iterative Development methodologies, the Semantic Web techniques and technologies he used, and their future applicability to the library domain.

Items discussed in our conversation:

LIBRIS
User-centered design and the next generation OPAC – a perfect match?
RDF / Linked Data representations of cataloged data via LIBRIS:
- URI for the Royal Library - http://libris.kb.se/resource/library/S
- URI for the subject heading "Mödrar" (Mothers in English) - http://libris.kb.se/resource/auth/154863
- URI for August Strindberg - http://libris.kb.se/resource/auth/94541
- URI for the book "The difference Engine" - http://libris.kb.se/resource/bib/5060570
- The book "The difference Engine" in OpenLink RDF browser - http://demo.openlinksw.com/DAV/JS/rdfbrowser/index.html?uri=http%3A%2F%2Flibris.kb.se%2Fresource%2Fbib%2F5060570
Cool URIs for the Semantic Web

Jonathan Gorman Talks with Talis

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:49:00 -0500

Originally posted on July 18, 2008 in the Talis Panlibus blog.

In this Talking with Talis podcast I am in conversation with Jonathan Gorman from the University of Illinois.

Jon can often be found on the code4lib IRC channel discussing many aspects of innovation with the community of library software developers and enthusiasts.

In our conversation we discuss his career and some of the tasks and projects he is involved with. Mentioned in our discussion is Jon’s article for Code4lib Journal about using Authority data in VuFind.

Ed Summers Talks with Talis

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:41:00 -0500

Originally posted on June 30, 2008 on the Talis Panlibus blog.

Ed Summers has recently been active in exposing Library of Congress Subject Heading data as Linked Data using Semantic Web technologies and RDF, through his experimental service at lcsh.info.

In this conversation we find out how Ed’s career, not always on a traditional library path, has led him to his work in the Library of Congress, his pragmatic interest in things Semantic Web, and why he has needed to experiment outside of the LoC.

In this conversation we reference:

Michele Kimpton and Sandy Payette Talk with Talis about DSpace, Fedora, and collaboration

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:32:00 -0500

Originally posted on October 10, 2008 in the Talis Xiphos blog.

In our latest podcast I talk with Michele Kimpton and Sandy Payette. Michele is Executive Director of the DSpace Foundation, and Sandy the Executive Director of Fedora Commons. We discuss the repository software solutions offered by each community, before exploring the implications of their recent announcement of a collaboration between the two organisations.

During the conversation, we refer to the following resources;

Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3)
Cornell
DSpace Foundation
DSpace Sponsorship Programme
Fedora Commons
Fedora Generic Search Service (GSearch) module
Fedora Project (Red Hat Linux distribution)
Harvard Open Access Repository
HP Labs
Internet Archive
MIT
Mulgara (and podcasts with Paul Gearon and David Wood)
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
National Science Foundation (NSF) DataNet
Andy Powell and Pete Johnston podcast
Simile
Herbert van de Sompel podcast
Zotero

Talis talks with Herbert van de Sompel about SFX, OAI, and Repositories

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:30:00 -0500

Originally posted on September 6, 2008 in the Talis Xiphos blog.

In our latest podcast I talk with Herbert van de Sompel of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. We discuss Herbert’s pivotal role in the development of SFX and the Open Archives Initiative (OAI), before turning to a broader discussion of issues related to the use of repositories in preserving and providing access to scholarly literature and data.

During the conversation, we refer to the following resources;

Talis talks with Pete Johnston and Andy Powell about the changing face of Repositories

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 4 Nov 2008 16:23:00 -0500

Originally posted on August 8, 2008 in the Talis Xiphos blog.

In our latest podcast, I talk with Pete Johnston and Andy Powell of the Eduserv Foundation. We build upon themes that they have been discussing elsewhere, and explore their views on the current state of (institutional and other) Repositories.

During the conversation, we refer to the following resources;

arXiv
ATHENS
CHEST
Jim Downing’s blog
Dublin Core Metadata Initiative
Eduserv
Eduserv Foundation
eFoundations blog
Elsevier
FRBR
JISC
JISC Repositories Conference
Brewster Kahle
Linked Data
MLA
Nature Network
Nature Publishing Group
Open Archives Initiative (OAI)
OAI Object Reuse and Exchange (ORE)
OAI Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (PMH)
Andy Powell’s VALA Presentation and eFoundations blog post
‘Andy Powell is spot on‘ post to Panlibus blog
Slideshare
Ed Summers’ blog
SWAP profile
SWORD
UKOLN
VALA Conference

Library 2.0 Gang 10/08: Financial Crisis or an opportunity?

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:56:00 -0500

Originally posted on 10th October 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

Unless you have been living under a stone for the last few months, the turmoil in the world financial markets can not have escaped your notice, but how will this, and the inevitable recession that we are heading in towards, influence libraries and their suppliers?

Is the library world insulated from it? Does it mean that open source become more popular because it is perceived to be cheaper, or less because there will be less funding for those involved? Does it mean that pressure to purchase add-on components as against full systems will increase? What pressures will there be on the vendors both traditional and open source? Does this mean that libraries will become more or less significant in their communities? Is this an opportunity or a crisis or both?

Joining gang members Marshall Breeding and Carl Grant to discuss this, our guest this month is Talis CEO and avid Bloomberg watcher, Dave Errington.

The conclusion seems to be that it is definitely a crisis for the world economies, but this first recession in an online world could be an opportunity for libraries if they are willing to grasp it. Take a listen and see if you agree.

During the conversation Carl references a Chronicle of Higher Education, Tech Therapy, podcast about the culture clash between librarians and IT in the academic environment. You can listen to that podcast by following this link.

Library 2.0 Gang 09/08: System Procurement

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:54:00 -0500

Originally posted on 9th September 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

All are agreed that the purchasing of a library system is not an insignificant undertaking, but in these times of rapidly changing 2.0 technology and open source systems, are the current procurement processes still fit for purpose?

To help with the discussion we are joined by two guests this month who are both veterans of many tender processes:

Karen Reece Sales Manager, Talis.
Rob McGee Founder and President of RMG Consultants Inc.

Gang members Carl Grant and Marshall Breeding join in the discussion about the frustrations of the procurement process and how it may or may not be applicable. There again, the process does lead to contractual rigor, but is it at the expense of stifled innovation.?

To help the discussion along Rob McGee has provided a couple of his white papers on the subject:

Request for Proposals for Integrated Library Systems [pdf]
Information Technology Strategic Planning for Libraries [pdf]

Although coming from differing points of view, the gang and our guests agreed on one piece of advice for libraries – make friends with your purchasing department, involving them fully in preparing requirements with vision.

Library 2.0 Gang 08/08: Open Source Systems

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:50:00 -0500

Originally posted on 12th August 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

Open Source Software has been around for many years. Open Source components have been used to develop library systems since the late 1990’s. Koha, acknowledged as the first fully open source library system was launched by its New Zealand based developers in 2000. The growing interest around open source, stimulated by Koha, was given a significant boost when Georgia Public Libraries launched Evergreen in September 2006.

We have two guests this month:

Karen G. Schneider, Community Librarian for Equinox Software, the support organisation which grew out of the Evergreen project.
L J Haravu Chief Domain Specialist, Verus Solutions Pvt., Ltd., Hyderabad India, the software company behind NewGenLib the Open Source library system successfully spreading across India and the Middle East.

Stimulated by the success of the organisations represented by our guests, the gang for this month – Nicole Engard, Talin Bingham, Andrew Nagy, Marshall Breeding, and Carl Grant – go on to discuss how Open Source Library Systems, and the open approach behind them, have changed the way all system suppliers both commercial and Open Source are delivering their systems and engaging with their customers.

Library 2.0 Gang 07/08: ALA - Anaheim

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:47:00 -0500

Originally posted on 8th July 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

22,000 Librarians congregated in Anaheim California between June 26th and July 2nd for the American Library Association 2008 Annual Conference and Exhibition. With over 300 educational programs, over 2000 committee meetings and events, the exhibition, opening and closing sessions, and the presidents program to choose from - and Disneyland just down the road - it was a busy time for those that attended.

Outgoing ALA President, Loriene Roy joins the Gang as our guest this month to reflect on the conference.

The Gang members, who all attended the conference, on this show are Char Booth, Carl Grant, Marshall Breeding, and Oren Beit-Arie. Amongst the topics discussed were the suitability of the venues chosen for ALA conferences, the return on investment for vendors as some conference attendees deliberately avoid the exhibition floor, concerns patron privacy and it’s effect on innovation, and the way librarians don’t discuss their failures.

Library 2.0 Gang 06/08: Bolt-on OPACs

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:44:00 -0500

Originally posted on 10th June 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

Against the background of Web 2.0 and Library 2.0, we have seen the emergence of complementary, or bolt-on, products for Library Systems. Gradually we are seeing a moving away from the tradition of libraries purchasing absolutely everything from their ILS vendor.

It is now becoming normal for libraries to purchase URL Resolvers, Electronic Resource Management software, and Federated Search products from 3rd parties. This trend is becoming most prevalent in the area of search and discovery interfaces, these ‘Bolt-on OPACs’ being available from both commercial and open source providers.

Our guest Taco Ekkel is Director of Development for Medialab Solutions, the Amsterdam based company who produced Aquabrowser, the first commercial example of a complementary OPAC. He is joined by Gang members Matt Goldner, Betsy Graham, Andrew Nagy, Marshall Breeding, and Carl Grant, to discuss where these products are going and what was learnt from Aquabrowser.

Library 2.0 Gang 05/08: ILS API

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:39:00 -0500

Originally posted on 6th May 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

Those reading library technology blogs, or attending conferences over the last couple of years, can not have failed to be aware of the pressure for Library System developers and vendors to open up those systems and provide API access.

Against this background, the Digital Library Federation (DLF) launched a working group to analyze the issues involved in integrating “integrated library systems” and discovery systems, and create a technical proposal for how such integration should be accomplished.

Following a survey of libraries, the working group produced a draft recommendation which was discussed at a meeting in Berkeley, California on March 6th attended by representatives of the DLF , academic libraries, and major library application vendors. Subsequent to this meeting participants agreed to the ‘Berkeley Accord’ supporting a set of essential functions for an API.

John Mark Ockerbloom Chair of the DLF Working Group is our guest this month. In conversation with the Gang members Talin Bingham, Oren Beit-Arie, Marshall Breeding, Andrew Nagy, and Dan Mullineux.

During the conversation we reference:

The DLF ILS API Wiki
Blog post by Innovative Interface’s Betsy Graham
Project Jangle

Library 2.0 Gang 04/08: Google Book Search API

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:36:00 -0500

Originally posted on 8th April 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

Google Book Search has created much interest since its appearance as Google Print back in 2004. Recently they released an API to enable the embedding of Google Book Search resources in to sites, not least library OPACs.

This month’s gang Oren Beit-Arie, Tim Spalding, Warwick Cathro, John Blyberg, and Carl Grant are joined by guest Google Product Manager, Frances Haugen who gives an interesting insight in to the thinking behind and application of the API. During the conversation Frances suggests that those who wish to offer comments about and suggestions for future API developments should contact her by mail - fhaugen@google.com.

The Gang also discuss how services such as Google Book Search, The Open Library, LibraryThing, and others may be indicators of how in the future library systems will increasingly use globally based services to handle resources traditionally held locally.

Library 2.0 Gang 03/08: Code4lib

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:30:00 -0500

Originally posted on 11th March 2008 on the Talis Library 2.0 Gang Podcast.

The Open Library, ILS APIs, and New Cataloguing Influences, are the subjects under discussion in this show. Gang Regulars John Blyberg, Nicole C Engard, Carl Grant, Char Booth, and Rob Styles are joined by Aaron Swartz from The Open Library.

The topics for this month’s show were drawn from the excellent Code4lib 2008 Conference February 25-28, in Portland, OR. - The Open Library, ILS APIs, and new influences on cataloging.

The following are referenced in the conversation:

ALA LITA Ultimate Debate :: There’s No Catalog like No Catalog

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:32:00 -0500

Thanks to the Internet Resources and Services Interest Group (IRSIG), there was another Ultimate Debate panel at ALA Annual 2008. The title this year was “There’s No Catalog like No Catalog”, and a full recording of the debate was podcast on the LITABlog. Panelists included Stephen Abram, Joe Janes, Karen Coyle, and Karen Schneider.

Podcast originally posted on July 5, 2008. [MP3 file: 105:47]
See also Roy Tennant's three summaries in Library Journal: [1], [2], [3]

Talking With Talis :: Tim Berners-Lee

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 11:25:00 -0500

Originally posted on Talking With Talis on February 27, 2008.

In our latest podcast interview I talk with Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web and now Director of the World Wide Web Consortium. We discuss the Semantic Web's readiness for mainstream adoption, and explore a wide range of issues from Linked Data to the writing of new books for developers.

For further discussion of the interview's content, see this post on ZDNet's latest blog, The Semantic Web.

Download MP3 [63 mins, 30Mb]. Read transcript

During the conversation, we refer to numerous resources. These are linked from the transcript, and reproduced below;

Sir Tim Berners-Lee
DBpedia
FOAF
Giant Global Graph
GRDDL
Linked Data Planet
Linked Data Project
Linked Open Data Workshop
Musicbrainz
N3
OpenAuth
OWL
RDF
'The Semantic Web', Scientific American 2001
Semantic Web Interest Group
SPARQL
Swoogle
Tabulator
Weaving the Web
World Wide Web Consortium

Talking With Talis :: Richard Cyganiak

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 11:19:00 -0500

Originally posted on Talking With Talis on March 13, 2008.

Latest recording on technical matters is a chat with Richard Cyganiak, who's currently working on the Sindice Semantic Web search engine, though is probably best known for his leading role in the Linking Open Data project (maintaining the cloud diagram :-)

In the podcast Richard describes various technical details of these projects, and talks about the nature of data on the Web in the wild, as RDF, microformats and increasingly RDFa. He also discusses some of the practical issues in mapping existing databases to the Semantic Web (the kind of techniques Tim Berners-Lee mentioned in his podcast with Paul a few weeks ago).

Richard naturally mentions the principles of Linked Data :

Use URIs as names for things
Use HTTP URIs so that people can look up those names.
When someone looks up a URI, provide useful information.
Include links to other URIs. so that they can discover more things.

Download MP3 [47 mins, 44Mb]

DERI Galway
Richard @ Freie Universität Berlin (via D2R)
HP Labs Semantic Web Research
Sindice Semantic Web search engine/API
Giovanni Tummarello
microformats, RDFa
TagSoup liberal HTML parser
foaf:knows
Give yourself a URI, Cool URIs for the Semantic Web
LinkingOpenData W3C SWEO Community Project
Chris Bizer
DBpedia
Joshua Tauberer
rdfabout.com (including a billion-triples dataset of U.S. Census statistics)
RKB Explorer
Hugh Glaser @ Scientific Commons
Linking Open Data mailing list, The Linking Open Data dataset cloud
Linked Data (Tim Berners-Lee Design Issue note)
RDF/XML, Turtle - Terse RDF Triple Language[see also : Why RDF is more than XML]
Tabulator Semantic Web browser
SPARQL
last.fm
W3C RDB2RDF Incubator Group
D2RQ - Treating Non-RDF Databases as Virtual RDF Graphs
Tim Berners-Lee podcast

Talking With Talis :: Tom Morris

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 15:24:00 -0500

Originally posted on Nodalities on March 8, 2008.

Today's verbal delight features Semantic Web hacker (and philosopher) Tom Morris, initially talking about using XML to describe real-world things, mentioning the advantages of RDF. He then describes his experiences with the Ruby programming language, and offers thoughts on practical aspects of working in the distributed environment of the Web. Tom tells of ideas he has around using Bluetooth with RDF, before giving his opinion of platforms like Facebook, and related novel aspects of online gaming. He concludes by talking about his recent experience of organizing SemanticCamp London, and encouraging other people to try the BarCamp approach to conferences.

Download MP3 [52 mins, 48Mb]

During the conversation, we refer to the following resources:

Tom Morris (blog)
OPML 2.0, RelaxNG
Google Contacts Data API
tommorris / rena
Rake (Ruby make), RSpec (Behaviour Driven Development framework for Ruby)
Jena, rdflib
NSFW: Not Safe For Work
microformats, GRDDL
Tim Berners-Lee
git, github
"Fork (software development)" on Wikipedia
ID3 (Rhythm and blues/Contemporary R&B on Wikipedia)
Colorado Benefits Management System
SKOS (Simple Knowledge Organization System)
SHA hash functions
BlogTalk WebCamp SocialNetworkPortability
LightBlue (cross-platform Python Bluetooth API)
BlueFOAF: discover nearby friends with Bluetooth
Dan Brickley, Dave Beckett, Matt Biddulph
danbri's MacBook Air
Growl
Inverse Functional Property
SubEthaEdit
Facebook, MySpace, OpenSocial
AOL, CompuServe, Prodigy (Wikipedia links)
Twitter, Dopplr
Rails, Amazon EC2
Pownce, Heroku
Drupal and the opportunity of RDF, video
EVE Online
The profile attribute and GRDDL
Dan Connolly
URI-Based Extensibility
Web 3.0 has checked into buzzword hotel...
Semantic Web Aliases
SemanticCamp, BarCamp, BarCampParis, BarCampBrighton
SWIG (Semantic Web Interest Group), mailing list
N3, DBpedia, Linking Open Data
#swig on irc.freenode.net

The Mark of Zotero: Two-Clicks to Citation Management

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 08:21:00 -0500

Originally presented at OPAL on January 23, 2008.

The Mark of Zotero: Two-Clicks to Citation Management, a presentation made by Chris Strauber, Reference and Web Services Librarian at Wofford College.

Streaming audio about Zotero with text chat and PowerPoint slides (playback time of 42 minutes)
downloadable MP3 audiorecording about Zotero (13 MB; playback time of 42 minutes)
PowerPoint slides about Zotero
Video about the Zotero interface (runtime 5:10)
Video about how Zotero captures citations and content (runtime 4:13)
Video about how Zotero creates bibliographies (runtime 3:39)
Blog post by Mark Dingemanse of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics about why he made the switch from Endnote to Zotero.

EDUCAUSE 2007 :: Bruce Schneier on Information Security: Ten Trends [Keynote]

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:50:00 -0500

Originally posted on EDUCAUSE Connect on October 31, 2007.

In this 43 minute podcast, we feature a keynote speech by Bruce Schneier, author and Chief Technology Officer for BT Counterpane, Inc. This speech was delivered at the EDUCAUSE 2007 Annual Conference in Seattle, Washington on October 26th, 2007. It is entitled "Bruce Schneier on Information Security: Ten Trends".

Surveying current trends in information security, it’s clear that a myriad of forces are at work. But fundamentally, security is all about economics: both attacker and defender are trying to maximize the return on their investments. Economics can both explain why security fails so often and offer new solutions for its success. For example, often the people who could protect a system are not those who suffer the costs of failure. Changing these economic incentives will do more to improve security than will more technology.

Bruce Schneier notes on his blog: "I spoke at the Educause conference this year in Seattle. There's a podcast and video of my talk available ("Ten Trends of Information Security"; I've given the talk before) as well as a podcast of an interview with me."

Talking with Talis :: Daniel Lewis on the Social and Semantic Webs

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:36:00 -0500

Originally posted on Talking with Talis on November 24, 2007.

In our latest Talking with Talis podcast, I talk with Daniel Lewis. We discuss some of his ideas about the 'Social Web', and the relationship between this and the ideas and technologies of the Semantic Web.

During the conversation, we refer to the following resources;

Media Berkman :: Aaron Swartz on the Open Library Project

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 8 Nov 2007 11:47:00 -0500

Aaron Swartz, co-founder of Reddit.com and Tech Lead for the Open Library project, spoke at this week’s installment of the Berkman Center’s Luncheon Series.

Listen to the MP3 or view the MOV (time: 1:03:39)

Aaron spoke about how, thanks to new technology, the grand vision of a library containing every book in the world is now within our grasp. He discussed how the Open Library Project, a loose collection of technologists, publishers, librarians, and book-lovers, has taken up this challenge by trying to create a website collecting everything we know about books — including library records, publishers’ blurbs, full-text and scans, reviews, and more

Aaron was previously a co-founder of Reddit.com, which was purchased by Condé Nast in late 2006. He was worked on Internet specifications for RSS and RDF and was one of the early team members of the Creative Commons project. He is the author of a number of free software packages and a co-founder of Jottit.com.

+ Open Library vision
+ Aaron Swartz’s website

Berkman Fellow David Weinberger live-blogged the lunch, and you can check out his comments and summary here.

Jon Udell's Interviews With Innovators :: Beth Jefferson on BiblioCommons

noreply@blogger.com (Tom) — Thu, 8 Nov 2007 11:35:00 -0500

Originally posted on Jon Udell's Interviews With Innovators on November 30, 2007.

This week’s ITConversations show features Beth Jefferson, founder of BiblioCommons Inc., a company that aims to reinvent and federate the online catalogs of public libraries. She’s thinking very creatively about the social forces that such a federation could marshall. The idea is not to create yet another social network. Instead, she wants to promote the social discovery — and social cataloging — of books, CDs, videos, and other kinds of library resources. Social networks pivot on interpersonal relationships. A BiblioCommons-enabled network would, in a complementary way, pivot on those resources.

How would such a network achieve meaningful scale? Beth has found some data which suggests that if you federated lots of public library catalogs, the combined user population would rival some of the web’s largest sites. Enabling those folks to connect with one another, in the context of resource collections that share common metadata, would be a big deal.

The BiblioCommons software is only now entering its first trial phase. But you can see some of what it does in Beth’s presentation at code4lib, a conference for library technologists.