Read the June 2012 Enewsletter

The June enewsletter is now available for your reading pleasure:

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs007/1101601481860/archive/1110075493661.html

Clover Adams: A Gilded and Hearbreaking Life

William Sturgis's immediate descendants were a talented but tragic lot, and his granddaughter Clover Adams was no exception.  On Tuesday, 22 May at 6:30 p.m., author Natalie Dykstra will give a reading from her new book, "Clover Adams: A Gilded and Heartbreaking Life," and talk about Clover's photography.  There will be books available for purchase and signing.  Please call us to register, so we put out enough chairs (they're very heavy and clanky, so we don't want to be trying to set them up during the talk!).

eBook Survey from the Pew Research Center

Do you want to contribute your views about and experience with eBooks?  Take a survey (the information comes from the blog of the "Librarian by Day"):

The Pew Research Center Internet & American Life Project is conducting an online survey of library patrons. We ask that you take the survey to help us out. All responses will be confidential. The survey should take about 15 minutes.

To take the survey, visit: http://libraries.pewinternet.org/participate/survey/e-book-borrowers

The Pew Internet Project will also be doing other general surveys of library patrons, as well as non-library-users who own e-readers or tablet computers. If you would like to participate future surveys, sign up here to be notified.

To learn more about the Pew Internet Project’s research on e-reading and libraries, which is entirely free and available to the public, visit libraries.pewinternet.org.

 Background Information

The ALA, IMLS, COSLA and other library leaders are advisors on a national research effort studying the changing role of public libraries in the digital age, as well as the experiences and expectations of public library users.  The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has funded the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project to conduct surveys and provide analysis related to reading and e-reading; the changing world of public library services and the choices public libraries must make; and a typology of who does – and does not – use public libraries. As many of you know, Pew is a national leader in this kind of research, and their reputation and reach are high and wide – and the Project is interested in learning about the work and opinions of public librarians.  We believe this effort will provide the kind of data-based information public libraries are demanding to proactively meet changing community needs and advocate for the future.

Visual eBook Downloads Help!

Still frustrated with trying to download eBooks to your phone or Kindle using written instructions?  OverDrive has added video tutorials to its help page.  (Thanks to Eileen Chandler at CLAMS for posting this news!)

Go to http://help.overdrive.com/going-mobile-videos to find the video for your device!

May 2012 Email Newsletter

The May 2012 email newsletter is hot off the presses!:

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs007/1101601481860/archive/1109844433544.html

eBook news from CLAMS

Students looking for some classic summer reading titles or folks just tired of waiting for their eBook holds to become available might want to check out this news from CLAMS:

Always Available eBooks is a new Featured collection on the CLAMS Digital Download website.  This is a one year promotional subscription from OverDrive--unlimited copies with no waiting lists. The titles are classics and many have featured on School Summer Reading lists.  CLAMS currently has a 50 title subscription and  50 more titles will be added over the next few weeks.

Best Free Reference

The 1 March edition of Library Journal included an entire section of the Best Reference Books for 2011.  There was also a short blurb on the Best Free Reference, which was a set of web sites that collect information from multiple sources and presents it in an easy-to-use portal fashion. You might find some of these reference resources handy to bookmark or just to explore:

• Biodiversity Heritage Library
• Arab Spring: An Interactive Timeline of Middle East Protests
• GetHuman  (best phone numbers for connecting with a live person at a company)
• World Public Opinion (consortium of public opinion research centers in 25 countries)
• Science Daily (breaking news and lots of research articles)
• Occupy Wall Street (you know you're curious...)

Thanks, Library Journal!