Blogging Librarian

- Town blocks voter approved budget
What the people want is not what the town officials are giving. The people of a town in New York, Philipstown, had voted to increase funding to the town’s library, Julia Butterfield Library. But town officials have come out to say that voters were ‘bamboozled’ into voting for the increase and have decided not to provide the increase. So, the town’s library board is going to sue the town board to release the funds.
(via LISNews)

- Thai Princess calls for more libraries
HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, whom I met very briefly when she visited the library I worked in previously, has expressed her concern of the lack of access to books for children in the rural areas because there is a lack of libraries.
(via LISNews)

- Libraries grow in digital age
An insight into the Delaware Public Library System and its transformation. It just shows the resilience of public libraries all over the world, not just in Singapore.
(via LISNews)

- BookMooch.com
BookMooch.com is another book-swapping site, similar to BookCrossing.com. You can read a comprehensive review of BookMooch.com here. How it works is that you post a list of books you want to swap and someone can request for it. Everything is free except for the shipping of the book to others. You also earn points by listing down the books you want to swap (one-tenth of a point) and actually sending out the books (one point). If you send the book out of the country, you can get three points. Points are needed to get books from someone else that you would like to read. Alternatively, the points can be ‘donated’ to charities that BookMooch works with, such as children’s hospitals, public library funds, and other charities for children and new mothers.
(via LISNews)

- Students lost over shrinking uni library
The University of New South Wales library has just discarded 100,000 books from their collection and sent it to Melbourne for storage. This was done without consultation with any of their stakeholders such as the students and lecturers. Now, the lecturers have to go to Sydney University’s Fisher Library to look for books they need for research. And a medical student commented about the state of the biomedical library, “There is nothing left in the library”. Quite worrying news!
(via LISNews)

Technorati Tags: academic libraries, book clubs, public libraries, book swapping, reading