Electronic Resources IG meeting

I volunteered to blog for ALA Midwinter 2008 LITA Electronic Resources IG meeting Friday night.

The IG meeting on Friday night attracted an impressive group of information professionals, with standing room available only. Zoe Stewart-Marshall, an ERMIG Chair and Clara Ruttenberg, an ERMIG Vice Chair started the meeting with Electronic Resources IG mission statement and goals

http://www.ala.org/ala/lita/litamembership/litaigs/erm/index.cfm

Zoe announced that Vice Chair position, responsible for organizing managed discussions, will be open. Those interested are invited to apply. Also, any suggestions for topics to be covered at
ALA annual are welcomed.

The first presenter, Ted Fons from Innovative Interfaces, Inc gave a brief overview of the Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative (SUSHI) and a positive update that the standard was approved by NISO. He indicated differences between SUSHI and COUNTER. COUNTER is good on how to report the statistics on a smaller scale. SUSHI allows query for usage data through web services and saves time for staff. It took 18-20 months for the idea to be implemented. Last October the standard was finalized and approved for use, it is now standard Z39-93. Project EUCLID, Highwire Press, Gale all implemented SUSHI Server online. As of right now, content providers are at some stage of implementing SUHSI server. Mr. Fons jokingly suggested thanking your content providers for getting on board. There are several SUSHI versions, now we just need one efficient model. Read more about SUSHI: http://www.niso.org/committees/SUSHI/SUSHI_comm.html and http://www.niso.org/standards/resources/Z39-93-2007.pdf

READ MORE HERE

ALA Midwinter 2008: Philadelphia

The 2008 ALA Midwinter meeting was in a beautiful Philadelphia. Since I arrived early on Friday morning, I was able to look around a little bit, before the opening ceremony.

Penn's landing

Benjamin Franklin Bridge

I loved the carriage on this door



Elfreth's Alley

The Betsy Ross house
unfortunately was closed

Christ Church Burial Ground





Amazing Liberty Bell at the Liberty Bell Center

and up close..


Chinatown:

"Science" and JSTOR

This just in from the Chronicle of Higher Education:

The Journal 'Science' Rejoins JSTOR

The influential journal Science has reversed course and rejoined JSTOR, The Chronicle has learned. The journal and the popular online archive of scholarly publications reached an agreement this morning, said a spokesperson for Science. The journal’s decision to withdraw last summer was the subject of much criticism by librarians and others.

Neither Science nor JSTOR would describe the terms of the new license, but Alan I. Leshner, chief executive officer of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which publishes the journal, said the changes had to do with price and with linking of articles within JSTOR to other articles. “We’re very pleased about it,” he said.

Michael P. Spinella, executive director of JSTOR, echoed Mr. Leshner’s cheer. “I think it’s very good for everyone,” he said. —Lila

Rose Parade Floats

We live on the street which gets closed for the Rose Parade floats viewing. It's a pain to get around, especially on the 2-nd of January, but it also gives us an opportunity to pet the horses:

and look at the floats:



Year 2008 is a year of a Brown Earth Rat:


More floats:

And of course I couldn't help but posting this:


more:

Deer

I almost forgot to mention deer, which came down to my in-laws house and looked at us through the window:

It was the most patient deer, letting us to take plenty of pictures!

Trip to Klamath Falls

We went to Klamath Falls, OR for Christmas to see Katrina's grandparents. The 11-hour drive wasn't that bad thanks to dvd player and plenty of lollypops:)


It was nice for a change to wake up and see snow on Christmas morning and then go outside and play snow balls and ride down the hill on the sled.

I think this was the BEST Christmas ever!!!!