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Beyond the Bullet Points: Sherlock Holmes

Here’s another joke I wrote for my presentation in Charleston. Enjoy the joke, or watch the Charleston screencast to find out what it says about language use in libraries:

Sherlock Holmes is called in to investigate a murder. After examining the scene Holmes announces that the killer was a librarian.

“How can you tell?” asks Dr Watson.

“Elementary my dear Watson. First the murderer not only alphabetized the victims books, but shelved them by genre.

“There is the fact that the murder itself was clearly inspired by a rare Victor Hugo novel recently acquired by the branch library down the street.

“However the real give away is that after the victim was killed the murderer dragged his body over to the toilet and wrote on the body ‘can you find the bathroom now?! can you find the bathroom now?!”

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Change to Presentation Postings

Just a quick note on a minor format change for my presentations. For a while now I have been posting streaming screencasts of my presentations in addition to slides and audio. I have been posting them as separate files because they take a bit of time to upload and process (meaning the audio and slides are ready earlier). I’ve decided to post them all together, simply adding the embedded screencast to the presentation post once it is done.

Not a big deal, and hopefully easier, just wanted to let you know. I’ve gone back and made the format changes to previous presentation as well. Hopefully it will make it easier to find everything.

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New Librarianship

“New Librarianship” Keynote Charleston Conference 2009, Charleston, SC.

Abstract: The best days of librarianship are ahead of us. However, to get there the field must step back, refocus, and reexamine our core principles. We as a profession have become so focused on the trees of standards and process that we are now at risk from missing the larger forest of opportunities. This talk will present a view of a new librarianship, one focused on knowledge and action instead of artifacts and collection. The presentation will look beyond the trends of today’s technologies to a durable new librarianship that focuses on innovation, leadership, and service.
Slides: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/Presentations/2009/Charleston.pdf
Audio: https://davidlankes.org/rdlankes/pod/2009/charleston09.mp3

Screencast:

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Beyond the Bullet Points: Job Security

The director of the university library called together her staff. “I’m afraid I have bad news. Tuition revenue is down, fewer parents are sending their kids to our university, and there will have to be budget cuts.”

A few hours later the director decided to walk the building and get a sense of moral among her staff. In rare books area she saw a group of librarians busily scanning books. “What are you scanning all of those books?” the director asked.

“We’re trying to increase the digital collection of the library so we can put a lot of great content on the website and make it more appealing to potential students.”

The director went to the acquisition area and saw the librarians surfing Amazon. “What are you doing?” asked the director.

“We are looking to see if we can save money by buying directly from online retailers.”

Finally the director went to the first floor where se saw the reference librarians pulling books off the shelf, tearing off the covers, and then randomly replacing them.

“WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT?” cried the director.

“Job security”

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Longshots #191: The Power of Participatory Librarianship

Here is a podcast I did with Sarah Long. Check it out. She also has a bunch of other great podcasts to check out as well:

Sarah talks with Dr. R. David Lankes, Associate Professor and Director of the Information Institute of Syracuse School of Information Studies at Syracuse University about the concept of participatory librarianship. They also discuss the mission of a librarian, learning as conversation, and the four major ways of facilitating knowledge and information.

http://www.librarybeat.org/longshots/play/191