- 8 Great Libraries for Your Zoom Background If you’ve been looking for a new background for your Zoom meetings, Library Journal’s Meredith Schwartz suggests these “eight photos of light, bright, and beautiful libraries to ensure that next time you go on camera, the library’s behind you all the way.” And it appears that all eight images are licensed for reuse so there are no copyright worries.
- Surprise Ending for Publishers: In 2020, Business Was Good This is an upbeat end of the year post by the NY Times’ Elizabeth A. Harris. In assessing the end of 2020 for the publishing industry. Ms. Harris notes that “With so many people stuck at home and activities from concerts to movies off limits, people have been reading a lot — or at least buying a lot of books.” She points out that “print sales by units are up almost 8 percent so far this year, according to NPD BookScan.” Ms. Harris also notes that “E-books and audiobooks, which make up a smaller portion of the market, are up as well…”
- Open access takes flight is written Jeffrey Brainard and appears in Science. Mr. Brainard starts his essay by acknowledging the debate and controversy surrounding Plan S and other open-access measures. Then he offers thoughtful guidance including both the pros and cons for authors “readying to plunge in” to open access publishing. It’s a worthwhile read for anyone thinking seriously about publishing their work open access.
- Library’s Web Archiving: COVID-19 Challenges This is a guest post by Joe Puccio, a collection development officer in the Collection Development Office at the Library of Congress. In it Mr. Puccio outlines the numerous difficulties and challenges encountered by the Library in its efforts to collect relevant and useful web material focused on the COVID-19 pandemic. (Mr. Puccio will be guest editing a future issue of Against the Grain on the topic of web archiving.)
- Choice publishes white paper exploring the changes ebooks have brought to collection development in academic libraries. In case you missed it, according to this post “Choice has announced the publication of the seventh in a series of white papers designed to provide actionable intelligence around topics of importance to the academic library community. The paper, “Ebook Collection Development in Academic Libraries: Examining Preference, Management and Purchasing Patterns,” aims to provide libraries with practical information and ideas for refining their strategies and adjusting expectations when integrating ebooks into their acquisitions workflow…”
Tom is originally from Brooklyn N.Y but has spent his entire professional career in South Carolina, most recently as Head of Reference Services at the College of Charleston. As part of the Against the Grain and Charleston Conference team, he serves as the associate editor of the print ATG as well as the co-editor of the webpage. Tom’s conference duties include coordinating the Penthouse Suite interviews as well as the conference poster sessions.
He received his MLS from the University of Buffalo, SUNY and a second master’s in public administration from the College of Charleston and the Univ. of South Carolina. His wife Carol and he live in downtown Charleston and she is an artist and a tour guide offering historic walking tours of the city.
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