From a Lengthy iTnews Article When flood waters threatened to breach the banks of the Brisbane River last Wednesday, the State Library of Queensland looked to be one of its first casualties. Fortunately for the library and Queensland's bookworms, management had a well-developed disaster recovery plan that went beyond simple data backup and that included all the minutiae of surviving catastrophe so that librarians didn't have to make it up as they went along. As the water started flowing into the basement levels, the library's client services director Rory McLeod and staff swung into action. [Clip] McLeod, who was also evacuated...

Martin Fenner on the always interesting Gobbledygook blog (part of the Public Library of Science Blogs Network) provides a look at the "Beyond the PDF...is ePub" workshop that took place last week in San Diego. Fenner's post also includes a link to his presentation at the workshop, "Blogging Beyond the PDF or Copy by Reference." From the Blog Post: The limitations of the PDF format were just one topic, the main themes were annotation, data, provenance, new models, writing and reviewing and impac ePub should become the standard document format for authoring, distributing and reading scholarly content. [Clip] The ePub...

Some great images of the digitization process are available and will continue to be available on this blog. Worth a look From a University of Manchester/John Rylands Library Announcement: Technology is to enable scholars for the first time to study a complete manuscript of one of the world’s most important and largest Korans. The book's ornate 88 x 60 x 18 cm pages - the size of a large plasma television - are kept at The University of Manchester’s John Rylands Library. Experts at the John Rylands Library are using digital technology and the internet to...

From an Article in the Toronto Star by Michael Geist: In the absence of national leadership, a loosely connected coalition of local and provincial digitization initiatives have begun to take shape. The LAC [Library and Archives Canada] may not be prepared to lead on a national digital library, but it is beefing up its digital collection. For example, by the end of the year, Canadians will be able to access digitized images of original census documents from 1861 and 1871, which contain the name, age, country or province of birth,...

Primary Research Group has just released a new report titled, "The Survey of Library Database Licensing Practices." The complete report is a fee-based document but Primary Research has made some highlights available at no charge. The 115-page report looks closely at how 70 academic, special and public libraries in the United States, the UK, continental Europe, Canada, and Australia plan their database licensing practices. The report also covers the impact of digital repositories and open access publishing on database licensing. Among the many issues covered: database licensing volume, use of consortiums, consortium...

From Europeana: The plan sets out a clear vision for the further development of Europeana. It focuses on four strategic tracks - aggregate, facilitate, distribute and engage - that will enable us to generate real value for our stakeholders. In the light of the release this week of The New Renaissance, the Comité des Sages’ report on digital cultural heritage to the Commission, this is an opportune moment to look at Europeana’s future direction. Download the full colour version or the black and white print version of the Strategic Plan 2011-2015. From the...

The John F. Kennedy Presidential Digital Archive debut on the web for the first time this Thursday (January 13, 2011). Thursday also marks the 50th anniversary of JFK's inauguration. A news conference to formally announce the launch will take place at the National Archives in Washington DC and include remarks from the Archivisit of the United States, David Ferrerio and Caroline Kennedy, President of the John F. Kennedy Foundation. What Will the Digital Archive Contain? The Digital Archive is an on-line archive of high interest materials from President John F. Kennedy’s official and personal records. It...

The 2010 Year in Review from the HathiTust has been released and is available online. It was quite an eventful yearl The report includes both events from 2010 as well as a look at a few new tools/features to be on the lookout for in 2011 and beyond. Full Text Report (HTML) Full Text Report (PDF; 4 Pages) Here are a few highlights from the 2010 year in review. Contributions HathiTrust partners contributed 2.6 million volumes to the repository in 2010, raising the total number of volumes to more than 7.8 million. Nearly 2 million volumes...

+ "Taiwan Libraries to Offer 11,000 Titles for E-readers" (via PC World) + Google Books: "Hachette Google agreement to last five years" (via The Bookseller) + "Amazon.com Formally Releases App For Windows Phone 7" (via Amazon.com) + "FBReader Has Encyclopedic Knowledge of E-Book Formats" (via TechNewsWorld) + "Ebooks top print books in USA Today list" (via TeleRead) + UK: Print: "Book sales in 2010 fall by more than 3% (via The Bookseller) Via Resource Shelf...

+ FollettShelf Offers a One-Stop Ebook Library (via Library Journal) Follett Library Resources has launched FollettShelf a virtual bookshelf that houses more than 95,000 ebooks from over 450 publishers-all in one place. + A New NOOK kids for iPad Application, 100 New Interactive Books Now Available Barnes & Noble [has] announced it is extending its popular digital children’s reading experience to iPad owners with the introduction of the NOOK kids for iPad application, available for free at www.NOOKkids.com/ipad and www.itunes.com/appstore. The new application makes the company’s expansive digital catalog of children’s content – including 100 new...

A quick reminder that a public database from ProjectNORMAN, (we first mentioned it the other day) allowing users to browse (or keyword search) a approx. 4400 paintings and other materials about the legenday American illustrator Norman Rockwell (and other American illustrators), is now live online. The project comes by way of the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA. Much more about the project here (Worth reading). You can also go direct to the database interface here. Numbers + Norman Rockwell's catalogue raisonné, including approximately 4,400 of the artist’s known drawings ...

A Commentary by Steve Haber, President of Sony’s Digital Reading Business (via The Huffington Post): Regardless of its exact nature, technology will play an increasing role in shaping our future libraries. For centuries, the book publishing industry has worked closely with and supported libraries, and they have done so without influencing the freedom of the institution. It is now time for the technology industry to step up and play a similar role. [Clip] At Sony, we believe there is a place for public/private partnerships. That's why we're so excited to be working closely with libraries and librarians across the country as part of...