UT, Google to Put University’s Books Online Annotated(1)
- Quote: More than 1 million volumes from the libraries of the University of Texas will be made available on the Internet under an agreement between the university and Google Inc., officials announced Friday. The initiative is part of a project by the search engine giant, based in Mountain View, Calif., to put books from major libraries on its Web site. The New York Public Library, the University of California, the University of Michigan, Harvard University, Stanford University and Oxford University are among the participants. UT is the 11th library to partner with Google.
Note: Some themed link blogging today. Save some type of injunction regarding the legality of this, books will become digitized. Personally, I think having the access to all of this information is a powerful development, one that we have to teach our students to use ethically and wisely.
– post by willrich
Witness to the Decline of Books
- Quote: The buzzword in the trade is “information literacy,” a misnomer, because what it is really about is mastering computer skills, not promoting a love of reading and books. These days, librarians measure the quality of returns in data-mining stints. We teach students how to maximize a database search, about successful retrieval rates. What usually gets lost in the scramble is a careful reading of the material. Students are still checking out the standard research fare — the Thomas Jefferson biography, the volume of literary criticism on Jane Austen — but few read it. The library checks the books back in a day later, after the students have extracted the information vitals — usually an excerpt or two to satisfy the requirement that a certain number of works be cited in their papers. –Thomas Washington
Note: More angst about reading and books…
– post by willrich
Could This Be the Final Chapter in the Life of the Book?
- Quote: No, it is the teachers who will have the final say. They will determine whether people will read for information, knowledge or, ultimately, wisdom. If they fail and their pupils read only for information, then we are in deep trouble. For the net doesn’t educate and the mind must be primed to deal with its informational deluge. On that priming depends the future of civilisation. How we handle the digitising of the libraries will determine who we are to become. –Bryan Appleyard
Note: So judging by some of the quotes of late, this is getting pretty serious. Apocalyptic, maybe. But again, books, ultimately, are words and ideas, not paper and bindings. Just because something is in digital form doesn’t make it any less a book, does it? Sure the form factor is different, and maybe the experience feels different to those of us who have grown up with paper and bindings. But I have to tell you, I love lying in bed at night reading on my Tablet PC, scrolling pages, marking up the text. IIf I could get more books in digital form, I would read more of them on my computer. Again, I think the jury is out as to whether this direction is good or bad…it’s just different. Will applying our cultural biases on our kids serve them most effectively in the future?
– post by willrich
I know that one of the Web 2.0 technologies is Podcasts. I downloaded and listened to “Globally Literate” by Clarence Fisher from the k12 Online Conference. He had some wonderful ideas about what it means to be literate in our present 2.0 society.I highly recommend that podcast.”Literacy is in a constant state of change.” “Texts have changed over time.”
Are we just going through another kind of change?
I must admit that I am more visual than I thought, because I had difficulties listening without taking notes or having visual clues(the video was much easier for me.)I wonder if our students, being brought up with Podcasts, e-books and other Web 2.0 technologies will have the same difficulties.
I love the feel of a book in my hand.
You should listen to the latest issue of the Boing Boing Boing Podcast. Two of the editors of boing boing talk about the role of electronic books in their professional lives.
Last time I looked, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Borders appear to be doing just fine. Have you ever tried to read a book on Google. Sorry, we are still tactile beings. Something about the feel of a book in my hands is part of the experience of reading.
Could it be that the classroom assignments requiring “research” are so mind-numbingly boring that students are forced to take the shortest path to a citation?