The March 15 issue of Library Journal is out, and it includes the Movers & Shakers 2003 supplement. I'm honored to say that I received a most fine write-up and am listed as a "Teacher." I like that because both of my parents are educators, so I feel like I'm holding up the family tradition.

In addition, lots of other shifted librarians are highlighted, including Carrie Bickner, Andrew Mutch, and Charles W. Bailey, as well as Carol Gulyas, with whom I have the good fortune to be working on the Illinois reference portal! Congratulations to everyone listed and thanks LJ!

Thanks to a company called Enviro Solutions, SLS is now recycling all used inkjet and laser printer cartridges, including any that staff want to bring in from home.

"We provide you with free, postage paid, collection and shipping materials along with complete instructions. You simply choose the method, or combination of methods, that works best for you, and get paid for your efforts. Millions of new cartridges are sold each year, 86% end up in our landfills as trash. Start recycling today for a better tomorrow!

We will recycle all ink jet and laser cartridges sent to us and pay you for those that qualify for cash back ( please see the programs pages for a list of qualifying cartridges). These are no risk, no cost programs with no 'minimum' commitment required from you. We provide free collection materials. The programs are simple, easy, problem free, and self sustaining with little or no supervision. We ship anywhere in the United States and Canada."

Very cool, since we haven't become a paperless office yet.  ;-)   You may want to consider doing this at your library, too.

Last year I said I thought Salon should look into licensing content to libraries, and now they're finally doing something about it. Adrienne Crew, their Content Licensing Manager, sent me the following:

"Thought you'd like to know that Salon's Premium Institutional Subscription program for libraries is finally up and running.... Currently we are offering a one year subscription in the $300-400 range and feeds all access to the articles on the site via an IP authentication system or a single password."

More details as I get them.

Every Wireless Internet Convert Has a Wi-Fi Moment

"Every wireless Internet convert has a Wi-Fi moment -- the instant when the person realizes that computing as it has previously existed is over. Think of it like Napster. In 2000, the rogue file-sharing service woke up tens of millions of music lovers to the fact that they had an alternative to paying $18 for a CD. Today, ultrafast wireless Internet connections are proving to millions that even with their pricey laptops, they were never really mobile -- until now.
Across the world, thousands of people each month are having their own Wi-Fi moment. The growing ranks of New York City's unemployed are discovering that, with a $50 network card, it's as easy to zap an e-mail and résumé from wireless access points -- known as hot spots -- at Bryant Park or Starbucks as it is from their bedrooms. Former Napster aficionados are wirelessly linking their PCs to their stereos to better enjoy their MP3 collections....

'Wi-Fi is a combination of high-speed Internet access and cell phones,' says Mark Laver, a senior analyst at Ipsos-Reid. 'It's an adaptation of other technologies we already know and love.' That makes Wi-Fi akin to two of the fastest-growing technologies in recent memory: Cell phones, which offered portability, and DVD players, which proved superior to VCRs thanks to clearer images and lots of extras.

In the past decade, 137 million Americans have purchased a cell phone, and more than 35 million now have a DVD player, up from hardly any just three years ago. Compare that to digital video recorders such as TiVO (TIVO ) -- a truly revolutionary technology that lets users pause live TV programming. Yet TiVO has signed up just 510,000 subscribers in five years." [CYBERFROST.net]

So if we're going to compare apples and oranges, maybe the orange should be DVDs instead of ebooks.

And that "WiFi moment," that's so true! It's like when you an "internet moment" a few years ago. When will you have yours? Our kids (ages 7 and 9) have already had theirs.

Art Rhyno is doing a great job of trying to extend Jon Udell's LibraryLookup Bookmarklet, and he's pursuing some very interesting ideas. He can explain his Bookmarklet Helper far better than I can, but he's now working on an app using Cocoon to create a proof-of-concept for the Leddy Library.

His plan is to first pass an ISBN or ISSN as a query against the library's catalog. Anything that is not found is queried against a Z39.50 target that he specifies (perhaps for a nearby library). It then searches Google for anything it didn't find. Art is also exploring ways to hook into an ISBN mapping service in order to search for all editions of a particular title. One possibility would be to use Amazon for this purpose but they probably wouldn't be too thrilled about that, which is why we really need a library-initiated service. WorldCat, anyone? Or do we need to create our own CDDB for books? (One that stays non-profit.)

It became apparent to me how much we need to implement this ourselves (rather than waiting for a vendor) when I spoke to an Innovative Interfaces rep at last week's conference. She hadn't even heard of LibraryLookup, and she didn't understand its potential at all. In fact, she tried to tell me they have a product that already does this, until I pointed out to her the differences that made LibraryLookup a complementary service.

Even then, she didn't grasp how helpful it would be to Innovative libraries, nor how Innovative could help by promoting it (let alone by helping create a full search toolbar). She said she'd take the info back to her office, so I'm waiting to see if I hear back from them. This is an opportunity for III to help its customers in new and interesting ways while promoting why their more open catalog is a Martha-Stewart-good-thing. I hope they realize this and run with it.

If they don't, though, we're lucky we've got people like Art. Actually, either way we're lucky to have people like Art, and I look forward to watching his progress with this!

Here's a little tip for Internet Explorer users if you're tired of Gator and its attempts to install itself on your PC.

"Hopefully by now you have removed that password manager/form filler Gator since it's gotten a bad reputation as spyware.  As an added precaution to keep the software from installing unwanted files on your system, also consider adding Gator to your list of restricted sites.  To do this, click on Tools, Internet Options, Security tab, and the Restricted Sites icon. Click on Sites and type '.gator.com' without the quotes into the 'Add this Web Site to the zone', then click on Add and OK." [Neat Net Tricks, 3/15/2003]

AskUsNow is a new 24/7 online reference service for Maryland residents. [via LibraryPlanet.com]

"It uses the expertise of librarians to provide answers to questions, research guidance, and help navigating the Internet. Expand your resources, connect with an information expert!"

I love their tag line: "Get answers from a librarian, not a machine."

As I start to ponder my next cell phone, it will most certainly include texting ability and better web browsing. I can't wait to take advantage of this kind of service. It seems like we always have important reference questions when we're driving down to Springfield, and this type of service would provide us with those oh-so-essential answers.

Illinois will be implementing something similar later this year!

Side note: The term "virtual reference" is often used in this context, but I'm working to stop using it myself. As Andrew Pace points out, "there's nothing virtual about online reference. It's real librarians answering questions from real people."