Another unsurprise at ALA was that the ALA Allied Professional Association (ALA-APA) was still losing money, and the ALA ponied up another $25,000 in loans. Given that the ALA-APA was designed to do what some people think ALA should do - advocate for improved librarian salaries and conditions and such - I'm not sure what to make of the fact that it can't support itself. I guess that makes the ALA-APA like a lot of the un- or underemployed librarians it should be helping. Part of the problem could be the silliness long emanating from the ALA-APA. A few years ago they were releasing salary "talking points" comparing librarians to systems analysts or saying librarians can't live on love alone. Or maybe it was that librarians couldn't live on the love of systems analysts alone. Anyway, it was something like that. I remember another of their strategies was to raise librarian salaries by taking advantage of living wage movements. If professional librarians anywhere are fully ...
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Perhaps the only good thing about bad economies is that they force people to set priorities and focus on what's truly important. Actually, maybe there are no good things, but I'm going to pretend it's good. The past year has been brutal for many libraries and librarians around the country. Layoffs, furloughs, closures abound. In good times it's easy to tolerate some of the fluff that passes for library discourse, but I'm seeing less fluff now, and that's a good thing. Sure, American Libraries announced a new blog that promises we will "be able to find the very edge of new technologies," as if we all need to waste more time on the latest everything just to say we've done it. And yes, there are librarian bloggers who spend a lot of time analyzing their own use of Twitter and think they're writing something worth reading. However, even the ALA, ever a source for library fluff, is changing. After years of hype and puffery, they're acknowledging that if libraries don't start ...
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“All information resources that are provided directly or indirectly by the library, regardless of technology, format, or methods of delivery, should be readily, equally, and equitably accessible to all library users.” --ALA Core Values A lot of librarians are very sensitive, as anyone who reads the sad. smug rantings of AL haters is no doubt aware, but it only becomes a problem for the profession when we take our sensitive little feelings and apply them to the library. Some librarians are fond of saying that a library that doesn’t have something to offend everyone isn’t doing it’s job, and the ALA OIF champions all sorts of provocative books that offend the delicate sensibilities of good country folk all over the country. For some other librarians, it seems to be one thing when you offend the community sensibilities of powerless fundamentalists and quite another when you offend the sensibilities of “indigenous peoples.” Given all that, you ...
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If you didn't make it to the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Boston, don't worry about it. You haven't missed much so far. Midwinter, for those not in the know, is not a conference. It's a meeting. So for those people who keep referring to it as a conference, just stop now. ALA doesn't like it when you talk that way, and you wouldn't want to annoy the ALA, now would you? It should be called Midwinter Meetings, because there are about 40,000 meetings at the conference (it's okay, ALA doesn't frighten me), approximately 10 for everyone involved. At these meetings, we sit around and do important library organization things, like drink coffee, complain about how broke our libraries are, make dinner plans, figure out which book or person should win which unimpressive prize, and wonder if we shouldn't be doing this virtually, Speaking of unimpressive prizes, the "meeting" opened with a raffle on the exhibit floor Friday evening, with vendors giving away various prizes. I really wanted ...
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Busily preparing for ALA, I find once again little old me is the subject of more bibliotek-blogland discussion. Yawn. Despite having a name - Annoyed Librarian - supposedly I'm "anonymous." Whenever someone likes the things I make fun of, but can't actually defend those things, I can count on them to trot out the "anonymous" complaint. It's even funnier when they don't like the things I make fun of. I think my favorite was when the oneohonions released that silly video. About the best the bouncy library cheerleaders could say about that was, "Oh, aren't they enthusiastic." Yet I'm somehow the villain for pointing out the ridiculousness of considering Hulu a basic library skill. Oh well, those who can't talk about ideas are reduced to talking about personalities. The annoying thing for them is I don't have a personality, and the only person with whom I can commiserate is my majordomo Chip. He doesn't have a personality, either. Speaking of ALA, it ...
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Last week the Wall Street Journal released a list of the 200 best and worst jobs for 2009, and Librarian made the list...in both categories! No, I'm kidding. There were no categories. It was a ranking, and Librarian ranked 46th. I didn't think it would get so high. The ranking was "based on five criteria -- environment, income, employment outlook, physical demands and stress," so I guess there's some combination in there that makes Librarian better than Forklift Operator (67) and Optician (88). Actually, in those cases, it was probably the income, which is lower for opticians than for Librarians. Opticians don't make much more money than Forklift Operators, which I didn't know. In fact, I don't think I know any opticians or forklift operators, but I don't know a lot of people. The pay was surprising on some. Librarians apparently make about the same as Hotel Managers (75), though managing a hotel seems like a lot more work to be than being a librarian. Teachers (116) are ...
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