Librarians are on the front line of today's struggles with privacy and intellectual property. Technology, politics and social issues intersect at the library. An advocate of privacy rights, active in legislative issues related to copyright, net neutrality and censorship, Cory Doctorow is a science-fiction novelist, technology activist, Guardian columnist and co-editor of the Boing Boing blog. He was formerly director of European affairs for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. His novels are published by Tor Books and simultaneously released on the internet under Creative Commons licenses. His views on the important role librarians play in assuring access to information remains unfettered and will inspire and charm you.

Following on from Cory Doctorow’s remarks, this session will explore further the ramifications of copyright restrictions, intellectual property protection, and freely available information access, recognising that the legal position differs from country to country

From bookless libraries and peer loans to proactive social media support, from SEO of research repository content and mining library web analytics to invisible authentication on third-party servers, Hirst believes ‘Library Inside’ services can give the academic library an invisible but essential presence across a university. In corporate settings, reduced space means a radical rethink of what resources to provide and how to provide them. Richardson considers how a virtual corporate information service can stay connected with users and improve the use of information.

A pilot study of usefulness, as opposed to usability, in a digital health service library’s clinical decision portal moves the  discussion of usability beyond the user interface to the practical considerations of supporting decision making at the point of care. Buchanan and McMenemy share their evaluation framework. Data mining of user behaviour is another new area for libraries. Pattern suggests using circulation data to generate recommendations and analysing OPAC keyword searches to
create suggestions for search refinement. Huddersfield has released aggregated book usage data and challenges other libraries to do the same.

This session begins with a description of subject-specific Web 2.0 portals for academic and National Health Service researchers  and moves to discussion of the pitfalls encountered and lessons learnt in choosing a portal hosting service. Hosted on iGoogle, Pageflakes and Netvibes, the portals bring together news, journal content, funding opportunities, events and tailored searches. Creating a central library portal for Hungary presents its own set of challenges as its developers worwork with 2.0 technologies to make library resources available.

Having fabulous content is one thing, but getting people to access library services is another. Dublin’s library portal uses a web-based start page service, which recently changed platforms. This portal now serves as the entry page on all public access, internet-enabled PCs in its 21 branch system and provides a single point of entry.  A web-based specialist library for health and well-being information for the GLBTI community in Australia moved from a static site to one that is ‘future proofed’.

Maximising usage of electronic subscriptions and controlling spend are related. In difficult economic times, building a convincing business case is essential. Pharmaceutical companies rely heavily on reprints of medical journal articles, but ordering these is often fragmented. AstraZeneca’s online ordering and consolidation tool not only saves money but also guards against copyright breaches.

The British Library’s Business and IP Centre is an example of how adding workshops, networking events, advice clinics and specialist partners proved its value and demonstrated its innovation. O’Hare sees the role of the information professional as evolving from gatekeeper to bespoke knowledge tailor. Houghton worries about bad information. Dangerous ideas that get seeded in the public consciousness and expose them to bad information can actually have value from an advertising agency’s perspective. Learn how he uses Web 2.0 tools to achieve consumer insights.

Next-generation catalogues provide an opportunity to do more with the resources and information libraries provide, but there is a need for innovation at the data level to make the most of the potential of new discovery interfaces. Linked Data, associated with the semantic web, is one way to open up data. Another is to create mashups using metadata for the library catalogue.

Thinking of search as platform, the State & University Library in Aarhus is developing an open source search system called Summa, which incorporates relevance ranking, faceted result sets, single search box, Google-like syntax and an interface between search and the underlying library system.

Open standards should provide application and platform independence, interoperability and universal access. If this sounds too good to be true, maybe it is. Standards can be like sausages—tasty, but you may not care to explore too deeply how they are made. Based on 10 years of experience, Brian Kelly will provide examples of failed open standards, explore some of the reasons for such failures and describe approaches that can help organisations identify successful open standards.

At the James Lind Library in Edinburgh, old books are finding niche readerships now that the library’s historic collection, which illustrates the evolution of fair tests of treatments from 1550 BCE to the present, has an online presence that includes text and images. The eBooks on Demand (EOD) network is a digitisation on demand service, soon to be print on demand, for library users. The network, established in 2008, consists of 18 libraries from 19 European countries. What are the core competencies for a digital curator and how can we build synergy across archives, libraries and museums?

Author of three books about Google, the most recent being The Digital Gutenberg, Steve Arnold turns his attention to Google Books and considers the ramifications of its massive digitisation project and legal settlement with authors. Books, he thinks, are in the process of change. Perhaps because books are cultural totems, Google’s scanning project captures headlines. Looked upon as a type of virtual library initiative, how does Google Books compare with Europeana and the World Digital Library. What about the possibility of federating these three catalogues?

Student views of the library vary greatly depending on their understanding of the concept of information literacy and their ICT skills. In both Norway and the UK, librarians have conducted surveys and course evaluations for several years. In this session, they will share what they have learned from the students and what changes they have made in their teaching and library services.

Web 2.0 technologies and personal learning environments influence how and when students learn. At the University of Leicester, librarians worked within the context of a medical ethics and law course to enhance information literacy and student learning, build relationships and add value to external tools such as Google Scholar. In Singapore, young people have quickly adopted new media and Web 2.0 applications, leading to a chasm between ‘netgeners’ and baby boomers. The National Library developed four core courses in new media literacy that can be adapted to other settings, such as when young people enter university.

Students arriving at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology do so wholly unprepared to face the rigours of university level education. Many have never used a computer and are unfamiliar with the internet, making information professionals wonder how much information literacy engineers need. It is satisfying to help them ease into the life of academic discourse, but it’s not all success stories. Call it Learning 1.0. In contrast, a Learning 2.0 project at Imperial College introduced a 23 Things programme. In the process, librarians learnt much about how to run the programme. Some things worked and some didn’t. In both settings, information professionals learnt from their failures as well as their successes.

All conference delegates and speakers are invited to an Evening Reception from 17.00 – 18.00 on Thursday 15 October in the Sponsor Showcase, hosted by Information Today Ltd.