New Spring 2009 Hours

Due to University Budget Reductions, There Are New Library Hours For Spring 2009

Regular Library Hours Begin Thursday, January 8, 2009

Regular Spring 2009 Hours:
Monday - Thursday
8:00 a.m. - 10:00 p.m.
Friday
8:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
Saturday
9:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
Sunday
2:00 p.m. - 11:00 p.m.

Latest Pew Report Predicts the Future of the Internet

The Future of the Internet III, the title of the latest Pew Report, surveyed technology stakeholders & critics about the future political, social, & economic impact of the internet. A summary of their finding is below:

• The mobile device will be the primary connection tool
  to the Internet for most people in the world in 2020.
  
• The transparency of people and organizations will
  increase, but that will not necessarily yield more personal
  integrity, social tolerance, or forgiveness.
• Voice recognition and touch user-interfaces with the
  Internet will be more prevalent and accepted by 2020.
• Those working to enforce intellectual property law and
  copyright protection will remain in a continuing “arms race,”
  with the “crackers” who will find ways to copy and share
  content without payment.
• The divisions between personal time and work time and
  between physical and virtual reality will be further erased for
  everyone who’s connected, and the results will be mixed in
  terms of social relations.
• “Next-generation” engineering of the network to
  improve the current Internet architecture is more likely than an
  effort to rebuild the architecture from scratch.

Of specific interest to me was the difficulty ahead in enforcing intellectual property laws and copyright. The report states, "Three out of five respondents (60%) disagreed with the idea that legislatures, courts,the technology industry, and media companies will exercise effective content control by 2020. They said “cracking” technology will stay ahead of technology to control intellectual property (IP) or policy regulating IP. And they predicted that regulators will not be able to come to a global agreement about intellectual property. Many respondents suggested that new economic models will have to be implemented, with an assumption that much that was once classified as paid content will have to be offered free or in exchange for attention or some other unit of value." What will this mean for the academic community and is this an even greater push towards open access?

Click here for the complete report.

Via Stephen's Lighthouse

Best Business Books of 2008

Business Week has listed its ten best business books of 2008 and I am happy to report that most of the titles are either in our library or on order!

The Trillion Dollar Meltdown by Charles R. Morris
[HG4910 .M667 2008]

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business Life by Alice Schroeder
On Order

The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs by Charles D. Ellis
On Order

Hell's Cartel: I.G. Farben and the Making of Hitler's War Machine by Diarmuid Jeffreys

Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely
On Order

The Gridlock Economy: How Too Much Ownership Wrecks Markets, Stops Innovation, and Costs Lives by Michael Heller

The Game-Changer: How You Can Drive Revenue and Profit Growth with Innovation by A.G. Lafley and Ram Charan

Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution - and How It Can Renew America by Thomas L. Friedman
On Order

Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China by Leslie T. Chang
On Order

Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

For the complete article visit BusinessWeek.

What is NAICS?

I was just asked this question at the Reference Desk and thought "What a great opportunity to show off this website!" Ask Dr NAICS created by US Census Bureau gives an overview of NAICS (North American Industry Classification System) including what it is and how it's used. It lists 25 popular questions about NAICS and if your question still isn't answered you can email the Census Bureau.

via Biz Ref Desk

PrintWhatYouLike

Have you ever wished that you could print out an article without all the advertisements and other junk on the pages? On the website PrintWhatYouLike you can! PrintWhatYouLike allows you to cut out the advertisements and also resize text. It's as easy as 1, 2, 3:

How It Works

• Enter the url of a page you wish to print
• Edit the page until it contains only what you want to print
• Print It! Only your modified page will be printed

via infodoodads