The following link is to a very nicely done explanation of Creative Commons licensing. What is that? This is an important tool for higher education because it allows academics and others to control the copyright of their own works. Most importantly, it can allow the author/creator of a work to specifically allow certain kinds of use without the need to obtain permission. ELI7023.pdf (application/pdf Object)

While you’re at the site http://www.educause.edu/7ThingsYouShouldKnowAboutSeries/7495, check out some of the other “Seven Things You Should Know About”. This is a great series from EDUCAUSE to help you keep up with the latest technology.

Speaking of keeping up with the latest, I found this link on Steven Bell’s The Kept-Up Academic Librarian. I highly recommend it!

Here’s a new white paper published by Educause that is right on the money in describing students’ habits and attitudes and the need for information literacy. I haven’t had time to read the entire paper yet, but just the quote below looks highly promising. Thanks Diana Oblinger! Sorry you couldn’t make it to our CALC Summit in May!

EDUCAUSE Quarterly | Volume 30 Number 1 2007
Constantly connected to information and each other, students don’t just consume information. They create—and re-create—it. With a do-it-yourself, open source approach to material, students often take existing material, add their own touches, and republish it. Bypassing traditional authority channels, self-publishing—in print, image, video, or audio—is common. Access and exchange of information is nearly instantaneous.

Every academic library dean or director has heard, at least once, the comment that the academic library has become obsolete. This is disheartening to hear and leaves one scrambling for an answer that doesn’t sound a bit desperate. This article in the latest EDUCAUSE Review takes an interesting approach by using an imaginary scenario to explore the ramifications of closing the academic library. One of the most important statements the author, Lynn Cochrane, makes is to predict that, in the future, academic libraries will split their time 50/50 between acquiring, managing, and providing access to published information and collecting, managing, and “publishing” locally produced information. She says, “Over the next decade (probably less), library leaders need to help those of us in academic libraries to reduce our focus on the publisher-driven model (role 1) and increase our attention and resources to the user-driven model (role 2). Then we can do what we’ve always done best: bring order out of the information chaos swirling around us. ” Click the link below to read the complete essay, which is eyeopening!

EDUCAUSE REVIEW | January/February 2007, Volume 42, Number 1
Let’s imagine August 2010 at Excellent College (EC), a liberal arts institution of 2,000 undergraduates and 200 faculty. The college has decided to stop funding its library. Instead, it will give students a tuition rebate and give faculty a stipend representing their share of the annual amount that would previously have gone to support the library’s collections, facilities, and staff—about $2.7 million total. Each student and faculty member will get $1,230. For now, the library building and hard-copy collections will remain in place, student assistants will keep the doors open, and custodians will clean the facility; but database subscriptions will be discontinued, and no other services will be provided. Since the college has a robust honor code, circulation of materials will be on the honor system. Students and faculty will now be on their own to secure the information resources they need to fulfill their responsibilities.