Thirty years ago, the only person in a library looking for an electrical outlet was a blue-smocked cleaning person who had to plug in a vacuum cleaner with a very long cord. Now, hordes of patrons outfitted with amp-devouring laptops and cell phones expect and need the library to offer an endless supply of electricity. The overall demand for…

Librarians should think of Yelp (yelp.com) as a kind of giant suggestion box hanging on the wall of the Internet. This web-based review service describes itself as "an online urban city guide that helps people find cool places to eat, shop, drink, relax and play, based on the informed opinions of a vibrant and active community of locals in the…

A hundred years after Marie Curie received her Nobel Prize in Chemistry, this arm of science is pointing the way to a more sustainable future. Growing movements like green chemistry, which strives to create alternative and new chemical reactions that produce no harmful waste products, and molecular engineering hold great potential for industry,…

Jewelry making began exploding as a hobby about ten years ago, largely because the flush economy gave individuals more leisure time and disposable income. Jewelry classes, bead stores, and special events have multiplied like craft shows at Christmas time. While the recent economic downturn has slowed the growth of the hobby, it is still as popular…

People keep writing articles about how valuable libraries are, even with ebooks and the Internet. What people are overlooking is that the reason libraries are having such fits dealing with a changing environment is not that libraries are unrecognized as fountains of value, it's that libraries are so valuable that they attract voracious new…

This article outlines Public Library Association (PLA) 2010 annual conference to be held in Oregon Convention Center, Portland on March 23-27. The days quickly fill up with the picks of over 100 programs as well as valuable "talk tables" and special events. The well-organized schedule, divided into eight broad tracks (e.g., technology,…

Respondents to "Library Journal's" ("LJ") annual book buying survey of public libraries nationwide reported that adult book budgets were down eight percent overall, the largest plunge recorded since the survey began in 1998. What's more, for the first time ever, cuts were reported for every region of the country and every size of population…

Prior to retiring from full-time librarianship to concentrate on readers' advisory (RA) consulting, teaching, and book and media discussions, Ted Balcom, longtime administrator of the Villa Park Public Library (VPPL), Illinois, repeatedly demonstrated a particularly effective approach to shoring up essential library support. Balcom, 1996 winner of…

This summer, sports-crazy South Africa, recently named by the "New York Times" as one of the "31 Places To Go in 2010," will become the first African nation to host the FIFA World Cup. Soccer fans making the trip will be rewarded with world-class facilities, modern infrastructure, and a nation of startling contrasts and…

Midwestern gardeners are legendary for enduring and outwitting winter, with its heavy snowpack and recurring freezes and thaws. Most of them also reckon with a relatively short growing period. All of them find their horticultural plans complicated by hot, humid summers. In fact, the Midwest deals with four seasons dictating special considerations…

This article focuses on resources for building successful stepfamilies and parenting children in stepfamily scenarios. While remarriage after divorce is the basis of most stepfamilies, divorced parenting differs from stepfamily parenting and is covered only peripherally in this article. Worthy stepparenting titles emphasize the singularity of…

Each new school year, academic librarians are given a fresh crop of students and faculty to entice through the doors, both physical and virtual. Librarians create clever marketing that appeals to their students' intelligence. They devise games to highlight services. They foster a sense of ownership, offer exemplary service that makes their users'…

This article features the University of Liverpool's arts and humanities library, which applies a new search tool to improve the user experience. In nearly every way imaginable, the Sydney Jones Library and the Harold Cohen Library--the university's two libraries that serve science, engineering, and medical students--support the lives of their…

In 1790, Congress passed the first act governing naturalization, which provided that any free, white, male or female adult alien who had resided within the limits and jurisdiction of the United States for a period of two years was eligible for citizenship. From this humble beginning the current system of granting naturalized citizenship developed,…

No one likes being two steps behind, and the fastest way to fall off the pace is by not keeping up with major titles and hot authors. Fortunately, there are numerous resources, both prepublication and postpublication, that can help. It is best when readers' advisory (RA) librarians know what is coming out months ahead of time--in order to think…