This report analyzes and synthesizes 12 library user behavior studies conducted in the US and the UK. The studies were reviewed by two researchers who analyzed the findings, compared their analysis, and identified the overlapping and contradictory findings. The Executive Summary lists the following implications for libraries which are shared by multiple studies: - The library serves many constituencies, with different needs and behaviours. - Library systems...

This BusinessWeek article looks at the first 25 years of dot.com and speculates on the next 25 years for the Commercial Web. Another 25 Years of Dot-Com Can anyone pinpoint the birth of the Social Web? I wonder what the first dot.edu was?

This widget that let's readers tell bloggers what they want to read about would be a great addition to library blog: Software tells Bloggers What Readers Want" IBM has created a widget that crowd-sources ideas for blog posts.

"Don't be evil." --Google "Be a force for good." --Twitter "Good is better than evil because it's nicer." --Mammy Yokum A number of states are considering legislation that would allow a company to become a designated “for-benefit corporations” and include non-financial values in its corporate charter. The New Entrepreneur: What A Good Company Looks Like

Do Free E-Books Drive Print Sales? Other Forces Seem More Powerful Than “Free” Kent Anderson blogging on the scholarly kitchen finds problems with a study done at Brigham Young University that supports the idea that free e-books promote the sale of dead tree books. Anderson concludes: Free access to content makes sense in some...

Educating the Many by Shai Reshef in EDUCAUSE Quarterly, Vol.33 no.1 (2010) describes and innovative approach to postsecondary education: University of the People (UoPeople). -In an age of dropping technology costs, unprecedented access to the Internet, and the free exchange of information online, the divides between the haves and the have-nots, including in postsecondary education, can be bridged. -Access to postsecondary edu...

Queens Library invites all our colleagues to experience "Innovation in Libraries: User Experience Design" Tuesday, March 2, 2010, 9:30 am Queens Library at Flushing 41-17 Main Street at Kissena Boulevard Flushing NY Admission is free. RSVPs are essential. Please email: egellman@queenslibrary.org Aaron Schmidt is a worldwide recognized specialist in library technology and usability. He has been a circulation clerk, reference librarian, and library director. Aaron has published articles in School Library Journal, Library High Tech News, Online, and currently writes the LJ colum...

This NY Times article explores the impact of technological change on children. The Children of Cyberspace: Old Fogies by Their 20s “People two, three or four years apart are having completely different experiences with technology,” said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Research Center's Internet and American Life Project. “College students scratch their heads at what their high school siblings are doing, and they scratch their heads at their younger siblings. It has sped up generational difference...

A UCLA neuroligist has been exploring the effect of using the internet and browsing the web on the human brain. iBrain — Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind "As our brain is plastic and remoulds itself in accordance to our daily activities, prolonged computer use can have a profound effect on the way we think, feel and behave," says Professor Gary Small.