Scott Rosenberg’s Links & Comment
Thank you Scott Rosenberg for letting us know that COPA (The Child Online Protection Act) is back to threaten us again. The Justice Department is appealing the ruling that struck it down. It will be argued before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, March 2nd. Scott will be attending the argument and the press conference afterwards, so tune in to his blog that day for more info.

Portal to Asian Internet Resources (PAIR)
Collection of more than 6,000 cataloged and annotated online resources on Asia with an emphasis on humanities and social science. The resources are professionally selected by scholars and subject specialists.

Crochet Pattern Central
Crochet instructions and tutorials, plus a directory of links to free patterns.

Antietam on the Web
Information on this battle with battle maps, information on participants, official reports, articles, and exhibits.

Information Outlook: Libraries Need Relationship Marketing
I love finding articles that change the way I see things. There were a couple of eye-openers in this article for me. One of the most basic was that marketing is more than promotion. Another was that we need to market not just what we offer now, but what we could offer with more support. This is definitely one that I will print out for and discuss with my Board.

I have been forced to turn off comments on this blog due to the large number of spam that are being entered. I have always thought that comments are one of the best parts of a blog and have enjoyed all of the legitimate comments made here. I hope that when the new version of MovableType comes out that I will be able to open comments up again.

Yahoo! Birth of a New Machine
SearchEngineWatch writes that Yahoo rolled out their new search engine yesterday. This is the engine that they hope to use to dethrone Google from the top search engine position. Time to go try it out!

AlterNet: Personal Voices: A Hysterical Librarian
A must read! Get excited about librarianship all over again as you read this article. Kim Antieau’s reasons for excitement are the same as mine: “the subversive nature of public libraries.”
I also appreciate her pointing out that in the Library Bill of Rights says that “”libraries should cooperate with all persons and groups concerned with resisting abridgment of free expression and free access to ideas.” This is something we need to trumpet to those librarians who would say that we need to work along with the Patriot Act and not make too many waves because we could become a target. I have sat through several meetings in the last year where the “expert” said exactly that. Where is the subversive nature, the guts, the honor in that? Librarianship may look like a slow, quiet job from those looking in, but if you do it right it can be one of the most fulfilling and exciting jobs out there. It’s sad that many librarians just don’t feel that excitement.
Via Library Link of the Day.

Wisconsin Vote
Coverage of the upcoming Wisconsin Democratic Primary on February 17th. The site is provided by Wisconsin Public Television, University of Wisconsin Extension, and Wisconsin Public Radio. It offers information on the candidates, TV and radio coverage, newsstand, voter registration, and educational materials

Censor ‘Scooby-Doo’? Words fail
The U.S. Department of Education has declared 200 TV shows not worthy of closed captioning. This has all been done with no public input.
“The Department of Education is refusing to reveal the names of the panel members whose opinions determined the caption grants and also won’t disclose the new guidelines. By every appearance, the government has changed its definition of what constitutes a caption-worthy program. But it’s keeping the new rules secret.
“They apparently used a panel of five individuals and then made the censorship decisions based on the individuals’ recommendations,” Mr. Brick says. “We have found the identity of one of the panelists. This individual tells us that he never knew he was on such a panel and that his views would be used for censorship. No panel was convened. The five panelists were contacted individually and separately.”"
Now I agree that Scooby Doo and some of the other shows mentioned in the article lacks educational value, but it is still censorship to deny it to people hard of hearing. I also detest the fact that all of this was done in secret so that no one could react to it until it was too late.