Armed Forces Medical Library Closing?
A big thanks to Ian Campbell of The Gov Doc for alerting us to yet another possible federal library closure. He reprints a letter from Patrick Walz of the Armed Forces Medical Library, which I will copy here due to the time factor cited in Patrick's letter:
Hello! I am a Tech Info Specialist at the Army Surgeon General's Armed Forces Medical Library. We are currently in a battle to save our Library which has been an esteemed part of the US Military Medical Corps since 1836. We perform research for the Surgeons General of all the Military Branches, as well as soldiers overseas in Germany, Great Britain, Iraq and Afghanistan. Recently, the Military has been forced to make some budget cuts, and as is usually the case, the "easy target" library has come under the microscope. We were suddenly and inexplicably placed under a highly aggressive "work-group" comprised of Lean Six-Sigma-ready business ninjas. They want to close/move/consolidate or minimize our already scant resources. As is always the case, our customers know the value of the Library. We've already received official letters, memos, testimonials etc... from a wide-range of military historians, commanders, executive officers and researchers, but it seems to be not enough. FY 06 marked the closings of nation-wide EPA Libraries and the Air Force has decided to close all of its Medical Libraries. We're getting a little freaked out. We must prove to the current bureaucracy that after 171 years, we are still an asset to the organization. We have a plan of attack, we're wearing out a copy of MAKING THE CASE FOR YOUR LIBRARY. What we lack is information. That's all this workgroup wants. Graphs, charts, spreadsheets and death by PowerPoint. If we could argue the entire case using ones and zeros we'd be in good shape. We are hoping that you may have researched, or know someone who has researched the impact of closing a library. We'd like to know the cost differences between reciprocal document delivery and independent research contractors. Physical Librarian vs.. 100% automated databases. The bosses are looking for short-term cost avoidance, and if they can save FY07 funds by canning the Library they won't hesitate. We wouldn't ask you for this if we had time to compile the data, but we don't have time. They want everything immediately. It's like an information ambush: defend your library with some annual usage stats that mean nothing to the workgroup and a wet noodle. Good luck! If you have any research or know anyone that's recently fought the good fight, the help would be greatly appreciated. I was the Director of Medical Library in Germany prior to my coming here. I lost that fight and the library there is no more. Many thanks! Patrick R. Walz Technical Information Specialist Armed Forces Medical Library 5109 Leesburg Pike, Room 670 Falls Church, VA 22041 E-mail: Patrick.Walz@tma.osd.mil Phone: 703-681-8028; FAX: 703-681-8034To me personally, it is just stunning that at a time when the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are greatly ramping up the need for evidence-based medicine in the military, the Pentagon seems to be choosing to gut their medical information resources. If you can help Patrick in his battle to keep high quality information resources for the military medical establishment, I think you will also find yourself supporting the troops in a positive way. We at FGI wish him and the staff Armed Forces Medical Library well. Continue reading
Short pub funding from beginning of time
A posting on govdoc-l from Janet Fischer, Collection Development/Government Documents Librarian Golden Gate University Law Library in San Francisco shows us that Congress has been tight-fisted regarding government documents for a very long time:
I'm wrapping up a fine read: Nathaniel Philbrick's "Sea of Glory," about the U.S. Exploring Expedition that sailed around the world from 1838-42, mapping Pacific Islands, part of the antarctic coast, and the Columbia river basin and US Pacific coast, among other things. The ExEx, as it was called, brought back copious amounts of samples, specimens, artifacts, charts, journals, etc., much of which provided the basis for the foundation of the Smithsonian. Among the problems was securing funding to publish the findings of the ExEx. Wilkes, the controversial leader of the ExEx, wrote, "I had more trouble and difficulty in securing the appropriation annually than I experienced in the command of the Expedition." Philbrick goes on to write: "A nation that prided itself in its democratic scorn of book-learning was reluctant to acknowledge that publishing volumes about 'bugs, reptiles, etc.' was a necessary expense. When asked to vote on yet another appropriation to pay for the seemingly never-ending publications of the Exploring Expedition, one vexed senator complained, 'I am tired of all this thing called science here.' ... [There was a] growing realization in Washington that scientific pursuits such as geology, botany, anthropology, and meteorology were crucial to the progress of the nation. Almost in spite of itself, Congress began to see the wisdom and necessity of paying for expeditions..." Congress began to see the wisdom and necessity of paying...in spite of itself. While we continue to be frustrated at GPO's underfunded mandate to provide copies of our government's work to the people, it does warm my heart a little to know that it has been ever thus.One of the reasons that we at FGI continually advocate a decentralized approach to the access to and preservation of government information is because of this long history of Congress being unwilling to fully fund information efforts. A system that depends on a centralized approach is held hostage to Congressmembers who may not always see the value of no-fee, permanent public access to fully functional government information. Continue reading
New Poll – Time for a FGI Podcast?
Hi All, We at Free Government Information are considering launching a podcast. We are thinking of something a little like the popular LibVibe podcast, which runs between 5 and 15 minutes and would feature news from this site and other govdoc related blogs and news sources. As far as a publishing schedule, we're thinking about twice a month or so until we got the hang of podcasting. But if there is no interest in a podcast, we could keep working on other stuff. That is why we have a new poll. For the next month we'll take your input on whether we should podcast and hopefully through comments, find out what you'd like to hear. So, please take the poll. If we get at least 50 people saying definitely or maybe, we'll go forward. Continue reading
Lunchtime Listens: Creating Remixes, er mashups
What we at FGI like to call remixes, others call mashups. How does one take a little of this, a little of that and create something new, interesting, and hopefully compelling or at least useful? For a gentle introduction to the process, check out Darlene Fichter's SirsiDynix Institute's presentation Mashups : A Little Bit of This, A Little Bit of That. At roughly 50 minutes, this would fit into a lunchtime. You'll definitely want her slides as you listen. Or maybe you could watch her presentation. Either way, check out the ProgrammableWeb and our remixes page for examples of things that can be done once you mix/mash things together! Continue reading
Lunchtime Listens: YouTube mistakes/Twitter/Web Radio
The Public Relations/Technology blog For Immediate Release featured several topics of interest to librarians in issue 222:
- YouTube, Viacom and the removal of videos
- Twitter and its potential in business;
- and at 46:09 - Comment from Clarence Jones on copyright royalties and it's implications (bad) for streaming radio providers.
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