HotDocs on Fire Prevention and Safety

Paula Webb has put together a collection of Government Documents on Fire Prevention and Safety. http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/govdocs/hotdocs.htm

Come to the Second Floor, South side, to see a display of print documents on the same topic including the original Smokey Bear memorabilia.

“I give my pledge as an American to save and faithfully to defend from waste the natural resources of my country – its soil and minerals, its forests, waters and wildlife”

ZipSkinny--Who are Your Neighbors? & Tech Fair

Try this app and get demographic info from the Census on your neighborhood. Compare your area with other zips.
http://zipskinny.com/

Come see us between 10 & 4 in the Ballroom. Ellen Wilson is doing LibX, a cool browser add-on; Kathy Wheeler is talking about tagging with del.icio.us and LibraryThing, your own personal library catalog; I'm postering on the various cool tools available through Google.

Technology Fair Tomorrow

Come to the Student Center Ballroom tomorrow between 10 and 4 for the (1st Annual?) Technology Fair. Kathy Wheeler, Ellen Wilson and I will be demonstrating some Web 2.0 kinds of technology--all of it free. Kathy is going to do tagging--del.icio.us and LibraryThing. Ellen was going to entitle hers "Pimping my Firefox," but settled for "Supercharge your Browser." I'm going to reprise my role as The Google Lady, briefing whoever dares to stop, or I can grab, about the uses of several of the Google Search and Productivity Tools like Docs & Spreadsheets, Calendar, Presentations, Finance and anything else I can fit on my posterboard this afternoon. Come visit us!
See: http://southmed.usouthal.edu/library/techfair/showcase.htm

Dumbledore is Outed

Ah, More for the censors!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7053982.stm

Starting Your Christmas Shopping?

I know I'm really digging here. I haven't found much that intrigues me lately--probably more me than the outside world in that endless middle of the semester with none of the excitement of the new and none of the anticipation of the finish.

Marylaine Block came up with this site today. For those of you with kids or little brothers and sisters, this is a good site for recommendations for presents for ages 0 to 12.

Dr. Toy's 100 Best Products of 2007

"Stevanne Auerbach, an author and expert on educational and skill building
toys offers parents a useful guide to some of the year's best products.
For each item, she gives a brief evaluation, the intended age level,
image, price, and the manufacturer's website."
http://www.drtoy.com/awards/2007_3_list.php

A Word of Warning to Students--and Faculty

Plagiarism, Education, and Information Security

Julie J.C.H. Ryan
George Washington University
Sept./Oct. 2007

"From 1997 to 2002, I caught an average of 18 percent of the students in my graduate-level information security classes plagiarizing large portions of papers (some copied in full) and turning them in as class assignments. This doesn’t include students who plagiarized small portions of papers or who were guilty of plagiarism by paraphrasing. Since 2002, the percentage has declined and the style of plagiarism has changed. At first blush, it appears to be an encouraging trend, but students’ attitudes and opinions haven’t changed much at all. On the contrary, very few students actually appreciate the need for academic integrity, specifically in writing, whereas the pervasive attitude appears to be that the checks performed on papers is simply a game—indeed, it’s one that many feel they can play successfully."

Full Text of the article

See also:
For Faculty
For Students

HotDocs from Paula Webb

This is the debut HotDocs posting for our new Gov. Docs librarian. Check it out. I really like Paula's use of del.icio.us to create a linkable bibliography. Del.icio.us is probably the web application that I use the most to keep track of my favorite websites.
http://www.southalabama.edu/univlib/govdocs/hotdocs.htm

Ghosting the Research--A Warning

It is truly hard to be a librarian these days. Skepticism about information can so easily turn into cynicism. I've read about this problem before--pharmaceutical company shills writing articles and getting researchers to front them. But here is another article proving that this is not just an aberration, but a common practice. Can I really tell students to use our medical databases, because they carry more reliable information than the public web? Not sure anymore.

These abbreviations will help you understand the article:
CHC, Complete Healthcare Communications;
CMD, Current Medical Directions;
CRO, contract research organization;
MECC, medical education and communication company
http://medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pmed.0040286&ct=1