Postcards from the Cracker Coast

Most of you have at one time or another called the Lyrasis (formerly SOLINET) HelpDesk with questions regarding OCLC products and services. As of July 1, 2009, OCLC members will now call OCLC Support for assistance with these issues.

OCLC recently mailed a “Guide to Contacting OCLC Product Support and Training” to all its members. If you did not receive a copy or need additional copies you can order the guide.

To contact OCLC support

• Phone: 1-800-848-5800
• Email: support@oclc.org

Lyrasis will continue to provide assistance with billing and ordering questions. The Lyrasis HelpDesk (800-999-8558) is still available to answer non-OCLC questions.

We recently learned of the death of Bonnie Davis. She was the librarian at the Navy Experimental Diving Unit in Panama City Beach for many years prior to her retirement last year. Bonnie was a longtime Board member for PLAN, frequently serving as Secretary/Treasurer. Many of you may remember her succinct Treasurer’s report at the Annual Meetings:

“The budget reports are included in the handouts. If you can’t read, you are in the wrong profession. Any Questions?”

We will greatly miss her humor and common sense.

From Sites and Soundbytes:

Blindsearch compares three leading search engines results for your search and displays the results with all of the search engine branding removed.  After looking at the three sets of results side-by-side, you vote for which one you like best and the search engines are all revealed.  The site searches Google, Yahoo! and Bing.

Great tool for classes on searching.

From Tallahassee Community College:

You are cordially invited to the Cherry Hall Alexander Retirement and Scholarship Celebration
Saturday, June 27, 2009
3:00PM – 6:00PM
Reception 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm
Program 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Turner Auditorium
Tallahassee Community College
444 Appleyard Drive
This Event is FREE and open to the Public.
A scholarship is being named in honor of Cherry! If you wish to contribute, please make out a check or money-order payable to:
“TCC Foundation”
Place in Note field on check or money-order:
“Cherry Hall Alexander Minority Scholarship”
And then Mail To:
TCC FOUNDATIION
444 APPLEYARD DRIIVE
TALLAHASSEE, FL 32304-2895
Help show Cherry how much she’s appreciated!

Cherry is a strong supporter and past Board Member of PLAN. We wish her the best in her retirement.

Hurricane season is here! Do you have the resources you need if disaster hits your library? Lyrasis (formerly SOLINET) provides round-the-clock disaster assistance. Please visit the Lyrasis Disaster Resources web page to obtain resources that will help you prepare for or recover from a disaster. You may also contact Lyrasis Preservation Field Services at 800.999.8558.

And don’t forget FSU’s website, Hurricane Preparedness & Response for Florida’s Public Libraries. This site provides resources to libraries so that they may assist their communities in preparing for and recovering from hurricanes.

There are a number of authors who are Twitter users. A recent post on Mashable provides a list of 100 authors who are carrying on conversations with their readers. The writer has culled the list of authors who are only trying to sell their books. The list is organized by genre. Happy tweeting!

June 2

Tom Needham Exhibit - This event will be held on June 2 at 6:00 pm at the Bay County Public Library.  It will honor Tom Needham, former News Herald Photographer.  Never seen photographs and family albums will be on display.  If you need more information, please contact Bettina Mead 850-522-2120.

July 2

Bay County Public Library will hold a Talent Show on July 2 @ 2:00.  You must be registered to participate.  Registration will be from June 1 -28 and is limited to the first 15 to sign up.  Applications are available in the Youth Services Department (850-522-21158).�

The staff of the Bay County Public Library wishes to thank the County Commissioners and the citizens of Bay County for the support given to the library in their new location.

In appreciation, please join Bay County for an Open House and THANK YOU celebration with a day of fun, music, singing, and tours hosted by the Bay County Public Library staff and the Panama City Women’s Club.  Maestro Eddie Rackley and members of the Panama City POPS will entertain including Bob Fowler’s beautiful voice commemorating our veterans on this Armed Forces day.

12:00 pm - 2:00 pm May 16, 2009

For additional information: Bettina Mead 522-2120 (bmead@nwrls.com)

Tuesday Keynote was very inspirational.  They  interviewed Paul Holdengraber from the New York Public Library.  Paul had such a great message of trying to break down the old walls of the NYPL and turning it into a place where people come together.  Paul was brought in from Santa Monica to help “Oxygenate” the library.  He said he really wanted to bring people into the library to show people what a fantastic place it can be.  He had a saying that he wanted to make the lions roars outside the library, and really wanted to make people desire what the library had to offer. He started something called “Live from the New York Public Library.”  Basically he has setup his own talk show that people can come and enjoy. He has had many famous authors, actors, chef, pretty much you name it in on his show.  Paul had so many great quotes’ from his interview I really thought they could have interviewed him all day and I would have enjoyed it.  One of the things he said that I thought was just fantastic was, “I wanted to change the name Librarian to LIFEbrarian.”  I personally took this as saying on how today’s Librarian needs to interact with their customers and really help them desire everything the library has to offer.  The streamed the interview live, and you can check it out here. I implore everyone to watch this interview; he had so many great things to say that I think they should send a copy of his interview to every library.      

One of my favorite sessions from Monday was by Sarah Houghton-Jan from San Jose Public Library. She gave a great presentation on how to help underfunded libraries use 2.0 web services.  You can check out her whole presentation on (www.librarianinblack.net).  Here are a list of tools I thought would be very useful for some our members.

www.EngagedPatrons.org  – They will provide free hosting, and setup a Blog for your library if your yearly budget is under 1 million yearly.  If it is over that she said that the cost is very low.

www.ImageGenerator.org, www.imagechef.com – These two sites will help you create Flyers, logos, and web images for free.  They are both very easy to use and the results are very professional looking.

www.gimp.org – Yeah the name does not sound very professional, but they provide a free image editing utility for your computer.  It’s a lot like Photoshop without the cost!

www.surveymonkey.com -  Looking to create a free online survey?  Check out Surveymonkey.com to setup a free online survey!

www.polldaddy.com -  Great free site to setup and host polls for you.