|
Sunday, November 22, 2009 |
|
|
Back to DACS - 2009
Conferences , Internet Technology November 22, 2009 04:04 PM |
|
|
Tuesday, November 17, 2009 |
|
|
OCLC - Part 1  It is a privilege to be able to participate and contribute
to various boards. It is also a way to learn a lot, meet great people
and gain new perspectives. That has certainly been the case since I joined the board of OCLC (see press release). Fifteen years ago some pundits -- myself not included -- were saying that libraries were history -- as in toast -- they were not long for the emerging digital world. Been to a local or college library lately? They are full of people and many are expanding their facilities. Library use has doubled over the past decade. What happened to the digital "vision"? It turns out that the digital and physical can get along together quite well. The month after I graduated from Lehigh University in 1967, OCLC -- Online Computer Library Center, Inc. -- was founded in Dublin, Ohio as a nonprofit, membership, computer library service and research organization dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the world's information and reducing information costs for libraries. More than 72,000 libraries in 171 countries and territories around the world use OCLC services to locate, acquire, catalog, lend and preserve library materials. Each of these five verbs has special and profound meaning to a very large number of librarians and library visitors. Over the months ahead, as I learn more about OCLC, some stories about the various services of OCLC will appear in follow-on postings. For now I will just highlight one of them -- the crown jewel -- WorldCat. WorldCat is the world's largest network of library content and services, connecting millions of users to the collections and services of more than 10,000 libraries around the world. WorldCat.org lets you search not just the collections of libraries in your community but thousands more around the world. Thirty-one million new records were added to WorldCat in the past year bringing the total to 139 million. How does WorldCat differ from other web resources? Suppose you are doing some research on the origins of a town where you live and specifically you want to learn more about the history of Connecticut's Golden Hill Paugussett tribe . You might find a book for sale at Barnes & Noble or Amazon about the subject but not necessarily. Using the web site or your iPhone you visit WorldCat and do the search. WorldCat tells you that A history of Connecticut's Golden Hill Paugussett tribe is not available in the local library but it is available at the Fairfield University library just fifteen miles away. If you are not in a hurry you could stop at your local library and ask them to arrange an interlibrary loan for you. In the past the lending process was manual and costly but using WorldCat tools, the libraries can handle book loans quite easily. If you are not sure the book you found is exactly what you are looking for you might use WorldCat's "Ask a Librarian" service. WorldCat allows you to search for books, music CDs and videos -- all of the physical items you're used to getting from libraries -- but you can also discover downloadable audiobooks, article citations with links to their full text, authoritative research materials, and digital versions of rare items that aren't available to the public. Some libraries allow you to join a waiting list, reserve the item, check it out or even have it shipped or delivered. WorldCat also leverages the social computing model by allowing you to enter ratings and reviews and contribute factual notes. The more people enter the more useful WorldCat becomes. That is their model -- enhancing the sharing of information on a global basis. The vision is "The world's libraries. Connected.".
Internet Technology , Media , Public Policy November 17, 2009 03:39 PM |
|
|
Sunday, November 1, 2009 |
|
|
IBM Happenings: August September October 2009
In a bold move to cut healthcare costs, IBM plans to drop co-pays by employees when they visit their primary care physicians under the company's self-insured coverage. The idea is to save costs over time by encouraging people to go to primary-care doctors sooner in order to get earlier diagnoses that could save on expensive visits to specialists and emergency rooms later. The company is able to make this change because it pays for the health-care benefits, not insurance companies. With 115,000 U.S. employees, IBM spends about $1.3 billion a year on healthcare so it is highly motivated to launch new healthcare initiatives. Approximately 50% of Americans (133 million) have some form of chronic medical condition. Most of these people are not actually disabled, but they absorb a large amount of the country's healthcare resources. The most common chronic conditions are high blood pressure, arthritis, respiratory diseases like emphysema, and high cholesterol. The projections are that the number of people with chronic conditions will continue to increase. Most of the people in this category are between the ages of 18 and 64 -- in other words they are people who are working. By encouraging employees to consult with their primary-care physicians IBM hopes to drive down costs over time. The company does not require primary-physician referrals for employees to see specialists. The combination of these factors -- no co-pay for primary care and no approvals for specialists plus payments of up to $300 a year to employees for taking exercise classes or enrolling their children in online weight-monitoring programs to curb obesity -- makes IBM a trend setter. The benefits will surely flow to both employees and shareholders.   Other IBM Happenings for the current period Complete index of IBM Happenings
|
On December 7th, the 