alycia.brokenja.ws

Lots of really great looking events are on their way for those of us who like to hold pieces of things bound together in our hands and talk to the person who gathered and created:

FEMINIST ZINE FEST: Saturday, February 25 @ Brooklyn Commons

2012 CHAPBOOK FESTIVAL: Wednesday-Friday, March 28-30 @ the CUNY Grad Center and the Center for Book Arts

BROOKLYN ZINE FEST: Sunday, April 15 @ Public Assembly

I'll be tabling with copies of all issues of The Borough is My Library and as the Brooklyn College zine librarian at the zine fests, and hope to be exploring at the Chapbook Fest.

This has been going around everywhere, but I thought I'd share it here too: Woody Guthrie's 1942 resolutions. We made a big list of all of the good things from 2011 and I have a few goals for 2012, but I can't really top this.

I didn't meet my goal for increasing the overall number of books in 2011. I'd set it high, at 65. But I did read one more book than I had in the last two years--52 instead of 51--and this year was also a LARGE book year: the number of pages that goodreads tells me I read in 2011 vastly outnumbers any previous year in which I kept track.

Most of the books on the list that aren't novels are because of grad school. There were also a number of books I am still half way through (a lot of cyberculture and ebook-related things) that I suspect I'll finish in 2012, and two huge novels I just started (Moby Dick and 1Q84).

Anyhow, here's the list! Especially recommended books are starred as usual. Happy 2012!

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The Borough is My Library: A Metropolitan Library Workers Zine, Issue 3, December 2011

It took me a little longer this year, but here are all of the details about The Borough is My Library/the Biblioball zine for 2011!!

Copies available on a sliding scale $4 – $7. All profits go to Literacy for Incarcerated Teens. Get issues 1 & 2 online here. Issues available free of charge for zine libraries.

The Borough is My Library #3 BIML #3 - Four dollars $4.00 USD
BIML #3 - Five dollars $5.00 USD
BIML #3 - Six dollars $6.00 USD
BIML #3 - Seven dollars $7.00 USD

*If you would like to order a copy via the mail email alycia(at)brokenja(dot)ws for mailing address and further details, or to get a quote for additional shipping costs for international orders.

This year's issue features more about a few projects I've been working on and have been inspired by.

Contents include:

• Intro/Meta piece about alternative materials in libraries
• "Double Duty" by Heather
• The Occupy Wall Street Library
• Interference Archive
• The Brooklyn College Library Zine Collection
• The Readers' Bill of Rights for Digital Books

This issue also has an authentic cloth taped spine, LC call number classification, and found book pages.

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CUNY IT Conference: Hacking Copyright
View more presentations from Alycia

I gave a short talk at the CUNY IT Conference on December 9 and thought I would share the slides I made here. There are more notes about the panel I was a part of at the Open Access @ CUNY blog (Prof. Jill Cirasella's presentation is especially useful for those interested in the practicalities of OA publishing). We had excellent conversations with other CUNY folks at the conference, and it was great to get a chance to talk OA with a wide array of CUNY colleagues.

The Borough is My Library issues 1, 2, and 3 at the Biblioball
The 2011 Biblioball was yet again a marvellous party, made all the more wonderful seeing all the amazing Occupy Wall Street/People's Librarians out enjoying themselves. I gave all the remaining copies of the brand-new The Borough is My Library #3 that had been created (so far) to the People's Library on Saturday, so I'm totally out right now. But more info about ordering your own copy is soon to come--once the semester settles down enough for me to collate and bind more. In the meantime, you'll have to visit the mobile library for one, or stay tuned for more info!

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Just a note that the Film Forum is screening Andrzej Zulawski’s POSSESSION, a Bleeding Light Film Group release, and Anthology Film Archives will be having a Anarchism on Film series later this month--if you happen to catch any of these, let me know what you think!

I'm delighted to yet again be a (small) part of the Desk Set Biblioball! Come out and support Literacy for Incarcerated Teens and pick up a copy of the soon-to-be-released The Borough is My Library: A Metropolitan Library Workers Zine, #3!

092 306.76 ǂb Q

110 2 Que(e)ry (Organization)

245 10 Que(e)ry V : ǂb open access / ǂc curated by the Que(e)ry Librarians.

260 New York, N.Y. : ǂb The Stonewall Inn (53 Christopher St.), ǂc Saturday, November 19, 2011.

300 1 dance party (9:00 p.m. - 4:00 a.m.)

521 For queer librarians and those who love them ; everyone welcome (21+).

511 0 DJ MARC Records; DJ Sirlinda ; DJ Emoticon.

505 0 Queer Zines — Gay-A$$ Raffle — Nerdy Gogos — Queer-Lit Drinks.

536 $5-10 suggested donation, Benefiting the Queer Zine Archive Project.

650 0 Librarians, Queer ǂx Friends and associates ǂv Congresses.

710 2 Queer Zine Archive Project, ǂe dedicatee.

710 2 Desk Set (Organization), ǂe cohost.

856 42 ǂu http://queeryparty.tumblr.com/

No library can be safely stored when it has been removed from its librarians by force in the middle of the night.
No library is being safely stored when it is kept from its readers.

Just a short note here about the talk that I attended yesterday that the CUNY Digital Humanities Initiative put on featuring Ben Vershbow of NYPL Labs: This was one of the most inspiring library-related talks I've been to in a long time. Maybe it was due to the fact that at Pratt I spent a lot of time pulling out print Sanborn maps for architecture students and puzzling over their layout and metadata that I was utterly amazed by the Map Warper project, or that I had just last summer had a discussion with Jim Danky about how important it would be if libraries would collect menus that I love the public collaborative What's on the Menu transcription project. But I suspect that even without these personal experiences, I would have been wowed by what they're up to at NYPL. It's great that they are working to share special collections in such useful ways for New Yorkers and the world. Hooray!

You can keep up with NYPL Labs at their blog, and a recording of the talk has been posted at CUNY DHI (a group who also continually impresses me).

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Tomorrow, 5pm at the CUNY Graduate Center--Open Access Scholarly Publishing as Thought and Action!

Data Storage Device / Pete Birkinshaw / CC BY 2.0

I just found out today that the old Kardex files that I used to use at the Wisconsin Historical Society are being retired (and all the thousands of serial titles from the Newspapers and Periodicals department are now in MadCat). This system was used at the WHS for more than 40 years, just a few of which I got to spend with James Danky and Tina Enemuoh and a handful of student workers in room 225, typewriters clacking away, even as recently as 2006.

It's Open Access Week, and so far 2011 has impressed me. From Barbara Fister's reveal of what journals are costing her library (going against nondisclosure agreements), to Maura Smale's Open Access Pledge.

I'm joining Maura and Barbara and many other colleagues who are celebrating Open Access this week.

At Maura's recommendation, I signed the Open Access Pledge. I also think that Maura's new publishing pledge is fantastic. I would like to use it as my own from here on out:

1. I will not submit articles I have authored or co-authored to any closed, subscription-based journals.
2. I will not undertake peer review for any closed, subscription-based journals.
3. I will not join the editorial board for any closed, subscription-based journals.
4. I will not accept the editorship of any closed, subscription-based journals.
5. I will make my own research and scholarship available online wherever possible.

What is Open Access? As someone who has struggled with variances in OA definitions, I believe that the Berlin Declaration captures OA in the clearest manner:

Open access contributions must satisfy two conditions:

The author(s) and right holder(s) of such contributions grant(s) to all users a free, irrevocable, worldwide, right of access to, and a license to copy, use, distribute, transmit and display the work publicly and to make and distribute derivative works, in any digital medium for any responsible purpose, subject to proper attribution of authorship (community standards, will continue to provide the mechanism for enforcement of proper attribution and responsible use of the published work, as they do now), as well as the right to make small numbers of printed copies for their personal use.

A complete version of the work and all supplemental materials, including a copy of the permission as stated above, in an appropriate standard electronic format is deposited (and thus published) in at least one online repository using suitable technical standards (such as the Open Archive definitions) that is supported and maintained by an academic institution, scholarly society, government agency, or other well-established organization that seeks to enable open access, unrestricted distribution, inter operability, and long-term archiving.

Open Access is more than the ability to view an article without paying for it,* or without your library having to pay for it. Open Access can be seen as a commitment to hacking copyright--in a way that provides more ways for everyone to use a creators' work (similar to the ways that free software licensing insures more freedom).

Please join us for CUNY's Open Access Week if you are able, or plan/discuss/pledge wherever you are!

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I'll admit: it snuck up on me this year and I feel silly posting this late! Happy Sandy Berman Appreciation Month 2011 nonetheless!

Just a quick note that I've made a policy change here on this site: I'm now welcoming comments.*

When I first started this site/project/experiment I was a bit worried about sharing information on the interwebs, and although some of those same inclinations still stand, my desire to make this a (safe) place for conversation and dialog has trumped my worries about carving out my own area where I feel comfortable. I hope I can make this a place where others feel comfortable as well. So set up an account, or just say hello, and help me to make this a useful site for reflecting and learning.

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