Reading:
Remembering David Bowie through his 100 favorite books
Although David Bowie was best known for his music, he also made countless contributions to the worlds of art, fashion and film. But the singer, who died Sunday, was also devoted to literature. In 2013, Bowie left the world something other than his groundbreaking albums to remember him by – a list of his 100 favorite books. Bowie’s favorite books list was featured in an exhibit honoring the musician at the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto.
Bowie’s list is as eclectic and surprising as he was. He paid tribute to the classics, including Homer’s "Iliad," F. Scott Fitzgerald’s "The Great Gatsby," George Orwell’s "1984" and D.H. Lawrence’s "Lady Chatterley’s Lover."
But he also had a love of contemporary authors. He listed among his favorites Michael Chabon’s "Wonder Boys," Sarah Waters’ "Fingersmith" and Junot Díaz’s "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao."
Bowie was known for his sense of humor; he had memorable turns as a comic actor in the film "Zoolander" and the television series "Extras." His book list reveals his love of comedy with novels such as Spike Milligan’s "Puckoon," Keith Waterhouse’s "Billy Liar," John Kennedy Toole’s "A Confederacy of Dunces" and Evelyn Waugh’s "Vile Bodies," which Bowie credited as influencing his song "Aladdin Sane."
http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-remembering-david-bowie-100-books-20160111-story.html.
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Public Policy:
Arkansas Governor Wants Civil War Icon Separated From MLK Holiday
U.S. civil rights hero Martin Luther King Jr. and Civil War Confederate commander General Robert E. Lee will share a common holiday on Monday in three southern states, but perhaps for the final time in one of them, Arkansas. The state’s Republican governor is pushing to separate the joint celebration after critics said it is an insult for the man who fought to end racial segregation to share a day with a man who fought to preserve slavery. "They need to be distinguished and separate," Governor Asa Hutchinson told a news conference this month about the remembrances.
Arkansas State Representative Fred Love, a Democrat who led the unsuccessful campaign in 2015 to separate the joint holiday, said passing the measure would be a winner in terms of race relations.
http://www.nationalmemo.com/arkansas-governor-wants-civil-war-icon-separated-from-mlk-holiday/.
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Digital History:
Wikipedia celebrates 15 years of free knowledge
This Friday marks the 15th anniversary of Wikipedia, the world’s free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. This week, we celebrate not just Wikipedia, but the birth of an idea: that anyone can contribute to the world’s knowledge. Globally, readers and editors are coming together to celebrate, with nearly 150 events across six continents. From editing marathons in Bangladesh and lectures in Switzerland, to picnics in South Africa and a conference in Mexico, the world is celebrating the joy of knowledge.
Wikipedia launched on January 15, 2001 with a bold vision: a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. At the time, the idea that people around the world would collaborate to build an encyclopedia-for-free seemed unbelievable. Since then, Wikipedia has grown to more than 36 million articles in hundreds of languages, used by hundreds of millions of people all over the world. Wikipedia and its sister projects are still built by volunteers around the world: each month, roughly 80,000 volunteer editors contribute to Wikimedia sites.
http://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/01/14/wikipedia-15-foundation-endowment/.
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Libraries:
14 million fewer books available in libraries than when David Cameron took office
Fourteen million fewer books are available in British public libraries today than when David Cameron became Prime Minister in 2010, official statistics have revealed. Funding cuts and library closures mean that around one in every seven books available on library shelves six years ago have now gone. Campaigners said Tory ministers had taken an “abysmal and appalling” approach to Britain’s libraries and demanded they act to stop councils closing any more. In 2010/11 there were more than 96 million books on Britain’s library shelves, but in 2014/15 there were just 82 million. Since Mr Cameron entered Number 10 more than 400 full-time libraries have closed in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland – with spending dropping by around £180 million.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/12102686/14-million-fewer-books-available-in-libraries-than-when-David-Cameron-took-office.html.
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Privacy Issues:
You are not what you read: librarians purge user data to protect privacy
Last week, with little fanfare, the Graduate Center at the City University of New York did something very few private companies would ever do to protect its users’ privacy: it quietly began to purge its interlibrary loan records. "This policy change is motivated by the idea that libraries should not keep more information about their users’ requests than necessary," wrote Beth Posner, head of library resource sharing at the school.
Recently, it’s become more common to try to force librarians to turn over user information and compel their silence simultaneously. Multiple librarians have pushed back against "national security letters" that would do just that in the name of public safety – a dangerous order to resist, since those letters include a gag order. But in 2005, when the FBI served a national security letter to Connecticut’s Library Connection demanding reading records and hard drives, the librarians resisted with such force that the government capitulated.
Libraries continue to develop ways to keep patron privacy at the forefront of the services they provide, including material accessed through library computers. Macrina’s group encourages libraries to operate "exit nodes" that aid the operation of difficult-to-trace web browser Tor – the Department of Homeland Security attempted to enlist the help of local law enforcement to shut down the project at a New Hampshire library last year, but was thwarted.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/13/us-library-records-purged-data-privacy.
Automated Comparisons of Ambiguity in Privacy Policies and the Impact of Regulation
Website privacy policies often contain ambiguous language that undermines the purpose and value of privacy notices for site users. This paper compares the impact of different regulatory models on the ambiguity of privacy policies in multiple online sectors. First, the paper develops a theory of vague and ambiguous terms. Next, the paper develops a scoring method to compare the relative vagueness of different privacy policies. Then, the theory and scoring are applied using natural language processing to rate a set of policies. The ratings are compared against two benchmarks to show whether government-mandated privacy disclosures result in notices less ambiguous than those emerging from the market. The methodology and technical tools can provide companies with mechanisms to improve drafting, enable regulators to easily identify poor privacy policies and empower regulators to more effectively target enforcement actions.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2715164.
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Publishing:
Scholastic pulls George Washington book over slave cake controversy
Scholastic is pulling a controversial new picture book about George Washington and his slaves, the publisher said on Sunday. A Birthday Cake for George Washington was released on 5 January and had been strongly criticized for its upbeat images and story of Washington’s cook, the slave Hercules, and his daughter, Delia.
"While we have great respect for the integrity and scholarship of the author, illustrator and editor, we believe that, without more historical background on the evils of slavery than this book for younger children can provide, the book may give a false impression of the reality of the lives of slaves and therefore should be withdrawn," the publisher said in a statement. The trade publication School Library Journal called the book "highly problematic" and recommended against its purchase. Another trade journal, Kirkus Reviews, labeled the book "an incomplete, even dishonest treatment of slavery".
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/17/scholastic-george-washington-book-slave-controversy.
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The Intersect Alert is a newsletter of the Government Relations Committee, San Francisco Bay Region Chapter, Special Libraries Association.