Supporting Access through Little Libraries and Library Box

Just a quick mention of two services that bring the library out of the walls and into the neighborhoods. One is Little Free Library where you build a little box on a post, put some books in it and then invite people to take a book and leave a book or read and return.

I read about Library Box in the August 2013 issue of Library Journal. This one is a small router that comes with a USB drive preloaded with free (in the public domain) content. The router allows the patron to download the content of their choice to a wifi accessible device. This is for those areas where people may not have access to wifi, but still want to read a copy of Emma by Jane Austen or the Jungle Book by Kipling. Or maybe the person may not know s/he can visit the Gutenberg project and download a book for free, or maybe there's just too many options and this little bad boy makes the choices easier. Check out the kickstarter campaign for Library Box to see what are the latest developments for the project.

Resources for Teaching Copyright

I like the list, but not the formatting of the blog where I found the original post. Mad props to them for collecting this list, but I'm going to recreate the list for myself.

• Copyright Advisory Network- brought to you by ALA's Office of Information Technology Policy. Geared toward librarians and copyright issues as pertains to the profession, an insightful quote on the homepage is "with copyright, there are no definitive answers." How deliciously evil sounding. Some nice resources on the page are: 
• The Copyright Genie
• the Fair Use Evaluator 
• the Is It Protected by Copyright Slider- (nice visual infographic)
• the Section 108 (of the US Copyright Code) Spinner
• and the Exceptions for Instructors eTool
• the Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines for Teachers chart- created by Tech(nology) and Learning, a site owned by NewBay Media, which specializes in creating products for the K-12 education market, this chart breaks down what you are thinking of using (it's medium), how you can use it, and the fine prints according to media.
• The Creative Commons website- Want to move beyond the restrictions of copyright? The CC can teach you how to put your stuff out there for use, while also protecting your right to make money off your stuff.
• The cute Cyberbee Copyright Classroom. Kind of simplistic, but an easy way to get started and explore the very basics of the issue with students using an interactive FAQ format.
• LoC's Taking the Mystery Out of Copyright- Flash based videos targeted toward younger teens present the info in comic style with story based examples.
• and finally, Teaching Copyright, a project of the Electronic Frontier Foundation has a thorough curriculum for older teens.