Kathy Hurley

The Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP) has announced that Kathy Hurley, Senior Vice President, Strategic Partnerships Pearson Education & Pearson Foundation, will be the keynote speaker at its 2010 IN Conference (September 21-23 in Philadelphia).  At Pearson, Hurley works on sales and marketing projects as well as education-related initiatives.  In her keynote speech, “Adapting the Business of Publishing to the Future of Learning”, she will discuss strategies for leveraging e-learning to enrich the educational experience and assist attendees in discerning where business opportunities exist.

The theme of the 2010 IN Conference is ” Imagining the Dream E-tool for Education and Learning”.   The conferences focuses on the impact of scholarly content in the classroom.  As well as a keynote address and other plenary sessions, the conference will feature breakout groups which will address the following issues:

• What does it take to transform an electronic device into a classroom?
• How can scholarly publishers and content producers optimize their products in the world of electronic deliverables?
• What can content creators learn from librarians, students, and faculty about the successful integration of e-learning tools?
• In this new world of education, how will the roles of librarians, faculty, content producers, and even students change?

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

Here are some interesting news items that I came across  when  I was preparing the September Conference Circuit column for Information Today:

• A report on the Joint CENDI/NKOS Workshop, entitled “Knowledge Organization Systems: Managing to the Future” has been published in D-Lib Magazine.  It contains summaries of the three conference sessions:  Toward a shared development environment, Toward interoperability, and Toward ontologies and the semantic web.  Click here to see the report and here for the conference website and the presentations.
• The preliminary program of the Pharma-Bio-Med Conference (Seville, Spain, November 8-10) is now available.   Here is a sampling of some of the presentation titles:
  • From the Unknown to the Known – Knowledge Management for the Digital Age
  • Competitor Analysis Tools Covering Integration, Text Mining, Visualization, Presentation and Delivery
  • Is Web 2.0 Really Adopted by Scientists? – Myths, Realities and the Relative Role of the Information Professional
  • Do the Right Thing – Confronting the Challenges of Global Copyright Awareness and Compliance Implementation
• The detailed schedule of events at the ASIS&T Annual Meeting (Pittsburgh, PA, October 22-27) has been posted to the conference website.  The keynote speaker is Lucy Suchman, Professor of Anthropology of Science and Technology in the Department of Sociology at Lancaster University.
• The ITI Conference Calendar has been updated with listings of the many state library association meetings (taken from ALA’s Calendar of Events).  If you can’t get to one of the major national meetings, state meetings provide a worthwhile alternative because they do not involve extensive travel, and the costs are generally lower.  And there is a wide selection to choose from:  here is a sample of the meetings occurring in just one week of October:
  • Oct. 6-8 Minnesota Library Association, Rochester
  • Oct. 6-8 Missouri Library Association, Lake of the Ozarks
  • Oct. 6-9 Idaho Library Association, Post Falls
  • Oct. 7-8 Maine Library Association, Camden
  • Oct. 7-9 Colorado Association of Libraries, Loveland, CO
• Presentations from the IFLA Satellite Meeting on Open Access and the Changing Role of Libraries, August 9, are available here.
• The schedule for the ASIS&T annual meeting in Pittsburgh, October 22-27 is now available here.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

This one-day conference on September 14 in London will focus on linking using semantic data.  Some of the applications to be discussed include linked data and public information, e-commerce, government, and geographic information.  For further details, see the conference website.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

It’s difficult to predict the future even a few years hence, but 500 years??  That’s just what the organizers and panel of the Tuesday Evening session at Internet Librarian 2010 will be trying to do (I wish them well!).  And in conjunction with that, if you create a video or podcast with your ideas and send the link to Jane Dysart, Program Chair, by September 15, and it’s chosen by the panel as one of the top 3 entries, you will see your entry featured at the session.  And knowing at least some of the panel members, there might be unannounced prizes… Go for it!

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

The annual IFLA conference opened today in Gothenburg, Sweden, and already there are lots of posts in the various blogs and on the interactive conference website.  For example, you can read the text of the opening address by IFLA President Ellen Tise.  An impressive list of 45 bloggers appears on the Blogging in Gothenburg page, including at least one blog (this one!) by a non-attending blogger.  (Thanks to Louis Takacs, Web Content Editor for titling the page “Blogs Dedicated To, or with posts about the Gothenburg conference, thereby allowing The Conference Circuit to qualify for inclusion!)  Even if you’re not at the conference, check the site frequently to get a sense of what’s happening.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today, and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

The Internet Librarian International (ILI) advance program is now available on the conference website.  ILI will feature two keynotes:  ”What Would Socrates Say?” by Robert Rowland Smith, and “Getting Real about Social Media”, by Hazel Hall.  A closing panel will discuss “Library Futures: Views and Visions for the Future of Libraries and Information Professionals”.   This will be the 12th ILI, and besides the keynotes, a full lineup of speakers from UK and other international organizations will appear.

Click here for ILI registration information.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today, and Conference Circuit Blog Editor

IFLA has added an interactive news and updating feature to its conference website.  So far, the site features a Twitter stream, interactive map of the venue, and list of bloggers at the conference (instructions for listing your blog are on the Bloggers page).  According to the site, “This website will support content that is generated by IFLA reporters, conference speakers, and you!”

For those (like me!) who will not be attending the IFLA conference in person, this will be a great way to attend virtually.  Thanks to the IFLA staff for making these facilities available.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Blogger

IFLA’s 76th General Conference and Assembly begins in just over a week, on August 10 in Göteborg, Sweden.  This year’s theme is “Open access to knowledge – promoting sustainable progress”.  A full program of satellite meetings, library visits, and related activities has been arranged; information is available on the conference website.  Many IFLA Divisions and Sections have issued newsletters with details of their conference activities; these can be found on the IFLA website.

The IFLA meeting is a major event on the information industry conference calendar; expect reports on it to appear in a number of industry publications, including Information Today.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Blogger

• The list of accepted papers to be presented at the 14th European Conference on Digital Libraries (Glasgow, Scotland, September 6-10) has been posted on the conference website.
• Information industry market research and advisory firm Outsell,  Inc. has announced the lineup of speakers at its Signature Event, to be held in Key Biscayne, FL, September 29-October 1.  Tony Hsieh, CEO of online clothing retailer Zappos and author of Delivering Happiness will be the opening keynote speaker.  Outsell has also formed a new Technology Leadership Council, to be chaired by Frank Gilbane, President of Outsell’s Gilbane Group, Marc Strohlein, Outsell’s Chief Agility Officer, and Bill Trippe, VP & Lead Analyst, Outsell’s Gilbane Group.  The first meeting of the Council will be in Boston in October.
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  Tefko Saracevic

  The program for the Information Interaction in Context (IIiX) Symposium (New Brunswick, NJ, August 18-20) is now available.  Professor Tefko Saracevic, from the School of  Communication and Information,  Rutgers University, will keynote  the Symposium.  Saracevic has had a long and illustrious career in the information industry and is well known for his work on information retrieval systems, user studies in information science, and many related topics.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today and Blogger

The advance program for Internet Librarian and Internet @ Schools West conferences are now available.  The dates are October 25-27 in the usual venue:  the Monterey Conference Center in Monterey, CA.  Links to information on the beautiful city of Monterey and the surrounding area with its many attractions are at the bottom of each conference’s home page.

Speakers and their topics for the plenary sessions are:

A new feature of Internet Librarian is “Mobile Monday”, six presentations on mobile technology and devices, which is also available online (check the conference registration page). With the full program of pre-conference workshops, receptions, and an exhibit hall, for which Internet Librarian is famous, this is an event not to be missed.

Don Hawkins
Columnist, Information Today, and Conference Circuit Blogger