Boston Public Library

Historical Boston is one of the most beautiful, but underrated cities in the world. Likewise its library system. Founded in the mid-19th century, the Boston Public Library (BPL) is strongly associated with the emergence of education for the working class. Its unique architectural style was maintained when Philip John designed an additional section in 1972. Serving as both a research library and headquarters for Boston Public Library's 26 branch libraries, the main library branch also holds a large collection of rare books and manuscripts and musical scores.

Semiotics and the Semantic Web

. . . when computing entered the realm of images, a new dimension was added to cyperspace (taking it literally from 1D to 2D) and the term 'virtual reality' started to be more than a daydream. (Cadognety, 2002).

According to Wikipedia, semiotics is the study of sign processes (semiosis), or signification and communication, signs and symbols. What is interesting is that there is currently a great deal of research on semiotics and the Web, and a result, have an important natural link to the semantic web. Anything intended to signal meaning of some kind, signs on websites are especially important. Various kinds of meaning can be transmitted or 'signalled' by using an image, icon, label or a hyperlink of some fashion -- signs. According to the semiotic theory, signs have a significant (e.g. link label), a referent (e.g. actual page the link points to), an interpretant (e.g. the concept it signifies), and even a behaviour (e.g. the link mechanism itself). Signs of all types leverage existing content to express some kind of function (e.g. a thumbnail image used as link to a product) or affordance.

Philippe Codognet has been one of the preeminent researchers in the field of the semiotics of the web. In his article in 2002, Ancient Images and New Technologies: The Semiotics of the Web, when the web was still in its infancy, Codognet points out that indexical images, which we use in navigating the multimedia documents which make up the web, can be based on the study of semiotics, and can be traced back to the classical thinkers such as Gottfried Liebniz and C.S. Peirce. In other words, instead of viewing the Semantic Web as something entirely novel, we must look at the core roots of the web, which is really just an organization of data, documents, and images - conceptually meshed in contemporary computer-based communication.

Horizon Report 2010 - Changes to Come?

The Horizon Report 2010 has come and gone. Reactions? What's most noticeable is that there are a lot of repeating themes to previous Horizon Reports. Perhaps this is due to the reality that there just aren't that many technologies to go around. My interpretation is that certain themes are emerging as this decade comes to a close. As the Web continues to grow, its supporting technologies are emerging to support its growing veins and organs. As a result, we aren't just seeing a few new technologies popping up here and there annually; rather, we're witnessing the growth a layer of technologies that form a foundation for moving our physical world more aligned to the digital realm. Here's a look at the 6 key technologies from the Horizon Report:

1. Mobile computing - This is not a surprise as the iPhone has entered our lives as seamlessly and ubiquitously over the past couple of years. Handheld tools such as smart phones to netbooks are portable tools for productivity, learning, and communication, offering an increasing range of activities fully supported by applications designed especially for mobiles.

2. Open content - Although the open content movement is a response to the rising costs of education, it has been around since the open source and freeware movements in the software and gaming industries back in the 1990's. In the open content (also known as open access in the publishing and academic world), the desire for access to learning in areas where such access is difficult and an expression of student choice about when and how to learn battle against the corporate for-profit universe which for years has seen growing textbook prices, hefty rising student fees, and the ivory tower image of the babel of academia. The digital world is attempting to fight back, be it free online courses or video webcasts open to the world.

3. Electronic books - Going hand in hand with open content, electronic books promise to reduce costs, save students from carrying pounds of textbooks, and contribute to the environmental efforts of paper-conscious campuses. As pblishers are raising the costs of printing to justify the costs of doing business, the digital world is paving the way to break down those barriers and allow for portable, compact, and inexpensive options for all.

4. Simple augmented reality – This is the technology that has subtly entered into our daily lives with little notice or fanfare, but will ultimately change the way we interact with the Web. AR is the concept of blending (augmenting) virtual data — information, rich media, and even live action — into our physical world – with the purpose of enhancing the information we can perceive with our senses is a powerful one. This is what some predicts as the next generation 3D web (or Web 3.0).

5. Gesture-based computing - Allows our natural movements of the finger, hand, arm, and body which can recognize and interpret body motions. As we work with devices that react to us instead of requiring us to learn to work with them, our understanding of what it means to interact with computers will have a paradigm shift.

6. Visual data analysis - An emerging field, a blend of statistics, data mining, and visualization, that promises to make it possible for anyone to sift through, display, and understand complex concepts and relationships. Visual data analysis may help expand our understanding of learning itself. Learning is one of the most complex of social processes, with a myriad of variables interacting in highly complex ways, making it an ideal focus for the search for patterns. Indeed, Chris Anderson has argued in Wired Magazine that the explosion of data spells the ‘end of theory.’

Sensors everywhere. Infinite storage. Clouds of processors. Our ability to capture, warehouse, and understand massive amounts of data is changing science, medicine, business, and technology. As our collection of facts and figures grows, so will the opportunity to find answers to fundamental questions. Because in the era of big data, more isn't just more. More is different.

What does this all mean? We're moving (albeit slowly) into an exciting era of cultural, social, and technological transformation. This has greater implications than just surfing the Web.

How the Mighty Fall

After Jim Collins' landmark Good to Great, now an essential for most organizations, the collapse of a number of those 'great' companies made Collins re-examine, how companies can fall after decades of unshakable excellence.

What began as a journal article eventually expanded to How the Mighty Fall, which confronts these questions with some answers to how even the best can succumb to decline and collapse. One thing is even more true about the recent financial collapse: all organizations are prone to vulnerabilities, regardless of how well crafted and seemingly operated they appear. Collins' research project--more than four years in duration-- reveals five stages of decline. It's an excellent guide to libraries and information centres, particularly those nestled in the guise of large budgeted institutions. All organizations run by humans face mortality one day or another - it's important that we recognize its symptoms and confront the brutal realities of decline. And perhaps step in if it's not too late. Here are Collins' five stages:

Stage 1: Hubris Born of Success - All success depends on hard work and luck; however, success does not guarantee perpetuity. Every decision needs to be continually re-examined.

Stage 2: Undisciplined Pursuit of More - Success often breeds greed, which often leads to straying from the original elements which produced success.

Stage 3: Denial of Risk and Peril - Greed leads to blindness that there are signs of hazard, until it's too late.

Stage 4: Grasping for Salvation - Signs of failure arises, but blindness to reality reinforces the need to look for miracles. Often, the organization looks for a messiah from outside the organization to lead it back to the promise land.

Stage 5: Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death - Nothing is done. Demoralized, the organization accepts its fate of a slow death.

Collins' research argues however, that these are just five stages. Indeed, they are reversible. Some companies do indeed recover--in some cases, coming back even stronger--even after Stage 4. In fact, this is because decline is (believe it or not) self-inflicted, and the path to recovery lies largely within the organization's own hands. As long a company is not entirely knocked out of the game, hope always remains. The mighty can fall, but they can often rise again.

Collins' book impressed me as a book that can be applied to all organizations, profit and not-for-profit - technology or customer-service. Regardless of what sector, when large numbers of people work together to achieve a common goal, they are bound to irrationality and group think, politics and human egotism. The five principles of decline are a good reminder that nothing is indestructible if pushed to its limits.

Seattle's Central Library

Here is a library that I is close to heart, literally and figuratively speaking. I heart Seattle, one of trendiest urban living spaces in the world. Its Central Seattle Library also ranks as one of the most beautiful architectural spaces in the world, with state of the art technology. A remarkably postmodern rendition perhaps, even the floors have a classically labeled Dewey Decimal system as markers of shelf sections.

Designed by Rem Koolhaas, the Library is award-winning in architectural style, modern on both the inside and the out. The library uses RFID that allows patrons to check out their own materials. Its former city librarian Nancy Pearl even had a few books under her name and a figurine, too. So grab a Starbucks and your MS Windows laptop, and take a plushy seat in one of the world's most interesting libraries.

Is it Google? Or Is it Information Imperialism?

Google's threat to withdraw from China over censorship and cyberspying is a sign of a growing willingness among foreign companies and governments to overturn the conventional wisdom that has defined decades of engagement by the West: that China is so big that it must be accommodated. Or is it simply Western hegemony? Or is it "information imperialism?"

In a recent posting from the Google Blog, Google has announced that it will be adopting a new strategy in China after facing cyber-attacks in which Gmail accounts were hacked into. In mid-December, it had detected a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China that resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google. Google would have an easier time quitting China than other companies. Although its business there has been growing, it is estimated to be only a few percentage points of its total revenues. That's a sharp contrast to companies like General Motors Corp., for which China is a crucial market.

What's interesting is that the US government has taken a stance in this growing situation, turning it instantly into a political issue, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently pointed out China as among a number of countries where there has been “a spike in threats to the free flow of information” over the past year. She also named Tunisia, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam. In response China called the US of practicing "information imperialism." Viewed from this angle, information is no different than economic and cultural imperialism. Looking at it in this light, Google's strategy might have both political and business implications.

Let's take a look at the the Global Search Report. The report indicates that even as far back as 2007, Google's reach into the web has not been as extensive as we think it might be. Not only did Google have only 21.7% of the market share compared to Baidu's 55% in China, it had only 24.7% compared to Seznam's 65.5% in the Czech Republic. Google didn't even rank top 3 in South Korea (Naver is number 1, with 72.7% of the market share). If we look at Google as a multinational corporation, perhaps its strategy isn't one of intellectual freedom, but one of consolidating market share. As it has no dominance in certain regions, why would it want to move into China in the first place? English isn't everything you know.

Libraries of the World - One Google Streetview At A Time

Launched in May 2007 to allow its users to explore the world through images, Google Maps' Street Views' coverage was limited to just five U.S. cities. When Street View first launched, the platform used to capture images was a van. Since 2007, Street View has expanded to include cities, streets, national parks and even some biking trails throughout the world. (And it's still capturing streets as we're talking). Currently, Street View is available for almost a dozen countries around the world in North America, Europe and the Asia-Pacific region.

Interestingly, scaling the project to this level required more lightweight and high-quality technology. Not only was the van replaced by a car, Google had to use different vehicles in different regions around the world to collect tens of millions of images. (Just think of those small alleys in London or Barcelona).

For the upcoming months, we will be travelling together throughout the world, starting in North America, to some of the most innovative and interesting libraries of the world. How are we going to do that? Google Maps. Our first stop? One of the largest libraries in the United States offering patrons access to millions of books, periodicals, and CDs, the New York Public Library also offers a large number of digitized collections that include images, prints and photographs. Interestingly, NYPL was one of the first to collaborate with Google to create a selection of online digital books as part of the Google Books Online Project. Not only is the library is also highly tech savvy with an active RSS feed as well as podcasts on iTunes U, patrons can download ebooks, video and audio directly from the website or video storybooks, video on demand as well as webcasts.

I like travelling.

Steve Jobs, Computers, Technology -- And How to Present Them

Steve Jobs will forever be one of the icons of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. He's helped shape not only technological and business landscape, but the cultural agenda as well. His pitching of the PC vs. Mac debate has split the world into two camps. As one likes to describe him, Jobs doesn't just sell computers; he sells an experience. A new book which has just come out is worth a read. The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs argue that Jobs' successful not only because of his visionary appeal of Apple's products, but ultimately his ability to create elegant presentations that are meant to inform, educate, and entertain - his ability to sell himself as a brand. An Apple presentation has all the elements of a great theatrical production—a great script, heroes and villains, stage props, breathtaking visuals, and one moment that makes the price of admission well worth it.

Take a look at Jobs' presentation of the 2001 iPod, long before it gained the foothold of our musical and cultural lexicon - Jobs doesn't just deliver, he performs. His words dances across the stage like an actor's - and we all know he's having fun doing it. Carmine Gallo's book is an addictive read after the lull of the holidays. Perhaps it is as important for librarians and information professionals as any, as presentations form the crux of their work. Steve Jobs' skills at articulating himself is a defiant reminder to how we can all work on effectively communicating to our audiences what we really need to say.

Act 1 - Create the Story

Scene 1 - Plan in Analog

Scene 2 - Answer the One Question That Matters Most

Scene 3 - Develop a Messianic Sense of Purpose

Scene 4 - Create Twitter-Like Headlines

Scene 5 - Draw a Road Map

Scene 6 - Introduce the Antagonist

Scene 7 - Reveal the Conquering Hero

Intermission 1 - Obey the Ten-Minute Rule

Act 2 - Deliver the Experience

Scene 8 - Channel Their Inner Zen

Scene 9 - Dress Up Your Numbers

Scene 10 - Use "Amazingly Zippy" Words

Scene 11 - Share the Stage

Scene 12 - Stage Your Presentation With Props

Scene 13 - Reveal a "Holy Shit" Moment

Intermission 2 - Schiller Learns From the Best

Act 3 - Master Stage Presence

Scene 14 - Master Stage Presence

Scene 15 - Make It Look Effortless

Scene 16 - Wear the Appropriate Costume

Scene 17 - Toss the Script

Scene 18 - Have Fun

Encore - One More Thing . . .

Lawyers and Web 2.0

In an article in Lexpert, considered the authoritative source for the latest news and information on the business of law, Marzena Czarnecka writes,

Lawyers have been cautious about using social networking but are gradually embracing the use of social sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Web 2.0 continues to challenge lawyers as they realize that opting out of this new system of connection may equal opting out of business

In fact, lawyers are often behind the curve, as not only are they a very traditional and conservative group with new tools and media, they don't have much incentive to being early adopters. Very much a contrast to libraries, law firms rarely adopt technologies until clients adopt them. There are a few early tech adopters, such as James Hatton and the Tory's Law Firm Youtube page, who experiment with using Web 2.0 among the up and coming.

Slaw.ca is an interesting example. Law professor Simon Fodden of Osgoode helped form Slaw.ca which is a Canadian co-operative weblog about any and all things legal. In its four years of existence, its audience has steadily grown to include hundreds of practicing lawyers, legal librarians, legal academics and students with an aim to share knowledge, offer advice and instruction, and occasionally provoke.

Perhaps the most important lesson here? Librarians are creative innovators. As Slaw.ca shows, the blog initially had a 'library' bend to it as law firm librarians, frequently the leaders in communication and information technology adoption at law firms, helped shape the development and direction of the blog. They remain key contributors and readers even though Slaw.ca's constituency and reach broadened. One of these innovators is Connie Crosby, who has started her own consulting company. It goes to show that intense information-driven industries, such as law, engineering, or whatever it may be, need to work hand-in-hand with librarians in the new social web.

Donate a Brick to Build a Refugee Camp Library

Seasons greetings everyone. This holidays, as last year's, as you are enjoying your Christmas at home, please take some time in considering contributing to a worthwhile campaign. Can you help build a refugee camp library? For $2 you can, and you can even turn your donation in honor of someone into a last-minute holiday gift.

Book Wish Foundation's holiday campaign for 2009 asks book lovers everywhere to contribute one of the 5000 bricks we need to build a library for Darfuri refugees in eastern Chad. Since Dec. 5, it has raised raised 821 bricks, 16% of its goal. Please join the effort, even with a single brick, by visiting: http://bookwish.org/library-builder

Please share with your friends and, especially, on Twitter. Book Wish can easily reach its goal if many people each give a little, so please spread the word if you have a moment during this holiday season. To make your donation a gift, make sure you fill in your honoree's email address in the donation form. Book Wish will then notify him/her, sending details about the project and a link to videos from the refugee camps where Book Wish works (you will receive a copy of the email).

Books for Darfur Refugees certainly appreciate your helping to spread the word, too. It is a 100% volunteer staffed; 100% of funds raised by this campaign for direct book related aid for Darfur refugees. The good news story here is the inspiration of Darfuris who self-organized their own English classes in refugee camps. For example, they view learning English as their "road to freedom."

Social Media in Academic Libraries

I recently presented on social media in academic libraries at the SLA Western Chapter's Annual General Meeting on a panel with social media expert Rob Cottingham. (See above for a preview of Rob in action). Personally, this was one of the most rewarding panels I've been one as it bridged the two worlds of academic and corporate libraries. We touched on issues that are relevant to both types of settings: how is social media faring in the world of information professionals? Here are some thoughts of the evening:

(1) Librarians Are Only Using Social Media Among Themselves - A common argument is that only librarians care about these social media tools. Can librarians ever measure the ROI on social media? If the average Twitter user is 31 years old, then why would it be used for outreach with a non-Twitter using college audience? Are social media tools used among librarians for their own amusement? There are two parallel themes here: librarians are even better connected to each other in the social web - so wouldn't that mean social media offers distinct advantages? Second, if statistics show that social media (like Youtube, Facebook, and Flickr) is heavily used, then why wouldn't librarians use them for outreach? Wouldn't it be an opportunity otherwise missed if unexplored?

(2) Small Special Libraries Are Understaffed - It's easy for large libraries and institutions to implement Web 2.0 technologies and policies, but many smaller institutions can't afford the manpower to consistently adopt such standards. It's important not to spread ourselves thin. However, great challenges offer greater opportunities. Social media flattens the information landscape, and outreach tools such as Twitter and Facebook bring branding where none exists before. It's a matter of how one uses such technologies that maximizes their exposure.

(3) Generation Y Is Important - Much has been written about this generation born post-1980's. It's crucial to note that our upcoming wave of students, colleagues, and staff will be from this generation. Technologically sophisticated, well-connected on the social web, entrepreneurial, and oftentimes, impatient. It's these qualities which will define how information professionals will align their programs and services. This is important for all librarians: academic, public, and special.

Are We Getting Stupider or What?

In one of the long-standing intellectual pillars of publishing, the Atlantic Monthly has recently came out with an article, Is Google Making Us Stupid? which continues the debate whether the computer age has indeed resulted in our over-reliance on compact, readily-available information.

As Nicholas Carr believes, we’re simply decoding information as we scan text on the web. For probably many of us like him, deep reading of densely formulated text has become a struggle. But here’s another worry that Carr ponders: the web’s simplification of information decoding has ultimately reduced our ability to think deeply as well. Our brains are so used to reading short blog posts or text messages under 140 characters that we’ve no longer the time nor patience to thoughtfully carry out our thoughts cogently. As Carr puts it:

Our ability to interpret text, to make the rich mental connections that form when we read deeply and without distraction, remains largely disengaged.

However, we’ve been paralyzed with fear about technological advancements since the earliest days of thought: Plato feared that writing would cause our memorization capacities to fade; Gutenberg’s press would lead to intellectual laziness; and thinking changed as Nietzsche’s words morphed from rhetoric to telegram style.

On other extreme end is futurist Jamais Cascio, who argues that “Google isn’t the problem; it’s the beginning of a solution.” Indeed, with intelligence augmentation, new technologies would be able to “filter” what we are interested in; and seamlessly tailor our information absorption according to our needs. This opposite end of the spectrum argues that civilization requires diversity and innovation – and technology is a means to that end. Information professionals must be aware of this dichotomy: when much information is too much information? As Herbert Simon once said, "wealth of information creates a poverty of attention." How can we scan when we must interpret and decode?

Web 2.0 Five Year Anniversary

As we approach the six-year mark from the original Web 2.0 thesis, Tim O'Reilly and John Battelle come together in a refocusing session of where the social web is going. Once applications live in the cloud, the key to success will be harnessing network effects so that those applications literally get better the more people use them. In the recent Web 2.0 Summit, O'Reilly and Battelle penned a white paper which they argue,

today we see that applications are being driven by sensors, not just by people typing on keyboards. They are becoming platforms for collective action, not just collective intelligence. The "data shadows" that people and things leave in cyberspace are becoming richer and deeper, and are being exploited in new ways. All this is adding up to something profound and different. When web meets world, we get Web Squared.

1. Sensory Input - We're not searching via keyboard and search grammar; we're talking to and with the Web. With new search applications such as Google's Mobile App for the iPhone, speech recognition is detected as soon as the application detects movement of the phone to the ear. The Web is growing, and is to the point of getting smart enough to understand things without us having to tell it explicity.

2. Implied Metadata - Because the Web is "learning," meaning is being learned "inferentially" from the body of data each day, and speech recognition and computer vision are examples of this kind of machine learning. The Web 2.0 era is about discovering such implied metadata, and then building a database to capture that metadata and fostering an ecosystem around it.

3. Information Shadows - Real world objects have "information shadows" in cyberspace. Because of sensor applications like the iPhone's, a book that has information shadows on Amazon, Google Book Search, LibraryThing, eBay, Twitter, and in a thousand blogs.

4. Digital Returns to the Physical - As a result, these shadows are linked with their real world analogues by unique identifiers: an ISBN, a serial number, etc. Real-world objects can be "tagged" and its metadata on the Web. Libraries have long been innovators in this field (as information managers), with some cataloguing systems based on the idea of FRBR, which represents a holistic approach to retrieval and access as the relationships between the entities provide links to navigate through the hierarchy of relationships.

5. Rise of the Real-Time - The Web has become a conversation - meaning, search has gotten faster. Microblogging (such as Twitter) has required instantaneous updating -- a significant shift in both infrastructure and approach. Search has become real-time and human participation has added a layer of structure (and metadata). This new information layer being built around Twitter could rival existing services such as search, analytics, and social networks. Moreover, real-time is not limited to social media or mobile. As the authors point out, Walmart has been doing such instantaneous information cascading for many years: real-time feedback (from customers) drive inventory. As a "Web Squared" company, its operations are infused with IT, and innately driven by data from their customers -- the physical being driven by the digital and vice-versa.

What does this all mean? Librarians have a role to play. We've been doing it for years with FRBR and RFID. It's time we turn the page and write the first sentence for this new Web.

The Facebook Era

Clara Shih is a rising star in the social media world. The Facebook Era is a new technology model, way of thinking, and cultural phenomenon. Whereas the last decade was about the World Wide Web of information and the power of linking web pages, today, we are seeing a World Wide Web of people emerge. I think Shih introduces some interesting concepts to the social media hemisphere:

1. The Social Graph -- Called the fourth revolution of "social computing", the social networking movement has blurred the lines of the private and the public, a movement that afffects us all personally first, professionally second -- it ultimately blends the old dichotomies of the personal and the professional.

2. Social Sales -- The social web has become one large Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. Social networking businesses and organizations to view profiles of their accounts, capture deal information, track performance, communicate with contacts, and share information internally. As a result the social CRM becomes a bidirectional relationship between vendor and customer.

3. Social Capital -- the social graph reaches far beyond technology and media. It is one of the most signficant sociocultural phenomena of this decade. Weak ties used to require a lot of effort to sustain; however, with the social web, people now are accustomed to accumulating and never losing contacts throughout the rest of their lives

Clara Shih became an important name in corporate social networking when she developed Faceconnector (initially named Faceforce) in 2007, which was the first business application on Facebook. The application integrates Facebook and Salesforce CRM, pulling Facebook profiles and friend information into Salesforce account, lead, and contact records. Although the book is aimed at the business and technology, it is also has an intellectual premise about a sociocultural transformation that requires a change in our thinking and a new language to articulate our strategies and observations.

It will be interesting to see the continued impact of the The Facebook Era in the upcoming years as social media is still ever-evolving. Although it is a required textbook for the Global Entrepreneurial Marketing course at Stanford and social media course at Harvard Business School, there's no gurantee that these tools will continue to dominate.

ASIS&T and Historians of Information

Thomas Haigh is one of those rare individuals who speak elegantly, and write brilliantly interesting stories that superimpose very uninteresting topics in a thoughtful, academic manner. Not a librarian or LIS practitioner by trade, Haigh is actually a(n) historian by training and have taught an eclectic collection of subjects over the years. But now he teaches at the University of Wisconsin's School of Information Studies program. Haigh's panel challenges the historiography of information science, arguing that much is lacking due to the fact that information science poorly focuses on the training and engagement of historical topics. He argues, convincingly in my opinion, that the history of information science is actually written more succinctly and richly by those outside of the field itself.

On Day 2 of the The American Society for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T) in Vancouver, BC (Thriving on Diversity - Information Opportunities in a Pluralistic World),I attended the panel, New Directions in Information History which included Haigh, Geoffrey Bowker, William Aspray, and Robert Williams. Haigh caught my attention the most as he challenged (often to an uncomfortable audience of LIS practitioners) thesocial and philosophical issues around technology, and in the relationship between the world of code and world of people. Haigh was trained in the History and Sociology of Science department at the University of Pennsylvania where he eventually became an historian specializing in 20th Century America, in the history of technology and in the social history of work and business.

Haigh is currently delving into the social history of the personal computer, where he argues that despite the shelves of books on the history of the PC, there has been "no serious historical study" of how people used their computers or why they brought them. In my session, Haigh was confronted heatedly about his argument that the history of information science is often weak and incomplete as information technology experts and scientists fail to capture the historical, social, and cultural contexts of proper history writing. Haigh touches on this briefly in his article, Sources for ACM History: What, Where, Why. It was very interesting seeing the giants of LIS such as Michael Buckland and Marcia Bates in the room debating with Haigh's externalist vision for historical inquiry of information science -- and is perhaps a microcosm of the state of the field today. Alas, the debate rages on.