Blog

4 March 2019 - 6:51am | by Jim Lynch

Cleveland Library Card

What's new in library tech! We've taken a break for a few months from our monthly collection of fun news items from wherever we find them, but we're back!.

This month we cover the coolest library cards from around the world, the state of libraries and the open data movement, a wrap-up of the 2019 ALA Midwinter Meeting, the launch of the EveryLibrary One Million Americans For Libraries Campaign, apps to better understand and control our smartphone use (which I badly need), and news about 3D-printed houses. We hope you heard it here first! We hope you enjoy our batch of newsbytes this time around!

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1 February 2019 - 7:14am | by Jim Lynch

A tired man in business suit sleeping in a Japan Railway train

If you're looking for a new theme that is a little different to spruce up your library for late winter, we modestly propose a celebration of World Sleep Day. This fairly new commemorative day was established in 2008 by the nonprofit World Sleep Society and will be on March 15, 2019.

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14 January 2019 - 5:54am | by Jim Lynch

A library patron using a mobile device near a book shelf

Here are TechSoup's library tech predictions for 2019. We forecast patron interest in controlling their privacy, particularly for Facebook, how to deal with the now universal fact of cyberbullying, graphic design trends, the state of fake news, tips on updating your media lab and makerspace and, as always, our favorite bleeding-edge tech you'll want to be super careful with. All that plus Ida Joiner's LITA Top Technology Trends Committee predictions. Get ready for 2019!

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11 January 2019 - 6:05am | by Jim Lynch

Library patrons using computers

From 1997 to 2018, the Gates Library Foundation (a program of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation) invested $1 billion over 21 years in public libraries both domestically and globally. Its investments have ensured that millions of people around the world have better access to digital tools that can help improve their lives. The program has left a powerful legacy, nothing less than bringing digital inclusion to many thousands of public libraries and their patrons around the world. TechSoup is deeply proud to have had the chance to work with the Gates Foundation to empower public libraries everywhere.

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10 December 2018 - 6:18am | by Jim Lynch

A hand pulling a page out of a book

Here's what's new in library tech this month! Library tech newsbytes is a monthly collection of fun news items from pretty much anywhere we find them. This month we cover the results of the midterm elections for library measures, offer you some free posters, highlight awesome children's libraries including Harry Potter–themed ones, provide info on what to do about patrons wanting to 3D print a working gun, showcase a fun Library of Things offer by New York Public Library, the Ilovelibraries facts about why libraries are more relevant than ever, and Silicon Valley's warnings about kids and screen time. We hope you enjoy our holiday batch of newsbytes this time around!

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6 December 2018 - 5:53am | by Jim Lynch

Library Technology

It is so fun to look back over the past year to see how well we predicted the 2018 Library Tech Trends, plus all the unexpected things that popped up during the year. We didn't do too bad. Looking back over 2018, we cover the new DigitalLearn websites, cord cutting, the Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, translation technology, and the library of things.

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5 November 2018 - 7:02am | by Jim Lynch

A hand pulling a page out of a book

What's new in library tech! Library tech newsbytes is a monthly collection of fun news items from pretty much anywhere we find them. This month we cover the inadvertent experiment in Oregon to privatize public libraries, the proposed federal copyright law that would undermine the Librarian of Congress, some heartening news and practical tips for your youngest and nonreading patrons, and the project to send a library to the moon. Improbable or not, we hope you enjoy our batch of newsbytes this time around!

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26 October 2018 - 6:32am | by Jim Lynch

Pottsboro Library and a librarian riding a bike-powered mobile library cart

A few years ago, we did a profile of the extraordinary Pottsboro Library in rural Texas, which was facing closure but got creative on a shoestring to turn things around. We recently called attention to the story again on Twitter. Volunteer library director Dianne Connery replied that a lot of things have happened since then. Here's the rest of the story of one of the most creative small libraries in the land.

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15 October 2018 - 9:11am | by Jim Lynch

A hand pulling a page out of a book

What's new in library tech! Library tech newsbytes is a collection of fun news items from pretty much anywhere we find them. We cover handy things like some new truth-seeking civics apps from the Library of Congress, the ilovelibraries free What's Your Library Worth Calculator, the free tech training resource Gail's Toolkit, now hosted in PLA, the latest on the Amazon vs. public libraries controversy, and TechSoup's own Marnie Webb on open data and how libraries serve as conduits between users and technologies. We hope you enjoy our batch for this month!

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11 September 2018 - 11:03am | by Jim Lynch

Library patron using Google Voice Typing

It's a fact. Interacting with our electronic devices by using our voices instead of typing has come of age. Voice recognition technology took a long time to mature, but it has arrived and is easy to use. Mouse and keyboard are still our primary input devices and probably will continue to be for quite a while, but speech recognition and voice input is available on nearly everything now. It's a great accessibility tool for patrons with physical disabilities. Here's a little how-to primer on one of the more universal free services: Google Voice Typing in Google Docs.

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