These libraries have been around for 100 years

When Gajanan Deshmukh read about a unique meet for 100-year-old public libraries, he was determined to travel for more than 10 hours from Jamkhed in Ahmednagar district to Mumbai.

Rare books at Dadar Sarvajanik Vachanalay. More than 40 representatives from 83 libraries in the state were felicitated by the Maharashtra Seva Sangh.

Last week, Deshmukh made that long journey to the city to represent Lokmanya Taluka Vachanalay that was started by his great grandfather in 1887. More than 40 representatives from 83 public libraries of Maharashtra were felicitated by Maharashtra Seva Sangh, a cultural organisation, as part of their 75th anniversary celebrations.

“The library is very close to my heart and the next step is to computerise the library so that rare books are preserved,” said Deshmukh, who retired as a school principal in 2001 and is now involved in library work.

The oldest library was in Ratnagiri, set up in 1828 and libraries such as the Dadar Sarvajanik Vachanalay – popularly known as DASAVA - and the Mumbai Marathi Grantha Sangrahalay, Dadar east were also felicitated.

“These books are invaluable for historical research because Maharashtra and India witnessed major social upheavals in 19th and 20th century,” said Pratibha Gokhale, chief librarian, Mumbai University. “They have maps, letters and manuscripts written by thinkers such as Lokmanya Tilak and Babasaheb Ambedkar.”

Added Nandini Hambarde, secretary, Maharashtra Seva Sangh, “The event gave representatives a chance to exchange notes on issues such as preservation of rare books and financial challenges.”

Source: Hindustan Times dated 22/05/2012

CPD23: Thing 3 - Consider your personal brand

Week 2 - CPD23

Thing 3: Consider your personal brand

Maintaining a consistent image – both personally and professionally reveals the nature of a person. Moreover, it makes more sense when you are in a service-oriented profession – like ours! People almost (always) refer to us as a Librarian and most of them do not even know our names. Thus branding becomes important in more than one ways. It is up to us to decide whether we would be like to be referred to as “Library Madam” (as they call it!) or “Chinmayee Bhange”. I feel I would not mind either, although I would be elated if they know me personally!

For the Thing 3: Consider your personal brand, I am a bit thoughtful, since my online presence is linked with my library’s online presence and vice-versa. Both of them almost go together, except for the Facebook account (which I admit was linked to my personal account earlier). I am beginning to take it easy with my online presence as I feel; an overdose would maul the positive effect. I am taking to the social networking and micro-blogging sites – one at a time.

Having said that, I googled “SFIT Library” and was contented to see the results. One the first page, the first four links were though my Institute’s website. The fifth to eighth ones were my Library Blog (Happy, happy…), followed by Facebook account. Let me now reflect on the things to be considered whilst creating a personal brand.

Name Used: As a norm, I always use my real name – Chinmayee Bhange across my personal accounts. As for the library, it has always been “SFIT Library”.

Photograph: I am a bit reluctant to post my personal photo on my accounts, although this decreases the chances of identification and so I have been using Gravatar. At least my “identification type” does not change with my accounts.

Professional / Personal Identity: As mentioned already, I am thankful to myself for keeping the two identities separate.

Visual Brand: The font and the colour-combination used may vary, but I try to stick to the main theme.

TOC - Recent Issues of Journals

NAME OF THE JOURNAL	ISSUE DATE	VOL. No.	ISSUE No.
LINUX FOR YOU	May 2012	10	03
DEVELOPER IQ	May 2012	12	05
JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH	May 2012	71	05
RESONANCE	May 2012	17	5
JOURNAL OF THE INDIAN INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE	Jan – Mar 2012	92	1

New Arrivals in the LIRC - April 2012

B18840 - B18842 NETWORK SECURITY AND CRYPTOGRAPHY   By MENEZES, BERNARD DELHI/CENGAGE/2011 005.82 MEN

B18843 – B18845 & B18865 – B18867 INTRODUCTION TO VLSI SYSTEMS   By MEAD, CARVER/CONWAY, LYNN HYDERABAD/BS/1979 621.395 MEA/CON

B18846 – B18847 HANDBOOK OF TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION MANAGEMENT   By SHANE, SCOTT ENGLAND/JOHN WILEY/2008 658.4062 SHA

B18848 – B18849 STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT OF TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION   By BURGELMAN, ROBERT A./CHRISTENSEN, CLAYTON M./WHEELWRIGHT, STEVEN C. NEW DELHI/TATA McGRAW-HILL/2009 658.4062 BUR/CHR

B18850 – B18852 EMBEDDED C PROGRAMMING AND THE ATMEL AVR   By BARNETT, RICHARD/O'CULL, LARRY/COX, SARAH NEW DELHI/CENGAGE/2007 004.16 BAR/OCU

B18853 ESSENTIALS OF MODERN OPTICAL FIBER COMMUNICATION   By NOE, REINHOLD NEW DELHI/SPRINGER (INDIA)/2010 [On Display] 621.38275 NOE

B18854 ANALOG AND DIGITAL SIGNALS AND SYSTEMS   By YARLAGADDA, R.K. RAO NEW DELHI/SPRINGER (INDIA)/2010 [On Display] 621.3822 YAR

B18855 SIGNALS AND SYSTEMS WITH MATLAB   By YANG, WON Y./CHANG, TAE G./SONG, IK H./JEON, WON G./LEE, JEONG W./HEO, J./KIM, JAE K./CHO, YONG S. NEW DELHI/SPRINGER (INDIA)/2009 [On Display] 621.3822 YAN/CHA

B18856 DIGITAL COMMUNICATION: THEORY, TECHNIQUES AND APPLICATIONS   By MUTAGI, R.N. NEW DELHI/OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS/2012 [On Display] 621.382 MUT

B18857 BASIC ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING- 2nd. ed.   By NAGSARKAR, T.K./SUKHIJA, M.S. NEW DELHI/OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS/2011 [On Display] 621.3 NAG/SUK

B18858 IMAGINING INDIA: IDEAS FOR THE NEW CENTURY   By NILEKANI, NANDAN NEW DELHI/PENGUIN/2009 [On Display] 954.0532 NIL

B18859 THE SHADOW LINES   By GHOSH, AMITAV NEW DELHI/PENGUIN/2009 [On Display] 823.914 GHO

B18860 SHOW BUSINESS   By THAROOR, SHASHI NEW DELHI/PENGUIN/1994 [On Display] 823 THA

B18861 WINNER STANDS ALONE, THE   By COELHO, PAULO/COSTA, MARGARET JULL LONDON/HARPERCOLLINS/2008 [On Display] 869.342 COE/COS

B18862 A BETTER INDIA A BETTER WORLD   By MURTHY, N.R. NARAYANA NEW DELHI/PENGUIN/2009 [On Display] 330.954 MUR

B18863 IDEA OF JUSTICE, THE   By SEN, AMARTYA NEW DELHI/PENGUIN/2009 [On Display] 320.011 SEN

B18864 2030 TECHNOLOGY THAT WILL CHANGE THE WORLD   By SANTEN, RUTGER van/KHOE, DJAN/VERMEER, BRAM NEW YORK/OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS/2010 [On Display] 601.12 SAN/KHO

Versita launches largest ever Open Access journal program

Academic publisher Versita announced today the launch of a new program of Open Access journals. 100 Emerging Science Journals are being launched in 2012. The program's focus is on young and rapidly developing fields of science, which have not yet been covered by a designated journal. The emerging topics have been identified in Life Sciences, Chemistry, Medicine, Physics and Mathematics.

The Emerging Science Journals program has already won support in the research community. Many distinguished scientists have become members of the editorial boards of the journals – among them Sir Harold Kroto, Professor at Florida State University, 1996 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry; most recent Medicine or Physiology Nobel Prize Winner – Prof. Jules A. Hoffmann or one of world's top chemits – prof. Didier Astruc.The journal editors hail from the world’s most prestigious universities and research institutes, such as Harvard University, University of California, Berkeley, Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), University of Cambridge, or Max Planck Institute.

One of the main reasons of this outstanding support is the Open Access publishing model, which provides free and unlimited access to the journal articles for all interested readers. In view of Academic Spring – and with Open Access gaining a momentum across scholar communities worldwide - Versita is not planning any publication fees for the first two years. Still, the journals will use sophisticated online submission and hosting technology solutions, and will be covered by all applicable abstracting databases.

“The emerging topics identified by Versita have all been experiencing growing interest among scientists in recent years. We believe that starting this publishing program in open access format will facilitate dissemination of the latest research results, making the journals the primary publishing options and a default communication hubs for authors writing in these scientific areas.” comments Jacek Ciesielski, founder and CEO of Versita.

Source: http://versita.com/

Book arms students with tools to fight stress

Even though I work hard, the teacher expects more of me. I am disappointed when I don’t do as well as others. I am confident about achieving my plans for the future.

Through a maze of more than hundred such questions aiming to identify the stress levels and ‘psychological self-constructs’ of students, a new book “Stressed... But Not Out”, based on a doctoral thesis, seeks to zero in on stress and tackle it among school students.

Giselle D’Souza, an associate professor at St Teresa’s Institute of Education, surveyed 1,092 Class 10 students over a two-year period for her PhD thesis. These findings, now compiled in a book, contain tools for identifying stress based on a scoring scale alongside suggestions for parents, schools and students.

The book was released last month and is likely to become available through schools from June. D’Souza has already conducted stress management workshops in a few schools.

The study found that stress scores were higher wherever scores for three ‘psychological self-constructs’ were lower: the academic self concept (sense of self-worth in academics), efficacy (sense of ability in performing any task) and locus of control (do you think you control your own life).

“This is the first such tool that has been created for the Indian context,” said D’Souza. The tools will also help zero in on the kind of stress students face: whether exam-related, achievement-related or social stress.

Source: Hindustan Times dated 3 May 2012

Cabinet to take up copyright Bill today - Indian Express

Cabinet to take up copyright Bill today - Indian Express

Anubhuti Vishnoi Posted online: Thu Apr 26 2012, 00:44 hrs

 

New Delhi : The Cabinet is likely to take up long-pending Universities of Innovation Bill and Copyright (Amendment) Bill on Thursday. Both the legislations will come with changes factoring in recommendations by stakeholders and parliamentarians.
While the amendments to the Copyright Bill will drop the controversial statutory licensing clause for radio broadcast, the Innovation Universities Bill will drop the clause to set up 14 such varsities.

The new Cabinet note will allow existing varsities to upgrade to innovation university status if they adhere to required standards. The numerical target of setting up 14 such varsities has been dropped on grounds of non-feasibility and the argument that even a few of them will help serve the purpose of fostering a research eco-system, as aimed. While the Bill, when it first went to Cabinet earlier this year, ran into trouble with 20 ministries/ departments raising red flags over a range of issues, the legislation has passed muster after being vetted by a Committee of Secretaries.

The Universities of Innovation Bill aims at establishment of varsities that will encourage superlative academic quality and research output. These will be set up either by the
government or private entities or through public
private partnerships and offer unmatched academic freedom.

The amendments to the Copyright Act, 1958, on the other hand, aim at according unassignable rights to ‘creative artists’ such as lyricists, playback singers, music directors, film directors, dialogue writers, who will be paid royalty every time the movie they have worked for is aired on a television channel. The Bill has run into a series of difficulties with clauses challenged by the film industry, book publishers and broadcasting industry. The legislation was opposed in Parliament in the last session over the statutory licensing for radio broadcast of literary and musical works.