This is a translation from Swedish of yesterday’s blog post by Mikael Böök on the library as publisher. Mikael is among other things involved in LibPub, IFLA’s special group in the field. The group places its main emphasis on publishing of academic texts by higher education and research libraries, even though they also visit public libraries. Mikael comments below on a recent webinar under the auspices of the special group, but asks why does not IFLA’s own extensive advocacy, especially with regard to the UN’s sustainability goals, count as publication? And why don’t librarians publish their support for the UN agreement on a ban on nuclear weapons? (that in fact won a big victory last night: «UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons reaches 50 ratifications needed for entry into force»).
The word is Mikael’s:
This sommer I joined the international umbrella organisation of librarians, IFLA. You can become a personal member there if you consider yourself able to afford the membership fee (77 euro).
As a background to my membership, a couple of years ago I decided to participate in the relatively new IFLA Special Interest Group on library publishing (LibPub).
The group held a webinar a few days ago (16 October) which I missed. But now I have watched the more than two hour long recording of this event via Youtube. The purpose of the webinar seems to have been to involve librarians from a larger part of the world than North America and Europe in the LibPub group. Thus, speakers had been invited from the Philippines, Russia, Nigeria and Turkey (see the program).
Those who do not have time to take part in the entire webinar can go directly to James «Jim» O’Donnell’s elegant concluding comments at 1:59.
Library publishing is usually given a rather narrow definition; …
