Volume 46, Number 6 - November/December 2022
EDITORIALFrontLines Page 4 It's been a good ride, but now it's over. This is the last issue of Online Searcher. By Marydee Ojala DEPARTMENTSPage 8 Search Engine Update Page 27 Conference Corral IFLA Drama in Dublin FEATURESPage 10 Librarian Amy Affelt explains how "counter-disinformation litigation" brings the fight against disinformation and malinformation to the courts. Suing those who spread false information augments the longtime efforts of librarians' evaluation methods, tip sheets, and critical thinking skills. She provides hints on how to research court cases. By Amy Affelt Page 16 Looking for Book Recommendations Online Finding your next great book to read or recommending a book to library patrons and users, not to mention friends and family, is part and parcel of our profession. Barbie Keiser highlights some newer tools from GoodReads, Ingram, and—take a deep breath—TikTok, along with lesser-known sites that surface a wide variety of books for readers at all levels. By Barbie E. Keiser Page 23 Stepping Outside Our Bubble: The Media and Information Literacy Alliance Information literacy is not just for those in higher education. A new organization in the U.K., the Media and Information Literacy Alliance (MILA), now numbers more than 190 groups and individuals, with the goal of promoting media and information literacy in the U.K. as a fundamental building block for an inclusive, democratic society. By William Badke COLUMNSInternet Express Page 30 The Gemstones Among the Junk: Old Tech’s Unique Role in Our Modern World As Carly Lamphere notes, the one constant about technology is that it's always changing. She takes a look at how some old tech, from vinyl to DVDs and games and consoles, are finding new life in the collectibles circuit. By Carly Lamphere InfoLit Land Page 33 Information professionals advise trusting the science, but obstacles to that trust originate from the mistaken notion that science always provides absolute and final answers. Preprints that are revised after peer review and social media that challenges scientific findings don't help engender trust. The implications for online research are numerous. By William Badke The Dollar Sign Page 36 Social Search for Business Research Should you use social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, and Quora for business research? Marydee Ojala opines that they will never replace standard business databases, but for some searches, may provide insights about customer behavior and company reputation. By Marydee Ojala Technology and Power Page 39 To Be Strategic in Strategic Planning Strategic planning requires a significant amount of time and staff resources to produce a thorough and detailed strategic plan. Some even wonder if it is worth doing, since some of the plan may go out-of-date. By not holding onto its strategic plan too rigidly, libraries can seize opportunities, obtain or shift new and existing resources, collaborate with available partners, and successfully cope with unplanned changes. By Bohyun Kim Metrics Mashup Page 42 Why Won’t Journal Indicators Just Die, Already? Journal-level metrics remain problematic, according to Elaine Lasda. She comments on two recent developments in the 2022 release of Clarivate's Journal Citation Reports (JCR)—the inclusion of scores for more than 3,000 arts and humanities journals and the calculation for all journals listed in the Web of Science Core Collection. By Elaine M. Lasda Hard Copy Page 45 Recommended Reading on Today’s Information Services, Cloud Computing Technologies, Open Scholarship, and Experiential Learning By Jennifer A. Bartlett Online Spotlight Page 48 Confronted with a client who preferred her gut feeling to authoritative research, Mary Ellen Bates has gone back to highlighting the quality of sources she uses to find information. By Mary Ellen Bates |
