Ellen McGrath writes:

Brian Striman mentioned the "So You Wanna Be a Writer ..." session presented at AALL in Baltimore in July. I now have a copy of the program tape which I am willing to lend, so please contact me if you are interested.

As I write this in late October, I have recently returned from my chapter annual conference (ALLUNY). In more than one session, the mantra was repeated that one should contact our chapter newsletter editor if s/he is willing to write for the newsletter and that any type of submission is welcome. So don't forget about your chapter newsletters, where I am willing to bet, the same holds true.

I was disappointed when I returned from Baltimore to discover that the LAW-TECH listserv had died. The listowner, Michael Cassidy, explained to me that this occurred for various technical reasons. I really liked the idea that I could reach other law technical services librarians on a listserv, and I did try to use it frequently to gather feedback on particular legal cataloging and/or processing questions I encountered in my daily work. I am not sure others felt the same way that I did and LAW-TECH was not utilized enough, in my opinion. But there had actually been discussions in Baltimore about using LAW-TECH more, so perhaps the need does exist. Anyway, this could be viewed as a "publishing" opportunity, if someone is willing to get another listserv off the ground. Just a thought ...
See WebMaster note at end of article for information on the new LAW-TECH listserve

Moving right along, I have a lot of colleague publications and publishing opportunities to highlight in this column, so I will get right to it.

Recent publishing accomplishments of our technical services colleagues include, in a non-law forum, Alva Stone's article "Up-Ending Cutter's Pyramid: The Case for Making Subject References to Broader Terms, " published in Cataloging & Classification Quarterly v. 23, no. 2 (1996): pp. 5-16.

I am very happy to say that I didn't have to go far to encounter lots of others in our own Law Library Journal and AALL Spectrum:

» "Managing the Boss" by Janis Johnston, LLJ v. 89, no. 1 (Winter 1997): pp. 21-29.

» "Use Study of OCLC Cataloging in an Academic Law Library" by Julie Thomas, LLJ v. 89, no. 1 (Winter 1997): pp. 31-40.

» LLJ v. 89, no. 2 (Spring 1997), the article "A Day in My Law Library Life, Circa 1997" includes the essays of at least seven (by my count) technical services law librarians: Ladd Brown, Anna Belle Leiserson, Carol Avery Nicholson, Janice Shull, Alva Stone, Brian Striman, and Leonette Williams.

Vol. 2, no. 2 (October 1997) of AALL Spectrum was full of goodies :

» "Exploring the National Digital Library: A Day at the Library of Congress" by Wendy Nobunaga, p. 13.

» "We Don't Need It, We Can't Afford It, Shut Up, Go Away" by William Benemann, p. 14.

» "1997 Annual Report of the AALL Representative to the Serials Industry Systems Advisory Committee (SISAC)" by Joan Liu and Nonie Watt, p. 24.

» On p. 25, Peter Beck, Editor of the Spectrum details "General Information for Contributers." Peter encourages us to take the plunge and write, then submit a piece to him. He gives tips on how to approach it best for this particular publication and he advises potential writers to communicate with him early on in the process.

I must say I was thrilled to pick up this issue and see so many pieces submitted by technical services colleagues! And they represent a range of approaches: a report of a tour/meeting, a description of daily cataloging work concerns with a plea for help in a cooperative project, and a report from an AALL rep. These illustrate quite nicely that we don't have to go way out of our way to think of something to write about. All we need to do is step back a bit, look at what we are already doing, and get it down on paper.

There are plenty of opportunities to publish out there. I know this because I have forwarded the ones I see on listservs to the distribution list (not a listserv) that I use to pass these along to those who have attended the past few OBS/TS Research Roundtable meetings at AALL. I think just since July, I must have sent along about 20-30 announcements. They are a real mix of calls for papers to be presented, for book/media reviews, and for reports of meetings attended, as well as solicitations for applicants for research awards. If anyone is following up on these and has a chance to drop me a line saying as much, I would love to know about it.

Here are just a few for which there either is no deadline, or if there is one, it should not have expired by the time you read this:

» An upcoming double issue of Journal of Library Administration will address the topic of the "blurring" of lines between public and technical services and, most importantly, the managerial issues that managers (middle and upper) are facing now and will be facing in the future as lines slowly, or in some libraries rapidly, disappear. Contact : Dr. Christine E. Thompson; 205- 348-1488; cthompso@gorgas.lib.ua.edu

» Fred Shapiro posted a call to LAW-LIB on October 17, 1997 on behalf of Greenwood Press. Greenwood is seeking an author to compile a book-length bibliography of biographical material in legal periodicals. Contact: fred.shapiro@yale.edu

» Hein is looking for writers to submit a pathfinder to be considered for inclusion in their Legal Research Guide Series. Contact: Brian A. Jablonski; 800- 828-7571; wsheinco@class.org

» The Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal is interested in publishing thorough bibliographies of publications in English on selected topics in comparative labor law, comparative employment law (e.g. job training, privacy, discrimination) and social security (e.g. pensions, benefits) as a regular feature. Contact the journal: University of Illinois College of Law, 116 Law Building, 504 E. Pennsylvania Ave., Champaign, IL 61820, Attn: Linda Payne.

» And that reminds me, I received a memo from the book review editor of our law review (Buffalo Law Review) seeking submissions; some book titles awaiting review were even listed. I think it is safe to say that other law reviews that feature book reviews would also be happy to hear from you, so keep that avenue in mind.

» One of our own, Rob Richards, is the Editor of the "Biz of Acq" column in Against the Grain and he would like contributors to his column. Rob even has a list of potential ideas already collected! Contact: Rob; 303- 492-7535; rrichard@stripe.Colorado.edu

» A special topic issue of the Journal of the American Society for Information Science on "Integrating Multiple Overlapping Metadata Standards" is in the works. Deadline: April 30, 1998. Contact: Zorana Ercegovac; 310-206-9361; zercegov@ucla.edu

» The Library Administration and Management Association (LAMA) Occasional Paper Series includes papers on topics related to the managerial aspects of librarianship such as facility planning and management, personnel, public relations, fiscal planning and management, middle management and statistics in all types of libraries. Contact: series editor, Judy Adams; 716-645-2816; adamsj@acsu.buffalo.edu

» "The Digital Libraries '98 -- The Third ACM Conference on Digital Libraries" will be held in Pittsburgh in June 1998. A lengthy call for papers, panels, short papers, demos, posters, tutorials, and workshops was posted to the LITA-L listserv on August 25, 1997. Contact: me if you would like a copy or Program Chair, Ian Witten, ihw@rimu.cs.waikato.ac.nz

» There was an ad in the May 1997 issue of The Journal of Academic Librarianship for a new journal coming in 1998, The Internet and Higher Education. It will be published by JAI Press. The editors are Michael H. Harris, Stan A. Hannah, and Pamela C. Harris. The only specific contact information given was for the editorial offices: hidakota@n-jcenter.com

Be sure to read Brian Striman's column on the Joint Research Grant on page 25 of this issue and consider applying for it! The funding of this grant by the OBS -SIS and TS-SIS definitely shows that research and publishing is a major concern of those SISs, as it is of AALL. I know there never seems to be enough time, but I would like to issue a challenge to each of you reading this column if you have never published or you have not done so recently. At least submit a brief article to your chapter newsletter in the next six months. Or better yet, follow up with one of the items I have listed above, perhaps a slightly more ambitious undertaking. As the saying goes, just do it!

WebMaster note:

Brian Striman forwarded the following to AUTOCAT on December 4, 1997:

Betty Roeske, Chairperson of the PLL Technical Services Roundtable and Leonette Williams, Chairperson of the Technical Services SIS are pleased to announced that our listserv is back.

As you know Law-Tech developed technical difficulties in April that Netcom could not overcome. Thanks to Mark Folmsbee and the Washburn servers, we now have a listserv again. In order to consistent with the listservs that Washburn already has, our new name is ts-sis. If you were a subscriber to Law-Tech, you will still need to subscribe to TS-SIS. There will be no automatic subscriptions.

Subscribing instructions:

1. Send an e-mail message to: listserv@aall.wuacc.edu
2. In the body of the message, type: subscribe ts-sis your name
3. After receiving the confirmation message, you may post messages to:

    ts-sis@aall.wuaccc.edu