This issue was read and has been floating too and from work in my bag ever since so a rapid run through while dinner is cooking.

In the news we have the start of the regular CILIP AGM strife with various updates on planned governance changes. It was good that these were eventually balanced better though not without the usual levels of stress.

Poor old Tom Bishop from the RCSEng Library gets renamed Tom MacMillan in an item about an event on current awareness. The RCSEng have been developing a fantastic tailored current awareness service working closely with their members.

There is a press release posing as news from one of the suppliers who have developed a new ebook reader that they claim helps visually impaired readers. Standards have not always been a strength for this company so hopefully they have taken this on board for this development.

Phil Bradley talks about Vine as a means of communicating with library users. I recently saw some nice brief videos from colleagues down at St George’s.

The article on Social media risk is interesting but lacks information on how the survey was distributed which has the potential for sample bias.

The article on managing your professional online profile is a handy nag to remind me to update my LinkedIn. Setting up on SlideShare lately will also help share things of interest.

The likely creator of the short videos from SGUL features in her #uklibchat guise. I have occasionally engaged with this but it tends to fall at the wrong time for me. Hopefully this article will bring it to wider attention as it is a good forum for discussion.

The item on JUSP was a really good introduction for me to this system I was only dimly aware of in my NHS days. The idea of benchmarking is particularly appealing and something for me to pursue as part of work to improve our user insight at work.

Finally another dose in the ongoing dripfeed of articles about Chartership, revalidation and the VLE. Great to see the progress with using these tools and making the whole set up easier to engage with.

Continuing my gentle potter to clear the backlog of CILIP Updates I reach April and an issue where I was the subject of the “60 Seconds with” (CILIP login required).  This was fun to be asked to do and I had a few people get in touch about it at the time so clearly some do read it.

In the news this month were a few bits on lobbying work – a new chair for the all party parliamentary group for libraries and details of the submission to the Seighart Review.  I was glad to see a clearer position adopted on the role of volunteers.

I liked the look of Copyrightuser.org a site I had not heard of before. A good looking resource aimed at explaining copyright to creatives and the public.

I found the reporting of a survey of PMLG disappointing.  A good response rate was claimed but not quantified which is unhelpful.  I also found it hard to follow the thread of the results.  The report on development around Information Management interests within CILIP was encouraging.

A couple of tech bits – Phil Bradley reports an interesting tool for looking at twitter Gwittr which could be handy for investigating details of how people use accounts (amused on trying it that it notes I tweeted Clang quite a lot).  I should use DuckDuckGo more but the wandering lifestyle my role requires means I end up on lots of different PCs and tend to stick to the default (it does mean I use Bing a bit).  The idea of emerging from the filter bubble is appealing.

I was glad to read about the work of the Internet Watch Foundation.  Interesting to put this work in juxtaposition with the research on internet filtering in Public Libraries.  Given the bluntness of filtering tools it is a worry that these are in place at most libraries and even imposed by their ISP in some cases.  Another nail in the coffin of the digital native was the observation that some of them have no smart phone and no internet at home.

This months library envy article is the Inner Temple library – pretty.

My planned catch up with the 2014 CILIP Update backlog has been predictably knocked off track by other events.  I did also hesitate over whether I should read the new issue that has arrived so as to have current news.  Having decided to stick with the plan we find ourselves back in March with the House of Commons on the cover.

The news section announces the arrival of the Update App.  I have downloaded it but there my use ended. I think paper lends itself well to the kind of reading I do of Update.  Clickable links are appealing but as I generally read it on public transport this is not a big selling factor.  Glad to see this development anyway.

There is a fair bit of health related content in this issue.  Bursaries from HLG for Conference are a good example of the things a SIG can do to support members professional development (they also keep the costs of conference relatively affordable).  The report on the Sally Hernando awards aimed at sharing innovation and best practice in health information work across the NHS in England are also a fantastic initiative. I am one of the judges for the London area and love the insight and ideas they provide.  I welcome also the update on sending health librarian presenters to non librarian conferences which can only be a good thing for building understanding between the professions engaged in health work.

There a few reports of matters of wider interest around elending, the Finch Pilot and likely impacts of Universal Credit on public libraries. Being behind with reading meant the item on the then upcoming UKSG conference should have been too late.  However I am going to attend this conference for the first time next year so I did read it through and learnt a bit about the KBART format which I had somewhat taken for granted.

The value of a cross sector journal was brought home by the Legal Beagle column looking at embedded roles.  Questions of subject knowledge and the value of co-location are highly relevant to the liaison roles I am involved with. Co-location is a great way to really engage with users and to spot opportunities to make a difference.

The cover article on the House of Commons library was fantastic including things on authority, outreach, training and information literacy.  I liked their personal approach to new MPs and that it ended up becoming an offer to the wider group.

The two CILIP qualification articles went well together.  I plan to use the new revalidation rules over the next few days so watch this space for how it went.  The experiences of mentoring were helpful.  I think this is something where we should be able to do more through the professional body. I have felt the lack of a mentor on a number of occasions (my Chartership mentor back in the mists was a great example but was also my boss under one of the previous sets of regulations so not quite a mentor / mentee relationship). I have also seen members of my team struggle to find a mentor with capacity to take them on.  CILIP are working to offer more training on becoming a mentor which is great. I would like to see it go on and function as a wider clearing house for people to find mentors at all stages of their careers.

Finally I liked the MOOC etiquette article.  In common with many MOOC participants I failed to complete the ones I have started.  I think my failure to meet rule 5 (be engaged) meant I never really did enough of rules 3 and 4 (support others / bring gifts).  There was also just too much chat in the forums on the MOOC I took for me to engage with it.