Is the Library of Congress the Next FEMA?
Jun. 29th, 2006 09:30 pmLink from the Invisible Library blog (written and maintained by my former classmate Keith Kisser).
There's definitely a service issue going on at LC. I got in touch with one of their reference librarians (via their Ask a Librarian service) for help with a patron's question a while back. I was given links to pages I'd already found--and already said I'd found in my query--and the librarian told me to call her directly to discuss in depth. "In depth" turned out to be telling me one more time to go to pages I'd already been. A miracle of unhelpfulness, somewhat assuaged by the fact that while the LC librarian probably has more prestige than I do, I at least probably make the same salary.
I like to think there's nothing darker going on here than an ill-advised band-wagon hop. But still. Paranoia seeps.
There's definitely a service issue going on at LC. I got in touch with one of their reference librarians (via their Ask a Librarian service) for help with a patron's question a while back. I was given links to pages I'd already found--and already said I'd found in my query--and the librarian told me to call her directly to discuss in depth. "In depth" turned out to be telling me one more time to go to pages I'd already been. A miracle of unhelpfulness, somewhat assuaged by the fact that while the LC librarian probably has more prestige than I do, I at least probably make the same salary.
I like to think there's nothing darker going on here than an ill-advised band-wagon hop. But still. Paranoia seeps.