Table of contents: issue49

Book Review: Essential Law for Information Professionals

editor — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Stuart Hannabuss picks another winner but wonders whether legal essentialism is enough for information professionals.

When you see a retail centre in a town, it is natural to wonder how central it really is : is it merely a claim? So when words like 'essential' appear in book titles, we again wonder whether it is really so. Years of publishers' blurbs and puffs induce irony, especially as we look along shelves of books with similar titles (and claims), above all for students and young professionals - essential psychology, essential statistics, essentials for Continuing Professional Development, essential law.

Book Review: Ambient Findability

editor — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Emma Tonkin reviews a book with interesting content despite a few rough edges.

Ambient Findability is to all external appearances an O'Reilly book. It boasts the familiar line drawing of an animal, on this occasion a Verreaux's sifaka, a large and engagingly thoughtful-looking lemur. Judging the book by its cover would suggest that it be placed on the shelf together with O'Reilly's classic line of reference books, upon which developers all over the world depend for sparsely presented, accurate information and advice. But this book is of a different breed.

Book Review: Teach Beyond Your Reach

editor — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Lina Coelho looks at this Instructor's guide to developing and running successful distance learning classes, workshops, training sessions and more.

One of the things that makes the author of this book particularly well-qualified to write on the subject is the fact that she had to overcome her own scepticism of distance learning in the course of gaining her creative writing degree. Robin Neidorf has since built a successful business, Electric Muse, which is dedicated to providing high standards of online learning through training and related services.