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Radical Reference members' blogs

Radical Reference Members: Please list your blog here, and annotate it if you like. Note: most of the entries are from 2007 and might need updating.

QUESTION: Media Email List

question / pregunta: 

!@! Possible Radical Reference Query

I've looked at bit at the site, but I'm not sure if this counts
as a "radical reference" question, nor am I sure how much it is
expected of me to include the reasons why it might be.

Query:

I am looking for an email list for the general media.

I have, of course, been able to create my own list of
the major television, radio and print media, and many
of the Internet media, as well, but I am looking from
the perspective of creating a much more complete list
to use when announcing free eBooks.

Here's the rub.

Every time Google announces a new consortium member--
the media is all over it--even if the added libraries
don't add up to that many possible new eBooks for the
average person to download.

Shortly, I am going to be sending out press releases,
this time for The Fifth Annual World eBook Fair which
promises to have about 3 1/8 million eBooks, free for
the downloading between July 4 and August 4. July 4,
1971 was the date of the first eBook, so this date is
going to mark the start of the 40th year of eBooks.

The First World eBook Fair ended up on the front page
of The Boston Globe, then The New York Times who owns
The Boston Globe, and thence to the AP, etc., and the
total sppears to have been about 1500 newspapers plus
other media outlets worldwide, around four years ago.

However, since that time we have not managed to get a
story about the doubline in size of the books' number
each year since then.

The excuse, when I get them on the phone or email, is
that this is "old news," it has been done before.

Well, it's never been done to the tune of 3+ million!

Heck, you would have a VERY hard time getting just an
eBook download of 1 million eBooks from Google!!!

OK, I've probably said more than enough for now.

Any suggestions on how I can create big media lists?

Ones that don't only include the major media?

Many thanks!!!

Michael S. Hart
Founder
Project Gutenberg,
Inventor of eBooks

ANSWER: what are blogs?

answer: 

This is a great example of a fast moving target. Under Blog, the Oxford English Dictionary says "see Weblog". The second definition of the noun Weblog is: "A frequently updated web site consisting of personal observations, excerpts from other sources, etc., typically run by a single person, and usually with hyperlinks to other sites; an online journal or diary." Their definition of the verb Blog is "To write or maintain a weblog. Also: to read or browse through weblogs, esp. habitually."

But clearly the term "Blog" covers a vast area of communication. See the results for the Google search: define: blog. In the Google Directory, the search "blog directories" gets 126 hits, many of which seem to be private companies' blogs or their directories of other companies' blogs.

You can get a sense of how varied "Blogs" are, by doing a Google web search for: "neuroscience blog" site:edu, which gets abut 36 unique hits out of 163. Many of these are extremely technical interchanges among experts in the field; collaborations on research projects, etc. To make things even more complicated, see the 16 (of about 106) hits for the Google web search: "difference between blogs and wikis" site:edu. Clearly, we do not yet have a neat definition for this relatively recent and rapidly evolving phenomenon.

Related Question

Why Zines Matter

answer: 

I think you told me you're sending her Alison Piepmeier's "Why Zines Matter" article, but for the sake of others with a similar question, I recommend it.

Related Question

articles about blogs

answer: 

Although it is old, I still think that Rebecca Blood's Weblogs: A History and Perspective is still the best explanation of what blogs do and what they mean. For something more recent and bare-bones, Walt Crawford's article Blog or wiki--which tool to use does a nice job of laying out the features of blogs (and wikis), and although it's somewhat library-focused, I think the basic information would still be useful.

I'm trying to find something that relies even less on hyperlinks, since those are frustrating without the internet.

Related Question

QUESTION: where would I find articles/essays describing exactly what blogs are (for a person in prison)?

question / pregunta: 

I'm looking for some articles and essays that talk about what blogs ARE (for a woman who has been in prison long enough to have missed the advent of blogs, myspace, facebook, etc, etc). I'm sending her Jenna's excellent "Zines are not Blogs," but I think the piece is geared more towards those who don't know what zines are, not for those who are totally clueless as to what a blog is.

The woman is reviewing a book on zines that sometimes compares them to blogs and it would be damn good if she knew what the hell a blog was. And, since there is no internet access in prison, I thought I would try to be helpful and send her some information to help her along.

Thanks!

QUESTION: Progressive/Radical Listservs, Blogs, Facebook pages, etc

question / pregunta: 

I am researching progressive listservs, blogs, web-journals, and news sources for the International School for Bottom-Up Organizing. We want to be able both to learn what people are addressing, as well as send out information on what we are doing so that there can be cross-collaboration and movement-building.

We're especially looking for groups/orientations that address or are interested in the following: anti-oppression, women-led/feminist, people of color led/anti-racist, community organizing, anti-authoritarian and are not limited to the U.S. or to english. The point is to be able to connect people who are actually doing this work, or who want to.

I know that there are millions of such resources... but getting a start would be immensely helpful- I imagine that someone has already done a lot of this work! Thanks so much!

answer #2

answer: 

I agree about the Grrrl Zine Network being a great resource, if you are indeed looking for information about print zines (In my opinion online zines or e-zines are not remotely related to zines if they even exist, but I'm a zine librarian and overly sensitive.)

You might also refer to an article in Bitch that discussed feminist zines and I believe also online publications (i.e. blogs and static sites). Eleanor Whitney. "On the Pageā€”In praise of zines: Pushing paper in the digital age," Bitch. Issue 31. 2006. If you can't track it down on your own, email me, and I'll scan it for you.

Just going on resources I know about, here is a list of Women's Studies journals available at my institution http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/eguides/womenstudies/fmjnls2.html

You might contact the Women's Studies librarian at the University of Maryland to see what resources you might have available to you locally. http://www.lib.umd.edu/guides/womens_studies.html .

The Women's Studies librarian at the University of Wisconsin has some hot resources:
Women and Gender Magazines, Newsletters, and Journals With Web Presences
More Media

The above led me to this Directory of Women's Media.

I gotta say I find it annoying that the Feminist Blogs blog aggregator blog doesn't seem to have a list of the participating blogs anywhere.

Related Question

additional blog for jenna

In case anyone cares, I've started a separate blog for my non-Rad Ref, non-activist, but generally library related posts. It's at http://jenna.openflows.com.

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