Miss Marple, Sherlock Holmes? –What kind of ILL detective are you?

                                

Anyone who is a fan of fictional detectives will know that David Suchet is hanging up his famous moustache and giving his little grey cells a much earned rest as he bids a farewell to his character Hercule Poirot.

 I am a bit of a fan of detective stories in general and I always enjoy the way the detective unravels all the evidence and finds things that no-one else seems to find. I also realised that this is why I enjoy my work in interlibrary loans because sometimes I get to be the detective. A reader brings in an obscure citation or half a citation and says ‘this is vital for me, please can you try and find it’. And then you’re off on your own detective adventure, searching databases, sometimes even trying to track down the whereabouts of authors.

 It is always both satisfying and gratifying when you find an item for a reader that is from half way across the world and even better when the other library says ‘yes of course you can borrow it’. Sad case though I might be:  it always makes my day. Just this week we received four photocopies of chapters from an obscure proceedings, only available in the Czech Republic. It’s really great to see an international spirit of co-operation in interlending.

Anyway must get back to work- have just received some interesting items from a mysterious place called Boston Spa :)

   

 

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/ollieolarte/3028314931/">olarte.ollie</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">cc</a>

Marketing our Service...... Cardiff Met style!

Marketing our Service..................Cardiff Met style!

I'm always looking to market the service in a more streamlined & professional manner, at the recent FIL Conference I was able to see the excellent products that REP Industries offer to the Inter Library Loans Community - and was particularly taken with the book straps.

On return to work, I made a case to my manager and was able to secure funding for a batch of the book straps. We had recently gone through a name & logo change so I consulted with my colleagues in our Creative Services department who provided REP Industries with the correct image for our strap, the result is below:

I have to say, I'm really impressed with the quality of the product and the service we received from REP Industries.

FIL related news now, we had our first 'newly formed' committee meeting back in October in Birmingham, with planning for Interlend14 high on the agenda. I'll say no more as Su Fagg is heading up the conference team and she can update you on all things Edinburgh when we have more news to share.

We're also planning some changes to the FIL Newsletter - but I'll let Tracey the Newsletter Editor fill you in on those.

FIL @ BL St Pancras is just over a week away, unfortunately I'm unable to attend as it's Mr L's big 40 birthday! What better way to celebrate than to go here :-)
However I digress, those attending the afternoon event may catch a glimpse of a new & quirky initiative that FIL is going to be working on over the next few months, I can't say more than that at the moment but for those attending FIL @ BL St Pancras I'd be interested to know your thoughts! I hope you all enjoy the day!


Enough from me, time to find my Minnie Mouse ears!

Marie
FIL Chair

13th IFLA Interlending and Document Supply Conference

Last week I travelled to Beijing to attend the 13th IFLA Interlending and Document Supply Conference.  It was a three day event held at Peiking University.  The event was hosted by China Academic Library and Information System (CALIS) who provided a consistently welcoming and professional experience for those in attendance. I will be writing a full report of the conference that should be published in the FIL Newsletter (with the editor's blessing).  The conference was a great way to learn more about interlending practice, developments and issues.  22 papers were presented with a reasonable number of these being speakers from China.  This provided a fascinating insight into the world of Chinese interlending, systems and collection development.  There were also speakers from Italy, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Canada, USA, Germany, Australia and elsewhere. Translations of all presentations were also provided in Chinese as an abstract by the presenter (or for those that couldn't speak Chinese - a translator). In all, 150 participants attended from 20 countries. It was a great opportunity to share perspectives and thoughts.  It became very apparent to me by the end that  international interlending is very varied and as much as we share some common practices, we share as many (if not more) different ones .

For those able to stay over on the Saturday there was the opportunity to visit the Great Wall of China. 

The conference website has abstracts, presentations (ppt.) as well as photos.

http://ilds2013.calis.edu.cn/

As a member of the IFLA Document Delivery and Resource Sharing Standing Committee I seek to engage the committee with the interests of FIL and the UK interlending community in general.

 

 

 

Well, it was Exec Committee in Birmingham this week. We spent most of the meeting planning Interlend 2014. Edinburgh will make a brilliant venue!

Let us know if there’s something you would really like to see featured, and watch this space (and all the other channels) for announcements of KeyNote Speakers, calls for papers and, most importantly, the booking forms!

Even as I type, one of the committee, Mark, is attending the IFLA conference in Beijing; another reason to consider joining us when places become available.  Some committee members do come to the end of their terms of office next June.

I took the opportunity of being in Birmingham to return to the new public library there, and visit the areas I didn’t manage when there for the CILIP AGM last month. Although it was overcast for this visit, so the views from the top weren’t as good as before, I was able to see the restored Shakespeare memorial room, the amphitheatre and Children’s library.  Lots of interesting spaces, with some very funky furniture throughout the building! I can see it becoming a place to visit at every opportunity as there is so much to see, and different exhibitions throughout the year.

Visit http://www.libraryofbirmingham.com/  for more details.

 

Document delivery, sharing books and rhubarb and custards...

Well it’s Welcome week here at the University of Reading so I’ve not actually been doing a great deal of inter-library loans related work the last few days. I’ve been helping new students find their way around the Library, running some welcome talks and tours of the Library, handing out freebies at the Library fresher’s fair and generally losing my voice from talking lots! To relieve my throat I’ve gone all olde worlde sweet shoppe and started eating these;

As part of our welcome talks and tours we explain how our holds system works (all the copies of a book are on loan, you place a hold on it, the Library recalls it from the person who has it on loan, they return it and we reserve it for you - join in if you know the words…)

The simple message of this system is - the Library is all about sharing things, if 200 students all need the same book, the Library is here to help share out the copies so everyone gets an opportunity to use it.  

The sharing ethos which is so fundamental to how a library works is also the baseline of interlending and document supply - we share materials with each other and with libraries all over the world so that our readers can get what they need. Having worked in inter-library loans for a few years now, I always think that fellow interlenders are the epitome of this libraries / sharing ethos. Not only do we share our materials but we also exchange information, whether it be about our services, systems or processes - interlenders like to talk about how we work.

The FIL committee are here to facilitate all this sharing - it’s always good to see colleagues chatting and sharing ideas at our events and there’s another opportunity coming up soon at our FIL@BL St Pancras day in November. Writing something for our newsletter is also a great way to share your methods with the community. And last but not least, don’t forget the FIL members forum - it’s there for you to discuss ideas and exchange practical tips - go on, do what you do best!

Anyone for a boiled sweet?

Natalie GuestFIL Membership Secretary