Dr. Carla Hayden was sworn in this week as the 14th Librarian of Congress. Coverage from the NY Times is here. Below is video of her speech from the ceremony which was streamed live on the Library of Congress’s YouTube channel. Congratulations Dr. Hayden!

The International Federation of Library Association and Institutions (IFLA) released the IFLA Trend Report 2016 Update discussing key issues and developments in libraries around the world.

The Pew Research Center released a new report as well. This one looks at Americans’ views and use of their local libraries.

In another case of algorithms behaving suspiciously, odd incidents of Facebook blocking content were recently reported by Techdirt.

Two stories from the Intellectual Property Desk and one from the Just for Fun Department:

• Musicians File Brief in the Blurred Lines Case, Supporting Limits to Copyright, by Ali Sternburg, succinctly explains the significance of the brief and links to it. Hat tip to the @ARLpolicy twitter feed for sharing this one.
• On Library Journal, Lisa Peet posted on the continuing saga of the illegal paper sharing site Sci-Hub, explaining the situation that lead the AAP to censure a university librarian for his comments about Sci-Hub. Many thanks to library student and MSK Library employee Kaitlin Kehnemuyi for bringing this excellent post to my attention.
• In 1975 a cat co-authored physics paper (which is now open access), according to this Atlas Obscura post. But wait- there’s more!! Read to the end for the joke from the APA.

Catching my eye as August begins…

This weekend, the New York Times will publish – in print only – an advance excerpt from Colson Whitehead’s highly anticipated novel, The Underground Railroad. More on the book, which has already been selected for Oprah’s book club, in this story by Ron Charles in the Washington Post Tuesday, August 2. Nieman Labs reported on this as well as other print features and some recent editorial changes at the New York Times encouraging print readership. While this is not a serialized novel in the classic Victorian mode, it is certainly a noteworthy event in publishing history. I am curious to see if the Times and similar publications will continue to use teasers of upcoming literature or even longer, print only stories as a way to reinforce their print products in an increasingly digital market.

Over at The Chronicle of Higher Education, Barbara Fister’s, latest Library Babel Fish post explores Playing, Learning, and the Teaching Problem. When new students arrive in an academic library setting, could teaching them what to do be doing them a disservice? There is some interesting discussion between the author and readers in the comments.