[Web4lib] Fwd: [CIRCPLUS] Student admits he lied about Mao bo ok

[K.G. Schneider]

> And then there are all of the incredibly gullible librarians from ALA
> on down to us "regular folks" who got their knickers in a knot without
> even investigating further.  We should all know that things aren't
> true "just because they appear in the newspaper".
> 

Far be it from me to leap in to defend "ALA on down," but what I saw for the
most part was careful, watchful waiting; intelligent discussion and indepth
fisking; and some rather resourceful independent deerstalker-cap activity
from erstwhile cub reporters. I only saw one or two blogs that reported the
newspaper article without at least one caveat and a side dish of skepticism,
and I only read one or two list posts asking Why ALA Wasn't Doing Anything. 

ALA, in fact, kept its knickers rather loose through the whole incident.
LibraryLand and the biblioblogosphere did well on this issue, in my opinion
(though you may have seen some Chicken Little activity I missed). 

The sad part is we live in a world where we aren't even surprised by the
idea that the Feds would monitor a student's reading habits or be able to do
so without us knowing they are doing it; and equally sad as well that we
would never say "but overall, library systems are far too secure for THAT to
ever happen." 

Karen G. Schneider
kgs at bluehighways.com