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Welcome to the April 2008 issue of C&RL 
News. Technology. From the development of 
the printing press to the first telephone refer­
ence service to systems like the Zatocoder 
featured on this month’s cover to Web 2.0, 
librarians have had to figure out how to best 
use new technologies to serve our users. 

A logical first step in dealing with a new 
technological landscape is learning. Librarians 
at the University of Michigan developed the 
“MLibrary 2.0” training program so interested 
staff members could discover Web 2.0 tools 
through structured play. 

A major theme of the Web 2.0 world is the 
individual as content creator and publisher. 
Daisy Benson and Selene Colburn of the 
University of Vermont took inspiration from 
the “Party photo phenomenon” and involved 
students in a promotional campaign for their 
chat reference service. At Georgia Tech, a 
contest to create short Flash animations pro­
moted the library while appealing to student’s 

creativity. Jon Bodnar, Alison Valk, and Brian 
Mathews give an overview in “Challenging 
your students.” 

Technology is also a major infl uence on 
the 21st­century workplace. In this month’s 
presidential theme article, Pat Hawthorne 
and Nicole A. Cooke use the work of futur­
ist Mark Penn to discuss “Trendspotting and 
microtrends in academic libraries.” Jennifer 
Duncan provides a closer look at the life of 
a stay­at­home worker, one of the trends 
discussed by Hawthorne and Cooke, in her 
article “Working from afar.” 

Make sure to take a look at all of the 
other great articles and columns in this is­
sue as well, including Internet resources on 
Zoology, more profiles of 2008 ACRL award 
winners, and a fascinating look at the resolu­
tion of the AAAS/ JSTOR controversy in the 
Scholarly Communication column. Enjoy! 

—David Free, editor-in-chief 
dfree@ala.org 

April 2008 193 C&RL News 

mailto:dfree@ala.org