Jinfo: Newsletter No. 272

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Editorial

By Sara Waddington

Sara Waddington This issue of the FreePint newsletter unveils ways of making the user content experience more worthwhile. The goal of automatic classification systems, which Karen Loasby examines in her interview 'Automatic Classification: A Panel Discussion', is to apply metadata in a way to make user access to content meaningful and scalable.

Automatic classification can offer great benefits in getting well-tagged content out of the door, especially where there is a need for content to be published quickly e.g. news. Karen's panel would like to see better tools with more user-friendly user interfaces and believe that it's time for automatic classification to move beyond its place behind-the-scenes to being a valuable part of how we present, organise and link information on the web, especially the relatively uncharted territory of the semantic web. The ultimate aim, they say, is for a high quality, publicly-available auto-cat service that provides web-scale identifiers.

Improving the user experience, as well as helping users to develop important relationships, is one of the goals of a good blogger, as Sol Lederman explains in his article 'Federated Search: A Year of Blogging'. His federated search blog went from zero to over 500 RSS readers in less than a year. The blog has evolved into a valuable educational resource for the library community and for others interested in the technology.

FreePint also pays close attention to the user experience. We've gradually moved from plain-text newsletters to HTML. By a wide margin, users tell us that they find the HTML versions easier to scan for what they are interested in. We're pleased to introduce this week new HTML offerings:

The enhanced Jinfo Update comes out weekly and features the latest job vacancies and latest listings of professional development and learning events. Whatever your career goals, Jinfo can support your resilience in the marketplace.

The all-new VIP Wires Weekly brings together the editorial commentary on the VIP LiveWire blog, with press release headlines from the VIP Wire. Stay on top of what the trends in the industry mean with a free subscription to the Wires Weekly.

If you find these resources useful, please forward them to a colleague. And if you have suggestions, please let us know via our online suggestion box, or email support@freepint.com.

Sara Waddington
Senior Managing Editor
Free Pint Limited

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My Favourite Tipples

By Christine Hamilton-Pennell

Christine Hamilton-Pennell

As a professional working across the fields of economic development and business research, I am always looking for sites that help in both endeavours. I am also interested in sites that deal with big ideas. Here are a few of my favourites:

TED was started in 1984 as an annual conference bringing together people in Technology, Entertainment and Design. The TED website now offers free videos of presentations by some of the world's most interesting thinkers, including Al Gore, Juan Enriquez, Jane Goodall and more than 300 others.
Flowing Data provides fascinating examples of data visualization. Posts on the site depict everything from a visual guide to the financial crisis to the safest seat on a plane.
Cooperative Intelligence is a blog by information professional Ellen Naylor that focuses on the role relationships play in successful competitive intelligence activities. Her business website offers reviews of more than 130 books on competitive intelligence and similar topics.
FITA's Really Useful Sites for International Trade Professionals is a bi-weekly newsletter that always reveals at least one site worth exploring. A recent issue included links to sites on Taiwan, summaries of trade agreements, a worldwide people finding tool and a comparison shopping site.
Pipl searches the deep web for information about people. In addition to news articles and websites, search results include email addresses, social networking profiles, blog posts, publications, documents and videos. Somewhat hit-or-miss, it can be a useful corollary to other people search sites.
Strategy+business is a magazine and website published by the global commercial consulting firm Booz & Company. It offers high quality reports, videocasts, webinars, and other resources covering a wide array of business topics - for example, corporate R&D spending around the world and digital in-store advertising.

Christine Hamilton-Pennell is President of Growing Local Economies, Inc., a company that provides training, consulting and research to communities developing local entrepreneurship support initiatives. Her primary clients include economic development agencies, libraries, and business service providers. Her special expertise is "economic gardening", an entrepreneurial approach to economic development.

Christine is the author of Canadian Business Research Resources, published in November 2008 through FUMSI.

Would you like to add your Favourite Tipples suggestions for the FreePint newsletter or write an article for FUMSI (Find, Use, Manage or Share Information?).

If so, please contact Sara Waddington at sara.waddington@freepint.com with your ideas or visit <http://web.freepint.com/go/family/contribute>.

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FreePint Bar

By Sara Waddington

Sara Waddington Tools for finding key contacts, free software for medical records, research sources and college data are hot topics on the Bar at the moment. See a round-up of recent conversations below and click through to join the discussion. Post your research dilemmas to the FreePint Bar »

The FreePint Bar is generously sponsored by Mark Logic.

One 'Pinter requests help with locating free sources which list the contact names for local authority chief executives. He also needs sources for other public sector contacts (such as the NHS).
One Bar member is trying to find any free/openware software (rather than MS Access) for keeping track of client medical records such as date of visit, symptoms, treatment and client feedback.
Another 'Pinter has requested help with research sources to size the market for business parks, industrial estates and science parks in the UK. He needs to obtain the total numbers of these sites by county.
Can you offer a Barista, who is running the Library and Learning Centre for three college level libraries in the UAE, suggestions on services that will provide research and document delivery on a fee-for-service base? Research subject areas include engineering, health, business, information technology, general education and English as a second language.
Another 'Pinter would welcome comments from the Bar on whether a particular college in the UK was teaching aeronautics engineering in the 1920s and 1930s, for a friend's eulogy.

Visit the FreePint Bar »

Sara Waddington is senior managing editor of Free Pint Ltd. She can be contacted at sara.waddington@freepint.com

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KYC regulations are serious business

VIP reviews two products that can help you maintain compliance

Plus the latest commentary from the LiveWire, an exclusive interview with Robin Bew of EIU, and more

Learn more and purchase Issue No. 63 now: http://web.vivavip.com/go/vip/

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Most Popular FUMSI Articles of the Past 60 Days:

Free to read, print, save or email to colleagues.

Find your own favourites now: http://web.fumsi.com/go/article/

FUMSI Features

FUMSI publishes articles, tools, and a monthly magazine, to give you practical help with information skills. Visit http://www.fumsi.com/

However you Find, Use, Manage or Share Information, you'll find something in FUMSI to help.

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We add new articles to the FUMSI database in each practice area every month, which are free to read, browse, email, print or save. Here are the most recent additions:

Automatic Classification A Panel Discussion

FUMSI: Manage

The goal of automatic classification systems, whether rules-based or Bayesian, is to apply metadata in a way to make user access to content meaningful and scalable. Following a recent presentation on the topic to the International Society for Knowledge Organization UK (ISKO UK), Karen Loasby interviews fellow panellists Silver Oliver and Helen Lippell on the opportunities and challenges presented by automatic classification.

WHAT'S INSIDE: 'The main barrier to successful implementation of automatic classification systems is the English language itself! The quirks that make English fantastic for cryptic crosswords are the ones that cause ambiguity, multiple meanings, and flexibility in parts of speech. Words shift meaning over time, new words come into the language, and idioms can be a nightmare.'

Read, print, save or forward this article now »

Federated Search: A Year of Blogging

FUMSI: Share

Blogging full time about a specific subject - in this case, federated search - has its share of ups and downs. Sol Lederman reflects on the ups and downs of his past twelve months as official blogger for vendor Deep Web Technologies, and shares what he's learned in the process.

WHAT'S INSIDE: 'I have to tow the middle line and keep my posts vendor-neutral. This means that, for better or worse, I can't write those controversial or gossipy posts that get people all riled up - I'll never be the Jerry Springer of federated search, that's for sure!'

Read, print, save or forward this article now »

Also recently added to the FUMSI database:

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Build Career Resilience: Get the Training to Succeed

http://www.jinfo.com/

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VIP Features

VIP publishes in-depth, unbiased reviews of business information products. If you purchase or use premium information resources, make VIP part of your professional reading every month »

VIP issue 63 VIP Magazine No.63

A Trusted Brand: Robust methodology and rigorous editorial independence make the Economist Intelligence Unit an especially trusted brand, its editorial director and chief economist Robin Bew tells VIP's Tim Buckley Owen.
Know Your Customer: Penny Crossland looks in depth at two leading due diligence services, Dow Jones Risk & Compliance and LexisNexis Know Your Customer.
Drawing the Line: Companies usually shy away from suing their own customers, but in deciding to take legal action in the US against the private equity firm Blackstone for alleged multiple uses of its ft.com log-in, the Financial Times seems to believe that a line has been crossed.
On the Grapevine: Press and technical blogs have been abuzz with news that the .tel domain has been opened up for sale to the public; and other product news.

VIP Magazine No.63 »

In the next VIP: NexisDirect and BBC Monitoring E-Mail Services

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