Now THIS is exciting.  Yeah yeah, they are announcing a new iPad 3 today – which many people can’t afford.  That’s exciting to some people, but what’s REALLY exciting is this: Online Newstand Project:  an application that brings the incredible content in those databases for which public libraries pay hundreds (ok, thousands) of dollars to the surface for people to “see”.  As we know, most people don’t understand what the heck a database is and as soon as we tell them there are “100’s of journals” in that “paid-for website a.k.a. ‘database”, their eyes glaze over.  Thanks to Steve Butzel, a website and database developer whose real job is serving as the assistant director at the Portsmouth Public Library in Portsmouth” for developing this tool to provide “easy, enjoyable access to popular and scholarly magazine articles by providing dynamically generated persistent links to feature length articles in each of the magazines included in the Newsstand. To read an article, all a patron has to do is click on the article they want, login at the next screen with their library barcode or student ID, and bam, they are connected directly to the article. Patrons don’t have to know what a database is or how to search one.”  Eureka!! 

Have a look at this – and imagine the possibilities. No, better yet, enable people to “see” the possibilities!