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FAST FACTSC&RL News, October 2007Vol. 68, No. 9 by Gary Pattillo Reading books A quarter of adults in the United States say they haven’t read a book in the past year, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll. The typical person claimed to have read four books in the last year and, excluding those who had not read any books at all, the usual number of books read was seven. The median figure for books read was nine books for women and five for men. Alan Fram, “One in four Americans read no books last year,” The Associated Press, August 21, 2007. www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/21/AR2007082101045.html. August 22, 2007 Online and offline friendships A study concludes that most people have an average of 150 people in their online social network, with a core of around five close friends. Another study confirms those findings, while adding that the actual number of close friends “is approximately the same as in the face to face world.” Of all the sites, the majority (90 percent) of close friends have been met face to face. “Face to face contact is a requirement for intimate friendships,” according to Will Reader of Sheffield Hallam University. Roger Highfield and Nic Fleming, “Facebook study reveals users ‘trophy friends,’” Telegraph.co.uk, September 10, 2007. www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/earth/2007/09/10/scisocial110.xml. September 14, 2007. OED update The latest update to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) published on September 13, 2007, contains 2,785 entries, bringing the total number of main entries in the OED to 261,120. The dictionary’s 590,653 lemmas (roughly, words and expressions that are included in the dictionary) are illustrated by 2,845,029 quotations and represent 709,136 different meanings. September 2007 revisions - Quarterly updates - Oxford English Dictionary, September 13, 2007. oed.com/news/updates/revisions0709.html. September 14, 2007 IT use among undergraduates Only 1.6 percent of undergraduate students do not own a computer. Students without their own computers reported less overall time spent doing computer work and engaging in many Internet activities. These students report, however, the same usage patterns as computer owners for the basic activities of e-mail, writing documents for class, and gaining access to college Web sites. Almost all students engage in e-mail correspondence. About 28 percent engage in blogging. Gail Salaway and Judith Borreson Caruso, et al., “The ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2007,” September 12, 2007, EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research. connect.educause.edu/library/abstract/TheECARStudyofUnderg/45075. September 17, 2007. Internet Archive to host NASA space imagery The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has announced a five-year agreement with the nonprofit organization Internet Archive to scan, archive, and manage the agency’s vast collection of photographs, historic film, and video. The imagery will be available through the Internet for free to the public, historians, scholars, students, and researchers. Under the deal, Internet Archive will digitize, host, and manage still, moving, and computer-generated imagery produced by NASA. Bob Jacobs and Paul Hickman, “NASA and Internet Archive Team to Digitize Space Imagery,” August 23, 2007. Internet Archive. www.archive.org/iathreads/post-view.php?id=144937. September 4, 2007 Gary Pattillo is reference librarian at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, e-mail: pattillo@email.unc.edu |
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