And the first paragraph after a section heading never, ever, ever, EVER indents in a properly-typeset book.

And, to Fiona — I think that’s a common perception (books are for the experts). But doesn’t blogging and writing articles and thinking about issues in a sense MAKE you an expert? I’m of the firm belief that librarians are in a wonderful position to write books, because we know how to research them and can find out what we don’t know. I wrote my first book 4 years out of library school, and don’t know that I was an “expert” on the topic. It worked out fine .

And, to Dorothea: I think they were going for a “NextGen” feel with the typography. They did ask me if an Arial font was OK, but I’m not sure I pictured the end result. What do you think of the “Accidental” series of books? I find their layouts clear and useful.

Walt: I’ve no doubt about the economics of American Libraries. If an organization is going to start asking for dues increases, though, it might behoove it to think about how people perceive one of the most visible and tangible benefits of membership. Just saying…

Judy: Exactly what I was getting at!

Thomas: Thanks for the pointer to your blog, and also for the additional insights about blogs, books, and non-English-language markets.

Blogging allows freedom of expression and tone in a way that books don’t. Blogging also allows for working out one’s ideas in writing, in a way the more straitjacketed, formal book-authoring process doesn’t, quite.

Text-artisanly rant here: blogging also allows ME to be in control of the typography. Rachel, I enjoyed Next-Gen Librarian, and its cover is great, but the interior design and typography look like something that somebody with ZERO book-design or typesetting experience knocked off in Microsoft Word.

*Please* tell ITI to find real book designers! I can even recommend a couple, who work at very reasonable rates! No, they don’t have to get a new design for every book, but some competent stock designs/templates would raise their book quality immensely for very little extra outlay.

I’m currently working on an article about the forms of blogs in LIS and books about writing projects are starting to become more prominent. Other uses include blogs as promotional tools, and an updater to published items.

I don’t know about other bloggers, but I still have this mindset that writing books is for the established, the experts, not the newbies. Which probably doesn’t apply anymore what with there being more opportunities than ever to write. But still, that thought, for me, is there.

“Writing a book helps you write anything else”

While I haven’t written a book, I did do a research degree that consisted of a 35000 word thesis, and it did help enormously with everything I’ve written since in terms of writing skills, but also helped in my day to day work with helping students to write literature reviews, use bibliographic managers, research methods etc. And yes, I have a very nice hardbound item on my shelf and at my university’s library with my name on it.

I’m currently writing a book on Library 2.0 (in norwegian for the norwegian library scene) and you can follow the process on my english language blog Librarian 1.5 http://lib1point5.wordpress.com

What you say is probably very true in the english-language area where it is possible to publish books on very narrow fields and still have a market. In other languages the publishing of library related books is almost impossible as the market is too small (about 3000 librarians in all in Norway).

In the small language areas blogs have been a great boon to library related professional writing. Finally we have an outlet that actually reaches our target audience (which might just be a few hundred people) and bypasses the paper publishing process which has rejected us.

The book can expand on the blog and vice versa. I started my blog as an adjunct to my book, The OPL Sourcebook, and to my newsletter, The One-Person Library. I got tired of happening on neat sites and not being able to fit them into the newsletter for a few months or into the next edition of the book in a few years. And, of course, if people like the blog they might buy the book and/or the newsletter.

Besides, I found out that I *love* blogging. At times it is like talking without knowing if anyone is listening, but I still like it. Not that I don’t enjoy writing books. The research is fun and, yes, it’s still a kick seeing my name in print.

So, books or blogs–why not both?

As for the slender issues of American Libraries, I’m guessing that fewer ads (and ALA’s general expectation that AL is at least self-sustaining is the reason. Unfortunate but likely. Still, a good magazine, as you say.