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Weekly News Digest
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August 27, 2024 — In addition to this week's NewsBreaks article and the monthly NewsLink Spotlight, Information Today, Inc. (ITI) offers Weekly News Digests that feature recent product news and company announcements. Watch for additional coverage to appear in the next print issue of Information Today.
CLICK HERE to view more Weekly News Digest items.
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The Knight Foundation Looks at Americans' Attitudes Toward Book Restrictions in Public Schools
The Knight Foundation released the results of a study from the Knight Free Expression Research Series, which is produced by Knight Foundation in partnership with Langer Research Associates. The report, “Americans’ Views on Book Restrictions in U.S. Public Schools,” is based on a survey of a random national sample of 4,500-plus adults. Key findings include the following:- Majorities of Americans feel informed about book restriction efforts and say the issue is personally important to them. Still, few actively participate.
- Two-thirds of Americans oppose efforts to restrict books in public schools and most are confident in public schools’ selection of books.
- Most Americans see age appropriateness as a legitimate issue, especially for younger students—even as concern about exposure to inappropriate books is limited. Marking the issue’s complexity, trust in specific groups to determine age appropriateness is lower than trust in schools’ book selections more generally.
For more information, read the executive summary.
Elsevier and The Physiological Society Prep New Journals in the Emerging Areas of Nutritional Physiology and Precision Medicine
Elsevier partnered with The Physiological Society (TPS) to launch two journals in 2025 that focus “on the rapidly developing fields of nutritional physiology and precision medicine. These areas are expected to grow significantly and the new journals will position the partners at the cutting edge of these dynamic disciplines.”The Journal of Nutritional Physiology and The Journal of Precision Medicine: Health and Disease will start accepting submissions in fall 2024, with the first papers planned for publication in early 2025. TPS and Elsevier will soon start their search for the inaugural editor in chief of each journal. For more information, read the press release.
Grambling State University Marks the Historic Opening of Its New Digital Library and Learning Commons
Grambling State University (GSU) celebrated the grand opening of its new Digital Library and Learning Commons, a 50,000-square-foot facility that “is designed to support all aspects of learning. With more than 150 computer stations, 17,000 square feet of study space, and multipurpose space for events, meetings, and seminars, it is the ultimate intersection of academics, curiosity, and community.” There are also plans to add a variety of makerspace elements and a digital repository for student work.GSU is the first Historically Black College and University (HBCU) in the U.S.—and the only institution in Louisiana—to have a digital library. For more information, read the news item.
The Verge Explores the Future of Easily Accessible AI Image Editing
Sarah Jeong, features editor for The Verge, writes the following in “No One’s Ready for This”:Anyone who buys … the latest model of Google’s flagship phone … will have access to the easiest, breeziest user interface for top-tier lies, built right into their mobile device. This is all but certain to become the norm. … Everyone who is reading this article in 2024 grew up in an era where a photograph was, by default, a representation of the truth. … Fake was the exception, not the rule. … [Now] the default assumption about a photo is about to become that it’s faked, because creating realistic and believable fake photos is now trivial to do. We are not prepared for what happens after. For more information, read the article.
Checking In on the Aftermath of the British Library Ransomware Attack
Jasper Hamill writes the following in “British Library Reveals £400,000 Plan to Rebuild After ‘Catastrophic’ Ransomware Attack” for The Stack:In October 2023, the British Library was hit by a ransomware attack so severe that a former CEO of the National Cyber Security Centre described it as ‘one of the worst cyber incidents in British history’. Now, almost one year after the incident, the world-famous library has revealed details of its £400,000 plan to move forward from the disaster—which left it with a website that still doesn’t have a proper Content Management System (CMS) and forced the ongoing closure of both physical and virtual archives. For more information, read the article.
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Brandi Scardilli
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