It's funny; I work in medical libraries, although I've been considering
attempting a move to regular academic libraries for a while now. In the
Medical Library Association we don't really have a LITA. We may have some
kind of technology interest group in there somewhere, but I find tech
interest on this side of the discipline to be very spotty. I approached the
responsible party at MLA about creating a technology section and couldn't
even get them to return my emails. I turned away from my AHIP (MLA's
Academy) membership a while back in disgust at some of their policies,
although before I did I noticed with some interest that you could (and I
did) get points for developing some apps or digital tutorials and the like;
nevertheless it felt very tacked on. The one case study I submitted to JMLA
(the association's main journal), on an XML/XSLT based staff list tool I
created for the website of the University of New Mexico's medical library,
was flatly rejected as being too technical for the journal.

Best regards,
*Jason Bengtson, MLIS, MA*

Head of Library Computing and Information Systems
Assistant Professor, Graduate College
Department of Health Sciences Library and Information Management
University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center
405-271-2285, opt. 5
405-271-3297 (fax)
[log in to unmask]
http://library.ouhsc.edu
www.jasonbengtson.com

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On Mon, Jan 5, 2015 at 2:51 PM, KLINGLER, THOMAS <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> ...and maybe a little influence by the current ALA membership payment
> options.  Used to have to pay your base membership and a division (or
> two?)   Recently, you can go cheap and pay ONLY the base membership cost!
>   No forced division membership.
>
> TK
>
>
> Tom Klingler
> Assistant Dean for Technical Services
> University Libraries, Rm 300
> 1125 Risman Drive
> Kent State University
> Kent, Ohio 44242-0001
> 330-672-1646 office
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Code for Libraries [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
> Roy Tennant
> Sent: Monday, January 05, 2015 11:42 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [CODE4LIB] lita
>
> Also, I would point out that libraries increasingly hire non-librarians in
> technology positions. That likely means that even if said persons might
> eventually find Code4Lib, their allegiance to a profession as epitomized by
> ALA is unlikely.
> Roy
>
> On Mon, Jan 5, 2015 at 8:37 AM, Debra Shapiro <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > LITA is now the smallest ALA division.
> >
> > Personally, as someone who’s been involved with LITA for 20 years, I
> > think the decrease is due to all the reasons Kevin cites below, and
> > also because of something of an identity crisis - related to the
> > advent of the Internet, as Eric says.
> >
> > LITA is the technology division of the ALA. *Everything* in libraries
> > is done with technology now, so ALA members who once might’ve chosen
> > to join the technology division choose instead to join other
> > divisions, related to their other interests. Look at the list of ALCTS
> > (the cataloging division) programs for any given ALA conference, or
> > ALCTS list of CE webinars, and it’s all topics that might’ve once been
> more the purview of LITA.
> >
> > Of course I ran for LITA prez on that platform 6 years ago and lost so
> > what do I know …
> >
> > deb
> >
> >
> > On Jan 5, 2015, at 10:28 AM, Kevin Ford <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > > > I think this just goes to show, with the advent of the Internet,
> > > > centralized authorities are not as necessary/useful as they once
> > > > used to be. —ELM
> > > >
> > >
> > > -- Maybe.  I think it it recession-related.  The high water mark for
> > nearly all of the groups on that list is 2007 (2006 for one or two). The
> > overall stats for ALA show the same membership pattern (increasing until
> > 2007, decreasing thereafter):
> > http://www.ala.org/membership/membershipstats_files/annual_memb_stats
> > >
> > > I'd be interested to know if LITA's membership decrease is greater (as
> a
> > percentage) than the others.  Perhaps that would suggest forums such as
> > code4lib peeled off some of those would-be LITA members.  Otherwise, it
> > just looks like a broader decline in ALA membership, probably for a few
> > reasons: fewer librarians in the workforce, fewer institutions willing to
> > pay professional membership fees, less willingness to pay those fees out
> of
> > pocket, etc.
> > >
> > > Yours,
> > > Kevin
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On 1/5/15 10:12 AM, Eric Lease Morgan wrote:
> > >>>> I’m curious, how large is LITA (Library and Information Technology
> > >>>> Association)? [0] How many members does it have?
> > >>>
> > >>> Apparently it has around 3000 members this year. I found this on the
> > ALA
> > >>> membership statistics page:
> > >>>
> > >>>
> http://www.ala.org/membership/membershipstats_files/divisionstats#lita
> > >>
> > >>
> > >> Interesting and thank you. Code4Lib only needs fifty more subscribers
> > to equal LITA’s size. I think this just goes to show, with the advent of
> > the Internet, centralized authorities are not as necessary/useful as they
> > once used to be. —ELM
> > >>
> >
> > [log in to unmask]
> > Debra Shapiro
> > SLIS, the iSchool at UW-Madison
> > Helen C. White Hall, Rm. 4282
> > 600 N. Park St.
> > Madison WI 53706
> > 608 262 9195
> > mobile 608 712 6368
> > FAX 608 263 4849
> >
>