
A new use for a figure 8 descender. For those who haven’t seen one, that’s an aluminum figure 8, used in rappelling. Or, in this case, an umbrella holder.
Jason Griffey is the Executive Director of the Open Science Hardware Foundation. Prior to joining OSHF, he was the Director of Strategic Initiatives at NISO, where he worked to identify new areas of the information ecosystem where standards expertise was useful and needed. Prior to joining NISO in 2019, Jason ran his own technology consulting company for libraries, has been both an Affiliate at metaLAB and a Fellow and Affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, and was an academic librarian in roles ranging from reference and instruction to Head of Library IT and a tenured professor at the University of TN at Chattanooga.
Jason has written extensively on technology and libraries, including multiple books and a series of full-periodical issues on technology topics, most recently a chapter in Library 2035 - Imagining the Next Generation of Libraries by Rowman & Littlefield. His latest full-length work Standards - Essential Knowledge, co-authored with Jeffery Pomerantz, was published by MIT Press in March 2025.
He has spoken internationally on topics such as artificial intelligence & machine learning, the future of technology and libraries, decentralization and the Blockchain, privacy, copyright, and intellectual property. A full list of his publications and presentations can be found on his CV.
He is one of eight winners of the Knight Foundation News Challenge for Libraries for the Measure the Future project (http://measurethefuture.net), an open hardware project designed to provide actionable use metrics for library spaces. He is also the creator and director of The LibraryBox Project (http://librarybox.us), an open source portable digital file distribution system.

A new use for a figure 8 descender. For those who haven’t seen one, that’s an aluminum figure 8, used in rappelling. Or, in this case, an umbrella holder.
I’ve been trying to find ways to enliven PatRec for awhile now, as I don’t post as much as I used to, and some of my energy/content has drifted off to other shores (Audioboo, TechSource, etc). I think I finally found a solution that I can use: FeedWordpress.
It’s a plugin that pulls RSS, and throws it into my timeline here on the blog. While I’m not going to be feeding in everything (no Twitter or Friendfeed) I do want my audioboo feed, and my Tumblr feed, to repost here. I’ll probably set up a Posterous as well to feed in, and then, no matter what kind of access I have, I can get things posted easily and quickly. We’ll see how this goes.

Testing tumble
Best bit on homeopathy and other quackery I’ve seen in a long time, courtesy of BoingBoing and Dara O’Briain. Fabulous, and I’ve got a longer list of who to put in that sack he’s talking about…
This is a panel that I was a part of at ALA 2009 on the future of mobile….phenomenal panelists. I was especially geeked to finally get to meet Eli Neiburger. Anyway, we all had something to say about the future of mobile, and what libraries need to be worried about. Watch it, and let me know if you have any feedback. I’m always interested in what other librarians think about things like this…the future isn’t certain, and it’s always possible that I’m remarkably wrong. 🙂
Here’s part one:
And part two:
Yesterday, the Louisville Free Public Library in Louisville, KY was hit with a terrible storm, and was flooded. The initial damage estimates are around $1 million, but given the pictures that were shared yesterday, I’m guessing that’s a lowball estimate. The pics are horrendous.
Steve Lawson has set up a paypal account specifically for donations going to the Library, in the name of the Library Society of the World. I’d like to ask everyone to head over to his post, and donate something…$5, $10, whatever you can afford. The people of Louisville will appreciate it.