~ One Library Will Be Awarded a Free Three-year Library Website Makeover ~

IPSWICH, Mass. — January 17, 2017 — EBSCO Information Services (EBSCO) and Stacks Inc. (Stacks) are now accepting applications for the inaugural Stacks Public Library Website Makeover Award. One winner will receive a free three-year library website makeover as well as up to $1,000 in travel expenses to attend the 2017 ALA Annual Conference in Chicago. Entries must be received by April 3, 2017.

Stacks, a hosted, turnkey web content management system designed specifically for libraries, will work with the winning applicant to create a website that offers a relevant and robust user experience tailored for their patrons and administrator’s needs. As part of their submission, entrants are asked to include information about the challenges the library administrators and patrons face with their current library website.

President and CEO of Stacks Inc., Kristin Delwo, says the new award was developed to help a qualified library create a powerful and effective website for its patrons. “The winner of the makeover contest will be able to experience firsthand, the power of Stacks. Not only will they be able to create a truly unique library website tailored to their patrons needs, but one that can be easily managed by their administrative team. We are thrilled to work closely with the winning library to create a new library website experience.”

Applicants can submit entries via the Stacks website at www.stacksdiscovery.com/makeover. In order to enter the contest, entrants must be an employee of a public library in the United States or Canada and by at least 18 years old. The Public Library Website Makeover Award will be presented during 2017 ALA Annual Conference in June.

About Stacks Inc.
The Stacks platform has supported more than 500 libraries since its first iteration in 2009, even the Microsoft Faculty Library is part of the Stacks story. Kristin Delwo, President and CEO of Stacks Inc., is a former Systems Administrator & Management Consultant for a large consortia serving over 150 public libraries. Inspired by the solutions she was able to create, Kristin partnered with her then vendor, Chad Smith to evolve the products they had built into what we now know as Stacks. The team's deep library technology expertise was recognized in 2014 when the TALOnline project was recognized with the ALA Award for Collaboration and the CLA Award for Innovation in Technology. These accomplishments attracted the last key members of an all-star team that is reinventing the library experience.

About EBSCO Information Services
EBSCO Information Services (EBSCO) is the leading discovery service provider for libraries worldwide with more than 11,000 discovery customers in over 100 countries. EBSCO Discovery Service™ (EDS) provides each institution with a comprehensive, single search box for its entire collection, offering unparalleled relevance ranking quality and extensive customization. EBSCO is also the preeminent provider of online research content for libraries, including hundreds of research databases, historical archives, point-of-care medical reference, and corporate learning tools serving millions of end users at tens of thousands of institutions. EBSCO is the leading provider of electronic journals & books for libraries, with subscription management for more than 360,000 serials, including more than 57,000 e-journals, as well as online access to more than 900,000 e-books. For more information, visit the EBSCO website at: www.ebsco.com. EBSCO Information Services is a division of EBSCO Industries Inc., a family owned company since 1944.

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For more information, please contact:
Kathleen McEvoy
Vice President of Communications
(800) 653-2726 ext. 2594
kmcevoy@ebsco.com

North Bethesda, MD, January 18, 2017 - LibLime, a division of PTFS, will be participating in the 2017 American Library Association (ALA) Midwinter Meeting & Exhibits. The conference exhibit hall will be open January 20 to January 23 at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, Georgia. All conference attendees are encouraged to visit LibLime at booth #748 to see a sneak preview of our new stand alone Discovery Layer.

LibLime will be presenting our new Discovery Layer, which will be formally released in March, 2017. This new Discovery Layer will be available to all LibLime customers, but it has been specifically designed to be used by any library that is dissatisfied with their current ILS OPAC or third party Discovery service. Several features in the Discovery Layer include:

• Support for the EBSCO EDS API with sponsorship from WALDO
• Support for open access databases and independent commercial databases
• Easy access to Overdrive eBook collections including current circulation status and holds capability
• Digital object import with full-text search & retrieval
• Easy access to bibliotecha’s cloudLibrary eBook collections including current circulation status and holds capability.
• Rich social media immersion using community-based tags & reviews, and integration with social media tools such as Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, & others.

To find out more about our new Discovery Layer and to enter a naming contest to win an Amazon gift certificate, visit LibLime at Booth #748 at the ALA Midwinter Exhibit Hall. Additional access to our naming contest is at the entry page at www.liblime.com

About LibLime - PTFS
LibLime, a division of PTFS, is the global leader in providing support for open development Library Service Platforms (LSP). Rather than sell software licenses for static, hard-to-customize software products, LibLime educates libraries about the benefits of open development, enabling them to make choices about how best to provide their communities and staff with better technology services. LibLime then facilitates deployment of the LSP in libraries by providing outstanding consulting, development, implementation, and support/hosting services. PTFS is also the developer of the world’s leading content management software, Knowvation, and specializes in meeting library personnel staffing requirements, digitization and metadata keying services. For more information, see http://liblime.com or http://ptfs.com.

DUBLIN, Ohio, 17 January 2017—OCLC has agreed to acquire Relais International, a leading interlibrary loan solution provider based in Ottawa, Canada, to significantly increase resource sharing options and capabilities for both Relais customers and OCLC member libraries and groups worldwide.

Relais has been working with libraries for more than 20 years to provide solutions for the full range of interlibrary loan and consortial resource sharing services. All Relais staff members will join the OCLC staff.

“Resource sharing is at the heart of OCLC’s mission, helping patrons find and get the materials they need. Today, we not only announced the release of Tipasa, the first-ever cloud based interlibrary loan management system, but we’re now pleased to add new technological capabilities through the addition of Relais,” said Skip Prichard, OCLC President and CEO. “Relais is the leader in consortial borrowing, facilitating the highest fill rate in the industry. Together, we will combine the best communities, best talent and best solutions to serve libraries and groups around the world. This is an excellent fit for libraries, Relais and OCLC.”

Relais D2D (Discovery to Delivery) solution is the market leader in consortial borrowing, and continues to grow. It is a state-of-the-art solution consistent with OCLC’s vision for a new service to address the needs of consortial borrowing users.

“We’ve been an OCLC partner for years, and we have a strong relationship with the OCLC team,” said Clare MacKeigan, Chief Operating Officer, Relais International. “We have been considering the long-term sustainability and continuity of service to our growing customer base. OCLC will provide a solid future for Relais and all of our current customers. OCLC shares our vision. We’re confident that OCLC is the best home for Relais, and I’m excited to be joining the OCLC team.”

OCLC currently offers resource sharing solutions on the WorldShare technology platform. The WorldShare Interlibrary Loan service provides core ILL capabilities to thousands of libraries. Today, OCLC also announced the roll-out of Tipasa, the first cloud-based interlibrary loan management system. The acquisition of Relais will provide a best-in-class consortial borrowing solution. Together, these systems and services deliver a comprehensive set of resource sharing solutions for libraries around the world.

Learn more about Relais and how it fits in OCLC’s resource sharing strategy at the OCLC Resource Sharing User Group Meeting during the ALA Midwinter meeting in Atlanta on Sunday, January 22, at 4 p.m. in the Georgia World Congress Center, Room A410.

There will be more discussion about Relais and OCLC during the 2017 OCLC Resource Sharing Conference, March 14-16, at the Hilton Virginia Beach Oceanfront in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

DUBLIN, Ohio, 17 January 2017—OCLC introduces Tipasa™, the first cloud-based interlibrary loan management system that automates routine borrowing and lending functions for individual libraries. The new Tipasa system is built on the OCLC WorldShare technology platform and takes advantage of the world’s largest resource sharing network.

“Tipasa is an exciting addition to our expanding list of cloud-based services that continues to evolve to meet the changing needs of libraries and their users,” said Mary Sauer-Games, OCLC Vice President, Product Management. “We’re grateful to the ILL community for their tremendous support and engagement in Tipasa’s development over the last nine months. Since we announced this project in March, the response and input from the community has been invaluable to our development efforts. We would not have been able to launch this system so quickly without the community’s support and involvement.”

Tipasa reimagines features and functionality of the Windows-based ILLiad service, and moves them to the cloud. Because updates and enhancements happen automatically in a cloud-based system, Tipasa requires only limited IT resources. The simple interface is easy to use, making it easy to train staff, volunteers and student assistants.

Libraries have the option to create unmediated processes to move requests to lending libraries and then to the user—anywhere, anytime, on any device—without requiring manual approval. Library users can receive customized email and text notifications, and they can access content as soon as it becomes available.

Tipasa complements a growing list of OCLC resource sharing solutions. OCLC’s WorldShare Interlibrary Loan (ILL) provides core interlibrary loan services to thousands of libraries around the world. WorldShare ILL and Tipasa are built on the WorldShare technology platform. OCLC also announced today an agreement to acquire Relais International, the leader in consortial borrowing. Together, these systems and services deliver a comprehensive set of resource sharing solutions for libraries around the world.

OCLC shared its plans to begin the Tipasa project in March 2016. Current ILLiad users will be able to move to Tipasa over time. To date, more than 50 libraries have committed to the first phase of the early-adopter program to implement Tipasa, and eight libraries are currently using the system.

“Having a cloud-based system is really beneficial,” said Jillian Maruskin, Public Services Librarian & Interlibrary Loan Manager, Ohio Wesleyan University, an early-adopter library. “I do a lot of different jobs in the library, so to be able to have the flexibility is something I’ve been waiting for.”

Learn more about Tipasa at the OCLC Resource Sharing User Group Meeting during the ALA Midwinter meeting in Atlanta on Sunday, January 22, at 4 p.m. in the Georgia World Congress Center, Room A410.

There will be more discussion about Tipasa during the 2017 OCLC Resource Sharing Conference, March 14-16, at the Hilton Virginia Beach Oceanfront in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Duluth, Georgia–January 12, 2017

On January 1, 2017, Equinox Software, Inc., the premiere support and service provider for the Evergreen Integrated Library System, became Equinox Open Library Initiative Inc., a nonprofit corporation serving libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions. This change comes after several years of consideration, evaluation of community needs, planning, and preparation. The change allows Equinox to better serve its customers and communities by broadening its mission of bringing more open source technology to a wide array of institutions dedicated to serving the public good.

About the conversion from for-profit to nonprofit, Mike Rylander, president of the new Equinox Open Library Initiative said, "Everyone at Equinox is dedicated to the mission of helping libraries of all types adopt and use open source software. We have been involved in this work for ten years now, and our move to become a nonprofit helps us further that mission. Importantly, this change also matches more closely the cooperative, community-focused ethos of the open source technologies with which we work. We could not be more excited to move forward in this new direction."

Jason Etheridge, an Equinox founder, added, "In 2009, we wrote an open letter to the community called the Equinox Promise, where we pledged to adhere to ideas such as transparency, code sharing, maintaining a single code set, and, in general, working with and within the Evergreen and Koha communities. This built on the original vision of Evergreen as software that should be open source for both philosophical and pragmatic reasons. Equinox becoming a nonprofit is another promise, one with legal teeth, where our charitable purpose is put front and center. I see no better way to participate in the gift culture known as open source, and in our Evergreen and Koha communities."

While daily operations at Equinox will not change, company leaders highlight that going forward there will be new opportunities for service expansion and enhancement, as well as creative funding options for projects that enhance library services. Grace Dunbar, Equinox Vice President, pointed out, "By becoming a nonprofit organization, Equinox will actually be able to do more and grow our service offerings to the library community. I think it's important to note we're not changing our services—we still offer a complete suite of services for seamless migration, support, and development for open source software library software. However, by making the change to nonprofit we will be able to grow in a way that does not require a merger or acquisition with a proprietary software company and will allow us to integrate more resources into our mission."

About Equinox Open Library Initiative Inc.

Equinox Open Library Initiative Inc. is a nonprofit company engaging in literary, charitable, and educational endeavors serving cultural and knowledge institutions. As the successor to Equinox Software, Inc., the Initiative carries forward a decade of service and experience with Evergreen and other open source library software. At Equinox OLI we help you empower your library with open source technologies.

For more information, please visit https://www.equinoxinitiative.org/
Equinox Transitions to NonProfit to Benefit Libraries