the (very) unofficial UKSG report...

I said I was only joking about a report, but here it is - with no depth or seriousness!!

The 11am train to Torquay apprently went via Turkey, it seemed to take forever. It also had the Best of British - a guy who was so drunk he could barely lift his 600ml beer can, and another guy who had a jacket over his lap, hand underneath, (doing what, I didn't want to contemplate).

Torquay was ok - if it's part of the so-called English Riviera it has alot to answer for! The murky brown sandy beach was only about 40m long. Can't imagine summer, you'd be like sunbaking sardines. Torquay was also very hilly (unexpected), and their seagulls are the size of small dogs.

UKSG was 2 1/2 days of speakers on various topics, and 4 extra sessions of your own interest. Topics ranged from relevent and interesting (digitising collections; 3 views on usage stats for online journals [impact, behaviour, abuse] - strangely interesting) - to ephemeral and pompous. The consensus was that many speakers aimed their talks at publishers rather than librarians, which was disappointing.

There was also a trade exhibition area so I went around and met suppliers (collecting free pens!). Dinner on monday had a theme of Around the World, and afterwards there was a quiz of the same theme. I'm relieved to say that I was able to help our team answer most of the Australian questions correctly - and in fact we came 2nd out of 37 teams!

Although - trust me! - at dinner I managed to offend a major supplier. Catrin and I sat between Cambridge Uni Press and Ex Libris. No problem there, except that I introduced myself to a guy from Ex Libris and he said 'ah yes, King's uses Aleph', to which I replied 'unfortunately'. He sniffed and turned away muttering 'surely not'... [Ex Libris produces Aleph, a library management system, and it's truly awful]. Catrin thought it was hilarious. Whoops....

Tuesday's dinner had a theme of Mostly Red - I went Mostly Black with a Tinge of Red. Red bangles and red nail polish - which made me feel as though I should be standing on a street corner!

The conference ended after wednesday lunch, and overall it was an excellent experience. I do have to write a real report but it won't include my thoughts on seagulls and red nail polish!