Tuesday 8 January 2008

CREDO Reference

I had hoped to bring you a copy of a short email that I received just before Christmas telling me about new items available through CREDO Reference. I wanted to alert you to what I think is a fantastic service -- the best reference source EVER.


However, I copied the text of the email into Blogger which proceeded to "eat" it -- and refused, point blank, to regurgitate my text. I went back to my "read emails" and, lo and behold, it isn't there either. Now I could have said, "OK, that's it, I'll wait for the next email" but no, that's the easy road out. I may be still officially "on the sick" but I'm not completely out of it -- yet.


So, what is CREDO Reference?
A portal (if that isn't too much of an old-fashioned word) to over 200 different reference "books" online.


Who can access it?
Anyone who pays a subscription -- or, in more and more instances, anyone with a library card and Internet access.


Members of Northamptonshire Libraries can search ... online reference library, containing dictionaries, encyclopaedias and other reference books on subjects varying from from history to science, quotations to music. Look up an entry in Who's Who, use the dictionaries and thesaurus to complete your crossword or view famous pictures in the Bridgeman Art Collection - CREDO Reference makes answering questions easy.


Maybe your own library service has a subscription -- if not then look at the trial, decide just how useful it could be, and lobby your library.


WARNING: Use for personal research not commercial purposes.
But, can anyone tell me where personal stops and commercial begins? This has always been a grey area. For me personal means looking at art, finding knitting patterns, solving crosswords whilst commercial is "how to build a thesaurus" and other things that I wouldn't look at if it were not for my work. Each end of the spectrum is clear but, as with the information-advice-guidance-counselling-therapy spectrum, the in-between bits are hard to define.

Red - Orange - Yellow - Green - Blue - Indigo - Violet
These colours are all clear in the rainbow but can you describe the colours where the hyphens are?

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