Some journals and ebooks on the Springer platform have become unavailable for some reason. We are currently investigating the situation. If there is Springer content that you cannot access, please consult a librarian for advice. We hope to have the problem resolved soon, and we thank you for your patience.
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BREAKING NEWS: A new Hollywood mega-blockbuster (working title: “Bookman”) will begin filming in the Thompson Library late in the day on Monday, April 1. It features the superhero “Bookman”, a librarian who does battle with archvillains “Overdue” and “The Loudtalker.” Several of the characters will be based on real-life librarians at UM-Flint.
Since the battle scenes will be filmed at night, disruption is expected to be minimal. People using the library can continue to do so, and can look forward to seeing themselves on the silver screen in a few months. They are asked, though, not to look at the movie cameras while they are filming.
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ProQuest databases are accessible again. Thank you for your patience!
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An edited message from Springer, one of UM-Flint’s major online resource providers. Please note that if you have an individual account in SpringerLink, you need to set up a new account:
We are pleased to inform you that SpringerLink is moving to a new and much improved platform. The new SpringerLink is faster, easier to use and optimized for most mobile devices. Access via [the Thompson Library] will be migrated to the new site shortly. In order to prepare you for this migration we would like to share some information with you.
Redirection and Linking:
Springer will redirect all users to the new SpringerLink upon migration. Meaning that if you try to access any Springer content within your institution you will be redirected to link.springer.com. So whether you find a Springer article on Google, via our catalog or even using an old Springerlink direct url, you will be redirected to the article on link.springer.com.My SpringerLink:
Individual accounts from the old SpringerLink will unfortunately not be migrated.You will need to go to link.springer.com and set up a new profile/account. Make sure to do this while within the institution’s IP range as you will then be automatically associated to the institution’s access rights. Meaning that remote access to link.springer.com is set up immediately.
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Today, October 3 from 9-5 we here at the Thompson Library are participating with the Libraries for Life Campaign in cooperation with Gift of Life of Michigan. This organization maintains the registry for all organ donors for the state of Michigan. Many people think that because they’ve signed the back of their license that they are organ donors, but without the heart insignia on your license, there is no official record of your wish to become an organ donor. Each organ donor can save up to eight lives. Each tissue donor can improve the lives of up to 50 people. This means that one person has the potential to impact the lives of 58 people! See the Gift of Life page for more information.
Signing up is as easy as handing us your drivers license and we’ll enter your info in 30 seconds. We have some thank you gifts as well. Hope to see you at our table today!
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If you were on campus on Wednesday, January 16, you may have enjoyed the privilege of being booted out of the Thompson Library, the University Pavilion, or someplace else, due to a bomb threat directed against the State Building nearby. I had an out-of-town meeting, so I experienced the evacuation only via email, but it reminded me of a favorite book of mine, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence, by Gavin de Becker (Boston: Little, Brown, 1997).
It’s a fascinating book that I’d recommend to anyone, especially women and parents, and is available in the second floor of the Main Collection, call number HM 281 .D36 1997. The theme of the book is using your instincts and intuition to keep yourself safe, although the relevant part here is a section (pp. 130-132) on bomb threats:
I can’t fault the administration for ordering the evacuation, because there may be crucial facts to which I’m not privy. They may also have decided that an extremely unlikely event (i.e. an actual bomb) that was potentially deadly to many was worth the trouble of an evacuation: put another way, they may have reasoned that a 0.01% chance of, say, ten injuries was an unacceptable risk.
I can’t fault this decision, but neither can I endorse it. As a society, we’ve become so risk-averse that we jump at the slightest hint of (particular) dangers. De Becker points out that “nearly 100 percent of [bomb threats] are bogus,” yet whenever some loser picks up a phone and calls in a bomb threat, hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people are inconvenienced by an evacuation. He asks, “If some anonymous caller said, ‘Listen, I’ve buried a million dollars cash in the planter in front of the building,’ would everybody from the CEO to the receptionist rush out and start digging through the dirt?”
A few years ago, a friend of mine was planning to fly to England, and admitted being afraid of being eaten by sharks on his trip. How could this happen, you wonder? His plane might crash-land in the middle of the ocean, he explained. This was a man who smoked, by the way. The odds of his plane a) crashing, and b) crashing in mid-flight over the ocean instead of at takeoff or landing over dry land were utterly dwarfed by the possibility that he would die prematurely, perhaps by decades, because of his cigarette habit. His shark anxiety was probably more in the realm of phobia (i.e. inherently irrational and immune to evidence and logic), but it seems that many public policies are based on similarly disproportionate fears of extremely rare events.
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Thanks for your patience!
On Saturday, March 24, 2012, some key resources at the Thompson Library will be temporarily unavailable. Because of an emergency upgrade, Summon, Journal Finder, Article Linker, and Easy Search will be unavailable starting at 2pm Eastern time. The estimated completion time on the upgrade is not known, but we will monitor the situation and announce when the upgrade is complete.
During the upgrade, you will be able to use all our other online resources, and easily access full text articles located in the resources you are using. However, accessing full text in other databases through links that say “Find Full Text” or “360: Link to Full Text” will not work during the upgrade.
Please feel free to contact the Thompson Library reference desk for assistance at 810-762-3408.
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Starting on Tuesday, January 24, 2012, Summon will be the default search option on the Thompson Library homepage. Everything in Mirlyn can be found in Summon. If you prefer, though, Mirlyn will still be available to search alone.
Below is a chart showing which tools to use in searching for different types of resources.
| Summon | Mirlyn | Mirlyn Reserves | Journal Finder | |
Books & other items physically in the Thompson Library
|
Yes | Yes | Reserve items only | Hard copy periodicals & journals only |
| Articles | Yes | No | No | No |
| Reserve items (hard copy & online) | No | No | Yes | No |
| Titles of periodicals/journals (i.e. “Does the library have journal X?”) | No | Hardcopy periodicals & journals only | No | Yes |
| E-books | Most e-books | Many e-books | No | Yes |
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We’ve been made aware of the fact that our alphabetical lists of resources are currently not displaying. We hope to have the problem corrected as soon as possible. The options to display in Delicious and Diigo are working, however our Netvous option is also having technical issues. Please use either Delicious or Diigo to access lists of our resources. We’re sorry for the inconvenience.
Thanks for your patience!
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Did you miss the registration table? It’s not too late to sign up as a Michigan organ & tissue donor! If you register through November 24, you can help Michigan beat Ohio State for the most registered donors. The easiest way is to use your Michigan driver’s license or Michigan state ID number. (You can also sign up without one.)
Go to http://www.giftoflifemichigan.org/become_a_donor?tag=library. Under “Where did you hear about organ donation?” choose “School/College,” and under “Click on the name below,” choose UM-Flint. The rest is self-explanatory.
An organ donation can save a life. Beating Ohio State makes life worth living!
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