Letter from the Editor Kenneth J. Varnum 
 

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND LIBRARIES | JUNE 2019 1 
https://doi.org/10.6017/ital.v38i2.11241 

  

Welcome	to	the	June	2019	issue	of	ITAL.	You’ll	likely	notice	a	new	look	to	the	journal	when	you	
read	this	issue’s	content.	Our	helpful	and	supportive	partners	at	Boston	College,	where	
Information	Technologies	and	Libraries	is	archived,	have	updated	the	journal’s	content	
management	system	to	the	current	version	of	Open	Journal	Systems.	I	am	grateful	to	John	
O’Connor	at	Boston	College	for	his	patience	with	and	quick,	helpful	responses	to	my	numerous	
questions	as	we	adapted	to	the	new	user	interface	and	editorial	workflows.	
Columns	in	this	issue	include	Bohyun	Kim’s	final	“President’s	Message”	as	her	term	concludes,	
summarizing	the	work	that	has	gone	into	the	planned	division	merger	that	would	combine	LITA,	
ALCTS,	and	LLAMA.	Editorial	Board	member	Cinthya	Ippoliti	discusses	the	role	of	libraries	in	
fostering	digital	pedagogy	in	her	“Editorial	Board	Thoughts”	column.	And,	in	the	second	of	our	
new	“Public	Libraries	Leading	the	Way”	column,	Jeffrey	Davis	discusses	the	technologies	and	
advantages	of	digital	pass	systems.		

Peer-reviewed	articles	in	this	issue	include:	

• “No	Need	to	Ask:	Creating	Permissionless	Blockchains	of	Metadata	Records,”	by	Dejah	
Rubel,	laying	a	path	for	using	blockchain	for	managing	metadata.	

• “50	years	of	ITAL/JLA:	A	Bibliometric	Study	of	Its	Major	Influences,	Themes,	and	
Interdisciplinarity,”	by	Brady	Lund,	a	thorough	study	of	how	our	journal	has	influenced,	
and	been	influenced	by,	other	leading	information	technology	journals.	

• “Weathering	the	Twitter	Storm:	Early	Uses	of	Social	Media	as	a	Disaster	Response	Tool	for	
Public	Libraries	During	Hurricane	Sandy,”	by	Sharon	Han.	This	article	is	the	2019	LITA/Ex	
Libris	Student	Writing	Award-winning	paper.	

• “‘Good	Night,	Good	Day,	Good	Luck’:	Applying	Topic	Modeling	to	Chat	Reference	
Transcripts,”	by	Megan	Ozeran	and	Piper	Martin,	describing	a	process	to	categorize	chat	
reference	themes	using	topic	mapping	software.	

• “Information	Security	in	Libraries:	Examining	the	Effects	of	Knowledge	Transfer,”	by	Tonia	
San	Nicolas-Rocca	and	Richard	J	Burkhard,	investigating	the	importance	of	knowledge	
transfer	across	an	organization	to	enhance	information	security	behaviors.	

• “Wikidata:	From	‘An’	Identifier	to	‘The’	Identifier,”	by	Theo	van	Veen,	describing	how	
libraries	could	use	Wikidata	as	a	source	of	linked	open	data.	

Thank	you	to	this	issue’s	authors,	and	all	of	Information	Technology	and	Libraries’	readers	for	
supporting	peer-reviewed,	open-access,	scholarly	publishing.	

In	closing,	I	would	like	to	thank	the	members	of	the	Editorial	Board	whose	terms	are	ending	June	
30:	Patrick	“Tod”	Colegrove,	Joseph	Deodato,	Richard	Guajardo,	and	Frank	Cervone.	I’m	grateful	to	
these	four	individuals,	upon	whom	I’ve	relied	for	their	excellent	advice	and	guidance	in	steering	
ITAL’s	course.	We	are	in	the	process	of	appointing	new	Editorial	Board	members	with	two-year	
terms	starting	on	July	1,	and	I’ll	introduce	them	in	the	next	issue.	

Kenneth	J.	Varnum,	Editor	
varnum@umich.edu	
June	2019