New information formats

The Alaska Library Association has started a new initiative to make state documents available on flash drives for use in Alaskan schools. As reported in School Library Journal, a number of small communities in Alaska have limited or unreliable internet access and having documents available in a robust format would help teachers and students. There hasn't been much coverage of the use of flash drives for storing and sharing information, at least not in the library press, yet the technology is available and used by most high school students these days. When you think about the sheer volume of material that could be made available in small packages, the advantages and possibilities seem huge. Let's hope there will be some funding for similar projects in other parts of the country and around the world.