Libfocus Link-out for February 2026

Welcome to the February edition of the Libfocus link-out, an assemblage of library-related things we have found informative, educational, thought-provoking and insightful on the Web over the past while. 

Images featured in this month's link-out articles

Why libraries still matter in a digital world.
Antonio La Cava, Italy's smallest library and how it is helping those who need it most.

Library sustainability action plan 2026 launched.
Trinity College Library launches a sustainability action plan focusing on six key areas.

Academic libraries cannot afford to carry on with transformative agreements.
Caroline Edwards highlights on the LSE Impact Blog that in a time when libraries need to find savings they ought to look at journal packages provided by the “big five” commercial publishers and divest funds into Diamond Open Access models and platforms.

University journal publishers – global, messy and underestimated.
Maryna Nazarovets, Mikael Laakso and Zehra Taşkın argue on the LSE Impact Blog that universities are a structurally significant part of the journal publishing landscape, whose role is systematically underestimated because publishing is decentralised, unevenly documented and often weakly supported by the institution itself.

The hidden costs for your brain from using ChatGPT.
David Mcgovern and Olive Brady look at the impact of LLMs like ChatGPT on human cognition in this RTE Brainstorm article. They have the capacity to expand our reach to information and make our work more efficient, but only if we learn to use them wisely.

The peer review system is breaking down. Here’s how we can fix it.
In Joshua Hoehne's article for The Conversation he explains why the peer review system is in crisis. This crisis threatens the viability of journals, particularly local or independent journals not owned by big publishers. He proposes solutions that address the issues arising from a voluntary system has been taken for granted too long.

Protecting what remains: Introducing the UVA Archival AI Protocol.
University of Virginia introduce their Archival AI Protocol document, that serves as a practical approach for evaluating AI requests involving cultural heritage collection.

‘The goal has been to demystify’: how a colonial Nairobi library was restored and given back to the people.
Diego Menjíbar Reynés speaks to Book Bunk, a project which has restored and transformed three Nairobi libraries for the use of their communities, including the grand McMillan Memorial Library, once a whites-only enclave.

What Do We Know About GenAI?
Ned Potter provides an overview of current research and evidence on generative AI, outlining documented limitations, risks, and open questions around its use in education and the workplace.

The State of Librarian Mental Health.
A report-based article by Kelly Jensen examining survey findings on librarian wellbeing, including workload pressures, burnout, workplace conditions, and the structural factors affecting staff morale.

Guest Post — Diamond Open Access Needs Institutions, Not Heroes.
Curt Rice contemplates on the state of diamond open access, urging [institutional] stakeholders to invest in diamond OA as an achievable infrastructure rather than simply perceiving it as an act of heroic individual effort.

Books and Screens.
Carlo Iacono convincingly argues that our "inability to focus isn’t a failing. It’s a design problem, and the answer isn’t getting rid of our screen time".