the wave of the present, part deux

This morning's Inside Higher Ed brings the news that starting in 2011, current University of California Press journals will be available via JSTOR along with the backfile.

The article mentions the Ithaka report from 2007 that libraries have to get more involved with scholarly publishing. I'm inclined to agree, but we also need to recognize that small libraries like mine have limited capacity to do that.

On the other hand, if our acquisitions budget went more toward directly supporting the infrastructure of scholarly communication, and less toward lining publisher pockets, that money would go further for greater good. That makes me really happy that it's JSTOR doing this.

Notes on the invisible library

One of the things I think about a lot is how the library is changing as the physical facility decouples from the collections it has traditionally housed. In my own personal taxonomy these thoughts group under the heading "Invisible Library", largely because I occasionally encounter students who use the library without knowing it--discovering a journal we subscribe to while using Google, for example. I gave a presentation on campus around this topic last fall and one thing that came very clear to me is that, somehow, we have to stop treating our digital resources in a way equivalent to our physical resources. Publishers do this, but libraries do, too, and it's in danger of killing us.

An article in the latest Journal of Academic Librarianship addresses this issue, adding a third dimension: namely, the people providing library services. It also highlights the phenomenon I mention: patrons can discover library resources through avenues other than the library, and often do. (This is one reason why it would be really nice to somehow handle library patron authentication at the vendor's end, rather than the library's. If there's a nice big banner across the top of the e-journal index page that says "SUBSCRIPTION PROVIDED BY PACIFIC LUTHERAN UNIVERSITY", does it matter whether they got there through the library website or through Google? I submit that it does not.)

A lot of what it talks about here--transformation of library space, digitization of information resource, and a service emphasis on outreach, information literacy, and value-added technology--is already happening; according to long-range plans at some institutions, by fits and starts at others. Some of the technological dimension was addressed in my MLIS program, especially the information architecture side, and some of the Web development and resource management components. But much more, such as data mining, scripting, and technology-dependent aspects of information use (I've been asked how to make charts in Excel so many times in the past month that I've lost count) was not.

The article makes it sound like MLIS programs should become computer science lite degrees, and I'm not entirely convinced that they shouldn't. I love our IT crew, but if certain parts of what we do pass into their domain, it'll be frustrating for them, tragic for us, and a loss to the institution as a whole.

News, blogs, and community

I live in Seattle. My city--hell, my entire region--has been in the news a lot lately. Snow and ice! Buses dangling over the interstate! Torrential downpours! All major roadways closed! (They are, too--right now, the only way to get out of western Washington is to fly.)

Yet for all the news coverage, the kind of local, community news--is that major arterial out of my neighborhood closed? Is there a hardware store anywhere in West Seattle that still has snow shovels? When is Public Utilities going to get around to collecting trash again, anyway?--that people find most useful during even minor crises was frustratingly hard to get ahold of. City news channels got some of it, but they cover the entire city. Two major sources of frustration--city utilities and transportation--were either impossible to reach, even by phone, or were unable to provide useful information.

Enter the West Seattle Blog. It came to prominence during a previous bout of wild weather--a massive windstorm two years ago that knocked out power to some parts of the city grid for over a week--but I'd been following it for awhile because I happen to live in West Seattle and, to be honest, had found the community newspaper rather lacking.

The blog has a number of cool features and interesting characteristics, but the most intriguing thing about it, which is key to its success, is that it's run by a couple of traditional-media veterans who encourage and capitalize on active community participation. Would the site be quite so popular if the 2006 windstorm hadn't happened? Probably not. But it's an excellent example of a virtual community serving a geographic or physical one, and as such, it has a number of characteristics that libraries would do well to emulate.

It's also an object lesson for traditional media: namely, to dismiss it because it's hosted on a blogging platform (which some sources that traditionally communicate with newspapers, radio stations, and TV stations have done) is to miss the point and miss the boat. It's a handy demonstration of how a blog CAN be a perfect community news and communication venue. Other community resources, libraries included, would do well to take heed.

Design on my mind

Last fall, a group of students in a market research class did a research project for our reference department. It was the sort of thing that we'd wanted to do for awhile, but lacked the wherewithal: surveying literature and students to gauge perceptions and get ideas and recommendations regarding our service. One advantage to being at a university is that you have all this brainpower at your disposal--not just the (considerable) faculty brainpower, but the students too, to whom you can provide opportunities for class projects and learning.

Anyway, among the recommendations--several of which we are implementing--was a redesign of the library website. I was a little tempted to skip this one at first, since we just did a redesign a couple of years ago: it was my first major project after starting here.

But I have to admit that while our library website is pretty good from an organizational and IA perspective, the design is, well, less visually interesting than it could be. And as I started looking at other library websites to get some ideas, I saw that for all we talk about the importance of making our Web presence engaging, easy to use, maybe even (dare I say it?) a little bit fun, most library websites--not to put too fine a point on it--suck.

I've never been a Web designer and have only a smattering of development experience, but I've been on the Web since 1995 and to be honest, most websites suck. Why is this so hard to get right?

Well, for one thing, there are a lot of different elements that go into making a good website. As librarians, we're really good at organizing information--that is, after all, a cornerstone of our profession--but most of us are not designers and we have an ongoing problem with presentation, which also manifests in our instructional settings and the physical layout of our buildings. A library doesn't have to look like a nightclub, and our websites need to resemble neither Google nor Facebook. But in addition to being well organized and functional, they should also be well designed.

This isn't only or even principally about aesthetics. I've seen some beautiful websites whose designs are entirely unsuitable for libraries--but I've also seen some exemplifying principles that library websites would do well to emulate. CSS Zen Garden provides plenty of examples of both, and is especially useful because it shows how many different ways you can display the same content. Some of those displays would work very well with the kind of content libraries provide.

So for the next while I'm going to be thinking about design. In a way, it's easier this time around because I know that the underlying organization of my library's website is solid, which wasn't necessarily the case before. It's also worth thinking about design as distinct from (though obviously necessarily related to) content, information architecture, technological feasibility, and implementation.

If you're contemplating a similar project, the best suggestion I can make at this point is to look beyond other library websites. Most of them suck, and most of them suck in the same ways, for a reason.

On the road again

Today, I am off to the ACRL-Oregon fall conference. I've gone to the Washington one the last few years, but this will be my first time going to Oregon. (For the conference, anyway; I've been to the state several times.) I'm going down early because ACRL-WA has a board meeting this afternoon. And before I go, the car needs servicing, so I get to spend my morning in the shop. Thank goodness for mobile technologies, or I'd have to tell you all about that afterward.

Er. Maybe that's not a good example.

Anyway, I'm developing a fondness for local and regional conferences. I'd started to draw back my emphasis from national events even before the latest economic downturn started to make that an eminently sensible move; although I still have a commitment that will likely take me to ALA this year, I wouldn't be going to ACRL if it weren't in Seattle already.

What I'm finding, though, is that a lot of really interesting stuff happens at these smaller-scale conferences. For me, "really interesting" means stuff I can take back to my job and almost immediately apply. I don't get the occasional derogatory comment about "how we done it good" kinds of presentations; personally, those are the ones I find most useful. Maybe I'll feel differently after a few more years in this profession.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to going for a run at Menucha. It looks beautiful.

I've been a little "eh" about the conference theme--the once and future catalog? Really?--but I think I get what they're getting at. The way we almost inevitably end up designing library websites constitutes, to me, an inherent failure of the OPAC. Maybe it's because I used to work for Amazon.com and have seen how this can be done well--there, the website and the catalog are so thoroughly integrated that nobody thinks of them as separate entities. And yet libraries almost have to do this, because catalogs handle so much so poorly.

I'm going to a users-group meeting on Voyager next month, and hoping afterward to brush up my somewhat rusty XML skills and really do some cool things with my library's website.

It's also been awhile since my last road trip. I've laid in a good supply of music, and downloaded the free portion of this audiobook. If I like the story (I expect I will, I like Jay Lake's work), I'll be buying the rest.

The Way to Preserve Knowledge is to Use It.

I know, not exactly a new observation. But I was thinking it again this morning, while reading a historical survey on the topic of homosexuality and civilization (see booklist to the right).

The book's a survey, of course, and a secondary source by definition, but it draws on a lot of primary sources: letters, legislation, Church documents, and especially trial records. One point that comes up over and over again is how many gaps there are in the record, because the primary documents upon which the author must draw to make his case are lost or destroyed. (In the latter case, sometimes deliberately so--and even being able to find out that much is telling.)

At my library, our emphasis is on use. Our budget and our physical facilities are simply too small for us to have the kind of large research collection of, say, the big state university up the road. When I'm weeding the collection, of course I'll keep the classics, as well as the heavily-used materials (not always the same thing, you'll note). And of course the main thing is that the information is available somewhere.

But using recorded knowledge is about more than keeping favorite materials in the library collection. It's also about keeping knowledge as part of the current understanding about the world, its circumstances, and the people in it.

Historians probably think this way all the time, but it's a rather new perspective on the preservation issue for me.

Working the Information Ground

For the past six years, I've seen in autumn by working at Bumbershoot, Seattle's music and arts festival. I manage an information booth, which resembles working a library reference desk more than a little. My standard observation is that it's just like a reference desk, only noisier and with more drunk people (some of my public library colleagues may, at this point, be saying, "Oh? How so?").

It's also busier than most reference desks, these days. An estimated 50,000 people come to Bumbershoot each day; of those, a certain number can be guaranteed to a) not have read any of the website or printed literature beforehand, b) be from outside the area and unfamiliar with the layout of Seattle Center (or be from Seattle and still not know how to find a particular building or stage; Seattle Center's grounds can be confusing to the uninitiated), c) require something that only an information booth can provide (i.e., a Mainstage pass or, this year, a Comedy pass), d) have a complaint that they wish to pass on to the festival's most visible representatives, or e) desirous to know if Elephant Ears are available from any of the food vendors this year.

I'm sure someone from the information science end of my profession has already done a study on this, but Bumbershoot always makes me think of information dissemination, customer service, and how to get a bit of that festival vibe into libraries. To wit:

• It's a perfect example of teach someone something, then get them to teach it. Every year I wrangle a team of volunteers, anywhere from two to seven at any given time. They get, on average, 5-10 minutes of training, then learn the rest of what they need to know by example (both from yours truly and from each other). It's amazing how well it works, in spite of, or perhaps because of, the pressure cooker that is information booth work.
• We only wish our reference desks were as busy as Bumbershoot information booths. Part of the reason the booths are so busy is that they're perfectly placed to provide point of need assistance. As we redesign our libraries into information commons, the placement of service points, including reference desks, ought to be done with this in mind.
• You know what customer service means when you have two people asking you questions simultaneously, plus a radio blaring in your ear, and you must address all three in the next thirty seconds. In that context, the combination of receptivity and assertiveness that superior service requires gets a real workout.
• The reference interview model exports very well. There are many studies in libraryland of patrons who come to the desk with so little notion of what they're after that they don't even know how to phrase the question; the well-known "information gap". The same thing happens at Bumbershoot. For example, there was the guy who came up to me on Monday afternoon and announced, "I'm confused." Using reference interview techniques, I determined the source of his confusion, helped him resolve it, and sent him on his merry way. My point here is that the reference interview really works, in contexts beyond the library reference desk.

The thing I always come away thinking about, though, is how the booth is no barrier to inquiry. We have tables with our programs, schedule grids, and other paraphenalia. They're just those long folding tables you find in classrooms, meeting rooms, and cafeterias everywhere. People don't hesitate to approach them, because their need outweighs any ambivalence they might have.

Recently there's been a lot of discussion in the library world about making reference desks less intimidating and more receptive. While there's some merit to this discussion (I have an ongoing issue with my own reference desk in this respect) and I'm a big fan of conscientious design of the built environment, it's not the only factor worth considering. I run across a lot of references to bringing customer service principles into the reference environment, as though this were some sort of revolutionary idea. It ought to be par for the course.

Jamie LaRue asks an excellent question.

We already think that Jamie LaRue is awesome for the letter he wrote in response to a patron complaint about the book Uncle Bobby's Wedding. But I have to say that I like the excellent question he poses in his column for the Douglas County News-Press even more. To wit: if we really should run a public service (i.e., a library) like a business, then shouldn't successful libraries attract more investment?

As anyone who pays attention to public funding knows, it typically doesn't work that way. When times are lean, it's hard to get funding because there isn't any. When times are flush, it's hard to get funding because, hey, things are clearly going great at current levels, so why does the library need more? (I've never met an overfunded library. Just sayin'.)

But, if you're an investor (and I am), you know that one common approach to long-term investing is: when an investment demonstrates value (which may or may not be correlated by price), you add money to it.

The thing is, though, "run your public service like a business" is really a euphemism for "do what you're doing with less money", under the tacit assumption that public service providers, even the good ones, must be bloated examples of waste. Such do exist, of course, but in my personal experience the problem most public service providers have is trying to do an increasing amount with less and less. They can't do it all and wind up looking ineffectual.

How about giving Douglas County Libraries, boasting numbers any business would be thrilled to have, more money, and see what happens. Particularly now, when a lean economy has sent library usage soaring nationwide?