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.
Showing posts with label library as place. Show all posts
Showing posts with label library as place. Show all posts
Friday, May 22, 2009
Thursday, January 8, 2009
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.
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.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Sometimes, it's still about the books
I came to librarianship from previous professions in e-commerce, PR, and freelance writing. Those things, particularly the e-commerce part (put it this way, I worked for Amazon.com when books were all they sold) have impacted how I work: in front of the computer, for the most part. The subject areas I work with in my job, mainly business and the natural sciences, also impact how I work. The scholarly record in those areas is increasingly born digital, and that's how people access it. (Insert yet another reference to that Ithaka study from a couple of years ago here.)
Yesterday, though, I was doing some research on a matter of personal interest after my workday was done. Most of the material my library has on the subject is in print: in books, not to put too fine a point on it. (Although Google Scholar had done well by me, too, including turning up a translation of an Old Irish poem that I was curious about. Since I don't read Old Irish, finding an article that contained a translation and extensive commentary was gold, especially since, in my cursory search, it was the only extant modern English translation available either online or in print.)
So I spent about half an hour wandering the stacks, looking up call numbers, skimming back-of-the-book indexes. These aren't things that I or the students I work with do much anymore. Online searching is so much faster and more efficient, even though a lot of the bibliographic research tools available to us...well, suck, to be blunt.
The librarian who loves to read is a stereotype, one that a lot of my friends in my profession eschew. The reading I do on the job certainly isn't the kind of reading I'd prefer to spend my time on, professional or scholarly research notwithstanding.
And yet, if it holds true in my case, what's so bad about that? One major difference that I find between going to the stacks and going online is that the latter often has an illusory sense of urgency. There's always more to discover and it can feel overwhelming.
There's always more to discover in the stacks, too. But there's something patient about a physical library, and that's a characteristic that the Internet lacks.
Yesterday, though, I was doing some research on a matter of personal interest after my workday was done. Most of the material my library has on the subject is in print: in books, not to put too fine a point on it. (Although Google Scholar had done well by me, too, including turning up a translation of an Old Irish poem that I was curious about. Since I don't read Old Irish, finding an article that contained a translation and extensive commentary was gold, especially since, in my cursory search, it was the only extant modern English translation available either online or in print.)
So I spent about half an hour wandering the stacks, looking up call numbers, skimming back-of-the-book indexes. These aren't things that I or the students I work with do much anymore. Online searching is so much faster and more efficient, even though a lot of the bibliographic research tools available to us...well, suck, to be blunt.
The librarian who loves to read is a stereotype, one that a lot of my friends in my profession eschew. The reading I do on the job certainly isn't the kind of reading I'd prefer to spend my time on, professional or scholarly research notwithstanding.
And yet, if it holds true in my case, what's so bad about that? One major difference that I find between going to the stacks and going online is that the latter often has an illusory sense of urgency. There's always more to discover and it can feel overwhelming.
There's always more to discover in the stacks, too. But there's something patient about a physical library, and that's a characteristic that the Internet lacks.
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
What's a gate count worth?
Today's Inside Higher Ed reports on an NCES report on academic libraries, specifically the news that library gate counts are holding steady.
The immediate question that springs to mind is one that a couple of commenters on this item have already asked: with so much information online, including library holdings, are gate counts still relevant?
I'd argue that they are--as part of a composite picture that should also include usage statistics for online resources, tallies of online reference transactions as well as those at the desk, and library instruction wherever it takes place. If the use of library space is changing, which it undoubtedly is, it's also worth knowing whether that change is successful.
The library on my campus is morphing into a multi-use learning space. It's the primary computer center on campus, a preferred study and group work space for many students, and a home for related services, such as tutoring and digital media. If we were offering all of that and people weren't coming in, that would be important, if disappointing, to know. So gate counts do still matter--because while the library is online, it's also (still) a building, and a building that people use.
Especially during finals, according to our gate counts.
The immediate question that springs to mind is one that a couple of commenters on this item have already asked: with so much information online, including library holdings, are gate counts still relevant?
I'd argue that they are--as part of a composite picture that should also include usage statistics for online resources, tallies of online reference transactions as well as those at the desk, and library instruction wherever it takes place. If the use of library space is changing, which it undoubtedly is, it's also worth knowing whether that change is successful.
The library on my campus is morphing into a multi-use learning space. It's the primary computer center on campus, a preferred study and group work space for many students, and a home for related services, such as tutoring and digital media. If we were offering all of that and people weren't coming in, that would be important, if disappointing, to know. So gate counts do still matter--because while the library is online, it's also (still) a building, and a building that people use.
Especially during finals, according to our gate counts.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Slate Discovers the Ultimate Library Question
Ross Dawson says that libraries will be extinct by 2019, but Slate isn't so sure that it agrees. I'm not so sure that I do, either, and not just because I'd like to have a job in 2019 (though, to be fair, I don't expect it to look much like my job today). Slate's slideshow of newer libraries includes the Seattle Public Library's downtown branch, a place that I sometimes love and sometimes hate. At the very least, though, it's an interesting experiment. And the question of what is a library in the digital age is an interesting one, though so far most commentators seem to be finding new ways of asking the question, rather than proposing answers.
One possible answer came from the students at my university recently. Several of them have campaigned for longer building hours, which surprised a few people--if you can work from anywhere, why come to the library?
Answer: in the library, you can tell people to be quiet--and they will. Our library isn't silent, particularly on the first floor where the group study happens, but there are nooks upstairs where you can work for hours undisturbed by so much as a footstep or a human whisper. And ours is not a large library.
We live in an increasingly noisy world, and a lot of the time we bring it with us: I'll never forget the day back in 1996 when I was hiking on Hurricane Ridge and passed someone plugged into a portable CD player (today, of course, it would be an iPod). That's his prerogative, of course; since it wasn't a boom box I can't disapprove too much.
But there are very few places you can go nowadays where people can be together, yet be quiet. Churches (and other religious houses), libraries, and not much else. It's still acceptable to insist on quiet in the library in our culture, and I worry about eroding that acceptability in the name of being all things to everyone. We shouldn't be all things to everyone. We should be what we are, and what we will be.
So what is a library to be? One possible answer: a quiet, yet communal, place to work.
What else is a library to be?
One possible answer came from the students at my university recently. Several of them have campaigned for longer building hours, which surprised a few people--if you can work from anywhere, why come to the library?
Answer: in the library, you can tell people to be quiet--and they will. Our library isn't silent, particularly on the first floor where the group study happens, but there are nooks upstairs where you can work for hours undisturbed by so much as a footstep or a human whisper. And ours is not a large library.
We live in an increasingly noisy world, and a lot of the time we bring it with us: I'll never forget the day back in 1996 when I was hiking on Hurricane Ridge and passed someone plugged into a portable CD player (today, of course, it would be an iPod). That's his prerogative, of course; since it wasn't a boom box I can't disapprove too much.
But there are very few places you can go nowadays where people can be together, yet be quiet. Churches (and other religious houses), libraries, and not much else. It's still acceptable to insist on quiet in the library in our culture, and I worry about eroding that acceptability in the name of being all things to everyone. We shouldn't be all things to everyone. We should be what we are, and what we will be.
So what is a library to be? One possible answer: a quiet, yet communal, place to work.
What else is a library to be?
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