Wayne Bivens-Tatum, a Princeton librarian and the blogger of Academic Librarian, wrote a post “Nothing is the Future” a few days ago, which resulted in many comments including the very excellent one from Tim Spalding at LibraryThing. In his comment in Thingology, Tim Spalding warns about a potential misreading of Bivens-Tatum’s post suggesting that people should use his essay as a way to “kick it up a notch” intellectually, get past the small stuff and confront the very real changes ahead.” Bivens-Tatum also posted a response, “Preaching and Persuading,” making it clear that that his target of criticism is not the adoption of any new technology in libraries per se but the manner in which new technologies have been adopted so far in libraries.
Here are some of the thoughts that came to my mind while reading these blog posts, which have gotten surprisingly long.
“We have reached a point where entrenched and traditional organizational settings give rise to organizational clashes, as new issues and content emerge which do not fit historical patterns. The bundling of functions has imperceptibly changed, but we have become so busy and adept at keeping the library efficient and well manage that we have lacked the space to step back and observe it from a higher level. …… Libraries have fallen into the trap of substituting means for ends and have not considered what is in the interest of their parent universities. It is, then, the purpose of this paper to review and scan the landscape facing university libraries and to attempt to identify the key competencies or core areas of work that the profession needs to grasp as its key to the future.”
His statement is targeted for academic librareis, but the diagnosis may well resonate with any rank and file librarian at differnet types of libraries. The problem seems to be that overall our library world appears lost on what a library should be in the future.
I realize that it is hard to articulate this impression of mine, particularly when there is so much conversation about new technologies and trends that libraries have to consider and adapt thier services for. What I am trying to get at is that most of the conversation is about what’s new and how to catch up. The numerous things get swiftly classified under the “Have To” category from this conversation. But they don’t always seem to have a clear relevance to “Why” and “For what” let alone “How To.”
Today’s library world, which resembles almost the Warring States period of China a long long time ago, unnerves me sometimes because everything seems to be geared towards catching up with the latest trends. Yesterday wiki and blog, today Facebook and Twitter, tomorrow mobile websites, content, and devices. Libraries and librarians have been working hard and frantically.
But, now that we have done so, are we significantly better off? Have our efforts significantly changed the way our users and our parent institutions perceive us? Why this nagging suspicion that we all seem to share and worry about, i.e. libraries are still ill-prepared for whatever the future will bring about? Why doesn’t this doubt cease that we are running in parallel with our users and parent institutions rather than running together as a team?
Staying up-to-date for the future is of course great. But what are we staying up-to-date for? There is no shortage of what libraries may become in the future: a digital repository, a learning commons, a place for innovative user experience, an information hub, what have you. But how do we get there where these visions are from here and now? Where are our blueprints, not another list of to-dos seemingly dislocated from the vision?
This brings back a question I often think about. What kind of an agent a library is in its parent organization as a whole? Is it a dynamic, creative, competent, and energetic enough agent that can lead a change it desires through its parent organization? If libraries are not currently such agents, how do we begin to become so? Changes at these two different levels -internal and external- seem to be intertwined. If we can at least begin to form some answers about these issues, maybe we will finally be able to spend more time on working towards making actual changes to the future of libraries rather than talking about it. Just a thought of a lay librarian.
Last September, I did an online presentation through OPAL (Open Program for All). The topic was “Web Services for Underfunded and Understaffed Libraries.” After the presentation, I uploaded my slides on SlideShare and then completely forgot about it. A few days ago, I got an email from SlideShare that notified me the number of views of these slides. How interesting! Anyhow, so I remembered. Right, I did that presentation, and what was I thinking back then?
I felt funny realizing that what was a burning question to me only about four months ago seemed already close to some distant memory. The presentation was part of my efforts to make sense of the challenges and difficulties I have encountered at my work as a new solo web librarian at a small academic library. I was feeling overwhelmed because I was fully aware of many innovative things I wanted to try, but also there was a very clear limit to what I could do in reality. Also I was somewhat depressed by the fact that some really awesome things other libraries were doing couldn’t be done for various reasons related to limited resources, funding, staff, etc.
Does the fact that I almost forgot about the presentation mean that I came to some kind of conclusion on that topic? Well, probably not. I think it would be more accurate to say that I have rather gotten used to my environment.
However, now that I look back, I think I learned something about patience in getting things done. Trying new things requires dealing with some procedures and forming a teamwork whether it is with some university offices or within one’s organization. Inevitably, it takes time and efforts – sometimes in a seemingly inexplicably large sum. Unfortunately, there is no real shortcut in dealing with all the steps whether it is bureaucracy or paperwork. So what becomes quite important is, more often than not, persistence.
Persistence is also an important virtue and one of the most valuable weapon in a solo web-services librarian’s arsenal. I mentioned in the presentation that almost everything technology-related becomes the responsibilities of web-services librarian in a small library. So, it is unavoidable that things that need to be done pile up while one solo web-services librarian tries to get all the technology-related things requested as well as other things s/he deems to be important done. Some of them cannot be done in the time frame desired and/or requested. Some of them have to go down on the priority list, so that more important things, which keep popping up anew, can be taken care of. But if there are things that need to be done whether it is next month or next season, they have to stay on the list and a solo web-services librarian needs to find time for those. This sometimes requires persuading others and enlisting their help.
Oh, and resourcefulness. That probably would make another blog post. So I won’t talk about it here.
Another thing that I have learned since the presentation is that one library can’t do all and each library’s environment is unique. This seems quite an obvious thing to say. But still many times, libraries waste a lot of time trying to replicate what has been done successfully at other libraries without realizing that there are very different dynamics at work. Particularly for small libraries, it only makes sense to focus a small number of things that they can excel at rather than spreading thin their resources and staff in many different things.
From time to time, I think I should remind myself of these new lessons I have learned, so that I won’t get unproductively frustrated or disappointed and stay positive and efficient at the same time.
The question which still remains in my mind as an unanswered question is how a solo web-services librarian should deal with necessary R&D. Unlike at larger libraries where there are multiple programmers and a large IT staff for example, it is extremely difficult for a solo web-services librarian to engage in any productive and meaningful R&D activities because there are so many daily tasks to be handled that come before R&D. (Also remember many of these librarians are trained first as librarians and not necessarily magical in programming and writing codes?) On the other hand, without R&D, a solo web-services librarian is likely to be burned out and get outdated at the same time. Sadly, I don’t see any systematic support for R&D in small libraries.
This is probably not an issue that can be solved by a lay librarian nor at the scale of individual small libraries. My hope is to see some larger agencies that support continuing education/R&D for library technology staff – maybe funded by multiple libraries – and those libraries again committing themselves to allowing time for such continuing education for their technology staff. Oh, well, wouldn’t that be nice?
For what it’s worth, here is my past presentation at OPAL. I am glad SlideShare sent me the notice. Otherwise I would have completely forgotten about all these questions.
So, a lot of people seem to want an iPad including those who are fully aware of its shortcomings. The iPad doesn’t support Flash, isn’t equipped with a camera, and lacks the e-Ink display. Do I think it will kill both netbooks and e-Readers currently available in the market? Probably not. (But some think it will. ) Do I think it would be a wise thing to buy an iPad as soon as it comes out to the market? Absolutely not.
But, do I want one? You bet. And hopefully I will hack it.
I missed the announcement of iPad Wednesday that so many people watched. Of course, as soon as I found time, I watched iPad video. While watching the video twice (thank you, Comcast, for turtle-speed internet), these are the thoughts that passed my mind.
OMG, it is so sleek! I can’t wait to try reading something on it.
No e-Ink? So iPad’s just a touch-screen netbook without Flash/peripheral support?
Stupid information appliance. Who needs that for $$$?
But maybe my aunt who doesn’t do any internet would like this because using the iPad will be easy and intuitive.
Still not fair that buyers can’t configure or control the iPad that is practically a computer!
How would the iPad change what we think about computers and the web?
The video on the Apple website was more than impressive. It was made perfectly to open people’s wallet. However, the advertisement video was also clear in that the iPad was designed to be an appliance. Something that you turn on and use without thinking to surf the web and consume online media. The iPad is more similar to Roku, a box that plays Netflix movies onto a TV than to a netbook and closer to a less portable iPhone that cannot make a call or take a photo than a MacBook. Unlike Annalee Newitz who thinks that Apple is marketing the iPad as a computer, I think Apple advertises iPad as a piece of electronics rather than as a computer.
However, I agree with her that iPad is a media consumption device more than anything. In “Why the iPad is Crap Futurism,” she says:
“One of the fundamental attributes of computers is that they are interactive and reconfigurable. You can change the way a computer behaves at a very deep level. Interactivity on the iPad consists of touching icons on the screen to change which application you’re using. Hardly more interactive than changing channels on a TV. Sure, you can compose a short email or text message; you can use the Brushes app to draw a sketch. But those activities are not the same thing as programming the device to do something new. Unlike a computer, the iPad is simply not reconfigurable. The iPad emulates television in another way, too: You can channel surf through the Apps Store, but you can’t change what’s playing. Every single app that’s available for the iPad has to be approved by Apple first, just like apps for iPhones. That means censorship of “offensive” apps, no apps that compete with Apple (i.e., no Google Voice), and no random app somebody wrote to do whatever obscure shit you want to do. So you’ve got thousands of channels and nothing on. You can only keep flipping through the channels, hoping in vain to see something other than reruns of Cheaters and Alf.”
Considering its computing power, the iPad is really a computer. With its large screen, the iPad has no excuse to be such a locked-down device that gives users no control over it. It seems that we are forced to take convenience over control, and this is worrisome.
Adam Pash of Lifehacker warns about the possible ramification of Apple’s attitude towards its products in “The Problem with the Apple iPad”:
“The iPad, much like the iPhone, is completely locked down. The user has no control over what she installs on the hardware, short of accepting exactly what Apple has approved for it. …… Apple requires you to hack the device if you actually want control over it yourself. Apple’s gotten into the habit of acting like you’re renting hardware. ”
As someone fascinated by apps, I believe iPhone/iTouch contributed to democratizing media on the web. More people now take photos, make drawings, and create videos using iPhone/iTouch because they made it so easy to do so. And those are creative activities, not the mere consumption of any given media. The iPad could have done more in this direction of promoting the read-write culture of the web. (See “Apple iPad – The content revolution that wasn’t” )
The very innovativeness of iPhone OS emphasizes the danger of it being a completely locked-down system. Have you ever wondered exactly how iPhone’s user interface is so revolutionary? In “The Apple Tablet Interface Must Be Like This”, Jesus Diaz explains this by showing how iPhone materializes Jef Raskin’s idea of a morphing information appliance that could do every single task imaginable perfectly, changing its interface according to your objectives.
Because the iPhone OS works well and intuitively, there is an even stronger need for it to be configurable. Why can’t it be both ways, Adam Pash asks, just as MacBook comes with a terminal that most people rarely use but is still essential for some who like to see under the hood. Like he says,
To say that “either a device is user friendly or it’s open” is a false dichotomy.
“Mentor/Mentee 101: Developing a Career Essential Relationship” is this month’s topic for ALA/NMRT (New Members Round Table) listserv. One of the contributors to the discussion mentioned the experience of unclear expectations on both a mentor’s and a mentee’s side. I was sending a reply to this discussion Friday, but the listserv didn’t let my email through. So I failed in posting my reply. But it got me thinking a bit about mentoring in librarianship.
I think having a mentor can be of great help for new librarians. But not all librarians necessarily need official mentors. Often new librarians can rely on their supervisors or other colleagues as their unofficial mentors. This approach works best at a large organization where a new librarian can find experienced colleagues with similar interests to hers/his. But I also heard about situations where colleagues tend to hoard knowledge rather than sharing. Also for a new librarian who works as a solo-librarian or at a small library where each librarian specializes in a different field, participating in a mentoring program can be quite valuable.
I suspect that a mentoring relationship through emails between two librarians who do not know each other and work at different organizations would be inevitably less strong than between those who know each other well and work at the same place. On the other hand, via email, mentors and mentees can discuss any questions and issues without worrying about the local context and/or, sometimes, politics.
I count myself lucky having found a great mentor through the first mentoring program I participated in. I was paired with a mentor whose work is very similar in nature to mine. Common interests make it easy to start a conversation. One thing I excel at is asking questions. I may not necessarily understand answers, but I ask a lot of questions. Often I got illuminating answers, which come from my mentor’s experience. And those answers helped me understand certain things that at first glance looked strange or downright irrational to me. So if I have one recommendation for new librarians in mentoring relationship, that would be to ask lots of questions without worrying about whether they are stupid or inappropriate. At what other times would one be free to ask such questions if not when a new librarian?
My expectation for the mentoring program was relatively simple — to find someone experienced who can give me advice about things I have difficulty in understanding, not so much about career development or skill sharing. So I am not sure how mentoring would workfor more experienced librarians with different kinds of expectations. But one thing I try to remember as a mentee is that mentoring is a big time investment for mentors. So I try to be specific, honest, and clear as much as possible when I ask questions via e-mail.
I wonder when one graduates being a mentee and can begin to help others as a mentor. Maybe when there are less questions that strike one’s mind everyday?
What happens when you join ALA? I am not sure about other professional organizations. But at least in ALA, nothing happens unless you are awarded with some scholarships, fellowships, internships, etc. I called up and paid my membership fee. A few weeks later, I got the card with my ALA member number printed in the mail. That was it. I could have researched about ALA and gone through documents in the ALA website. But I didn’t. I thought that maybe I would get some kind of quick guidebook. But nope. Somehow I thought something would happen since I joined. But nope. I didn’t just join ALA. I joined LITA. I joined ACRL. I joined NMRT. That’s a lot of groups, that’s quite a bit of investment. Again, nothing happened. (Yes, later on I signed up for a mentoring program at NMRT and met a wonderful mentor. But it took a while for me to figure that out.)
The organizational structure of ALA seems to be quite complicated. During the 2010 midwinter I went to the NMRT membership meeting. NMRT is a Round Table for new members. A place for me to go and learn about ALA, I thought. But it turned out that I wasn’t even aware of the complexity of NMRT’s organizational structure itself. I forgot the exact details, but there were at least 3-4 levels of ranks/tiers. I was also told that ALA has a even more complicated structure. (I still don’t get what ALA council does, for example. Should I?) It bothers my mind that an organization has to have that many levels to function, to the degree that new members have to attend a membership meeting to just get an idea of how the organization is structured and operates. (Since I didn’t attend, I have no idea. Am I a bad member?)
Anyhow, I took the risk of heading out to my very first ALA conference in Chicago last summer without knowing so much about ALA nor any people in particular. Well, the experience was, shall I say…, mixed. I loved the chance to meet one of my ex-bosses. I hung out with one of my colleagues briefly a couple of times outside the conference. It was nice. But overall it was overwhelming, and there wasn’t as much fun as I would have liked. (Granted I didn’t go to any orientation and membership meetings simply because I didn’t know that they would be helpful. Are they?) I went to a lot of programs and meetings (including many interest groups and discussion groups) that seemed relevant to my work. The experience was informative. I got new ideas and learned quite a bit. But when the conference ended, I sorely realized that I didn’t meet that many people, and I didn’t feel any closer to ALA. I still felt like an outsider. (And this was after I was an ALA member for two years – one year as a student – and I attended an annual.)
Some may object. But I suspect that my experience may pretty much sum up what new ALA members feel, may complain about, and possibly make them leave . There is no welcoming gesture. There is no personal contact. ALA is aloof. It won’t say hi just because you are nearby. It expects you to make a move. ALA is no treasure chest that you get to open when you join. It is more like a playground where you get to go in when you become a member. But you still have to find people to play with and participate in some games to have fun.
I think I am near the entrance of this playground peeking in curiously. But ALA feels slightly closer to me now that I have some faces that I can associate ALA with. At the Midwinter, I actually met people I didn’t know because I marked social events in my schedule. NMRT social was fun. The tweet-up I organized was great because I met lots of librarians with whom I had a chat on Twitter. (Thank you everyone who came!!!) After Hours social was awesome because we were all sort of drunk, and it was quite late. On the other hand, LITA happy hour was kind of awkward. (Networking dinner was nice though.) The reception for young librarians was interesting, but I wasn’t sure about who was invited on what basis. (Was it for all new members or for all new and young members…?)
I discovered that small groups such as interest groups and discussion groups at ALA are great for new members because they are small in size. There are also so many of these that there is a good chance there is something you may find interesting. If you show enough interests, it may not be terribly difficult to get involved in these groups. I was – to my surprise – drawn into organizing a program for 2010 D.C. annual, which came out of the discussion that took place at the LITA Emerging Technologies Interest Group meeting I attended at the 2009 annual. I am a new member and organizing a program (hard to believe in my mind). Well, this is definitely something exciting. But then, I may not get a chance to work on a committee I volunteered for in the next 10 years (I actually saw someone tweeted about this) and/or I may not succeed in getting involved at the level of divisions and sections. (Well, that would be kind of disappointing. Or not, I am not sure…)
For new members’ information, I was also given a great advice at the midwinter that it is a good idea to be active in listservs and online because it gives one something to talk about and connect with others when you actually attend a conference. (But of course, one needs to find out what listservs would be a good fit and how to get on to them first.)
I am not yet sure if I will continue to play in this playground. But I think I will give it a shot. I had more fun in Boston than in Chicago.
Have you ever had an A-HA moment for something that only makes sense in a smart phone?
I had one of those with a to-do list. To-do list apps are essentially personal information management (PIM) systems. Because you carry your smart phone all the time and it is always on, a smart phone is an idea platform for a personal information management system such as a to-do list app. You may not be at your office or in front of your personal computer all the time. But a smart phone? That is always with you permanently powered on.
In addition, the push notification capability of a smart phone allows a to-do list app to remind you of your tasks without your making the effort of actually looking them up. This way, your tasks are guaranteed to appear on your peripheral vision whether you are remembering or not.
You would think that there would be many easy-to-use to-do list apps in the market. I also expected to find a reasonably good free app in this category because it is something that can be so useful for so many people. Nope. This wasn’t the case unless I give up the feature of a to-do app that initially made me realize how useful it could bee on my smart phone, i.e., push notification. Also, many To-do list apps had a user-interface that is truly far away from user-friendly.
If a to-do list app requires a user to select priority, folder, due date, reminder setting, due time, repeat setting in six different screens after entering the task name, certainly the user will abandon the system. Similarly, if entered tasks don’t send out a push notification, those tasks may never become visible in users’ peripheral vision. So, the value of the PIM system significantly decreases. Also, even a smart phone is not always looked at. Users may have a stretch of time during which they are paying more attention to their emails, Twitter, or calendar on their computers. So the integration with these channels in data-input and reminder-push would significant increase the worth of a PIM system. In addition, nobody wants to work in a hideous-looking interface. So the user interface should be not only functional and efficient but also aesthetically satisfying.
Many information systems can benefit from considering these factors to increase their chances of being adopted and continuously used by users. In today’s environment of constant information overload, attention is a scarce commodity and information organization is a critical activity. Many information systems will need to cater to information consumers’ needs of efficiently organizing their information. How many information management system do we see that succeeds in meeting all these requirements?
Also for newbies’ interests, Green Dragon Tavern is also very close to both NMRT social (Bell-in-Hand Tavern; 5:30-7:30pm) and After Hours Social (Black Rose, 10pm) on the same day. Hope to see lots of newbies there. Cheers!
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Update:
Interested folks, please go to http://www.doodle.com/pzzbxi6ehakhp9y9 and check all times that you are available for a tweet-up.
Once time and place are determined, it will be tweeted and posted here as well. Thanks!
It is unbelievable that ALA midwinter at Boston is just around the corner. I can hardly wait for snow and slush of Boston and to revisit all the used bookstores that I used to frequent. But the business first, I haven’t still had time for creating a schedule for the midwinter. It is tough for me because I am going to be at the Midwinter first-time. As a newbie librarian, I have no committee commitments, and the midwinter program listing lots of meetings of lots of groups to which I don’t really belong to (yet!) – instead of programs with explicit topics unlike ALA annual – is somewhat baffling to me. I am sure I will figure it out just in time.
But in the meantime, I wonder, if any other librarians are going to ALA Midwinter as a first-timer and are interested in a tweet-up at Boston?
I attended my first ALA in the summer. I crammed all the interesting programs into my schedule, and I had barely time for lunch and passed out sometimes even before dinner. (I was so serious!) So this time, I am focusing some efforts in socializing and networking. For newbies like me, however, networking and socializing are a more daunting task than attending some programs. I don’t know many people and am not sure where I fit in or can be fitted in. But I know I can most certainly fit in the newbie group.
I know that there are many social hours for already defined groups and sections. (I am going to try a few this time.) I know that there are lots of free breakfasts and luncheons that are sponsored by vendors to which so far I had no success in obtaining any RSVP. But a tweet-up would consist of totally random group of people. And there would be no pressure!
I have already received some responses via Twitter. So we newbies should meet up!
Leave a comment below to express your interests or holler at me on Twitter (@bohyunkim). Time and place will be determined in a democratic but ruthlessly efficient manner later on. (Veterans with newbie spirit are quite welcome too!)
I was reading this book review by ricklibrarian today morning. The review was about Marilyn Johnson’s new book, This Book Is Overdue: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All. In the book review, it was stated “most librarians knock themselves out serving their clients regardless of pay, institutional support, or appreciation from society at large.”
And is this supposed to be praises for librarians? No librarian would argue against the fact that librarians tend to be more than 100 percent service-oriented. Yes, librarians are eager to help, librarians are willing to do almost any kind of work that may contribute to library users’ better understanding and use of library resources, librarians are friendly, librarians are polite, and librarians protect the public’s freedom and privacy.
But I don’t think librarians are to be praised for knocking themselves out serving their clients regardless of pay, institutional support, or appreciation from society at large. That is just crazy, isn’t it? Not because there is something wrong with librarians being devoted to their work but because librarians’ services rendered in such a way may well make them almost meaningless.
There are obvious and clear limitations to ‘individual’ librarians’ devoted services that is unsupported by proper pay, institutional support, and appreciation from society at large. No matter how excellent their services are, without the proper recognition and support from society and institutions that govern and fund libraries, the value of libraries and librarians’ services will go unnoticed or taken for granted.
I wonder how many people are even aware of the fact that librarians are required to finish a graduate school to be a librarian and also have to invest additional years as a library assistant for experience enduring a surprisingly low salary for their education and previous experience. Probably not that many. I wonder how many academic faculty members at a college/university know that at their institution, librarians may also be faculty just like them (although it may not be tenure-track)?
Some may question why what makes someone qualify as a librarian should be common knowledge. Why not? After all, everyone knows that what doctors, lawyers, journalists should do to become qualified in their professions. The point is not bragging that it is not easy to become a librarian nor claiming that librarians are intelligent, knowledgeable, and talented people (although both of them may be quite accurate a description for librarians in general).
Rather, my questions is this. If the basic qualifications of a librarian is unknown to library users -either faculty and students or the general public, why would they respect, listen to, and work with librarians? Without such knowledge, there is going to be little appreciation and understanding about what librarians provide and offer to library users. It seems to me that there is some serious work to be done in libraries’ outreach activities and that it may concern more librarians than library services or resources.
So, librarians, let’s please not knock ourselves out regardless of pay, institutional support, or appreciation from society at large. Instead, libraries and librarians have to help people understand what kind of places libraries are these days – certainly not just a warehouse of books – and what kind of work librarians perform -certainly not just shelving books.
As the cataloguing librarian describes so vividly in the recent blog post, the general public’s perception and understanding of a librarian is sadly obsolete and dismal. How did it happen that a used car salesman is so convinced that he knows so much about what a librarian does and laughs at librarianship as a profession? Although deplorable, I don’t believe that this car salesman is any unique exception. But in my opinion, it is mostly those outside a library who declare the death of librarianship. If you are working at a library, you will be so busy that you won’t even have time to worry about the death of a library.
There is this table that has recently fascinated me. It is Microsoft Surface table. With both the commercial and the development version, this table looks absolutely fabulous to my librarian eyes.
What is Microsoft Surface table? Imagine a coffee table whose surface works like an iPhone responsive to touch with its full computing power.
I can see so many applications of this table at a library. I work at a medical library and our students love to use the anatomy software that is loaded on the computers at the library. For this particular resource in mind, the library has ordered a large screen monitor for library computers. Medical students absolutely love it. But as any librarian can testify, today’s students study together. At libraries, group study rooms are always in a short supply and all the tables tend to be moved in a group by students who want to study together. Our library provides forty something carrels for each individual medical student. But students prefer studying as a group in our two group study rooms.
So it is no coincidence that when I saw this MS surface table I immediately came to think about putting anatomy software on it. Students can not only see clear large anatomical images on the table but also can manipulate them with their hands. Even more cool is the fact that multiple students can simultaneously interact with the surface. One can zoom, the other can rotate, and another can annotate.
At this year’s ALA conference at Chicago, DOK Library Concept Center’s in-house application for MS surface table was also shown, making a lot of librarians fall in love with the table and the possibility of providing useful applications for it at a library.
Yesterday I have learned that actually the university of Nevada- Reno-library owns two MS Surface tables and that the library’s application development librarian, Will Kurt, wrote an anatomy flash card application for it. (He also published his anatomy application codes for everyone’s use.) A news article from University of Nevada, Reno, reports that these surface tables are in high demand from students. In the first week of the semester, they were used for 70 hours over just seven days at University of Nevada, Reno.
See the demo here:
Some may say, “OK, I see that the table looks cool and maybe good for anatomy and maps etc. But what other use could it have at a library?” Well, Darien public Library purchased this table in December, 2008 and there the surface table was placed at the library’s children’s room. In his blog post, John Blyberg talks about the idea of tagging certain picture books, so that when they were placed on the Surface, a video-recording of a story-time with that book would pop up in his blog post.
The surface table can also be used for gaming, music, and probably history, math, physics, and other humanities and sciences. Just imagine classicists studying old manuscripts on the surface table to decipher the annotations on them! Applied to medicine, the surface table can do so much more than showing two-dimensional images. See this video in which the images of a human heart rendered in 3D being studied, annotated, and discussed. Depending on the quality of images and the sophistication of 3D rendering applied, a whole surgery can be recorded and studied.
I see the use of this MS surface table in architecture too, in which 3D image-rendering is common. Actually any 3D image viewing and analysis would be fantastic on this kind of surface, and the surface would be a wonderful tool for many people to study such images together at the same time.
But guess how much it would cost to get one of these tables? I asked around today in Twitter and found out that it costs $12,500 + shipping and handling. Ok, so it won’t be in any near future that libraries can offer these tables for library users. Will Kurt made a good point saying that these tables are not only heavily used by students but also not extremely expensive compared to some of the online journals and databases that libraries license. However, the table is still hardware, not part of a library’s collection. At the current stage, the purchase of this table would also be wise only if a library already has an in-house application developer who can write some custom applications for the table. So the real costs for a library are even more than the cost of the table itself. Consequently, not many libraries won’t be able to afford a surface table any time soon.
Still, I can’t stop thinking about all potential applications of this surface table at a library because it can make coming to a library much more fun and useful for students. Surface computing enables us to use a computer in an environment that is not designed specifically for computing. Surface computing replaces traditional input devices such as a keyboard and a mouse with our human hands and fingers. And as a result, it can also accommodate collaboration and group study in a more natural manner.
My undying curiosity also prompted me to find out how a surfacetable is built. This excellent blog post by Stewart Greenhill shows how to build a home-made surface table with a relatively cheap LCD monitor with the total cost of $500. There are many youTube videos but this blog post is much more thorough in explaining the mechanism of a surface table.
Now, $500, that’s the price a library can probably afford.
I have to say I have a love-hate relationship with e-books. I love the idea of e-books. No matter where I am, I can instantly access it and start reading it on an electronic device. That’s great. As an expatriate, I dream about the day in which all the books I want to read written and published in Korean become available in an electronic format, so that the exorbitant international shipping charge (for heavy heavy books) can be instead used for more books I want to read. I love to underline, highlight and save the passage in an e-book for future references as a text file, so that I don’t need to retype it again later. I want to carry multiple e-books in my smart phone, so that my bag won’t drag me down stuffed with multiple paperbacks.
But how so much I hate e-books! Every time I search for certain books on my library’s online catalog and it turned out that the book is available as an e-book, I grind my teeth. I don’t want to read any books in front of my computer. It simply isn’t my favorite manner of reading books. And how so much I hate that restriction that I can only print one page at a time from an e-book! You gotta be kidding me to think that I would need one page of a book for my reference purposes whether I am accessing the book via a library or whether I bought it through Amazon or any other online bookstores. Besides, I want to hold a book in my hands and I want to read it in my comfortable reading chair, not in front of my computer straining my eyes and back. I desperately want a book in paper, particularly the ones that I am going to take some time to read it through. When a book that I look for is not available as an e-book at my library, I get relieved because it means that I can request the book via Interlibrary loan. And I count days until the book arrives! How ironic.
So I am desperate for the growth and maturation of the e-book market. It is just that the vendors are not getting it. That is, what they need to do to make their market to expand. Here are my suggestions.
Go for textbook market particularly in science. They are expensive and heavy. And students need them for classes. They will “buy” them.
Make e-books “significantly cheaper” than print ones. Unless it is cheaper by 50 % or more, people won’t go for e-books. I would personally pay 30 %. The utility of e-books is much less than that of print books. This applies to particularly for non-textbooks such as fiction, bestsellers, etc.
“Standardize” the e-book reader software. Agree on one software that can be used for all types of devices including computer, smart phone, PDA etc. regardless of where they are purchased.
“Don’t go crazy on DRM” to make e-book buyers keep entering password every time people open the e-books they already bought. Make it easy for the owner of the e-book to use it.
Let e-book owners “own” the book. Don’t make them feel that they pay for ownership but are treated as if they were actually only getting a license for the ebooks they pay for. That’s just unfair.
But I now realize that for e-books to become popular, we also need a right device for them. It may be something like Kindle. But it probably should be better than that. If it can be something like a bendable touch-screen e-paper with memory and internet connection, that would work great because right now what bothers potential ebook consumers most seems to be the fact that they cannot read e-books like normal paper books. They need a proper device for e-books. But devices currently available for e-books are hardly ideal for comfortable reading.
Phillipse e-paper technology from YouTube
While I was reading a news article about the University Librarian of University of Michigan, Paul Courant, I came to wonder if libraries should have a vision about e-books.
Despite the advantages of having tangible books on hand, Courant said the University Library’s books will be uselessly sitting on shelves while students browse them on their laptops.“This is blasphemous,” he said. “But it’s true. We don’t need to have 3 million books in the middle of campus.” Courant said he predicts the University Library will use converted files to make materials even more digitally accessible in the future. “In a few years, most of what I expect will be in the library (will be) in a form where you’ll be able to load it into something that looks like a Kindle or a Sony Reader and read it very easily,” he said. He added that the stacks will eventually disappear. With this shift, Courant said the role of universities and libraries will become increasingly important as society moves into the “information age,” where loads of information are available at people’s fingertips. “The problem of converting information into knowledge and knowledge into wisdom is every bit as important as it always was,” he said. “The University is the place that’s going to figure out how to do that, and within it, the library is going to be the place in the University that figures that out.”
Well, if the stacks disappear, I don’t think that it will be any time soon because the current technology for ebook devices are still quite below users’ expectations.
But my question is whether this is something libraries should think about and include in their vision. How do libraries plan to deliver information and knowledge in the future? Is it going to be an espresso book machine that can print out and bind whatever old book that a user happens to need to use? Or is it going to be a computer file that can be downloaded immediately to whatever device a user has in their hands? Or maybe both? It is not a matter of whether it is possible now or not. It is a matter of planning for unpredictable future and doing something about it to make the best vision to come true by conscious efforts. That is something that online bookstores or e-book publishers may not be interested in but something that libraries can play a significant role.
Librarians are mediators between knowledge and people. Paul Courant says: The problem of converting information into knowledge and knowledge into wisdom is every bit as important as it always was. I see a great role that libraries can play in solving this problem. We are digitizing a lot of information and knowledge. Now how do we want to deliver it to users? Until the mode of access to digitized information and the manner of utilizing it become almost effortless, digitized information will be less than optimal in being absorbed by people to become their knowledge and wisdom.
