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Where New Tech Should Libraries Try Next?
99bottles asks: "I work for a good sized Public Library. The management folks want to have a sit down to discuss what our next tech. undertakings should be. We already offer free wireless, use Voice-over-IP, have self-checkout machines, have dropped Microsoft Office for OpenOffice.org, and are slowly but surely getting Linux to the desktop. It's not like we need to catch up, this is geared toward being unique and at the forefront. One manager believes that a video reference service would be popular, I've tried to convince him that video-phones have been around for decades and no one really wants them. So, I ask you, what would Slashdot readers want to see at the local library?"
Hi,
:-) Print on demand of Project Gutenberg.
softcopies of your books, would take some organising
Community bookshare sort of like netflix/netbooks but controlled from the library. People give you there lists and you use the library as the exchange point.
Would have a server that mirrored popular open source distros plus stuffs like CPAN.
First - I wholeheartedly agree that books are what the money should be spent on.
However, I'd like to at least partially disagree about getting rid of the old 1960's Fortran books. I realize that there is limited space, and there are priorities, but I think part of a library's function should be to serve as a historical archive.
I happen to find unit record equipment (pre-computer punch card machines) and early computers to be a fascinating topic, frankly much more interesting than what's going on in 2005. It's difficult to find information on them, despite the thousands of machines that must have been used and the volumes of text written about them.
When something is 10-20 years old, it's garbage and uninteresting. All of it gets throw in the dump and lost to the ages. 20 years after that, it's history, and those studying it always wish a little bigger sample was kept.
Appalling as it seems now, in 2035, wouldn't it be nice if there were a few Windows 95 reference books on the shelf?
Add RFID tags to all the books, and a reciver every 5-10 feet or along the bookshelfs. Add compatibility to the lookup system, to tell users where the book REALLY is, and not where it was last filed. Doubles as a security system.
Wonder what the public key field is for?
Rock Concerts!
-Colin
Is there really a need for a 1960's book on Fortran?
Since differential equation solvers from that era, written in Fortran, are still in use, yeah, I think it would be great if I could use the interlibrary loan to borrow a Fortran text if I ever have to understand the guts of those routines. So I hope some library somewhere is preserving these.
Besides, where but in Fortran can one experience working with trinary logic conditionals? I still remember those three-tailed decision diamonds.
Are you sure your boss is meaning video phones when he says video reference???
One thing that could be cool in regards to video reference would be actual video footage that can be used for other stuff, for example if one is making a video production and wants to include footage of the shuttle landing, or various riots or other footage, it would be nice go to the library, find all the video footage you want, burn it to DvD and then go home and use it. I guess it would be more of a stock footage reference.
Just a thought.
I read Slashdot for the headlines, because the headlines, unlike the articles, are usually original and never duplicated
Simple desktop additions:
* Wikipedia link.
* Suggestion box email link.
* Google Print link (Great full text book search).
Other stuff:
* Open source CD's (Linux, BSD, TheOpenCD, etc.) available for checkout, or even ISO's available for burning.
* CDR's, jumpdrives, minor network equipment, and other information media and technology for sale. Nothing expensive though, unless you have good security. The bookstore at my local university carries all this stuff.
Advice for libraries:
-- Stay open until midnight on friday and saturday night.
-- Let me borrow the book as long as I want. Like netflix. Or 1 year.
-- Have a 24 hours pickup/dropoff walk-up counter: I go online, I ask for a book by ISBN, the interlibrary exchange does its thing, and the book is delivered at the location in 24 hours (not 4 weeks), then I get an email: your book is ready. Give me 36 hours to drive by over there and pick it up, on my way home from work, at 9:45 PM, on Tuesday.
-- Have more books. I don't care if you have to rent one million square feet of warehouse space on the poor side of town, I want you to stock at least one copy of every single book currently in print in the western world, and have out-of-print books going back 50 years.
-- Stock comics, magazines, newspapers, car manuals, foreign titles, foreign comics.
-- Stock more than one copy of the latest New York bestsellers top ten list.
-- Have lots and lots of chairs and small tables. Hundreds of them.
-- Drop the computers. Who cares. You see computers at Borders?
-- Stay open until midnight on friday and saturday night. Are you getting it?
-- Copy machines at cost (no more than $0.02 per page) But you shouldn't have to, since the people can just take the books home.
-- Some people have mentioned printing on demand. You wouldn't have to offer that service if you had the book in stock to begin with. Have more books.
-- Forget cds and dvds. Books. But if you got to have DVDs, let people keep them a week or more.
-- Last but not least, allow people to talk to each other. It's not a morgue. I't not a study hall, nor a hospital. People like to go where it's lively.
I have a card (Los Angeles Public Library), but I don't go because, and yes, I'm talking to you my dear tax-consuming librarians: you're closed when I want to go there, you don't have the books I want to read, and I often take more than 3 weeks to read a book, especially if I'm trying to grok an O'Reilly title like "Programming Python".
I buy about 30 books a year (1 every 2 weeks approx.) and about one third are fiction, the others technical, so it's not like I don't like to read.
I hope you guys get it. The post office is open until 5 PM on Saturdays. They're adapting. You adapt too, or we'll use the tax money elsewhere.
"Piter, too, is dead."
Electronic ink makes e-books not suck. They are high-contrast screens which can be read under bright daylight and use a minimum amount of power (many only use power when "turning pages" (refreshing the display). Read more about the LOC's use of E-ink.
It is very much in the early adopter stage. It is hard for a regular US consumer to get a device. I think I might have my SO pick me up a used Sony Librie when she's in Japan. Very cool stuff.
OMG Yes!!! But don't stop there!
There's a branch near me that has done a lot of good stuff. A dozen large magnifying lenses, opaque projection viewer, audio book listening stations, large print section, low shelves for those portions of the catalog, et cetera.
Almost all of it is in the basement. That was bad enough. But the elvator broke this week. And even when it is working, the risks to handicapped patrons during an emergency are significant enough to suggest an ADA lawsuit.
Without knowing firsthand, my bet is that this was all planned and implemented without any input from the target populations.
Libraries are more than just storage sites (i.e. not blockbuster et al.) for rentable items. They also serve as sanctuaries against the hustle and bustle of everyday life--they are places where you can read the newspaper or catch up on the latest philosophy journals (for instance). However, all too often the hustle and bustle invades the local library destroying the tranquility. For this reason, I would like to see libraries install white noise machines and better soundproofing.
"I'm a philosophy major. That means I can think deep thoughts about being unemployed." -- Bruce Lee